Historical Dictionary of the Russian Civil Wars, 1916-1926

Chronology

1916 Summer: Widespread revolts occur against Russian rule across Central Asia consequent to the extension of conscription to the formerly exempted Muslim subjects of the Russian Empire. The revolts are suppressed by force and meet considerable resistance, anticipating further Russian–Muslim conflicts in the region in the coming years (the Basmachi movement).

1917 27 February (12 March): A revolt in the Volynskii Regiment leads to a general mutiny of the Petrograd garrison during revolutionary disturbances on the streets of the Russian capital that had been building for several days, sealing the victory of the February Revolution. 1 (14) March: The Petrograd Soviet issues its “Order No. 1,” subsequently blamed for the disintegration of the Russian Army. 23 (15–16) March: Following the advice of all his senior generals (including M. V. Alekseev), Nicholas II abdicates. The Provisional Government, having come to an agreement with the Petrograd Soviet of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Deputies on 1–2 (14–15) March 1917, assumes power. 4 (17) March: Ukrainian Central Rada created at Kiev; the start of efforts to assert Ukrainian autonomy or independence, which will be an enduring feature of the civil wars. 16 (29) March: Polish independence recognized by the Provisional Government. 3 (16) April: V. I. Lenin arrives back in Russia, having traveled from Switzerland through Germany on a “sealed train.” 14 (27) April: Bolshevik organizations in Petrograd and Moscow resolve to create Red Guards—the seeds of the Red Army. 1 (14) May: 1st All-Russian Muslim Congress convenes at Moscow and calls for a democratic, federal republic. 18 June (1 July): Under pressure from the Allies, the Russian Army launches an ultimately disastrous summer offensive on the Eastern Front. 5 (18) July: In the aftermath of disturbances on the streets of Petrograd (the July Days), the Provisional Government publishes allegations that the Bolsheviks are German agents. Many leading Bolsheviks are arrested (including L. D. Trotsky), and the party is outlawed. 18 (31) July: Prime Minister A. F. Kerensky names General L. G. Kornilov as supreme commander of the Russian Army. 19–21 July (1–3 August): German forces capture Riga. 27 August (9 September): Kerensky denounces Kornilov as a traitor for organizing a coup against the government (the Kornilov affair). Kornilov and his main alleged co-conspirators are subsequently arrested and imprisoned at Bykhov. The Petrograd Soviet creates the Committee for the Struggle against Counter-Revolution, which approves a Bolshevik resolution to create a Workers’ Militia (thereby, in effect rearming the Bolshevik Red Guards suppressed after the July Days). 31 August (12 September)–5 (18) September: The Bolsheviks win majority support in the Petrograd, Moscow, and Krasnoiarsk Soviets. 12 (25) October–21 (3 November): German forces occupy the islands of Saaremaa, Muhu, and Hiiumaa, off Estonia. 23 October (5 November): Estonian Bolsheviks under Jaan Anvelt seize power in Revel (Tallinn). 24–26 October (6–8 November): Russian Bolsheviks, acting under the aegis of the Military-Revolutionary Committee of the Petrograd Soviet, seize power in Petrograd. October 25 (November 7): The ataman of the Don Cossacks, A. M. Kaledin, announces that the Host authorities will assume full authority over their own affairs until the restoration of the power of the Provisional Government. 25 October–1 November (7–14 November): A Bolshevik–Left-SR coup in Tashkent creates the Turkestan Council of Peoples’ Commissars (Turksovnarkom) and proclaims Soviet power across all southern Central Asia. 26 October (8 November): At the Second All-Russian Congress of Soviets, Lenin reads a proclamation to all belligerents in the First World War, calling for immediate peace without annexations or indemnities (the “Decree on Peace”) and the “Decree on Land,” abolishing private ownership. Sovnarkom is created, with the Military-Naval Revolutionary Committee attached to it. 27 October (9 November): Cossack units (the 1st Don Corps), commanded by General P. N. Krasnov, capture Gatchina in the first significant military opposition to the Bolshevik coup (the Kerensky–Krasnov uprising). By order of the ataman of the Orenburg Cossacks, Colonel A. I. Dutov, the Host authorities assume full power over their own affairs. 28 October (10 November): Tsarskoe Selo is captured by a 700-strong unit of Krasnov’s Cossacks. In Petrograd, armed resistance to the Bolsheviks organized by the Committee for the Salvation of the Country and the Revolution leads to 200 casualties. A Sovnarkom decree is issued calling for the creation of workers’ and soldiers’ militias by all local soviets. 29 October (11 November): Anti-Bolshevik rising of officer cadets (junkers) is crushed by Red Guards in Petrograd. This date also marks the beginning of the anti-Bolshevik uprising in Moscow. 30 October (12 November): Moscow Kremlin is captured by Red Guard detachments after several days of fighting. 31 October (13 November)–1 (14) November: Defeat of Cossack forces sent against Petrograd by Kerensky and Krasnov. General Krasnov is briefly arrested; Kerensky goes into hiding. 1 (14) November: General N. N. Dukhonin is named by Kerensky as supreme commander of the Russian Army. 2 (15) November: The “Declaration of the Rights of the Peoples of Russia,” signed by Lenin and J. V. Stalin, offers self-determination, to the point of independence, to all nationalities of the former Russian Empire. 3 (16) November: The final suppression of the anti-Bolshevik rising in Moscow. In Kiev, the Central Rada issues its Third Universal, proclaiming Ukraine to be a People’s Republic within a Russian federation. 6 (19) November: Tsentrosibir′, the Central Executive Committee of the Soviets of Siberia, is proclaimed by the 1st All-Siberian Congress of Soviets at Tomsk. 9 (22) November: General Dukhonin is dismissed as commander in chief for insubordination (i.e., refusing to propose an armistice to the Germans) and is replaced by the Bolshevik ensign N. V. Krylenko. Izvestiia publishes details of the “secret treaties” between the Allies, revealing their annexationist war aims. 10 (23) November: A Sovnarkom decree is issued on the gradual reduction of the size of the Imperial Russian Army. 11 (24) November: Establishment of the Transcaucasian Commissariat (Zavkom). 12 (25) November: Voting begins in the elections to the Constituent Assembly. 13–14 (26–27) November: Soviet and German emissaries at Dvinsk agree on an armistice. 14 (27) November: Soviet power is proclaimed at Khar′kov, in opposition to the Rada at Kiev; the first Bolshevik invasion of Ukraine begins. The Sovnarkom decree “On Workers’ Control” is issued. 15 (28) November: The Estonian National Council (Maapäev) proclaims Estonian independence shortly before it is overthrown by local Bolsheviks. 18 November: As Soviet forces secure their hold on Irkutsk—after a two-week battle against local Cossacks, officers, and junkers—in Transbaikal, Esaul G. M. Semenov leads his Mongol-Buriat detachment against Soviet forces at Verkhneudinsk. 19 November (2 December): Military-Revolutionary Committee is created at Mogilev. The flight of Generals L. G. Kornilov, A. I. Denikin, A. S. Lukomskii, I. P. Romanovskii, and S. L. Markov from Bykhov prison toward the Don begins. Peace negotiations between Soviet Russia and the Central Powers open at Brest-Litovsk. The Allies refuse to participate. 20 November (2 December): Arrival at the stavka at Mogilev of Supreme Commander Krylenko. He is unable to prevent the lynching of General Dukhonin by a mob of soldiers and sailors. 21 November (3 December): Sfatul Ţării, the Bessarabian (later Moldavian) legislature, holds its first meeting. 24 November (6 December): The beginning of the full demobilization, on the order of Sovnarkom, of the Russian Army. The Finnish Diet proclaims the independence of Finland. 25 November (7 December): The Sovnarkom appeal “To the Entire Population” is issued, placing those areas of the Don and the Urals where “counter-revolutionary detachments have revealed themselves” under a state of siege and denouncing Generals Kaledin and Kornilov and Colonel Dutov as “enemies of the people.” Arrival in the port of Vladivostok of the American cruiser USS Brooklyn. 26 November (8 December): At Kokand, the Extraordinary Regional Muslim Congress, in opposition to the Tashkent Soviet, creates the Provisional Government of Autonomous Turkestan, soon to be headed by Mustafa Chokay-oghlu. 28 November (10 December): The Lithuanian National Council (Taryba) declares its independence from Russia, under German protection. 30 November (12 December): The Military-Revolutionary Committee at the Mogilev Stavka issues a telegram canceling “all officer and class ranks, titles and decorations.” 1 (14) December: Establishment of VSNKh. 2 (15) December: Kaledin’s Cossacks capture Rostov-on-Don. The National Council of Bessarabia (Sfatul Ţării) proclaims the independence of the Moldavian Democratic Republic. 4 (17) December: A Sovnarkom ultimatum to the Ukrainian Central Rada is issued, demanding that it cease offering covert support to counterrevolutionaries. 5 (18) December: V. A. Antonov-Ovseenko is named as People’s Commissar for the Fight against Counter-Revolution in South Russia. 5–13 (18–26) December: The Third Kazakh Congress at Orenburg proclaims Kazakh autonomy and elects an executive committee (under Aliqan Bokeyqan-uli) of an anti-Bolshevik Kazakh government, Alash Orda. 6–19 December (19 December–1 January 1918): At Tomsk, an Extraordinary Regional Congress, dominated by the SRs, denounces the Soviet government and establishes the Provisional Siberian Regional Council in opposition to it. 7 (20) December: Establishment of the Cheka. 9 (22) December: Peace negotiations between Soviet Russia and the Central Powers open at Brest-Litovsk. 10 (23) December: In Paris, the Supreme War Council resolves to support all national groups in the former Russian Empire that wish to continue the war against the Central Powers. An Anglo–French Convention, signed in Paris, divides South Russia and the Caucasus into (respectively) French and British “spheres of interest.” Members of the Party of Left-SRs join Sovnarkom. 12 (25) December: The Muslim Idel-Urals Republic is established at Kazan′. 14 (27) December: Sovnarkom nationalizes the banks. 15 (28) December: A Bolshevik uprising at Rostov-on-Don is crushed, and the Don Civil Council, headed by Ataman A. M. Kaledin, is transferred there. 16 (29) December: Sovnarkom decrees are promulgated on the election of officers in the army; the organization of authority in the army; equal rights for all military personnel; the abolition of all military ranks, titles, and badges of rank; and the abolition of saluting. 18 (31) December: Red forces capture Khar′kov. 20 December (2 January 1918): The All-Russian Directorate for the Formation of the Red Army and the All-Russia Collegium for Direction of the Air Forces of the Old Army are created. 25 December (7 January 1918): The short-lived Ukrainian Soviet Republic is established at Khar′kov. 27 December (9 January 1918): The Commissariat of Military Affairs orders that officers should only be dismissed if there are suitably qualified personnel available to replace them. 28 December (11 January): Soviet forces from Khar′kov capture Ekaterinoslav and begin to advance on Kiev. 30 December (12 January 1918): A Japanese warship, the Iwami (formerly the Russian battleship Orel, captured in May 1905) arrives off Vladivostok, followed the next day by the British cruiser HMS Suffolk.

1918 2 (15) January: A Sovnarkom decree is issued on universal labor obligation. 3 (16) January: VTsIK adopts the “Declaration of the Rights of the Toiling and Exploited Peoples” and the decree “On the Formation of Workers’ and Peasants’ Red Army.” 5–6 (18–19) January: The Constituent Assembly meets in Petrograd; Bolshevik and Left-SR delegates walk out when it refuses to accept the “Declaration of the Rights of the Toiling and Exploited Peoples.” Red forces, commanded by Colonel M. A. Murav′ev, capture Poltava in Ukraine. 6 (19) January: Delegates to the Constituent Assembly are denied entry to the Tauride Palace by Bolshevik guards. 7 (20) January: VTsIK endorses a Sovnarkom decree dissolving the Constituent Assembly. General Kornilov is named as commander in chief of the Volunteer Army. 8 (21) January: Outbreak of Finnish Civil War. 9 (22) January: In its Fourth Universal, the Ukrainian Central Rada proclaims the independence of the Ukrainian National Republic. The Donets-Kryvoi Rog Soviet Republic is proclaimed at Khar′kov. 10 (23) January: Cossack and Russian anti-Bolsheviks create the United Government of the Don to oppose Soviet rule in the Don oblast′ and oversee the activities of the Volunteer Army. On the same day, a congress of Cossack frontoviki in the northern Don region forms a Military-Revolutionary Committee in opposition to the United Government. 11 (24) January: Red Guards capture Yalta and Feodosiia in Crimea. 12 (25) January: Red Guards and units of the Russian Army battle against the rising in Belorussia of the 1st Polish Legion under General Józef Dowbór-Muśnicki. 13 (26) January: Romanian troops capture Kishinev, driving out Rumcherod. Sovnarkom severs relations with Romania. 14 (27) January: Rumcherod declares itself the supreme authority in Bessarabia. 15 (28) January: The Sovnarkom decree “On the Organization of a Worker-Peasant Red Army” on a volunteer basis is issued. Allied leaders announce that the Czechoslovak Legion in Russia has become an integral part of the French army. The Latvian National Assembly (Tautas Padome) proclaims independence. 16–17 (29–30) January: Red forces capture Odessa. 18 (31) January: Dutov’s Cossacks are defeated, and Soviet power is proclaimed in Orenburg. 19 January (1 February): Patriarch Tikhon anathematizes the Bolsheviks. 20 January (2 February): Sovnarkom proclaims the disestablishment of the Russian Orthodox Church. 21 January (3 February): Sovnarkom repudiates Russia’s state debts. 24 January (6 February): Sfatul Ţării declares the independence from Russia of the Moldavian People’sRepublic. 26–27 January (8–9 February): The Provisional Government of Autonomous Siberia is founded at Tomsk and immediately driven underground by Red Guards. Soviet forces under M. A. Murav′ev capture Kiev. 27 January (9 February): At Brest-Litovsk, the Central Powers sign a separate peace with the Ukrainian Rada. 28 January (10 February): Trotsky walks out of the Brest-Litovsk negotiations, declaring a policy of “neither war nor peace”: Soviet Russia will not accept the annexationist peace terms offered by the Central Powers but will not continue fighting. Red forces seize Taganrog. 29 January (11 February): A Sovnarkom decree is issued disbanding the imperial Russian fleet and announcing the creation of the Socialist Worker-Peasant Red Fleet. A. M. Kaledin resigns as ataman of the Don Host and subsequently commits suicide, as the Volunteer Army leaves Novocherkassk and embarks on the First Kuban (Ice) March. The Fourth Regional Congress of Soviets at Tashkent declares war on the Kokand government. 30 January (12 February): Turkish forces reopen hostilities against Russian forces in Transcaucasia, advancing toward Erzincan and Trabzon (Trebizond). 31 January: At midnight, Soviet Russia adopts the Gregorian calendar; the following day will be 14 February. 14–20 February: With much brutality, Red forces from the Orenburg Front and Red Guards of the Tashkent Soviet, supported by Austro-Hungarian “internationalists” (liberated prisoners of war), overthrow the Muslim government at Kokand, initiating the war between the Soviet authorities and the Muslim resistance fighters (Basmachi). 16 February: At Vilnius, the Lithuanian National Council (Taryba) proclaims Lithuania’s independence. 17–18 February: German forces reopen operations against Russia: “Operation Thunderbolt” captures virtually the entire Baltic region and much of Belorussia within a week. 19 February: Sovnarkom issues a radio message agreeing to accept the German conditions for peace. The Sovnarkom decree “On the Socialization of the Land” is issued. 19 February–2 May: “The Ice March of the Baltic Fleet”: 226 Russian vessels are moved from Revel and Helsingfors to Kronshtadt, to prevent them from falling into German hands. 21 February: The Committee for the Revolutionary Defense of Petrograd is created. Sovnarkom issues an appeal, “The Socialist Fatherland is in Danger!,” as German forces capture Minsk. 23 February: The Bolshevik Central Committee votes to accept German peace terms (by seven votes in favor to four against, with four abstentions). 23–24 February: Rostov-on-Don is captured by Soviet forces after its evacuation by the Volunteer Army. The British government authorizes the funding of Ataman Semenov’s forces in Manchuria. The Transcaucasian Assembly (Sejm) is established at Tiflis and declares the independence of the Transcaucasian Democratic Federative Republic. 24 February: In Revel, the Estonian Provisional Government, under Konstantin Päts, is proclaimed by the Committee of Elders as German forces close on the city. By a vote of 116 to 85 (with 26 abstentions), VTsIK agrees to sign a peace treaty with the Central Powers. 24–28 February: The remaining Allied diplomatic and military missions leave Petrograd (mostly for Vologda). 25 February: Soviet forces capture Novocherkassk. The newly elected ataman of the Don Cossacks, A. M. Nazarov, is shot by Cossack radicals. German forces capture Revel. 28 February: The Austro-Hungarian army begins to advance into Ukraine, as German forces enter Pskov. 1 March: Forces of the Tashkent Soviet disperse the Kokand Autonomy. 2 March: Soviet forces abandon Kiev, which is then occupied by Austro-German units and forces of the Ukrainian Central Rada commanded by S. V. Petliura. 3 March: The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk is signed: Soviet Russia loses control of the Baltic provinces, Ukraine, and much of Belorussia; cedes to the Ottoman Empire all territory captured in the Russo–Turkish War of 1877–1878; agrees to full demobilization of its armed forces; and promises to cease agitation and propaganda against the Central Powers. 4 March: The Supreme Military Council is created, headed by L. D. Trotsky. German forces capture Narva. 5 March: The Red Army’s Northern and Western “Screens” are created. German forces land on the Åland Islands, as a first step in their intervention in the Finnish Civil War to assist the Finnish Whites. 6–8 March: British and French troops land at Murmansk, at the invitation of the local soviet. The 8th (Extraordinary) Congress of the Russian Social Democratic Labor Party (Bolsheviks) changes the party name to the Russian Communist Party (Bolsheviks): RKP(b). 8 March: The Baltic German Landesrat offers the crown of the Duchy of Courland to Kaiser Wilhelm II. 10–12 March: The Soviet government moves from Petrograd to the new capital, Moscow. Invading Austrian and German forces occupy Odessa. 13–14 March: Red forces from Novorossiisk capture Ekaterinodar, the Kuban capital and headquarters of the Kuban Cossack Host. 14 March: Trotsky is named People’s Commissar for Military Affairs. German and White Finnish forces occupy Helsinki (Helsingfors). 14–16 March: The Fourth (Extraordinary) All-Russian Congress of Soviets ratifies the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk. Subsequently (19 March 1918) all Left-SR commissars resign in protest from Sovnarkom. 15 March: Sovnarkom agrees that the Czechoslovak Legion can leave Russia via Vladivostok, providing it surrenders most of its arms. The first train leaves Penza on 27 March. Turkish forces occupy Trabzon. 21 March: The election of officers is ended in both the Red Army and the Red Fleet. 25 March: A Soviet treaty with Bukhara is signed recognizing the independence of the emirate. The German-sponsored Belarussian National Republic is established. 27 March: The Don Cossack Host rises up against Soviet rule. 30 March: German forces occupy Poltava. 31 March–2 April: Bolshevik and Dashnak forces of the Baku Soviet emerge victorious in fighting with Muslim members of the Musavet. At least 3,500 (and perhaps as many as 12,000) Muslims are killed during the “March Days.” April: The Don Army and the Urals (from January 1919 the Urals Independent) Army are formed. German and Austrian forces overrun much of southeastern Ukraine and Crimea. 3 April: The All-Russian Bureau of Military Commissars (Vsebiurvoenkom) is formed, attached to the Commissariat for Military Affairs. 3–5 April: German forces (commanded by General Rüdiger von der Goltz) land on the Finnish mainland at Hangö (Hanko) and march on Helsinki, which they enter on 12–13 April. 5 April: German forces capture Khar′kov. 5–6 April: 500 Japanese troops land at Vladivostok to “restore order” in the port, followed by contingents of British and U.S. forces. 6 April: Trotsky adds the post of Commissar for Naval Affairs to his portfolio of duties. 9 April: The Bessarabian national assembly (Sfatul Ţării) votes for union with Romania. 10 April: Cossacks elect General P. N. Krasnov as ataman of the All-Great Don Host. 10–13 April: Emerging from the Kuban steppe, the Volunteer Army lays siege to Ekaterinodar before being forced to retire. General Kornilov is killed in action (13 April), and the Whites retire. 11–12 April: The Cheka raids anarchist centers in Moscow, killing more than 100 people. 13 April: General A. I. Denikin is named as the new commander in chief of the Volunteer Army. The Transcaucasian Assembly (Sejm) declares war on Turkey. 14–15 April: Turkish forces enter Batumi (Batum), in accordance with the terms of the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk (which had not been recognized by the Transcaucasian Assembly). 17 April: Red forces capture Novocherkassk. 22 April: Under pressure from the Turks, the Transcaucasian Assembly, uniting Azeri Musavetists and (more reluctantly) Armenian Dashnaks and Georgian Mensheviks, declares an independent Transcaucasian Federal Republic under Akaki Chkhenkeli. A VTsIK decree is issued on universal military service (Vsevobuch). VTsIK promulgates “The Oath of the Red Armyman.” 24 April: The Supreme Military Inspectorate of the Red Army is created. 25 April: The Baku Soviet proclaims a Bolshevik–Left-SR Council of People’s Commissars (the Baku Commune) under Stepan Shahumian. 25–27 April: Turkish forces occupy Kars. 27 April: The Supreme Allied War Council recommends that Czechoslovak units that are west of Omsk be diverted to Arkhangel′sk for evacuation. 28–29 April: The first Czechoslovak trains reach Vladivostok. With German support, General P. P. Skoropadskii overthrows the Central Rada and is proclaimed hetman of the Ukrainian State by the All-Ukrainian Agrarian Congress. 1 May: German forces enter Rostov-on-Don. The Food Army (Prodarmiia) of the Soviet Republic is created. 2 May: The Vladivostok Soviet proclaims its supreme authority in the port. 6 May: Don Cossack forces recapture Novocherkassk. 8 May: The All-Russian Main Staff (Vseroglavshtab) is created to oversee Soviet mobilization efforts. 14 May: Czechoslovak forces clash with released Hungarian prisoners of war east of the Urals (the “Cheliabinsk incident”). 14–15 May: The last Red Finnish units surrender to Mannerheim’s forces. 20 May: In response to a demand from the Soviet government, military leaders of the Czechoslovak Legion refuse to surrender their arms. 23 May: The British government resolves to land further forces at Murmansk and Arkhangel′sk. Sovnarkom orders the Cheka to increase surveillance of SR and Menshevik leaders. 24–26 May: The revolt of the Czechoslovak Legion begins. Trotsky orders local Soviets to shoot on the spot any armed Czechoslovak troops found on the Trans-Siberian Railway. 25 May–2 August: The Red Army’s “Ural–Volga Defensive Operation” on the Eastern Front against the Czechoslovak Legion and Komuch’s People’s Army occurs. 26 May: Turkish forces enter Alexandropol. 26–28 May: The Transcaucasian Federation dissolves into Georgian, Armenian, and Azerbaijani republics. An SR conference in Moscow endorses the program of the Union for the Regeneration of Russia, calling for Allied intervention in Russia to restore the Eastern Front. 28 May: The German–Georgian treaty signed at Poti grants Germany access to Georgian raw materials and the right to station troops in Georgia, effectively establishing a German protectorate over Georgia. 29 May: A universal military draft is declared in Soviet Russia. 29–30 May: Czechoslovak forces capture Penza and Syzran′. 1 June: The anti-Bolshevik West Siberian Commissariat is proclaimed at Novonikolaevsk. It sanctions the formation of the Siberian Army. 4 June: Georgia and Armenia sign peace agreements with Turkey (the Treaty of Batumi), ceding Batumi, Kars, Alexandropol, and other regions to Turkey. J. V. Stalin is sent to Tsaritsyn (Stalingrad/Volgograd) to organize its defense against Don Cossack attacks and to secure the supply of food and oil from South Russia to the north. 8 June: Czechoslovak troops capture Samara, where Komuch proclaims its authority and begins the formation of the People’s Army. 10 June: The German Caucasus Mission arrives in Tiflis. 11 June: Sovnarkom issues a decree establishing Committees of the Village Poor. The Taryba offers the crown of Lithuania to the Duke of Urach (Wilhelm von Würtenberg). 12 June: The first rounds of conscription into the Red Army begin. An armistice agreement between the Russian Soviet Republic and the Ukrainian State is signed at Kiev. 13 June: Sovnarkom announces the creation of the Revvoensovet of the Republic to oversee the struggle against the Czechoslovak Legion and the “landlord and bourgeois counter-revolution which lies behind it.” The Eastern Front is organized from the rudimentary 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, and 5th Red Armies, under Colonel I. I. Vācietis. 14 June: VTsIK votes to exclude all Mensheviks and Right-SRs from its ranks (“for counter-revolutionary activities”) and advises all local soviets to follow suit. 16 June: Capital punishment is restored in Soviet Russia. 18 June: On the orders of the Soviet government, at Tsemesskii Bay, near Novorossiisk, the battleship Svobodnaia Rossiia and nine destroyers of the Black Sea Fleet are scuttled (in an operation overseen by F. F. Raskol′nikov) to prevent their capture by German forces. 20 June: In Petrograd, V. Volodarskii, People’s Commissar for the Press, is assassinated by G. I. Semenov, a member of an SR terrorist organization. 21 June: Captain A. M. Shchastnyi, commander of naval forces in the Baltic Sea and chief architect of the Ice March of the Baltic Fleet, is executed in Moscow, following a dispute with Trotsky. 23 June: Czechoslovak forces capture Ufa. The Second Kuban March of the Volunteer Army begins. 25 June: The Volunteer Army captures Torgovaia, severing railway communication between Soviet forces in the North Caucasus and central Russia. 28 June: Sovnarkom issues a decree nationalizing large-scale industry, signaling the beginning of War Communism. 29 June: The Czechoslovak Legion takes control of Vladivostok. Late June: Menshevik G. F. Bicherakhov instigates an uprising of the Terek Cossacks (commanded by his brother, L. F. Bicherakhov) against Soviet power (the Bicherakhov Uprising). 1 July: The Provisional Siberian Government is formed at Omsk and subsequently (4 July) declares Siberian independence. 1–3 July: The capture of Orenburg by Ural Cossack forces of Ataman Dutov isolates Red forces in Central Asia from Soviet Russia. 4–10 July: The meeting of the Fifth All-Russian Congress of Soviets in Moscow ratifies the first constitution of the RSFSR. 5 July: 322 Left-SR delegates leave the Fifth All-Russian Congress of Soviets in protest at Sovnarkom policies (particularly the peace with Germany and the food dictatorship), signaling the beginning of the Left-SR Uprising. 6 July: With the aim of provoking a renewal of Soviet–German hostilities, two Left-SR Chekists (Ia. G. Bliumkin and N. A. Andreev) assassinate the German ambassador in Moscow, Count Wilhelm von Mirbach. 6–7 July: Left-SR delegates to the Fifth All-Russian Congress of Soviets are arrested in Moscow and held inside the building of the Bolshoi Ballet, as the Latvian Riflemen, commanded by Vācietis, mop up the remnants of Left-SR resistance in the city. 6–21 July: After some initial successes, anti-Bolshevik risings at Iaroslavl′ and other towns in the upper-Volga region (including Murom, Rybinsk, Nizhnii Novgorod, and Penza), which had been organized by B. V. Savinkov and his Union for the Defense of the Motherland and Freedom, are crushed by Soviet forces. 8 July: Anglo–French forces capture Kem, on the western shore of the White Sea. 10 July: Czechoslovak forces capture Syzran′. The Fifth All-Russian Congress of Soviets agrees to the formation of a regular army and the employment of former tsarist officers as military specialists; it also ratifies the first constitution of the RSFSR. 10–11 July: M. A. Murav′ev, the Left-SR commander of Red forces on the Eastern Front, revolts, attempting to end hostilities with the Czechoslovak Legion and reopen the war against Germany. Murav′ev is shot dead during his arrest. 11–12 July: The Ashkhabad uprising, led by the Menshevik–SR Ashkhabad Committee of Salvation, begins expulsion of the forces of the Tashkent Soviet from Transcaspia and establishes the Transcaspian Provisional Government. 16–17 July: Tsar Nicholas II, his wife, his progeny, and his retainers are executed at Ekaterinburg. 19 July: The constitution of the RSFSR comes into force. 22 July: Czechoslovak forces capture Simbirsk. 23 July: The Volunteer Army captures Stavropol′. 25 July: Czechoslovak forces capture Ekaterinburg. 29 July: Compulsory military training is introduced in the RSFSR; officers of the old army are ordered to register. 2 August: By invitation of the newly proclaimed Supreme Administration of the Northern Region, under N. V. Chaikovskii, some 1,500 British, American, and French forces disembark at Arkhangel′sk. 3–10 August: 12,000 Japanese and a small British force land at Vladivostok. 3–25 August: A Red Army offensive operation on the Eastern Front aimed at the liberation of the Volga and Ural regions is unsuccesful. 6–7 August: Czechoslovak and Komuch forces capture Kazan′, before local Soviet forces can evacuate the imperial gold reserves that had been stored there. 7 August–16 November: Workers in the Ural towns of Izhevsk and Votkinsk rise against the Bolsheviks. 9–20 August: Lieutenant-General A. P. Vostrosablin leads Soviet forces’ defense of the fortress of Kushka (Serhetabat) against forces of the anti-Bolshevik Transcaspian government. 10 August: Responding to a call for assistance from the Ashkhabad Committee, British and Indian troops under the command of General W. Malleson (Norperforce) cross into Transcaspia from northern Persia. 11 August–12 November: Terek Cossack forces led by G. F. Bicherakhov conduct a 100-day siege of Groznyi before overcoming its Soviet defenders. 14 August: Dunsterforce enters Baku. 15–18 August: The Volunteer Army finally captures Ekaterinodar. 26 August: The Volunteer Army captures Novorossiisk, gaining access to the Black Sea. 27 August: Supplementary agreements to the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk are signed in Berlin; Soviet Russia agrees to pay 6 trillion marks in compensation to Germany. 30 August: F. E. Kaplan, alleged to be an SR terrorist, shoots at Lenin, hitting him twice, as he leaves a meeting at the Mikhelson factory in Moscow. M. S. Uritskii, head of the Petrograd Cheka, is assassinated by an officer cadet with connections to the SRs (Leonid Kannegeiser). 31 August: A Cheka-led mob enters the British embassy in Petrograd; Captain F. N. A. Cromie, the British naval attaché, is killed. 31 August–4 September: British agent Robert Bruce Lockhart and others implicated in the “Lockhart Plot” are arrested in Moscow. 20 August: Czechoslovak forces clear the last Red troops from the Trans-Siberian Railway near Irkutsk. 2 September: The Revvoensovet of the Republic is created, headed by Trotsky, and post of main commander (commander in chief) is established, first occupied by I. I. Vācietis. The RSFSR is declared to be a “single armed camp.” 5 September: The Sovnarkom decree “On Red Terror” grants sweeping powers to the Cheka, which immediately executes hundreds of prisoners and hostages. 5 September–28 February 1919: A Red Army strategic offensive operation against the Czechoslovak Legion, the People’s Army of Komuch, and White formations on the Eastern Front is aimed at the capture of the Volga–Kama and Urals regions and the establishment of links with the Turkestan Soviet Republic. 6–9 September: A military coup, organized by Captain G. E. Chaplin, is launched at Arkhangel′sk against the Supreme Administration of the Northern Region. 8–23 September: Representatives of Komuch, the Provisional Siberian Government, and other anti-Bolshevik organizations gather at Ufa (the Ufa State Conference) and, under pressure from Allied agents and the Union for the Regeneration of Russia, agree to the establishment of a coalition Provisional All-Russian Government (the Directory). 10–12 September: Red forces, under the personal direction of Trotsky, recapture Kazan′, Vol′sk, and Simbirsk, the first major victories of the Red Army. 14–15 September: The advance of the Turkish Army of Islam forces Dunsterforce to abandon Baku. Before regular Turkish forces can enter the city, some 9,000 Armenians are massacred by local Azeris and Turkish irregulars in the “September Days.” 14 September–8 October: Offensive operations of the 1st and 4th Red Armies and the Volga Military Flotilla result in the capture of Syzran′, Samara, and other Volga cities. 16 September: The Order of the Red Banner is established. 19–22 September: Japanese forces occupy Blagoveshchensk and extend control along the entire Amur branch of the Trans-Siberian Railway. 20 September: The Twenty-Six Commissars (the former leaders of the Baku Commune) are executed between the stations of Pereval and Akhcha-Kuyma (on the Transcaspian Railway). 25 September: The British government approves the dispatch to anti-Bolshevik forces in Russia of equipment for 100,000 men. (A further consignment for another 100,000 was agreed to on 6 December 1918.) October: The Whites’ South-Western (from December 1918 Independent Orenburg, from May 1919 Independent Southern) Army is formed. In northwest Russia, with German support, the Independent Pskov Volunteer Corps is formed. 2–3 October: The British agent Robert Bruce Lockhart leaves Moscow for Finland, the British government having agreed to the release and repatriation of his Soviet equivalent in London, M. M. Litvinov. 7 October: The Provisional Government of the Northern Region is created at Arkhangel′sk. 8 October: After a lengthy illness, General Alekseev dies at Ekaterinodar. The 5th Red Army captures Samara. 14 October: General Ironside succeeds General Poole as commander of the Allied forces in North Russia; by the end of October these consist 6,330 British, 5,200 Americans, 1,700 French, and 2,700 Russians. 15 October: Vice Admiral V. M. Al′tfater is named as the first commander of all naval forces of the RSFSR. 18 October: Lenin is persuaded by Trotsky to recall Stalin from Tsaritsyn; Trotsky is incensed that, during the “Tsaritsyn affair,” Stalin and his associates in the town have resisted the centralization of the Red Army and have refused to cooperate with military specialists—namely, the commander in chief of the Southern Front, General P. P. Sytin. Sovnarkom formally abolishes workers’ control in industry. 28 October: The Czechoslovak National Council, in Prague, proclaims the independence of Czechoslovakia; the disintegration and collapse of Austria-Hungary begins. 29 October: The command of the Czechoslovak Legion in Russia orders a general withdrawal from the Volga front. 30 October: An Allied–Turkish armistice is signed at Mudros, on the island of Lemnos. 1 November: British and Indian forces assist troops of the Ashkhabad Committee in capturing the oasis of Merv from Red forces of the Tashkent Soviet. 1–4 November: As Ukrainian troops of the Austro-Hungarian Army (the Ukrainian Sich Riflemen) seize the city (1 November), the Western Ukrainian People’s Republic is proclaimed at L′viv (L′vov). 1 November–16 July 1919: The Ukrainian–Polish War begins in Galicia (Western Ukraine). 8 November: The Military Academy of the Red Army opens. 11 November: The Allied–German armistice effectively brings an end to the First World War. Romanian forces occupy Bukovina. 13 November: VTsIK announces the annulment of the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk. The Red Army begins to advance into Ukraine, Belorussia, and the Baltic provinces. 14 November: The British War Cabinet agrees to send arms and ammunition to Denikin and to grant de facto recognition to the Ufa Directory, which has now moved to Omsk. A British fleet will also be sent into the Baltic to help the Baltic states establish their independence. 17 November: German forces begin to withdraw from occupied areas of the former Russian Empire. 2,000 British and Indian troops, under General Thompson, reoccupy Baku. 17–18 November: A coup at Omsk unseats the Ufa Directory and names Admiral A. V. Kolchak as “Supreme Ruler and Commander-in-Chief of all Russian Land and Sea Forces.” 18 November: Tautas Padome (the Latvian National Council), at Riga, proclaims the Latvian Provisional Government under Kārlis Ulmanis. 19 November: The Estonian National Council (the Maapäev) returns to power as Estonia affirms its independence. 20 November: Denikin’s forces crush the Red Army of the North Caucasus near Stavropol′, beginning a process that will bring all of the North Caucasus under White control by February 1919. Red forces capture Pskov. The Provisional Workers’ and Peasants’ Government of Ukraine is established; the second Bolshevik invasion of Ukraine begins. 22 November: Polish forces capture L′viv (Lwów); the West Ukrainian People’s Republic moves its capital to Stanislau (Stanyslaviv). 22–29 November: The Red Army moves into Estonia and captures Narva; the Estonian Workers’ Commune is established under Jaan Anvelt. 23–27 November: Allied forces land at Novorossiisk, Sevastopol′, and Odessa. 24 November: A British division under General G. T. Forestier-Walker lands at Batumi and begins establishing control of the Baku–Batumi railway. 30 November: The Council of Worker and Peasant Defense is created in Moscow. VTsIK repeals the 14 June 1918 ban on Menshevik participation in Soviet institutions, following that party’s expression of conditional support for Soviet power. November–January 1919: In the wake of German withdrawals, the 7th Red Army and other Soviet forces occupy Belorussia and parts of the Baltic region. 2 December: Sovnarkom votes to disband the Committees of the Village Poor. 6 December: Red forces capture Dvinsk. 7–31 December: The Georgian–Armenian War erupts over control of the provinces of Lori and Javakheti and the Borchalo district. 8 December: Sovnarkom recognizes the Estonian Soviet Republic (proclaimed on 29 November), which will collapse the following month. The Communist Party of Lithuania establishes a Soviet government at Vilnius. 10 December: Soviet forces capture Minsk. 12 December: A Royal Navy squadron under Rear Admiral E. A. Sinclair reaches Revel (Tallinn) and delivers weapons to Estonian nationalist forces. 12–14 December: The Skoropadskii regime in Kiev collapses, and the Directory of the reestablished Ukrainian National Republic is formed. 17–24 December: As German forces withdraw from the city, some 1,800 French troops land at Odessa—the first contingent of a 60,000-strong army of occupation (including also Greek, Polish, Senegalese, and Algerian detachments) that will soon occupy the Black Sea coast from Bessarabia to Kherson. 24 December: Red forces capture Tartu. 24–25 December: Kolchak’s Northern Army captures Perm′. 26–27 December: Royal Navy vessels off Revel (Tallinn) capture the Red cruiser Spartak. On board is the head of the Red Fleet, F. F. Raskol′nikov, who is taken to London. 29–31 December: Red forces recapture Ufa and Sterlitamak.

1919 January: The Whites’ Northern Corps is formed in Estonia. The Whites’ Western Army is formed in Siberia. A counterattack by the Estonian Army, reinforced by Finnish, Danish, and Swedish volunteers, drives invading Soviet forces back to Narva. 1 January: The Belorussian SSR is formed. 3–5 January: The Red Army occupies Riga (establishing a Soviet government under Pēteris Stučka) and Vil′na (establishing a Soviet government under Vincas Kapsukas). The Latvian Provisional Government flees to Anglo–German protection at Libau (Liepāja); the Lithuanian Provisional Government flees to Kaunas. 3 January–16 March: Soviet forces advance on the Ukrainian Front, capturing Khar′kov (3 January), where a new Soviet government is proclaimed under Cristian Rakovski (28 January); Kiev (4–6 February); and eventually, most of left-bank Ukraine, and establishing bridgeheads on the right bank of the Dnepr. 5–15 January: The Spartacist uprising in Berlin fails. 8 January: The Armed Forces of South Russia is created, uniting the Volunteer Army with the Don (and subsequently the Kuban and Terek) Cossacks, with General Denikin as commander in chief. 13 January: General E. K. Miller arrives at Arkhangel′sk and assumes the post of Governor-General of the Northern Region. N. D. Chaikovskii subsequently leaves North Russia (23 January) to join the Russian Political Conference in Paris. 14 January: A congress of the National Russian Committee at Vyborg selects General N. N. Iudenich as commander of White forces in northwest Russia. 18 January: The Paris Peace Conference opens. 22 January: The Allies broadcast an invitation to all warring parties in Russia to meet for peace talks in Turkey (the “Prinkipo Proposal”). The Act of Zluka proclaims union of the Ukrainian National Republic and the West Ukrainian People’s Republic. 24 January: A circular from the Orgbiuro of the Bolshevik Central Committee calls for mass terror against Cossacks implicated in attacks on Soviet power. Red forces drive Dutov’s Orenburg Cossacks from Orenburg, reestablishing rail communications with Red forces in Central Asia. January–March: The Red Army’s advance on the Southern Front results in the defeat of the Don Army and the capture of the important agricultural regions around the Don and parts of the northern Donbass. 4–6 February: The Red Army captures Kiev. 10 February: White forces commanded by General Wrangel capture the Terek capital, Vladikavkaz. 11 February: S. V. Petliura becomes head of the Ukrainian Directory. 14 February: As German forces withdraw, Red Army and Polish units clash at Bereza Kartuska (Biaroza)—the beginning (or at least a precursor of) the Soviet–Polish War. 15 February: Krasnov resigns as ataman of the Don Cossacks. A. F. Bogaevskii is elected to replace him. 16 February: The formation of the joint Lithuanian-Belorussian Soviet Republic (Litbel; dissolved 25 August 1919) prompts Polish occupation (20 February) of Brest-Litovsk, Białystok, and other border cities. 18 February: Ukrainian partisan forces under Nykyfor Hryhoriiv ally with the Red Army. 24 February: Estonia is cleared of Red forces by the Estonian national army with the aid of the Whites’ Northern Corps. 2–6 March: The First Congress of the (Communist) Third International (the Komintern) meets in Moscow. 2–10 March: Hryhoriiv’s partisans clear Kherson province of all French and other interventionist forces before capturing Nikolaev (12–15 March) from a stranded German garrison and advancing on Odessa. 5 March: The Inter-Allied Railway Committee is established at Harbin to oversee the running of the Trans-Siberian line. 8 March: The American Bullitt mission arrives in Russia to investigate the terms on which the Soviet regime would treat with its enemies. 10–11 March: A further Don Cossack uprising against Soviet rule begins. 13 March: Admiral Kolchak’s Russian Army launches its Spring Offensive, moving across the Urals toward the Volga. 14–16 March: Kolchak’s Western Army captures Ufa. 16 March: The Bolshevik Central Committee decides on repressive measures against the Don Cossacks (“de-Cossackization”). 17 March–16 June: A Red Army offensive on the Ukrainian Front captures most of Ukraine and Crimea. 18–23 March: The 8th Congress of the RKP(b) meets in Moscow. It adopts a new party program and reorganizes the Central Committee (through establishing within it the Politbiuro, the Orgbiuro, and the Secretariat), but sees attacks on the party leadership from the Military Opposition and the Democratic Centralists. 21 March: A Communist regime under Béla Kun is established in Hungary. (Overthrown on 1 August 1919.) 23 March: An agreement is signed between Soviet Russia and the Bashkir leadership, establishing a Bashkir ASSR within the RSFSR. April: In Moscow the Tactical Center is created, aimed at uniting the activities of other anti-Bolshevik underground organizations (the National Center, the Union for the Regeneration of Russia, etc.). 2 April: French and other Allied forces begin to evacuate Odessa, which is occupied by Hryhoriiv’s partisans on 6 April. General Malleson’s troops begin to evacuate Transcaspia. 3–7 April: Soviet forces enter Crimea across the Perekop isthmus and capture Simferopol′ (10 April), Evpatoriia (10 April), Yalta (12 April), and Sevastopol′ (29 April). 7 April: The Bavarian Soviet Republic is proclaimed in Munich. (It collapses on 5 May.) Kolchak’s forces capture Sterlitamak, Belebei, and Menzelinsk. 8 April: French and Greek forces abandon Odessa. 9 April: The Revvoensovet of the Republic establishes a political section (converted on 26 May into the Political Administration of the Red Army, PUR) to control political commissars. 11 April: A Sovnarkom decree is issued on the creation of forced labor camps. 15 April: Kolchak’s Western Army captures Buguruslan. 16 April: General von der Goltz overthrows the Ulmanis government in Latvia and installs the pro-German regime of Andrievs Niedra. 19 April: Soviet forces are driven from Vil′na (Vilnius, Wilno) by the Polish army. A series of mutinies on French vessels in the Black Sea begins. 28 April: French troops evacuate Sevastopol′, where a workers’ soviet had been established to administer the city on 19 April. 28 April–20 June: A strategic counteroffensive of Soviet forces on the Eastern Front pushes Kolchak’s forces back 250–300 miles to the Urals, capturing Ufa and other cities. 30 April: General Miller and the White government in North Russia recognize the supreme authority of Admiral Kolchak. 1 May and 3 May: Soviet Russia and Soviet Ukraine issue ultimatums demanding the withdrawal of Romanian forces from Bessarabia and Bukovina. 1–21 May: Allied forces advance southward from Murmansk to the northern shores of Lake Onega. 5 May: On Trotsky’s insistence, the commander of the Red Eastern Front, S. S. Kamenev, is dismissed for insisting on pursuing Kolchak’s forces into Siberia and for refusing to release troops for transfer to the Southern Front. Kamenev is subsequently reinstated by Lenin (29 May). 7 May–June: Hryhoriiv’s partisans are at the center of a major rebellion against Soviet power in Ukraine, leading to the collapse of the Southern Front against Denikin. 8 May: The Central Ruthenian People’s Council declares union with Czechoslovakia. 13 May: Iudenich’s 25,000-strong North-West Russian Army launches an advance toward Petrograd from its base in Estonia. 22–23 May: German, Russian, and Latvian forces under von der Goltz drive the Red Army from Riga and southern Latvia. Red forces recapture Merv. 25 May: Estonian and White forces capture Pskov (Pihkva). 26 May: An Allied note to Kolchak offers conditional de facto recognition to the Omsk government as the government of Russia. Kolchak’s reply (4 June) is deemed sufficiently positive to warrant an additional Allied note (12 June) promising further assistance, but there is no overt statement of recognition. 26 May–10 June: Some 8,000 British troops arrive in North Russia to relieve garrisons there. 30 May: Nestor Makhno resigns his command in the Red Army. A few days later (2 June) he is denounced as a kulak and a bandit by Trotsky. June: Allied forces begin to evacuate North Russia. 1 June: As the Red Army storms the Urals, Admiral Kolchak announces the creation of a single Russian Army in Siberia, organized into a new Eastern Front. The VTsIK decree “On the Unification of the Soviet Republics of Russia, Ukraine, Latvia, Lithuania and Belorussia for the Struggle against World Imperialism” centralizes control of military and economic affairs in the commissariats of the RSFSR. 1–28 June: Red Army defensive operations take place on the Narva–Pskov front. 5 June: The Landeswehr War begins with German attack on Estonian armored trains. 8 June: Soviet authorities declare Makhno and his followers “outside the law.” 9 June: Ufa is recaptured by Red forces. Kolchak’s forces retreat beyond the Urals. Evhen Petrushevych is appointed dictator of the Western Ukrainian People’s Republic. 10 June: Kolchak confirms General Iudenich as Commander of All Land and Sea Forces on the North-West Front. 10–17 June: Anti-Bolshevik mutinies and uprisings are suppressed at a series of fortresses around the Gulf of Finland (Krasnaia Gorka, Seraia Loshad′, Obruchev, etc.), but Red forces rally, and Iudenich is forced to retreat. 12 June: Denikin formally subordinates the command of the Armed Forces of South Russia to Kolchak. 16 June: A Slovak Soviet Republic is established by Hungarian Red Guards. (It collapses on 7 July 1919.) 17–18 June: British naval forces under Lieutenant (later Commodore) Agar attack the Reds’ Baltic Fleet on coastal motor boats; the Soviet cruiser Oleg is torpedoed and sunk off Krasnaia Gorka. 18–20 June: The 9th SR Party Conference in Moscow resolves to cease armed struggle against the Soviet government. 19 June: The Red Army begins offensive operations to drive White forces back from Petrograd. 21–23 June: In the decisive battle of the Landeswehr War (Battle of Võnnu), von der Goltz is defeated by the Estonian Army and the Latvian Northern Corps and is subsequently forced to abandon Riga (5 July). 21 June–7 January 1920: A strategic offensive of Red forces on the Eastern Front leads to the annihilation of Kolchak’s forces and the establishment of Soviet power in the Urals and across Siberia. 24 June–2 July: White forces commanded by General V. Z. Mai-Maevskii capture Khar′kov (27 June); Tsaritsyn is captured by General Wrangel’s Kuban Army (30 June–2 July). Ekaterinoslav and Crimea are also cleared of Red forces. 28 June: The Treaty of Versailles is signed in Paris. 30 June: Kolchak’s Northern Army abandons Perm′. 1 July: Iudenich’s Northern Army Corps is renamed the North-West Army. Soviet troops reoccupy Perm′ and Kungur. 3 July: General Denikin issues his “Moscow Directive.” S. S. Kamenev is confirmed as Vācietis’s replacement as main commander of the Red Army. The resignation from the Politburo and the War Commissariat of Vācietis’s champion, Trotsky, is refused. 8 July: Kolchak dismisses General Radola Gajda from command of the Northern Army. 11–15 July: Soviet forces capture Ashkhabad. 14 July: Soviet forces capture Ekaterinburg. 19 July: The Politbiuro votes to establish separate Georgian, Armenian, and Azerbaijani SSRs. 25–27 July: A counterattack by Kolchak’s forces at Cheliabinsk collapses, and the Whites fall back in disorder. 27 July: Ataman Hryhoriiv is shot dead during a parley with Makhno. August: The West-Siberian Partisan Army is created under E. M. Mamantov. 3 August: Red forces capture Cheliabinsk, taking 15,000 White prisoners. 5 August: The British Military Mission in Siberia is informed from London that no further assistance will be offered to Kolchak, it having been decided to concentrate support on the forces of Denikin and Iudenich. 10 August: K. K. Mamontov’s 4th Don Cavalry Corps launches an extensive offensive (the Mamontov raid) in the rear of Red forces on the Southern Front, capturing several major towns (including Tambov, 18–21 August, and Voronezh, 11 September). General Ironside’s forces launch an offensive south of Arkhangel′sk to disrupt the opposing Reds in preparation for the withdrawal of Allied forces from the region. 14 August: On the initiative of British officers in the region, a North-West Russian Government is formed at Tallinn by White forces. 14 August–12 September: Denikin’s forces advance on a broad front toward Kursk and Orel. 14 August–14 September: The Red Army’s Aktiubinsk offensive operation smashes Kolchak’s Southern and Urals Armies and establishes contact with the Turkestan ASSR. 18 August: British naval forces attack the harbor at Kronshtadt; the Red battleship Andrei Pervozvannyi is sunk. 19 August: British forces evacuate Baku. 23–24 August: Denikin’s forces capture Odessa. 25 August: Litbel dissolves following the complete occupation of its territories by Polish forces. 26 August: Soviet forces capture Pskov, as Estonian forces that have quarreled with Iudenich abandon it. 30 August: On the Turkestan Front, Red forces capture Orsk. Ukrainian nationalist forces under Petliura occupy Kiev. 31 August–2 September: White forces drive Petliura’s forces from Kiev. In Warsaw, Petliura’s representatives conclude an armistice with Poland. 5 September: The Russo–German Western Volunteer Army is created under General P. R. Bermondt-Avalov. 13 September: Troops of the 1st Red Army make contact with Red forces on the Aktiubinsk front, reestablishing links between Central Asia and Soviet Russia. 18–19 September: Cheka forces arrest some 1,000 “counterrevolutionaries” in Moscow. On 23 September the press lists the names of 67 of them who have been executed. 20 September: Troops of the Volunteer Army capture Kursk. 26 September: As Denikin’s forces approach, the Bolshevik Central Committee decides to create the Committee for the Defense of Moscow. Makhno’s Revolutionary Insurrectionary Army of Ukraine defeats Denikin’s forces at Peregonovka and begins a drive eastward across Ukraine, severing the supply lines of the AFSR. 26–27 September: Allied troops evacuate Arkhangel′sk. 28 September–20 October: Iudenich’s forces advance from Estonia to the outskirts of Petrograd. 30 September: The 3rd Kuban Corps, under General A. G. Shkuro, captures Voronezh. 8 October–14 November: Bermondt-Avalov’s attempts to capture Riga and Libau are defeated by Latvian forces, with naval support from the British and French. 11 October–18 November: A decisive Red counteroffensive on the Southern Front halts Denikin’s advance and places the strategic initiative in the hands of the Soviet command. 12 October: The last British troops leave Murmansk. 13–14 October: Denikin’s forces capture Orel, 200 miles from Moscow. 16–21 October: Iudenich’s forces capture Gatchina, Tsarskoe Selo, and the Pulkovo heights on the outskirts of Petrograd. 19–20 October: Red forces recapture Orel. British troops complete the evacuation of Transcaucasia, leaving only a small garrison at Batumi (which withdraws on 7–9 July 1920). 21 October–early December: A Red counteroffensive from Petrograd, organized in person by Trotsky, smashes Iudenich’s North-West Army and drives it back into Estonia. 24 October: Red forces recapture Voronezh. 28 October: As Red forces capture Petropavlovsk, Kolchak orders the removal of his government to Irkutsk but refuses to surrender Omsk. General M. K. Diterikhs resigns as commander in chief in protest and is replaced by General K. V. Sakharov. October–December: An extensive and extremely disruptive raid in the rear of Denikin’s forces is conducted by Makhno’s Revolutionary-Insurgent Army of Ukraine (capturing Guliai-Pole, Berdiansk, Nikopol′, Mariupol′, Melitopol′, Aleksandrovsk, Ekaterinoslav, and other cities); the Armed Forces of South Russia’s retreat threatens to turn into a rout. 2 November–10 January 1920: The Urals–Gur′ev offensive of Red forces smashes the Urals Army of General V. S. Tol′stov and captures the Urals oblast′. 11 November: The Estonian cabinet votes to end support to Russian White forces. 13 November: The command of the Czechoslovak Legion issues a memorandum demanding that the Allies evacuate the legion from Russia. 13–14 November: Forces of the 5th and 3rd Red Armies capture Kolchak’s capital, Omsk. Kolchak and his government flee eastward by train. 16 November–January 1920: Troops of Iudenich’s North-West Army are interned in Estonia. 17 November: By order of the Revvoensovet of the Republic the 1st Cavalry Army is created, commanded by S. M. Budennyi. Red forces recapture Kursk. An anti-Kolchak uprising at Vladivostok (the Gajda putsch) is crushed. 25 November: Maxim Litvinov meets a British representative (James O’Grady) at Copenhagen to discuss the exchange of prisoners of war. 19 November–10 January 1920: A Red Army offensive on the Southern and South-East Fronts smashes the AFSR. Soviet forces capture left-bank Ukraine, the Don oblast′, and the Donbass and reach the approaches to the North Caucasus. 1–24 December: Bermondt-Avalov’s Western Volunteer Army is interned in Latvia. 2 December: Petliura’s representatives in Warsaw sign an agreement accepting Polish occupation of Eastern Galicia (Western Ukraine). 8 December: Denikin appoints General P. N. Wrangel commander of the Volunteer Army, but unable to face abandoning the Don territory, refuses to accept his advice to withdraw all White forces into Crimea. The Allies define the eastern border of Poland (the Curzon Line). 11 December: General V. O. Kappel′ is named commander in chief of Kolchak’s Russian Army as his predecessor, General Sakharov, is arrested. 12 December: Red forces recapture Khar′kov, which is again proclaimed the capital of the Ukrainian SSR. In Siberia, partisan forces lay siege to Krasnoiarsk and other cities, impeding the retreat of Kolchak’s forces. 16–17 December: Soviet forces recapture Kiev. 23 December: Kolchak’s train is held up by Czechoslovak forces at Nizhneudinsk to allow their own echelons to pass. 24 December: Denikin dismisses Wrangel as commander of the Volunteer Army, accusing the latter of scheming against his leadership of the AFSR. 24–25 December: An anti-Kolchak rising is staged at Irkutsk, organized by the Political Center, which gains control of much of the city. 29 December: Red forces capture Tomsk. 30 December: Red forces enter Ekaterinoslav.

1920 3 January: Soviet forces recapture Tsaritsyn. 3–5 January: Polish and Latvian forces drive the Red Army from Dvinsk (Daugavpils). 4 January: Kolchak resigns as supreme ruler, passing authority in South Russia to Denikin and in the Far East to Ataman Semenov. 5 January: The Political Center assumes power at Irkutsk. 5–10 January: Azov, Taganrog, Novocherkassk, and Rostov-on-Don fall to the Red Army. 7–8 January: Red forces pursuing Kolchak, aided by local partisans, capture Krasnoiarsk. 11 January: Great Britain and Italy offer de facto recognition to the independent governments of Georgia and Azerbaijan (and, on 18 January 1920, Armenia). 12 January–1 April: The U.S. forces are withdrawn from Vladivostok. 15 January: Czechoslovak forces hand Kolchak over to the Political Center at Irkutsk. The Allies end the economic blockade of Soviet Russia. 17 January–7 April: Red forces on the Caucasian (formerly South-East) Front inflict decisive defeats on Denikin’s forces and capture the North Caucasus. 20–22 January: Control of Irkutsk (and the imprisoned Kolchak) passes from the Political Center to a Bolshevik Revolutionary Committee. 22 January: The Bolshevik Central Committee approves Trotsky’s theses on the militarization of labor and the creation of Labor Armies. 27 January: General Wrangel resigns from his post in Denikin’s forces and travels to Constantinople on a British warship. February: The Caucasian Bureau of the RKP(b) (Kavbiuro) is created. 1 February: An armistice is signed between Latvia and Soviet Russia. 1–2 February: Red forces capture Khiva, liquidate the independent Khanate of Khiva, and drive Junaïd-khan into the Karakum desert. The Soviet–Estonian peace treaty, signed at Tartu (Dorpat), brings an end to the Estonian War of Independence. 5 February: Soviet forces capture Mariupol′ and Taganrog. 7 February: Red Army troops enter Odessa. A Soviet–Czechoslovak armistice signed at Kuitun facilitates the evacuation of the legion through Irkutsk to the Far East. Kolchak and his last prime minister, V. N. Pepeliaev, are executed at Irkutsk. 10 February: The Red Army’s capture of Krasnovodsk completes the consolidation of Soviet power in Transcaspia. 12 February: An Anglo–Soviet agreement on the exchange of prisoners is signed at Copenhagen. 19–21 February: Some 1,000 White soldiers and civilians evacuate Arkhangel′sk, as the city is captured by the Red Army; 1,500 more Whites, under General V. S. Skobel′tsyn, cross into Finland. 1 March: The last contingent of Czechoslovak troops leaves Irkutsk. 7–8 March: Red Army forces enter Irkutsk. 13–14 March: Red forces capture Murmansk. 17 March: Red forces capture Ekaterinodar. 23 March: A White military council at Yalta proclaims General P. N. Wrangel Denikin’s successor as commander in chief of the AFSR. 27 March: Red forces enter Novorossiisk, as, amid chaotic scenes, 35,000 White forces are evacuated from the port to Crimea, leaving tens of thousands more civilian and military refugees behind. 29 March–5 April: At the 9th Congress of the RKP(b), the Council of Worker and Peasant Defense is transformed into the Council of Labor and Defense, while Trotsky’s plans for the militarization of labor come under attack from the party left and future members of the Workers’ Opposition. 1 April: General Graves and the last contingent of U.S. troops leave Vladivostok. 6 April: The Far Eastern Republic is founded at Verkhneudinsk, with A. M. Krasnoshchekov as its first president and minister for foreign affairs. Red forces land at Fort Aleksandrovsk, on the eastern shore of the Caspian. 4–6 April: Japanese troops occupy Vladivostok and much of the Maritime Province. 16 April: Soviet–Latvian peace talks begin in Moscow. 17 April: Marshal Józef Piłsudski orders the Polish Army onto the offensive, signaling the active phase of the Soviet–Polish War. 21–24 April: A series of political and military agreements is signed between Petliura’s representatives in Warsaw and the Polish government (the Treaty of Warsaw); the latter recognizes Ukrainian independence under Petliura, while the former agree to Polish command of Ukrainian forces west of the Dnepr and renounce all Ukrainian claims to Eastern Galicia (Western Ukraine). 25 April: Polish troops enter Ukraine. 26 April: The Khorezm (Khwarazm) People’s Soviet Republic is proclaimed at Khiva. 27 April: The Bolshevik organization in Baku begins an uprising against the Democratic Republic of Azerbaijan. 27–28 April: Red Army forces enter Azerbaijan and overthrow the independent Republic of Azerbaijan, which is distracted by a war with Armenia over Karabakh. The Soviet Socialist Republic of Azerbaijan is proclaimed. 6–8 May: Polish and Ukrainian forces enter Kiev. 7 May: A peace treaty is signed between the RSFSR and the Georgian Democratic Republic; Moscow recognizes Georgian independence and promises to refrain from interference in its internal affairs. 9 May: Soviet–Lithuanian peace negotiations open in Moscow. 11 May: The remaining elements of the AFSR that have gathered in Crimea are renamed the Russian Army by General Wrangel. 17–18 May: Red forces commanded by F. F. Raskol′nikov land at Enzeli (Bandar-e Anzali) in northern Persia and capture the White Caspian Fleet from its British custodians. 25–27 May: Partisan forces at Nikolaevsk-on-Amur under Triapitsyn massacre the Japanese garrison in the town (the “Nikolaevsk incident”). The Japanese retaliate by strengthening their control of the Maritime Province and occupying northern Sakhalin. 26 May–17 June: The Red Army’s Kiev Offensive operation on the South-West Front drives Polish and Ukrainian forces from much of Ukraine. 31 May: L. B. Krasin, the People’s Commissar for Foreign Trade, is received by Lloyd George in London. June: Soviet forces march on Resht in Persia and assist in the establishment of the Soviet Republic of Gīlān (which survives until October 1921). The Bolshevik North Caucasus Bureau instigates an unsuccessful rising in North Ossetia against Georgian rule. 5–7 June: Budennyi’s cavalry and other Soviet units penetrate Polish lines to capture Berdichev and Zhitomir to the west of Kiev. 6–7 June: General Wrangel’s forces break out of Crimea into the Northern Tauride. 10–12 June: Soviet forces commanded by A. I. Egorov recapture Kiev as the Poles withdraw. 12 June: Soviet–Finnish peace negotiations begin at Tartu. 27 June: The final 625 men of the British Military Mission in South Russia (once more than 2,000 strong) are withdrawn, soon to be followed by the French. 1 July: Wrangel sends an emissary to Makhno, seeking an alliance against the Bolsheviks; the emissary is executed (July 22), and Makhno puts out feelers to Moscow for joint action against Wrangel. 4–23 July: A Red offensive on the Western Front drives the Poles back through Belorussia. Minsk is captured on 11 July, Vil′na on 14 July. On the Galician Front, Budennyi’s cavalry captures Rovno on 10 July. 7–9 July: British troops evacuate Batumi. 8 July: The Galician Soviet Socialist Republic is established at Ternopol′ (Ternopil′) under V. P. Zatonskii. (It is dissolved 21 September 1920.) The United States lifts its trade embargo against Soviet Russia. 12 July: A Soviet–Lithuanian peace treaty is signed (Treaty of Moscow), recognizing Lithuanian independence and Vilnius as Lithuanian. 14 July: Red Army forces under G. D. Gai enter Vilnius. 15 July: A treaty (the Gongota Agreement) is signed between the Japanese Army and the Far Eastern Republic, recognizing the latter’s sovereignty. Japanese forces subsequently withdraw from eastern Transbaikalia and the Chinese Eastern Railway zone as far eastwards as Harbin (17–26 August). 16 July: A plenum of the Bolshevik Central Committee decides to continue the offensive against Poland, effectively endorsing an invasion of that country. 19 July: White forces of Wrangel’s Russian Army land on the Taman peninsula and push into the Kuban. 19 July–7 August: The Second Congress of the Komintern adopts the “Twenty-one Conditions” for admittance to the organization, which have been prepared by Lenin to exclude any party not subservient to Moscow. 23 July–16 August: The Warsaw Offensive on the Western Front brings Red forces to the gates of the Polish capital. 30 July: A Provisional Polish Revolutionary Committee (Polrevkom), headed by Julian Marchlewski, Feliks Dzierżyński, and others, is established at Białystok in expectation of a revolution in Poland. 10 August: Soviet representatives in Tiflis sign an agreement with the Armenian government, recognizing Armenian independence; Red Army forces are invited to occupy for two years the territories disputed by Armenia and Azerbaijan. 11 August: The Soviet–Latvian peace treaty is signed at Riga. The French government offers de facto recognition to the Wrangel regime. 14 August: In the Kuban, 7,000 of Wrangel’s troops, under S. G. Ulagai, begin an advance toward Ekaterinodar but are defeated; they are forced to evacuate the region over 1–7 September. 14–16 August: In “the Miracle on the Vistula,” Polish forces push the Red Army back from the gates of Warsaw. 15–19 August: A peasant uprising in Tambov guberniia, led by A. S. Antonov, begins. 23 August: Polish forces recapture Białystok. 24 August–2 September: The last units of the Czechoslovak Legion are evacuated from Vladivostok. 26 August: Alash Orda is defeated by Soviet forces; the Kirgiz (Kazakh) ASSR is proclaimed. 1–8 September: The First Congress of the Peoples of the East opens in Baku to denounce (mainly British) imperialism in Asia and Africa. 2–6 September: A Bolshevik-inspired coup in Bukhara overthrows the emir and facilitates the entry of Red troops into the city. 6 September: Wrangel’s forces cross to the right bank of the Dnepr at Kakhovka. 9 September: Wrangel’s forces capture Aleksandrovsk. 13 September: A treaty of alliance is signed between Soviet Russia and the Khorezm People’s Republic. 21 September: The first meaningful Soviet–Polish peace talks open in Riga. The Revvoensovet of the Republic places M. V. Frunze in command of the newly designated Southern Front facing Wrangel. 21 September–27 October: Frunze’s forces conduct defensive operations to disrupt Wrangel’s plans to occupy the right bank of the Dnepr and link up with Polish and Ukrainian forces to the west. October–February 1922: Red forces battle with and eventually suppress a Finnish-aided peasant rebellion in Karelia. 8 October: The Bukharan People’s Soviet Republic is established. 10–15 October: Agreements are signed between Makhno and Soviet representatives at Khar′kov, according to which the Revolutionary-Insurgent Army of Ukraine will collaborate with the Red Army against Wrangel in return for the release of anarchists from Soviet prisons. 12 October: At Riga, delegations from Soviet Russia, Soviet Ukraine, and Poland agree on an armistice (effective from October 18). 14 October: A Soviet–Finnish agreement is signed at Tartu, by which Moscow confirms its recognition of Finnish independence. Budennyi’s 1st Cavalry Army turns Wrangel’s advance on the Southern Front. 15 October: Polish forces capture Minsk. 20–21 October: Semenov’s forces are driven out of Chita and into Manchuria by partisans loyal to the Far Eastern Republic (FER). The FER transfers its capital to Chita on 22 October. 28 October–3 November: Red forces go on the offensive on the Southern Front, driving Wrangel’s Russian Army out of the Northern Tauride and back into Crimea. 30 October: Turkish forces capture Kars. 7–17 November: With the Perekop offensive, Red forces on the Southern Front break through into Crimea and capture the peninsula. 14–16 November: Red forces capture Simferopol′, Feodosiia, and Sevastopol′. 16 November: Under French protection, 150,000 White soldiers and civilians, including the last units of Wrangel’s Russian Army, are evacuated from Crimea, bound for Constantinople. 26 November: Makhno is again declared to be an outlaw by the Soviet authorities, which begin an extensive drive to capture his supporters across Ukraine. November–early December: Units of the 11th Red Army enter Armenian territory, capture Yerevan (29 November), and overthrow the Democratic Republic of Armenia. 2 December: A peace treaty is signed between Soviet Russia and the Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic, recognizing the independence of Armenia. The Treaty of Alexandropol ends the Turkish–Armenian War. 22–30 December: The Eighth All-Russian Congress of Soviets at Moscow—the last at which SRs and Mensheviks are permitted to stand—is the occasion of bitter disputes over the role of trade unions in the Soviet state.

1921 27 January: Great Britain and France afford de jure recognition to the Democratic Republic of Georgia. 1–3 February: R. F. Ungern von Sternberg’s forces drive the Chinese authorities out of Urga (Ulan Batar); Ungern becomes virtual dictator of Mongolia. 12 February: Soviet forces enter Georgian territory under the pretext of policing the border dispute between Georgia and Armenia. Mid-February–early April: An anti-Bolshevik rising in Armenia briefly drives the Soviet Revolutionary Committee from Yerevan; it is restored to power by the 11th Red Army. 16–25 February: Red forces on the Caucasus Front capture the Georgian capital, Tiflis. The government of the independent Georgian Democratic Republic, under N. N. Zhordaniia, flees first to Batumi (occupied by Turkey on 11 March) and then into exile, as the Georgian SSR is proclaimed. 21 February: Soviet forces occupy Dushanbe, eastern Bukhara, as the emir flees into Afghanistan. 22–28 February: A strike wave occurs in Petrograd, directed against government food supply policies and the militarization of labor. 26 February: A treaty of friendship and cooperation between Persia and the RSFSR is signed in Moscow. 28 February: A treaty of friendship and cooperation between Afghanistan and the RSFSR is signed in Moscow. 28 February–18 March: An uprising of sailors of the Baltic Fleet at the naval base of Kronshtadt, under the slogan “Soviets without Communists,” is crushed after two brutal assaults by forces of the 7th Red Army (commanded by M. N. Tukhachevskii); thousands of rebels are killed in the fighting, and at least 2,000 more are subsequently executed. February–May: Red Army units battle a series of peasant uprisings in Western Siberia. 4 March: A treaty of alliance is signed between Soviet Russia and the Bukharan People’s Soviet Republic. 8–16 March: The 10th Congress of the RKP(b) sees the introduction of the New Economic Policy (NEP) and the “Ban on Factions,” quashing the Workers’ Opposition. 16 March: The Anglo–Soviet Trade Agreement is signed in London. A treaty of friendship and cooperation between Kemalist Turkey and the RSFSR (The Treaty of Brotherhood) is signed in Moscow, granting Turkey sovereignty over extensive territories claimed by Armenia. 17–19 March: Fighting in Batumi between Georgian and Turkish forces ends with the expulsion from the city of the latter, the occupation of the city by the Red Army, and the evacuation of the Georgian government and the British mission attached to it, marking Soviet dominance across all Transcaucasia. 18 March: The Treaty of Riga formally ends the Soviet–Polish War. 21 March: A Sovnarkom decree on the introduction of a tax in kind on agricultural produce signals the end of War Communism and the beginning of the NEP. 7 May: A treaty of alliance (the Treaty of Moscow) is signed between Soviet Russia and the Georgian SSR. 8 May: Transcarpathia is annexed by Czechoslovakia. May–June: Decisive and merciless operations of Red forces under M. N. Tukhachevskii (appointed to head the operation on 27 April) finally crush the rebellion in Tambov province. June: The Reds defeat the remnants of Makhno’s forces in Ukraine. 29 June–22 August: Offensive operations of forces of the Far Eastern Republic, the Mongolian People’s Republic, and the 5th Red Army of the RSFSR capture (on 6 July) Urga (Ulan Bator) and crush the army of Ungern von Sternberg. 8–14 July: Fruitless talks between Soviet Russia and the Armenian Dashnaks are held at Riga. 25 July: As the potential scale of the disaster on the Volga is realized, Maxim Gorky announces that Soviet Russia will accept the offer of famine relief made by Herbert Hoover and the American Relief Association. 20 August: An agreement is signed in Riga between Soviet Russia and the American Relief Administration concerning procedures for famine relief. 28 August: Makhno and the remnants of his army are driven across the border into Romania. August–April 1922: Red forces battle a prolonged anti-Soviet uprising in Gornyi Altai. September: The 1st Cavalry Army battles against insurgents in the North Caucasus. October: There is an outbreak of a major anti-Soviet uprising in eastern Bukhara, led by Enver Pasha. 7 October: An agreement is signed between Soviet Russia and Poland concerning the expulsion from Poland of Boris Savinkov’s Russian Political Committee. 13 October: A treaty of friendship (the Treaty of Kars) is signed between Azerbaijan SSR, Armenian SSR, and Georgian SSR (with the participation of the RSFSR) and Kemelist Turkey. 21 December: White forces capture Khabarovsk from the FER. 22 December: White forces under V. M. Molchanov capture Harbin. 30 December: A Sovnarkom decree is issued on the disbanding of Labor Armies.

1922 January: Red forces crush a Finnish-inspired uprising in Karelia. 5 January: Ten prominent anarchists are expelled from Soviet Russia. 6 February: The Cheka is recast as the Main Political Administration (GPU). 14 February: Khabarovsk is captured by forces of the FER. 23 February: A Sovnarkom decree is issued on the confiscation of church valuables. 12 March: The Transcaucasian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic is formed. 3 April: Stalin is appointed as the first general secretary of the RKP(b). 10 April–19 May: Soviet Russia participates in the Genoa Conference on economic reconstruction in Europe. 16 April: A Russo–German treaty is signed at Rapallo. A secret supplement (signed in Berlin on 29 July) permits Germany to train its forces on Soviet territory, thereby breaching the terms of the Treaty of Versailles. 26 April: The trial of 54 religious leaders begins in Moscow. 25 May: Lenin suffers his first stroke. 8 June–7 August: The trial of members of the SR Central Committee is held in Moscow. 4 August: Enver Pasha is killed by a Red Army patrol near the Afghan border, marking the end of unified (and therefore threatening) Basmachi operations against the Soviet regime. September–November: Some 160 anti-Bolshevik intellectuals are expelled from Soviet Russia on the “Philosophers’ Ships.” 27 September: Japanese forces evacuate Nikolaevsk. 4–25 October: Forces of the Far Eastern Republic crush the army of the Vladivostok Zemstvo government in the Maritime Province. 25 October–1 November: Soviet forces enter Vladivostok, as the last Japanese forces evacuate the city and the Inter-Allied Railway Board is abolished. 14 November: The Far Eastern Republic applies for union with the RSFSR (effectively voting itself out of existence), an appeal that is granted by VTsIK on the following day. 29 December: The treaty on the creation of the USSR unites the Russian and Transcaucasian SFSRs and the Belorussian and Ukrainian SSRs. 30 December: The First Congress of Soviets of the USSR meets in Moscow.

1923 January–17 June: General V. N. Pepeliaev leads a White landing on the shores of the Sea of Okhotsk and an incursion into Iakutia, beginning the Iakutsk Revolt—the final White campaign on Russian soil. 14 March: The Conference of Allied Ambassadors in Paris recognizes the annexation of Eastern Galicia (Western Ukraine) by Poland. 8 May: British Foreign Secretary Lord Curzon delivers an ultimatum to Moscow (the “Curzon note”), threatening to abrogate the Anglo–Soviet Trade Agreement if Soviet Russia does not desist from instigating subversion within the territories of the British Empire. 6 July: The Constitution of the USSR is adopted by the All-Union TsIK (formally confirmed by the Second All-Union Congress of Soviets on 31 January 1924).

1924 21 January: V. I. Lenin dies. 1 February: A note delivered to Moscow by the new Labour government in London recognizes the authorities of the USSR as “the de jure rulers of those territories of the old Russian Empire which acknowledge their authority.” Full diplomatic recognition is subsequently offered by Italy (7 February), Norway (15 February), Austria (25 February), Greece (8 March), Free City of Danzig (13 March), Sweden (15 March), Canada (24 March), China (31 May), Denmark (18 June), Albania (4 July), Mexico (4 August), Hejaz (6 August), Hungary (18 September), and France (28 October). 27–28 August: The anti-Soviet “August Uprising” in Georgia is crushed by the Red Army. As many as 3,000 rebels are killed in the fighting and as many as 10,000–12,000 prisoners and hostages may be executed in reprisals by the Cheka. 25 November: The Mongolian People’s Republic is established.

1925 26 January: L. D. Trotsky is removed as People’s Commissar for Military and Naval Affairs and head of the Revvoensovet of the USSR. He is replaced by M. V. Frunze. 4 April: In accordance with an agreement signed between Soviet and Japanese representatives at Peking (on 20 January 1925), withdrawal is completed of the last remaining interventionist forces on Soviet Russian soil, as Japan evacuates northern Sakhalin.

1926 4 June: The closure of the last active Red front, the Turkestan Front, marks the end of the “Russian” Civil Wars.