The VSVR 1875-1880 (Part 2)
The Eastern War was to be Commissar Alfred Schlieffen’s greatest moment to date. At the outbreak of war he had an impressive 186,000 men on the Russian border. Much of the Army remained in the West to guard against a possible French counterattack although many brigades would later come Eastward when this threat failed to materialise. At the declaration of war the Russians had just 6,000 men on the Republic’s border. This Army of Poland was of little use beyond policing the Congress of Poland – the real threat from Russia would come from the Three Russian Imperial Armies: The Army of Kiev, The Army of Moscow and The Army of St Petersburg. Each army consisted of 40-50 thousand men whilst it was estimated that Russia could mobilise up to a million men from its peasantry. Yet despite these chilling numbers Schlieffen made a bold move. He refused to call up the reservists.
Whilst weakening the VSVR’s military situation by well over a million men the move was a public relations and economic coup. Thousands came out to praise the Republic’s leadership for sparing the common worker, miner and farmer from the horrors of war – in the Bohemian War tens of thousands of these armed civilians had died leaving the conflict with a permanent blemish. Now Schlieffen and Lenin promised victory without the cost in life for the common man.
With popular sentiment firmly in favour of the war the Young Anarchist revival seemed to peter out, even Kadon and Malatesta stopped calling for immediate action against the government.
On the field of battle the Red Army crashed into highly industrialised Poland with ease as the Army of Poland surrendered upon first contact with the Red Army. Elsewhere Lithuania was overrun whilst Red Army units thrust Northwards towards Riga – the base of the Russian Baltic Fleet. However just as a reasonably large force of some 15,000 Red Army soldiers approached the vital port city the Army of St Petersburg brought the full weight of its 44,000 men down upon the brave men of the Republic.
The resulting slaughter was one of Russia’s worst military defeats for centuries – it would not be the last of the Eastern War. The Army of St Petersburg lost half its men as the human wave tactics employed by the Russians left them at the mercy of the Red Army’s Maxim Guns. After the battle Schlieffen, now at Red Army Headquarters in Konigsberg in East Prussia, sent a message to the Politburo in Cologne ‘’their Generals are incompetent, their men lack morale, are poorly trained and their equipment is archaic – if we do not defeat this enemy then the Red Army should be disbanded’’. It was a bold boast, but one that was largely correct. Despite superior numbers the Russians were simply unable to combat the power of Republican Arms.
In late May the Army of Kiev was crushed by an Army half its size at Brest-Litovsk, suffering an appalling 75% casualty rate before eventually surrendering after being pursued for two more weeks. Then at Grodno in Lithuania 33,000 recently trained up Russian conscripts suffered a mauling at the hands of several units of Red Army units who were headed Northwards to the largest clash of the entire conflict – the 2nd Battle of Jelgava.
Between July and September the 2nd Battle of Jelgava would rage just to the South of Riga. With their Army on the brink of collapse on all fronts this was the last roll of the dice for Russia. In late July a huge Russian Army of almost 100,000 men launched an attack on around 20,000 Red Army soldiers. The Russian Army consisted on the entire Army of Moscow (the last surviving professional army at full fighting fitness), the tattered remnants of the Army of St Petersburg and a large force of conscripts from the Russian heartland. At the start of the Battle the Russians frequently looked to on the brink of a bloody but important victory as the pushed the Red Army to the brink of breaking point before tiring out before the final push could be exerted. In truth it was at Grodno where the fate of the Battle was decided. Had the Russian troops at Grodno slowed the Republic’s men by another week at least then the Russians would have probably won the Battle, instead 25,000 fresh soldiers came t bolster the VSVR ranks and a massive counterattack was launched that would crush the Russian Army as a viable fighting force.
The 2nd Battle of Jelgava was a blow from which Russia would never fully recover.
However just when everything was falling apart the Russians were provided a ray of hope – on August 2nd the British Empire had entered the fray by declaring war upon the VSVR.
Just days after their final defeat at Jelgava the Russian military could rejoice as the Red Navy was reduced to the bottom of the Ocean. Just North of their harbour at Kiel the Red Navy faced a Royal Navy force ten times its size. With a mixture of wooden vessels and modern ironclad ships like the Red Navy the British were able to sweep aside their Republican counterparts and sunk every last ship. It was a humiliation at sea, but in truth the VSVR always knew it could never match the British at sea so this blow was not nearly as damaging at it could have been. The public reaction was to unite around the government rather than criticize it.
It was support that would be gravely needed as the British directly threatened the Republic with invasions of Flanders and Hannover during the Autumn. Luckily the troops left in the West to guard against French incursions were equally useful in beating the British back into the sea. All in all around 80,000 British soldiers were killed or captured in attempts to invade the Republic during ate 1877. At the same time minor attacks on the Republic’s West African territories were repulsed whilst the British outposts in the Gambia and Sierra Leone were occupied.
In March 1878 the British sued for peace and the Republic accepted a return to the pre-war status between the largest and second largest powers on earth. It was now much less clear which of the two occupied either position.
Back in the East the Republic’s expansion deep into Russian continued despite the constant attacks of the still large, if clearly beaten, Russian Army. However in June 1878 the Red Army was provided a great opportunity – from Finland a large force of Communists had risen up and besieged St Petersburg from the North. Knowing an opportunity when he saw one Schlieffen ordered a large force to quick march from Estonia to the South of St Petersburg in order to force the Tsar to surrender.
The tactic was a great success – with nowhere to go the Tsar and his government were trapped in their European capital.
Now under the custody of the Red Army the Tsar’s Empire was beaten. All of the Baltics, the capital, most of the Congress of Poland and large swathes of Great Russia, Belorussia and the Ukraine were occupied with Southern Finland and Kiev being wrestled from the Tsar’s armies. Tsar Alexander II surrendered.
The terms were harsh but not disastrous. Half of Poland was directly annexed into the VSVR. This highly industrialised territory was very valuable and very ethnically mixed. Around 50% was Polish, 20% was Russian, 15% was Jewish with the final 15% being of other ethnic groups (Tartars, Lithuanians, Latvians, Ukrainians, Circassians and Georgians). The Southern, industrialised, part of Finland was given its independence as a People’s Republic linked to the VSVR. Russian protection was withdrawn from the Swedish Monarchy with the Communist Government receiving recognition as the rightful government of the new Republic.
The Eastern War had been an unadulterated success. However just as its start had defused the internal problems of the Republic as people looked towards their external enemies its end reignited the same problems. After a Moderate Marxist paper launched a scathing attack on the government for annexing half of Poland rather than giving the entire Congress of Poland its independence under a Communist government (as had been the other offer on the table for the Republic) the censorship laws were used to suppress the publication. Once again the Young Anarchist flared up as the champions of freedom.
In February 1879 at a huge rally in Brussels (perhaps the greatest hotbed of Anarchists and radicals) things turned nasty once more. Extremist elements of the mob firebombed a police building and murdered two soldiers. The Brussels state police sent a desperate message to Cologne calling for assistance. The government in Cologne interpretated this as an attempted coup (the message was very unclear and only noted that violent Anarchists were attacking the state and taking control of the city). Even the Anarchist leader Kropotkin was worried writing in his journal ‘’what are these fools doing in Brussels?’’ The response from Lenin was simple – squash the revolt immediately. 24,000 Red Guards were dispatched to Brussels. Young Anarchist elements clashed with the troops and soon sucked many of the Anarchist protesters who had not come to fight into the battle. For around 2 days citizen fought citizen in the most important VSVR city West of the Rhine. The final death toll exceeded 600. It was a disaster for all involved. As the truth behind what happened trickled out half the country rose up in uproar. In Berlin thousands gathered with a banner not calling for Anarchist rule or a Moderate solution but with the simple message – ‘’Lenin and Schlieffen – OUT!’’ Yet it cannot be forgotten that at the same time many thousands of pro-Leninists marched in support of their Chairman.
In more positive news the African project proceeded at pace as by the end of Lenin’s term over 2 million Africans lived within the VSVR’s African territories.
Even more interesting news reached Cologne in December 1879 as the French puppet-Sultan was overthrown in Morocco by a Communist group. Almost instantaneously Spain declared the Republic of Morocco to be Spanish territory and controversially sent troops in. The cause of protecting Morocco from the French was grudgingly accepted by the Comintern which did not want to alienate Spain. After all, how could the expansionary VSVR criticise Spain was expanding its territory in a manner that directly helped the spread of Communism?
By the end of Lenin’s first term as Chairman the Comintern was significantly larger than before. Both Spain and the VSVR had expanded the Comintern’s influence in West Africa; the VSVR had annexed half of Poland whilst 3 new Republic’s had adopted socialism – Sweden, Finland and the People’s Republic of the Netherlands and East Indies.
