The first decades of the new XXI century may well be called the era of political extremism. “Color revolutions”, one more outlandish than the other, occur literally all over the world: the “rose revolution” in Georgia (2003), the “orange revolution” in Ukraine (2004), the “tulip revolution” in Kyrgyzstan, the “cedar revolution” in Lebanon (2005), and now "events" in Syria and Yemen. There was even a "Second Melon Revolution" in the same Kyrgyzstan (2010), but everyone probably knows about today's Ukrainian Maidan. And these are only those revolutions that have taken place, and after all, some "color revolutions" simply did not succeed, although attempts to organize them were made. Some had the appearance of an outright rebellion, but it should be noted that it is wrong to think that the purpose of all these actions was only power! Very often the rebels also make very good money on this. So rebellion for someone is also a very profitable business. And now we will tell you about one such rebellion that happened on our Russian soil back in 1918.
Armored vehicles of the Czech corps.
And it so happened that during the First World War, many Czechs and Slovaks, drafted into the army of Austria-Hungary, did not want to fight against the Russian "brothers" and surrendered in droves to them. After the victory, they were promised the creation of an independent Czechoslovakia, and in order to bring this happy day closer - to fight as part of the Czechoslovak Volunteer Corps. The corps was formed and even took part in the battles against the Germans. But then the October Bolshevik coup took place, the Bolsheviks concluded the Brest Peace with Germany, and the corps found itself in a very difficult situation. At first Pravda wrote happily: "50 thousand Czecho-Slovaks have gone over to the side of Soviet power!" And they really crossed over. But … formally being part of the Entente forces, the corps had to either disarm or leave Russia. However, the German General Staff did not at all want the appearance of a 40,000-strong corps on the Western Front and demanded that the Soviet government intern and disarm it. Fearing that the Bolsheviks would simply "sell" them to the Germans, the Czechs refused to lay down their arms; on May 25, 1918, they raised a mutiny and decided to fight their way home, relying on armed force: that is, to go from Penza to Vladivostok, in order to evacuate from there to France by the Entente ships. In a short time, the Czechs overthrew Soviet power along the entire Trans-Siberian Railway, and even more: it was with their help that the first anti-Bolshevik government was created in Russia - KOMUCH - the Committee of the members of the Constituent Assembly, who fled to the rebellious Volga immediately after the revolution in Petrograd. And so it happened that the Czechs and Slovaks on the territory of Russia became hostages of big politics. But they were also strength! Having supported KOMUCH, they then supported Kolchak in the same way! But it was not so easy to use them directly against the Bolsheviks!
Legionnaires at the carriage.
Moreover, one of the reasons for this was that the Czechs, having taken possession of a large number of locomotives and wagons, quite naturally did not want to part with them and waged a so-called "echelon war" against the Reds. Moving along the Transsib and meeting any obstacle on their way, they disembarked from the cars, fired, smashed the enemy and … drove on! It was almost impossible to lure them into the cold and dirty trenches, especially since the First World War ended in the fall of 1918, and the Czech legionnaires rightly believed that their place was not in Russia, but in their homeland. It got to the point that their beloved commander Colonel Shvets, unable to bear the shame, shot himself, and … the legionnaires were really shocked by his death, and they vowed to stay at the front … for one more month - until December 1! And one should not think that they did not fight at all, by no means! They spent more than seven months at the front and the battles with the Red Army cost them great losses, but since many of them were not at home for four years, they did not want to continue fighting for interests completely alien to them! By the way, the Penza bourgeoisie immediately after the mutiny offered them two million rubles, just to keep them, but, nevertheless, the Czechs left!
And this is also their carriage!
But in the economic sphere the Czechs in Russia, and especially in Siberia, had no equal. And above all, they have shown just incredible thrift in the development of their logistics. Thus, for 60 thousand legionnaires, 100,500 poods (-16 kg) of flour, 75,000 poods of meat, 22,500 poods of potatoes, 11,500 poods of butter, 11,250 poods of sugar, 8,125 poods of cabbage and 6,500 poods of cereals were released monthly. Moreover, they bought not only provisions, but also raw materials - wool, non-ferrous metals, rolled metal, cotton, hoping to bring all this home by sea. At a distance of 30-40 versts from the railway, they had large farms, in which they kept 1000 or more head of cattle! Expeditions were sent to Mongolia to buy livestock, grain was transported on camels. In Omsk, as well as in other places, the Czechs set up factories that supplied their troops with practically everything necessary so that they would not depend on anyone for anything. For example, at their soap factory they produced 200 poods of soap every day. Daily! Can you imagine what kind of production it was? Enough for the soldiers, and … for sale!
Fun with the "bear". Tomsk, 1919
What Czech doesn't like sausages and beer ?! And now sausage establishments are being created throughout the Trans-Siberian Railway, preparing 12,000 poods of sausage and famous Czech pork pork every month! Well, in the city of Kurgan a brewery was built, which produced 3600 buckets of beer per week. Cheese was produced up to 3500 poods, and in the city of Nikolaevsk even such trifles as tooth powder, shoe polish and cologne were produced!
Armored car "Grozny", 1st Czech regiment in Penza, 1918-28-05. The Chinese brought him from Moscow to "suppress the rebellion" on the orders of Trotsky … and handed him over to the Czechs.
Moreover, taking care of spiritual food for their soldiers, the corps command published more than a dozen (!) Of various newspapers, magazines and educational books in various fields of knowledge. Moreover, the scale of their release is simply amazing! The newspaper "Czechoslovak Day", for example, had a circulation of 11,000 copies, but only in August 1919, when there was widespread devastation in Russia and a shortage of all the essentials, the Czechs printed 160,000 copies of various brochures! At the same time, the building had its own archive, photo and film workshops, a graphic art studio, a school for soldiers, sports clubs, regimental orchestras and, in addition, one large symphony orchestra!
In Siberia. Czech cavalrymen. “We are brave guys, brave, brave …”, 1919.
Moreover, although many people accused the Czechs of stealing the gold reserves of Russia, in fact, the reason for their wealth was quite different. It's just that among them there was an intelligent and far-sighted person - Colonel Ship, who later became the director of the Prague Legio-Bank, who convinced the legionnaires not to spend the salary they received in Russian rubles, but to use it to create factories and workshops and purchase various kinds of raw materials. Indeed, at that time no one took it out of Siberia, therefore it was sold at bargain prices. As a result, if the White Guard troops did not have enough uniforms and some soldiers even at parades were forced to flaunt in underpants (!), Because they simply did not have trousers, the Czechs and Slovaks were dressed in brand new uniforms, sewn on their seamstresses from their own cloth, bought in advance in bulk. ! It is interesting that some legionnaires settled down so well in Siberia that they did not even want to go home and, having got wives and children here,in the midst of the general chaos and devastation, they lived just happily. At the same time, despite the losses and such "fugitives", the number of the corps was constantly growing due to … women and children, who joined him in search of a better life. So the Czechs eventually took out from Russia not only leather, cotton, bacon, copper and hemp, but also a lot of our Siberian beauties!
And these are dressed in a lot, but with a machine gun.
And when, in December 1919, the first ships with legionnaires finally began to leave Vladivostok, it turned out that a total of 72,644 people needed to be transferred (3004 officers and 53,455 soldiers and warrant officers of the Czechoslovak army, and the rest were … "persons accompanying them"!), which took … 42 ships to send to Europe together with the cargo! More than four thousand legionnaires who died or disappeared from Russia did not return. It is easy to calculate that almost every second legionnaire was also taking his wife with him to his homeland, or even his wife and children! That is, here in Russia he also got married and had children. Here he did not want to fight!
Scribes of the 7th Czech Regiment. Tomsk, 1919 The elite, so to speak, a soldier's …
So it is now quite understandable why the economy of Czechoslovakia rose so quickly after gaining independence. After all, such a powerful economic infusion turned out to be truly invaluable for her. But for our country, the departure of the Czechs turned into the most dire consequences. The sober practitioner V. I. Lenin, for example, believed that, despite all efforts to create the Red Army, which numbered about 500 thousand by the end of February 1919, 40,000 Czechs were more than enough to put an end to this brainchild of Trotsky!
Tomsk theater for soldiers of the Czechoslovak Legion.
And if the leaders of the White movement were not stingy with gold, if they turned the Czechoslovak corps to Moscow, perhaps we would not have had all these zigzags of historical development in Russia, it went more or less in a straight line, and where, in this case, would we be today? ! Although, who knows, maybe the troubles that befell Czechoslovakia in 1939 and 1968 were a kind of retaliation for … their search for material benefits in 1919 ?!
Football match of the 7th regiment team with the British. Tomsk. 1919. War - war, and football - football!
