“Komuch's Guard”: volunteer units of the Ufa front in october 1918–january 1919
https://doi.org/10.25206/2542-0488-2025-10-4-12-19
EDN: LBDWDF
Abstract
The study, based on archival documents of the White Army, memoirs and Soviet reports, using historicalreconstructive and comparative methods, for the first time comprehensively analyzes the little-studied volunteer formations of Socialist-Revolutionary orientation (the 1st Russian-Czech Regiment, the Constituent Assembly Battalion, the B. K. Fortunatov Detachment), created in 1918 with the support of the Komuch and the Czechoslovaks. It is established that the initiative to create them came from the Czech command to replenish the front. Despite the revolutionary rhetoric, they demonstrated limited combat effectiveness. Attempts by the Socialist-Revolutionaries to use them against Kolchak's coup failed due to the neutrality of the Czechs and the apolitical nature of the volunteers. In January 1919, the formations were disbanded, which confirms the failure of the “democratic alternative” in the Civil War. The study contributes to the understanding of the mechanisms of the formation of the White armies and the role of political factors in their evolution.
About the Author
N. A. Zayats
Moscow Aviation Institute
Russian Federation
Russian Federation
ZAYATS Nikolai Alekseevich, Candidate of Historical Sciences, Assistant of the History Department
Moscow, Volokolamskoye shosse, 4, 125993
AuthorID (RSCI): 959848
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Review
For citations:
Zayats N.A. “Komuch's Guard”: volunteer units of the Ufa front in october 1918–january 1919. Omsk Scientific Bulletin. Series Society. History. Modernity. 2025;10(4):12-19. (In Russ.) https://doi.org/10.25206/2542-0488-2025-10-4-12-19. EDN: LBDWDF
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