Polish-Soviet War - First Phase 1919 - May 1920 (Documentary)

hi I'm Jesse Alexander and welcome to the Great War where we're once again filming in our pandemic lockdown Studio here in my living room now by the spring of 1920 Central and Eastern Europe was starting to calm down from the chaos that had existed since the November 1918 Armistice but one exception to this was the region between Poland and Russia where the borders were still open and there had been all sorts of local conflicts throughout 1919 things would escalate dramatically in April 1920 when Poland attacked Bolshevik Russia and launched a major offensive known as the Kiev operation so let's take a look at what happened 100 years ago 1919 would be a very challenging year for the new polish Republic it was trying to set up its state Administration and it was involved in smallscale wars with nearly all of its neighbors now its Western borders were basically being decided by the peace conference in Paris but its eastern border with Russia was still a wideopen question and this region was extremely important to Poland historically because it had previously belonged to polish States like the Polish Lithuanian Commonwealth and the kingdom of Poland but now the region was open and was claimed by Poland Lithuania B R Ukraine Bolshevik Russia and also the White Russian movement now within Poland there were basically two political camps that had different approaches to what to do about where they wanted to have the Eastern Polish border one school of thought was represented by the new head of the Polish state Yosef pilsudski basically he wanted to create to recreate a sort of Polish Commonwealth where Poland would be in the lead of a Federation of countries that reached from the Baltic Sea to the Black Sea on the other side of the political divide was romanovski and his National Democrats who wanted what they considered to be a more modern uh nation state of Poland where poles would be the absolute majority and the state while expanding somewhat to the east was a solid majority polish speaking country now in early 1919 German occupying troops left over so to speak from the first world war withdrew and both polish and Bolshevik forces moved into the Gap and clashed with one another now during this time the polls tried to suggest a federation to the lithuanians but this attempt failed because they both claimed the city of vus also known as vno to poles and because of opposition from nationalists on both sides in the spring and summer of 1919 in small scale offensives the poles were able to push the Bolshevik armies back and occupy Minsk after that the conflict stabilized somewhat for the rest of the year into a Guerilla type Warfare the polls also gained East Gala after a successful war against the Western Ukraine People's Republic so now the polls had acquired new territories in the East but these would not be so easy to administer the population there was mixed they spoke different languages they had different religions and they had different types of identities and even some Polish speakers had stronger regional identities about their religion and local area than any sort of loyalty to a new nation state as one small example of the overlapping identities in the region Poland's most famous National poet Adam mitkevich wrote a poem in polish that begins with the words Lithuania my land and he was born in what is now Belarus now in addition to these challenges the Practical administration of the new territories was not easy for the polls either as a local report from Lutz in March 1920 makes clear the jeery are busy distilling illicit vodka and requisitioning pigs for their butchers and mistresses [Music] a further issue was the behavior of some Polish troops and some Polish paramilitary units as they Advanced into these Eastern territories there was looting and there were also violent progs against the local Jewish population for example these took place in the towns of L pinsk and Minsk polish Lithuanian German loyer Mel RMA wrote about this phenomenon in his diary in March 1919 the Polish troops Advance onto Lithuanian bellian soil is sad and pitiful in nature and certainly cannot contribute to glorifying Poland in the hearts and minds of the local people and is not conducive to the idea of those lands uniting with the Polish state voluntarily now it's important to point out that although pilsudski and especially dski held anti-semitic views these programs were not the result of State sanction policies and the Army brought in disciplinary measures to try to stop them now as far as polish relations with the Allies were concerned there were some complications as well now the British and French did want a strong and independent Poland in part to act as a Bull workk against Bolshevik Russia but they also had their hesitations and the Allies also imposed the so-called minority treaties on PO Poland which forced the polls to respect certain minority language rights in particular and this was seen by some in Poland as a source of great shame the French had the most Pro poolish position and made up the majority of the inter-allied military mission that was sent to advise the polls in 1919 in December of that year the Allies proposed an eastern border for Poland based on what was called the kurur online but this was too far to the West for Polish interests now over on the bulvik side of the conflict things were also in a bit of a tricky state to say the least in 1919 they were fighting a civil war against the White Russian movement on three different fronts and feared that they might lose the war on a couple of different occasions now they did Advance westwards early in 1919 but as I mentioned were then pushed back by the polls and some historians have seen this B buvik Advance as the fundamental cause of the war the red Army's Advance into the Borderlands especially into the territories Warsaw considered ethnically polish led to the outbreak of hostilities for Moscow however the advance and the concurrent establishment of national Soviet republics in this region was necessary as a means of spreading Revolution to the rest of Europe the Bolsheviks also struggled to get support from the local population and there was l and programs carried out by bulvik troops as well in fact the local population's primary concern was not necessarily about ideology but about the behavior of whatever armed group was in their area at that time in this region traditionally the Polish had made up the aristocratic landowning class and many peasants did Fear The Return of their polish land owners so 1919 was a tough year for both the poles and the the Bolsheviks but by early 1920 both had essentially won their respective Wars against their other enemies and they now turn to the negotiating table with each other but it's unclear as to whether either side was really sincere in those negotiations for example pilsudski proposed that the Polish border be located along the border of the Polish Kingdom of 1772 a proposition that was sure to be rejected as too far east by the Bolsheviks Bolshevik negotiators have also been accused of being insincere and some have seen this as a part of a coherent foreign policy of ideological Warfare and formal negotiations it was in any case difficult for the Bolsheviks to be sincere or coherent in the negotiations because they themselves were divided lanan and truty favored war with Poland while the commissar for foreign affairs Gori chicherin favored a truce after the polls rejected a bolik offer for much of Belarus and parts of Ukraine chichin was exasperated Soviet Russia is not a defeated country to which the Victor can dictate its will now as these negotiations were going on both sides were simultaneously preparing for war the Bolsheviks ordered reinforcements from other fronts to the West most importantly General Simon Bud's first Cavalry Army which was experienced and included four armored trains and three air squadrons plus a couple of guys you may have heard of by the names of zukov and osena to reach the Western Front the first Cavalry Army would ride all the way across Ukraine and clash with Nester magno's Anarchist forces on the way budoni had had a fearsome reputation as a daring and able Commander as French General vea somewhat undiplomatic admitted when he referred to budoni as a Reincarnation of the Tatar Chiefs whose hordes once conquered Southern Russia and of course the poles were also preparing for a coming War part of this was diplomatic and they lobbied the British and French in Paris to put the blame on Russia for the conflict in the east they also prepared militarily because they feared that now that the Bolsheviks were on the cusp of defeating the whites they would soon turn against Poland and Poland would have to face Bolshevik Russia alone a Polish intelligence report in January 1920 put it this way the Bolsheviks are turning their eyes to the Western Front which up to now has been treated as secondary after completion of the operations against denikin and kchaka the Bolsheviks are to begin an action against Poland at that point all the burden of fighting against the Bolsheviks will fall on Poland so pilsudski decided to act sooner rather than later and attack the Bolsheviks before they could be fully ready and he was confident of his chances I am not afraid of Russia's power if I wanted to I could now Advance as far as Moscow and nobody would would be able to withstand my power the poles also looked for an ally the problem was they'd fought Wars with most of their neighbors in 1919 so they didn't have very good relations with them they defeated the Western Ukrainian State and taken possession of East Gala but they had not been involved in full-scale war against the other Ukrainian State the Ukrainian People's Republic led by Simon petora pilki and petora now came to an agreement and signed the Treaty of Warsaw petlura accepted that Poland would retain East Galia and valinia and in exchange Poland agreed to militarily support Ukraine in setting up once again an independent Ukrainian State based on Kiev pilsudski hoped that an independent Ukraine would weaken Russia strategically and strengthen Poland although there has been some criticism that perhaps perhaps pilki was simply using pitura and the new Ukrainian state that was planned to buy space and time before the coming clash with Russia by the third week of April 1920 the poles were ready to launch their attack they gathered three armies and I'm going to consult my notes here for a few statistics which totaled up about 75,000 men and perhaps 12,000 of these were ukrainians under pitura the Bolshevik forces are a little harder to estimate the statistics are somewhat uh unclear but they had most likely somewhere around 30,000 fighting men to face the poles now the poles had a few advantages on this critical sector of the front for one thing the first Cavalry Army of the Bolsheviks had not yet arrived for another two brigades of Ukrainian soldiers in the Red Army deserted to the Polish side just before the battle began the poles also had air superiority in part thanks to the Polish American volunteer kusal Squadron and advanced aircraft like the fuler D7 now the Polish plan was for the third Army to lead the Breakthrough and I'm going to consult my notes Here for pronunciation help for the name of the general commanding that Army who was General edad rck schmig and the idea was to break through the red 12th Army defending the line under General majano the Polish offensive got off to a fast start and they smashed the red lons immediately this is what Norman Davies referred to as border war in its purest form lots of movement heavy use of Speedy Cavalry and relatively light fighting the Polish troops occupied the town of jomir on the 26th of April having Advanced 90 km in just 24 hours on May 3rd a Polish Cavalry Squadron actually reached Kev they commandeered a tram took it into the center captured an unsuspecting Bolshevik officer and then made their escape the main polish Force reached Kiev on May 7th which had been abandoned without a fight by the Red Army so by May 7th the polls had Advanced captured Kiev at the cost of of only 150 dead and about 300 wounded so the polls had won a military Victory but now the question was what would happen next for sure the Red Army would strike back and the polls had to be ready and in order to sustain this victory that they had achieved they would also need a political Victory and that meant the successful establishment of a new Ukrainian State pilsudski expressed this desire in a declaration to the Ukrainian people I formly declare that the foreign Invaders against whom the Ukrainian people have risen sword in hand to defend their homes from rape banditry and looting will be removed by the Polish force from territories inhabited by the Ukrainian Nation the Polish forces will remain in the Ukraine for such time as may be necessary to enable a legitimate Ukrainian government to take control now as I mentioned before it's not entirely clear how sincere pudi's support for the new Ukrainian State actually was but what what is clear is that the new Ukrainian State failed the population was war weary KV had changed hands some 15 times in the last 2 years and pitl was not able to generate a significant amount of support he was only able to raise about 30,000 troops which was entirely insufficient to defend Ukraine against the coming bolik attacks pitura also proved unable to set up a working Administration and the polls kept their hands off of any civilian Administration and began to shift their troops and their attention to the front to the North in bellarus in the words of historian Norman Davies the Ukrainian People's Republic having been delivered into this world proved stillborn back in Poland there was A Rush of Victory and the Parliament congratulated pilsudski but even so there were still some divisions among the polls tomovski for example was critical of the alliance with Ukraine and did not want Eastern territories with non- Pooles being included in the country polish Communists also launched a series of strikes as did some British and French socialist unions now as far as the British and French governments were concerned there was also some degree of criticism of the Polish attack in particular in Britain even though the government were no fans of the Bolsheviks Lloyd George had some critical sentiments the polls were inclined to be arrogant and they will have to take care they don't get their heads punched there were also some divisions in France the military wanted to support Poland as much as possible but the political left was more hesitant the League of Nations for its part put out a statement condemning the Polish aggression and the so-called deplorable events in Central Europe now as far as the Bolsheviks were concerned the Polish attack against Kiev was a political gift they could call on Russians and other ethnicities to support the international social Revolution and protect it from the Polish attack and they could call on Russian Patriots and National to protect the motherland from a foreign invasion they could also count on the fact that many were suspicious of the Polish Aristocrats who had been the landlords in that region and the Party Central Committee combined these ideas in a statement to the public honorable citizens you cannot allow the bayonets of the Polish Lords to determine the will of the great Russian Nation and War commissar trosy later wrote the capture of Kiev by the poles did us a great service it awakened the country even former Imperial General alexe brusilov rallied to the bulvik cause and there were even calls on Ukrainian nationalism to protect the country from a Polish Invasion and many ukrainians did fight on the Bolshevik side and for many bolik leaders this was the perfect opportunity to spread the revolution westwards Into the Heart of industrialized Europe prominent volvik mik Khan put it this way I believe the Polish Lords by marching on the Soviet Republic are only digging their own Graves but they will only succeed in founding yet another Soviet state through which we will gain close relations with the proletariat of of the West back at the front it wasn't only the polls who found themselves in a difficult situation the bolik leaders were also worried about the state of the Red Army at the front as trosky wrote to an official the administrative Machinery is weak the Army commanders and commissars are below the average level yet we have operating against us for the first time a regular army led by good technicians the best army commanders must be taken from all fronts and posted to the West as divisional commanders haste is needed in order to make up for lost time now despite their worries the fact that the polls had attacked on the south of the front towards Kiev actually played into the red Army's hands and they wanted to draw the poles further into the interior before striking with the planned Counterattack they also decided when the fighting was going on to hit the poles in the North in Belarus in order to relieve some of the pressure on the southern front now to do that they sent 27-year-old General mik tovi to lead the attack in bellarus this was launched on May 15th just days before the poles were going to launch their own attack in that region this led to the battle of the Bina Where The Red Army was able to push back the poles about 100 km over the course of 2 weeks the Polish then counterattacked and were able to recover some of the Lost ground before the front in bellarus stabilized until early July now let's go back to the southern sector of the front in Ukraine here on May 18th the very day that pilsudski returned to Warsaw to great a claim for the victory boni's first Cavalry Army AR arrived on the scene and shortly thereafter on the 29th of May the commissar for nationalities ysf Stalin arrived in the front as well and he would later take credit for what was about to occur the plan for the Red Army Counterattack at the beginning of June was to strike the poles at the juncture between the Polish 3D and sixth armies but at first there was limited progress and the Red Army was not able to break through and budoni even lost two of his armored trains so they began to switch their tactics and concentrated on smaller groups attacking with extra artillery support the Polish Defenders received a boost when the ordin Bor kxs who were fighting for the Reds after having defected from the whites now defected over to the poles but even so on June 5th the red army cavalry found an infiltrated several weak spots in the Polish line and a breakthrough was achieved the Red Army captured the town of jomir where it freed 5,000 Red Army prisoners and set fire to a hospital complex with 600 wounded polish soldiers inside the third polish Army was now encircled and the poles on the Run stores had to be abandoned prisoners released airplanes were left behind on the ground because there was not time to repair them units which lingered to fight were overtaken the polls abandoned Kiev on June 10th but were able to avoid being destroyed despite the chaos partly because of their air superiority ISAC Babel was serving in the first Cavalry Army and wrote in the later autobiographical story about the effects of Polish American air attacks they dropped down to 300 M and shot up first andruska and then trunov none of the shots fired by our men did the Americans any harm so after half an hour we were able to ride out and fetch the corpses all trunov wounds were in his face his cheeks punctured all over his tongue ripped out another reason that the poles were able to escape destruction was because budoni withdrew from jomir now he's been criticized for this by some historians who say that if he had stayed in place the Red Army would have won a more decisive Victory but others say that withdrawing was the correct Choice given the limitations on his Logistics and communication in any case the Red Army continued its advance and by early July captured the town of Ru where pilsudski had his headquarters in April when the Polish offensive began Babel described the Cavalry crossing the BR River into the cool evening dripped the smell of yesterday's blood the stench of slaughtered horses the blackened River roared along twisting itself into foaming knots at the Rapids so by the beginning of July 1920 the Polish offensive into Ukraine had been stopped and reversed by the Red Army which was now ready to launch a major Counterattack all across the front General tuvi saw it as a historic moment in the west the fate of World Revolution is being decided over the corpses of white Poland on the other side of the line a Polish Soldier put it in much more practical terms we ran all the way to Kev and we ran all the way back and as the Red Army prepared its counter offensive in Belarus the question of the day was where exactly all the way back would be now it's time for our Roundup segment where we take a look at what else is going on in the world in April 1920 on April 2 the German Army marched into the rural region to fight against the uprising of the red RAR Army the French considered this a breach of the peace treaty terms demilitarizing the region and the French army Advanced and occupied Frankfurt and other cities on April 6th from the 19th to the 26th the conference of Sano took place where Britain and France were given League of Nations mandates over Palestine Syria and Mesopotamia on the 19th Germany and Bolshevik Russia agreed to an exchange of prisoners trapped in the respective countries since the end of the first world war on the 20th the Summer Olympic Games opened in ant worp in Belgium and the five interlocking Olympic rings were displayed in public for the first time in the Middle East in Jerusalem violent riots broke out opposing Arab and Jewish residents the Palestine riots resulted in nine killed and over 200 wounded and finally on April 23rd in Ankara Mustafa kimal forms the Grand National Assembly which adopts a new temporary Constitution and a stance opposed to the sultan thanks again to curiosity stream for sponsoring today's episode curiosity stream is a streaming service where you can stream thousands of documentaries for just $111.99 per year it's if you sign up at curiositystream.com theeg greatwar you will also get nebula bundled in with your account nebula is a platform for creators like us where you can watch content ad free and you can find original content that you won't see on YouTube for example we are releasing our documentary series 16 days in Berlin on nebula it's the most detailed documentary on the Battle of Berlin one of the final battles of World War II and for several reasons we couldn't upload it onto YouTube because of their content restrictions so sign up at curiositystream.com theeg greatwar for just $11.99 per year as usual you can find all our sources for this video in the video description below if you want to support our Channel you can support us on patreon or by buying some of our merchandise and the links for that are in the video description below as well I'm Jesse Alexander and this is the Great War 1920 a production of realtime history and the only YouTube History Channel that is a Reincarnation of the Tatar Chiefs hordes that once conquered Southern Russia

Channel: The Great War

Views: 251,398

Keywords: History, World War 1, WW1, First World War, Documentary, Documentary Series, The Great War, Indy Neidell, 1919, Interwar Period, 1920s, Educational, Russian Civil War, Revolution, Interbelum, Polish-Soviet War, Poland, Soviet Russia, Eastern Europe, Józef Piłsudski, Leon Trotsky, Joseph Stalin, Red Army, Red Cavalry, Polish Army, Borders

Id: KipWEl-e0HM

Length: 29min 13sec (1753 seconds)

Published: Fri May 15 2020