Abstract
As if the constant threat from Germany were not enough, the Bolsheviks, in this same crucial month of May, brought upon themselves a fresh danger, in the form of the revolt of the Czechoslovak Legion. It would, perhaps, be unfair to see this ‘own goal’, this self-inflicted wound, as the result of mere ineptitude. It was the contradictions of their situation that compelled the Bolsheviks to take the steps that led to so disastrous an outcome.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
Notes and References
Quoted in W. H. Chamberlin, The Russian Revolution (1935), vol. II, P. 3.
Victor M. Fic, The Bolsheviks and the Czechoslovak Legion: The Origin of their Armed Conflict, March-May 1918 (1978), pp. 12–13. As Fic points out, subsequent Bolshevik claims that the movement of the Czechoslovak Legion was halted because of the landing of Japanese troops at Vladivostok do not hold water, since that landing did not take place until 5 April (p. 65, n. 12). In general, Fic finds flimsy Trotsky’s argument about the danger of ‘collusion’ between the Japanese and the Czechoslovaks if the latter were allowed to reach the Far East. It was a lame argument to say that the presence of the Czechs in Vladivostok would increase the danger of intervention. In fact, the truth was just the reverse. Had the Allies really been contemplating to use these troops for launching their intervention, then the troops would have been ordered to hold fast to their strategic position in the proximity of the German front and in Central Russia, and not ordered to Vladivostok by the [Allied] Supreme War Council… (ibid., p. 245 ).
J. F. N. Bradley, Allied Intervention in Russia, pp. 86–7 (see also his The Civil War in Russia [1975], p. 85);
P. Golub, ‘A glorious page of international solidarity’, Voenno-istoricheskii zhurnal, no. 6 of 1965, pp. 94–5. This article mentions (p. 97) that those Czechoslovaks who did join the Red Army were quickly put to good use, participating in the suppression of a peasant revolt in Saratov province in early May.
G. Bečvar, The Lost Legion (1939), p. 84.
V. V. Garmiza, Krushenie eserovskikh pravitel’sty (1970), pp. 78–9.
Peter Fleming, The Fate of Admiral Kolchak (1963), p. 25.
E. A. Preobrazhenskii, The Third Anniversary of the Russian October Revolution (Glasgow, 1921), p. 10.
Ludendorff (ed.), Urkunden der Obersten Heeresleitung über ihr Tätigkeit, 1916–1918 (1921), p. 490.
Baumgart (ed.), Von Brest-Litovsk, pp. 397–8.
V. T. Sukhorukov, XI Armiya v boyakh na Severnom Kavkaze i Nizhnei Volge, 1918–1920 gg. (1961), p. 36.
Karl von Bothmer, Mit Graf Mirbach in Moskau (1922), pp. 63–4; Baumgart, Deutsche Ostpolitik 1918 p. 345. Lockhart telegraphed on 21 June that Chicherin and Karakhan were ‘amused at the idea that they had accepted German help for the purpose of crushing’ the Czechoslovaks (CAB 24/145, p. 58).
N. N. Golovin, Rossiiskaya kontr-revolyutsiya v 1917–1918 gg. (1937), Part nn, p. 91. The Germans became nervous even regarding their good friend the Don Ataman, P. N. Krasnov, and sent a special mission to Novocherkassk to obtain from him a clear statement as to his attitude towards the Czechoslovaks. Krasnov promised to observe ‘neutrality’ (A. A. Zaitsov, 1918 god pp. 156–7).
D. Lehovich, White Against Red: The Life of General Anton Denikin (1974), pp. 221–3, 250;
P. M. Volkonskii, The Volunteer Army of Alexeiev and Denikin: a short historical sketch of the army from its origin to November 1114, 1918 (1919), p. 25.
A. I. Denikin, Ocherki russkoi smuty, vol. III (1924), p. 116.
V. Zhuravlev, Dekrety sov. vlasti kak istorichesky istochnik (1979), pp. 268–9;
S. Liberman, Building Lenin’s Russia (1945), pp. 24–5.
S. Dernberg et al. (eds), Sovetski-germanskie otnosheniya of peregovorov v Brest-Litovske do podpisaniya Rapallskogo dogovora, vol. I (1968), p. 573.
H. W. Gatzke, ‘Zu den deutsch-russichen Beziehungen im Sommer 1918’, in Vierteljahrshefte für Zeitgeschichte, 3 (1955), pp. 86–7, 91.
Copyright information
© 1987 Brian Pearce
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Pearce, B. (1987). The Czechoslovak Revolt and its Consequences. In: How Haig Saved Lenin. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-18843-7_7
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-18843-7_7
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London
Print ISBN: 978-1-349-18845-1
Online ISBN: 978-1-349-18843-7
eBook Packages: Palgrave History CollectionHistory (R0)