The Polish–Soviet War (14 February 1919 – 18 March 1921) was fought primarily between the Second Polish Republic and the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, following World War I and the Russian Revolution. After the collapse of the Central Powers and the Armistice of 11 November 1918, Vladimir Lenin's Soviet Russia annulled the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk and moved forces westward to reclaim the Ober Ost regions abandoned by the Germans. Lenin viewed the newly independent Poland as a critical route for spreading communist revolutions into Europe. Meanwhile, Polish leaders, including Józef Piłsudski, aimed to restore Poland's pre-1772 borders and secure the country's position in the region. Throughout 1919, Polish forces occupied much of present-day Lithuania and Belarus, emerging victorious in the Polish–Ukrainian War. However, Soviet forces regained strength after their victories in the Russian Civil War, and Symon Petliura, leader of the Ukrainian People's Republic, was forced to ally with Piłsudski in 1920 to resist the advancing Bolsheviks. In April 1920, Piłsudski launched the Kiev offensive with the goal of securing favorable borders for Poland. On 7 May, Polish and allied Ukrainian forces captured Kiev, though Soviet armies in the area were not decisively defeated. The offensive lacked local support, and many Ukrainians joined the Red Army rather than Petliura's forces. In response, the Soviet Red Army launched a successful counteroffensive starting in June 1920. By August, Soviet troops had pushed Polish forces back to Warsaw. However, at the decisive Battle of Warsaw (1920), Polish forces achieved an unexpected victory between 12 and 25 August 1920, turning the tide of the war. This battle, often referred to as the "Miracle on the Vistula", is considered one of the most important military triumphs in Polish history. The war ended with a ceasefire on 18 October 1920, and peace negotiations led to the Peace of Riga, signed on 18 March 1921. The treaty divided disputed territories between Poland and Soviet Russia. Poland's eastern border was established about 200 km east of the Curzon Line, securing Polish control over parts of modern-day Ukraine and Belarus. The war resulted in the official recognition of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic and the Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic as Soviet states, undermining Piłsudski's ambitions for an Intermarium federation led by Poland. Despite this, Poland's success at the Battle of Warsaw cemented its position as an important player in Eastern European geopolitics in the interwar period.
== Names and ending dates == The war is known by several names. "Polish–Soviet War" is the most common but other names include "Russo–Polish War" (or "Polish–Russian War") and "Polish–Bolshevik War". This last term (or just "Bolshevik War" (Polish: Wojna bolszewicka)) is most common in Polish sources. In some Polish sources it is also referred to as the "War of 1920" (Polish: Wojna 1920 roku). The ending year of the conflict is variously given as either 1920 or 1921; this confusion stems from the fact that while the ceasefire came into force on 18 October 1920, the official treaty ending the war was signed on 18 March 1921. While the events of late 1918 and 1919 can be described as a border conflict and only in spring 1920 were both sides engaged in an all-out war, the warfare that took place in late April 1920 was an escalation of the fighting that had begun a year and a half earlier.
Background
The war's main territories of contention lie in what is now Ukraine and Belarus. Until the mid-13th century, they formed part of the medieval state of Kievan Rus'. After a period of internal wars and the 1240 Mongol invasion, the lands became objects of expansion for the Kingdom of Poland and for the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. In the first half of the 14th century, the Principality of Kiev and the land between the Dnieper, Pripyat, and Daugava (Western Dvina) rivers became part of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. In 1352, Poland and Lithuania divided the Kingdom of Galicia–Volhynia between themselves. In 1569, in accordance with the terms of the Union of Lublin between Poland and Lithuania, some of the Ukrainian lands passed to the Polish Crown. Between 1772 and 1795, many of the East Slavic territories became part of the Russian Empire in the course of the Partitions of Poland–Lithuania. In 1795 (the Third Partition of Poland), Poland lost formal independence. After the Congress of Vienna of 1814–1815, much of the territory of the Duchy of Warsaw was transferred to Russian control and became the autonomous Congress Poland (officially the Kingdom of Poland). After young Poles refused conscription to the Imperial Russian Army during the January Uprising of 1863, Tsar Alexander II stripped Congress Poland of its separate constitution, attempted to force general use of the Russian language and took away vast tracts of land from Poles. Congress Poland was incorporated more directly into imperial Russia by being divided into ten provinces, each with an appointed Russian military governor and all under complete control of the Russian Governor-General at Warsaw. In the aftermath of World War I, the map of Central and Eastern Europe changed drastically. The German Empire's defeat rendered obsolete Berlin's plans for the creation of Eastern European German-dominated states (Mitteleuropa), which included another rendition of the Kingdom of Poland. The Russian Empire collapsed, which resulted in the Russian Revolution and the Russian Civil War. The Russian state lost territory due to the German offensive and the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, signed by the emergent Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic. Several nations of the region saw a chance for independence and seized their opportunity to gain it. The defeat of Germany on the Western Front and the withdrawal of the Imperial German Army in the Eastern Front had left Berlin in no position to retaliate against Soviet Russia, which swiftly repudiated the treaty and proceeded to recover many of the former territories of the Russian Empire. However, preoccupied with the civil war, it did not have the resources to react swiftly to the national rebellions.
In November 1918, Poland became a sovereign state. Among the several border wars fought by the Second Polish Republic was the successful Greater Poland uprising (1918–1919) against Weimar Germany. The historic Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth included vast territories in the east. They had been incorporated into the Russian Empire in 1772–1795 and had remained its parts, as the Northwest Territory, until World War I. After the war they were contested by the Polish, Russian, Ukrainian, Belarusian, Lithuanian, and Latvian interests. In newly independent Poland, politics were strongly influenced by Józef Piłsudski. On 11 November 1918, Piłsudski was made head of Polish armed forces by the Regency Council of the Kingdom of Poland, a body installed by the Central Powers. Subsequently, he was recognized by many Polish politicians as temporary chief of state and exercised in practice extensive powers. Under the Small Constitution of 20 February 1919, he became chief of state. As such, he reported to the Legislative Sejm. With the collapse of the Russian and German occupying authorities, virtually all of Poland's neighbours began fighting over borders and other issues. The Finnish Civil War, the Estonian War of Independence, the Latvian War of Independence, and the Lithuanian Wars of Independence were all fought in the Baltic Sea region. Russia was overwhelmed by domestic struggles. In early March 1919, the Communist International was established in Moscow. The Hungarian Soviet Republic was proclaimed in March and the Bavarian Soviet Republic in April. Winston Churchill, in a conversation with Prime Minister David Lloyd George, commented sarcastically: "The war of giants has ended, the wars of the pygmies begin." The Polish–Soviet War was the longest lasting of the international engagements.
The territory of what had become Poland had been a major battleground during World War I and the new country lacked political stability. It had won the hard-fought Polish–Ukrainian War against the West Ukrainian People's Republic by July 1919 but had already become embroiled in new conflicts with Germany (the 1919–1921 Silesian Uprisings) and the January 1919 border conflict with Czechoslovakia. Meanwhile, Soviet Russia focused on thwarting the counterrevolution and the 1918–1925 intervention by the Allied powers. The first clashes between Polish and Soviet forces occurred in autumn and winter 1918/1919, but it took a year and a half for a full-scale war to develop. The Western powers considered any significant territorial expansion of Poland, at the expense of Russia or Germany, to be highly disruptive to the post-World War I order. Among other factors, the Western Allies did not want to give Germany and Russia a reason to conspire together. The rise of the unrecognized Bolshevik regime complicated this rationale. The Treaty of Versailles, signed on 28 June 1919, regulated Poland's western border. The Paris Peace Conference (1919–1920) had not made a definitive ruling in regard to Poland's eastern border but on 8 December 1919, the Allied Supreme War Council issued a provisional boundary (its later version would be known as the Curzon Line). It was an attempt to define the areas that had an "indisputably Polish ethnic majority". The permanent border was contingent on the Western powers' future negotiations with White Russia, presumed to prevail in the Russian Civil War. Piłsudski and his allies blamed Prime Minister Ignacy Paderewski for this outcome and caused his dismissal. Paderewski, embittered, withdrew from politics.
The leader of Russia's new Bolshevik government, Vladimir Lenin, aimed to regain control of the territories abandoned by Russia in the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk in March 1918 (the treaty was annulled by Russia on 13 November 1918) and to set up Soviet governments in the emerging countries in the western parts of the former Russian Empire. The more ambitious goal was to also reach Germany, where he expected a socialist revolution to break out. By the end of summer 1919, the Soviets had taken over most of eastern and central Ukraine (formerly parts of the Russian Empire) and driven the Directorate of Ukraine from Kiev. In February 1919, they set up the Socialist Soviet Republic of Lithuania and Belorussia (Litbel). However, it is unlikely that the Soviets forced planned further incursions westward. From late 1919, Lenin, encouraged by the Red Army's civil war victories over the White Russian forces and their Western allies, began to envision the future of world revolution with greater optimism. The Bolsheviks proclaimed the need for the dictatorship of the proletariat and agitated for a worldwide communist community. They intended to link the revolution in Russia with a communist Revolutions and interventions in Hungary (1918–1920) they had hoped for and to assist other communist movements in Europe. To be able to provide direct physical support to revolutionaries in the West, the Red Army would have to cross the territory of Romania. According to the historian Andrzej Chwalba, however, the scenario was different in late 1919 and winter–spring 1920. The Soviets, facing decreasing revolutionary fervor in Europe and having to deal with Russia's own problems, attempted to make peace with its neighbors, including Poland.
According to Aviel Roshwald, (Piłsudski) "hoped to incorporate most of the territories of the defunct Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth into the future Polish state by structuring it as the Polish-led, multinational federation." Piłsudski had wanted to break up the Russian Empire and set up the Intermarium federation of various different states: Poland, Lithuania, Belarus, Ukraine and other Central and East European countries that emerged from the crumbling empires after World War I. In Piłsudski's vision, Poland would replace a truncated and vastly reduced Russia as the great power of Eastern Europe. His plan excluded negotiations prior to military victory. He had hoped that the new Poland-led union would become a counterweight to any potential imperialist intentions of Russia or Germany. Piłsudski believed that there could be no independent Poland without a Ukraine free of Russian control, thus his main interest was in splitting Ukraine from Russia. He used military force to expand the Polish borders in Galicia and Volhynia and crush a Ukrainian attempt at self-determination in the disputed territories east of the Curzon Line, which contained a significant Polish minority. On 7 February 1919, Piłsudski spoke on the subject of Poland's future frontiers:"At the moment Poland is essentially without borders and all that we can gain in this regard in the west depends on the Entente – on the extent to which it may wish to squeeze Germany. In the east, it's a different matter; there are doors here that open and close and it depends on who forces them open and how far".Polish military forces had thus set out to expand far in the eastern direction. As Piłsudski imagined, "Closed within the boundaries of the 16th century, cut off from the Black Sea and Baltic Sea, deprived of land and mineral wealth of the South and South-east, Russia could easily move into the status of second-grade power. Poland, as the largest and strongest of the new states, could easily establish a sphere of influence stretching from Finland to the Caucasus".Piłsudski's concepts appeared more progressive and democratic in comparison with the rival National Democracy's plans, although both pursued the idea of direct incorporation and Polonization of the disputed eastern lands. However Piłsudski used his "federation" idea instrumentally. As he wrote to his close associate Leon Wasilewski in April 1919, (for now)"I want to be neither an imperialist nor a federalist. ... Taking into account that, in this God's world, an empty talk of the brotherhood of people and nations as well as the American little doctrines seem to be winning, I gladly side with the federalists".According to Chwalba, the differences between Piłsudski's vision of Poland and that of his rival National Democratic leader Roman Dmowski were more rhetorical than real. Piłsudski had made many obfuscating statements, but never specifically stated his views regarding Poland's eastern borders or political arrangements he intended for the region.
=== Preliminary hostilities === From late 1917, Polish revolutionary military units were formed in Russia. They were combined into the Western Rifle Division in October 1918. In summer 1918, a short-lived Polish communist government, led by Stefan Heltman, was created in Moscow. Both the military and civilian structures were meant to facilitate the eventual introduction of communism into Poland in the form of a Polish Soviet Republic.
Given the precarious situation resulting from the withdrawal of German forces from Belarus and Lithuania and the expected arrival of the Red Army there, Polish Self-Defence had been organized in autumn 1918 around major concentrations of Polish population, such as Minsk, Vilnius and Grodno. They were based on the Polish Military Organisation and were recognized as part of the Polish Armed Forces by the decree of Polish Chief of State Piłsudski, issued on 7 December 1918. The German Soldatenrat of Ober Ost declared on 15 November that its authority in Vilnius would be transferred to the Red Army. In late autumn 1918, the Polish 4th Rifle Division fought the Red Army in Russia. The division operated under the authority of the Polish Army in France and General Józef Haller. Politically, the division fought under the Polish National Committee (KNP), recognized by the Allies as a temporary government of Poland. In January 1919, per Piłsudski's decision, the 4th Rifle Division became part of the Polish Army. The Polish Self-Defence forces were defeated by the Soviets at a number of locations. Minsk was taken by the Russian Western Army on 11 December 1918. The Socialist Soviet Republic of Byelorussia was declared there on 31 December. After three days of heavy fighting with the Western Rifle Division, the Self-Defence units withdrew from Vilnius on 5 January 1919. Polish–Soviet skirmishes continued in January and February. The Polish armed forces were hurriedly formed to fight in several border wars. Two major formations manned the Russian front in February 1919: the northern, led by General Wacław Iwaszkiewicz-Rudoszański, and the southern, under General Antoni Listowski.
Polish–Ukrainian War
On 18 October 1918, the Ukrainian National Council was formed in Eastern Galicia, still part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire; it was led by Yevhen Petrushevych. The establishment of a Ukrainian state there was proclaimed in November 1918; it had become known as the West Ukrainian People's Republic and it claimed Lwów as its capital. Because of Russia-related political considerations, the Ukrainian attempts failed to generate support of the Entente powers.
Key buildings in Lwów were seized by the Ukrainians on 31 October 1918. On 1 November, Polish residents of the city counterattacked and the Polish–Ukrainian War began. Lwów was under Polish control from 22 November. To Polish politicians, the Polish claim to Lwów and eastern Galicia was indisputable; in April 1919, the Legislative Sejm unanimously declared that all of Galicia should be annexed by Poland. In April to June 1919, the Polish Blue Army of General Józef Haller arrived from France. It consisted of over 67,000 well-equipped and highly trained soldiers. The Blue Army helped drive the Ukrainian forces east past the Zbruch River and decisively contributed to the outcome of the war. The West Ukrainian People's Republic was defeated by mid-July and eastern Galicia had come under Polish administration. The destruction of the West Ukrainian Republic confirmed the belief held by many Ukrainians that Poland was the main enemy of their nation. From January 1919 fighting also took place in Volhynia, where the Poles faced the forces of the Ukrainian People's Republic led by Symon Petliura. The Polish offensive resulted in a takeover of the western part of the province. The Polish–Ukrainian warfare there was discontinued from late May, and in early September an armistice was signed. On 21 November 1919, after contentious deliberations, the Allied Supreme War Council mandated Polish control over eastern Galicia for 25 years, with guarantees of autonomy for the Ukrainian population. The Conference of Ambassadors, which replaced the Supreme War Council, recognized the Polish claim to eastern Galicia in March 1923.
=== Polish intelligence === Jan Kowalewski, a polyglot and amateur cryptographer, broke the codes and ciphers of the army of the West Ukrainian People's Republic and of General Anton Denikin's White Russian forces. In August 1919, he became chief of the Polish General Staff's cryptography section in Warsaw. By early September, he had gathered a group of mathematicians from the University of Warsaw and the University of Lwów (most notably the founders of the Polish School of Mathematics – Stanisław Leśniewski, Stefan Mazurkiewicz and Wacław Sierpiński), who succeeded in breaking the Soviet Russian ciphers as well. During the Polish–Soviet War, the Polish decryption of Red Army radio messages made it possible to use Polish military forces efficiently against Soviet Russian forces and to win many individual battles, most importantly the Battle of Warsaw.
War
Early progression of the conflict
On 5 January 1919, the Red Army took Vilnius, which led to the establishment of the Socialist Soviet Republic of Lithuania and Belorussia (Litbel) on 28 February. On 10 February, Soviet Russia's People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs Georgy Chicherin wrote to Polish Prime Minister Ignacy Paderewski, proposing resolution of matters of disagreement and establishment of relations between the two states. It was one of the series of notes exchanged by the two governments in 1918 and 1919. In February, Polish troops marched east to face the Soviets; the new Polish Sejm declared the need to liberate "the northeast provinces of Poland with their capital in Wilno [Vilnius]". After the German World War I troops had been evacuated from the region, the Battle of Bereza Kartuska, a Polish–Soviet skirmish, took place. It occurred during a local Polish offensive action of 13–16 February, led by General Antoni Listowski, near Byaroza, Belarus. The event has been presented as the beginning of the war of liberation by the Polish side, or of Polish aggression by the Russian side. By late February, the Soviet westward offensive had come to a halt. As the low-level warfare continued, the Polish units crossed the Neman River, took Pinsk on 5 March and reached the outskirts of Lida; on 4 March, Piłsudski ordered further movement to the east stopped. The Soviet leadership had become preoccupied with the issue of providing military assistance to the Hungarian Soviet Republic and with the Siberian offensive of the White Army, led by Alexander Kolchak. By July 1919 Polish armies eliminated the West Ukrainian People's Republic. Secretly preparing an assault on Soviet-held Vilnius, in early April Piłsudski was able to shift some of the forces used in Ukraine to the northern front. The idea was to create a fait accompli and to prevent the Western powers from granting the territories claimed by Poland to White Russia (the Whites were expected to prevail in the Russian Civil War).
A new Polish offensive started on 16 April. Five thousand soldiers, led by Piłsudski, headed for Vilnius. Advancing to the east, the Polish forces took Lida on 17 April, Novogrudok on 18 April, Baranavichy on 19 April and Grodno on 28 April. Piłsudski's group entered Vilnius on 19 April and captured the city after two days of fighting. The Polish action drove the Litbel government from its proclaimed capital. Upon the taking of Vilnius, in pursuit of his federation objectives, Piłsudski issued a "Proclamation to the inhabitants of the former Grand Duchy of Lithuania" on 22 April. It was sharply criticized by his rival National Democrats, who demanded direct incorporation of the former Grand Duchy lands by Poland and signaled their opposition to Piłsudski's territorial and political concepts. Piłsudski had thus proceeded to restore the historic territories of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth by military means, leaving the necessary political determinations for later. On 25 April, Lenin ordered the Western Front commander to reclaim Vilnius as soon as possible. The Red Army formations that attacked the Polish forces were defeated by Edward Rydz-Śmigły's units between 30 April and 7 May. While the Poles extended their holdings further, the Red Army, unable to accomplish its objectives and facing intensified combat with the White forces elsewhere, withdrew from its positions. The Polish "Lithuanian–Belarusian Front" was established on 15 May and placed under command of General Stanisław Szeptycki. In a statute passed on 15 May, Polish Sejm called for the inclusion of the eastern borderline nations in the Polish state as autonomous entities. It was intended to make a positive impression on the participants at the Paris Peace Conference. At the conference, Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Ignacy Paderewski declared Poland's support for self-determination of the eastern nations, in line with Woodrow Wilson's doctrine and in an effort to secure Western support for Poland's policies in regard to Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania. The Polish offensive was discontinued around the line of German trenches and fortifications from World War I, because of high likelihood of Poland's war with Weimar Germany over territorial and other issues. Half of Poland's military strength had been concentrated on the German front by mid-June. The offensive in the east was resumed at the end of June, following the Treaty of Versailles. The treaty, signed and ratified by Germany, preserved the status quo in western Poland. On the southern front in Volhynia, in May and in July the Polish forces confronted the Red Army, which was in process of pushing Petliura's Ukrainian units out of the contested territories. The rural Orthodox population there was hostile to the Polish authorities and actively supported the Bolsheviks. Also in Podolia and near the eastern reaches of Galicia, the Polish armies kept slowly advancing to the east until December. They crossed the Zbruch River and displaced Soviet forces from a number of localities.
The Polish forces took Minsk on 8 August. The Berezina River was reached on 18 August. On 28 August, tanks were deployed for the first time and the town of Babruysk was captured. By 2 September, Polish units reached the Daugava River. Barysaw was taken on 10 September and parts of Polotsk on 21 September. By mid-September, the Poles secured the region along the Daugava from the Dysna River to Daugavpils. The frontline had also extended south, cutting through Polesia and Volhynia; along the Zbruch River it reached the Romanian border. A Red Army assault between the Daugava and Berezina Rivers was repelled in October and the front had become relatively inactive with sporadic encounters only, as the line designated by Piłsudski to be the goal of the Polish operation in the north was reached. In autumn 1919, the Sejm voted to incorporate into Poland the conquered territories up to the Daugava and Berezina Rivers, including Minsk. The Polish successes in summer 1919 resulted from the fact that the Soviets prioritized the war with the White forces, which was more crucial for them. The successes created an illusion of Polish military prowess and Soviet weakness. As Piłsudski put it, "I am not worried about the strength of Russia; if I wanted to, I could go now, say to Moscow, and no one would be able to resist my power ...". The offensive was restrained in late summer by Piłsudski, because he did not want to improve the strategic situation of the advancing Whites. In early summer 1919, the White movement had gained the initiative and its forces, commanded by Anton Denikin and known as the Volunteer Army, marched on Moscow. Piłsuski refused to join the Allied intervention in the Russian Civil War because he considered the Whites more threatening to Poland than the Bolsheviks. Piłsudski's adversarial relationship with tsarist Russia went back to the earlier stages of his career. He engaged in warfare with Soviet Russia from the beginning of his tenure as Polish commander-in-chief. Based on this experience, he underestimated the strength of the Bolsheviks. Piłsudski also thought he could get a better deal for Poland from the Bolsheviks than from the Whites, who represented, in his opinion, the old Russian imperial policies, hostile to strong Poland and Ukraine independent from Russia, Piłsudski's main objectives. The Bolsheviks had proclaimed the partitions of Poland to be invalid and declared their support for self-determination of the Polish nation. Piłsudski thus speculated that Poland would be better off with the internationalist Bolsheviks, who were also alienated from the Western powers, than with the restored Russian Empire, its traditional nationalism, and its partnership with Western politics. By his refusal to join the attack on Lenin's struggling government, he ignored strong pressure from the Triple Entente leaders and possibly saved the Bolshevik government in summer to fall 1919, although a full-scale attack by the Poles to support Denikin would not have been possible. Mikhail Tukhachevsky later commented on the likely disastrous consequences for the Bolsheviks if the Polish government undertook military cooperation with Denikin at the time of his advance on Moscow. In a book he later published, Denikin pointed at Poland as the savior of the Bolshevik power.
Denikin twice appealed to Piłsudski for help, in summer and in autumn 1919. According to Denikin, "The defeat of the south of Russia will make Poland face the power that will become a calamity for the Polish culture and will threaten the existence of the Polish state". According to Piłsudski, "The lesser evil is to facilitate a White Russia's defeat by Red Russia. ... With any Russia, we fight for Poland. Let all that filthy West talk all they want; we're not going to be dragged into and used for the fight against the Russian revolution. Quite to the contrary, in the name of permanent Polish interests, we want to make it easier for the revolutionary army to act against the counter-revolutionary army." On 12 December, the Red Army pushed Denikin out of Kiev. The self-perceived interests of Poland and White Russia were irreconcilable. Piłsudski wanted to break up Russia and create a powerful Poland. Denikin, Alexander Kolchak and Nikolai Yudenich wanted territorial integrity for the "one, great and indivisible Russia". Piłsudski held the Bolshevik military forces in low regard and thought of Red Russia as easy to defeat. The victorious in the civil war communists were going to be pushed far to the east and deprived of Ukraine, Belarus, the Baltic lands, and the southern Caucasus; they would no longer constitute a threat to Poland. From the beginning of the conflict, many peace initiatives had been declared by the Polish and Russian sides, but they were intended as cover or stalling for time, as each side concentrated on military preparations and moves. One series of Polish-Soviet negotiations commenced in Białowieża after the termination of the summer 1919 military activities; they were moved in early November 1919 to Mikashevichy. Piłsudski's associate Ignacy Boerner met there with Lenin's emissary Julian Marchlewski. Buoyed by their armies' successes in the Russian Civil War, the Soviet government rejected the tough Polish armistice conditions in December. Piłsudski broke off the Mikashevichy talks two days after the Soviet takeover of Kiev, but major military operations had not been resumed. Early in the talks, Boerner informed Marchlewski that Poland had no intention of renewing its offensive; it allowed the Soviets to move forty-three thousand troops from the Polish front to fight Denikin.
The only exception to the Polish policy of front stabilization since autumn 1919 was the winter attack on Daugavpils. Rydz-Śmigły's previous attempts to capture the city in summer and early autumn had been unsuccessful. A secret political and military pact regarding a common attack on Daugavpils was signed between representatives of Poland and the Latvian Provisional Government on 30 December. On 3 January 1920, Polish and Latvian forces (30,000 Poles and 10,000 Latvians) commenced a joint operation against the surprised enemy. The Bolshevik 15th Army withdrew and had not been pursued; the fighting terminated on 25 January. The taking of Daugavpils was accomplished primarily by the 3rd Legions Infantry Division under Rydz-Śmigły. Afterwards, the town and its vicinity were handed over to the Latvians. The outcome of the campaign disrupted communications between Lithuanian and Russian forces. A Polish garrison was stationed in Daugavpils until July 1920. Simultaneously, the Latvian authorities pursued peace negotiations with the Soviets, which resulted in the signing of a preliminary armistice. Piłsudski and the Polish diplomacy were not notified and had not been aware of this development. The fighting in 1919 resulted in the formation of a very long frontline, which, according to the historian Eugeniusz Duraczyński, favored Poland at this stage. In late 1919 and early 1920, Piłsudski undertook his gargantuan task of breaking up Russia and creating the Intermarium bloc of countries. Given the refusal of Lithuania and other eastern Baltic region countries to participate in the project, he set his sights on Ukraine.
Abortive peace process
In late autumn 1919, to many Polish politicians it appeared that Poland had achieved strategically desirable borders in the east and therefore fighting the Bolsheviks should be terminated and peace negotiations should commence. The pursuit of peace also dominated popular sentiments and anti-war demonstrations had taken place. The leadership of Soviet Russia confronted at that time a number of pressing internal and external problems. In order to effectively address the difficulties, they wanted to stop the warfare and offer peace to their neighbors, hoping to be able to come out of the international isolation they had been subjected to. Courted by the Soviets, the potential allies of Poland (Lithuania, Latvia, Romania, or the South Caucasus states) were unwilling to join a Polish-led anti-Soviet alliance. Faced with the diminishing revolutionary fervor in Europe, the Soviets were inclined to delay their hallmark project, a Soviet republic of Europe, to some indefinite future. The peace offers sent to Warsaw by Russia's Foreign Secretary Georgy Chicherin and other Russian governing institutions between late December 1919 and early February 1920 had not been responded to. The Soviets proposed a favorable for Poland troop demarcation line consistent with the current military frontiers, leaving permanent border determinations for later. While the Soviet overtures generated considerable interests on the parts of the socialist, agrarian and nationalist political camps, the attempts of the Polish Sejm to prevent further warfare turned futile. Piłsudski, who ruled over the military and to a considerable degree over the weak civilian government, prevented any movement toward peace. By late February, he directed the Polish representatives to engage in pretended negotiations with the Soviets. Piłsudski and his collaborators stressed what they saw as the increasing with time Polish military advantage over the Red Army and their belief that the state of war had created highly favorable conditions for Poland's economic development. On 4 March 1920, General Władysław Sikorski initiated a new offensive in Polesia; the Polish forces had driven a wedge between Soviet forces to the north (Belarus) and south (Ukraine). The Soviet counter-offensive in Polesia and Volhynia was pushed back. Polish–Russian peace negotiations in March 1920 produced no results. Piłsudski was not interested in a negotiated solution to the conflict. Preparations for a large-scale resumption of hostilities were being finalized and the newly declared (over the protest of a majority of parliamentary deputies) marshal and his circle expected the planned new offensive to lead to the fulfillment of Piłsudski's federalist ideas. On 7 April, Chicherin accused Poland of rejecting the Soviet peace offer and notified the Allies of the negative developments, urging them to prevent the forthcoming Polish aggression. The Polish diplomacy claimed the necessity to counteract the immediate threat of a Soviet assault in Belarus, but the Western opinion, to whom the Soviet arguments seemed reasonable, rejected the Polish narrative. The Soviet forces on the Belarusian front were weak at the time and the Bolsheviks had no plans for an offensive action.
Piłsudski's alliance with Petliura
Having resolved Poland's armed conflicts with the emerging Ukrainian states to Poland's satisfaction, Piłsudski was able to work on a Polish–Ukrainian alliance against Russia. On 2 December 1919, Andriy Livytskyi and other Ukrainian diplomats declared their readiness to give up the Ukrainian claims to eastern Galicia and western Volhynia, in return for Poland's recognition of the independence of the Ukrainian People's Republic (UPR). The Treaty of Warsaw, Piłsudski's agreement with Hetman Symon Petliura, the exiled Ukrainian nationalist leader, and two other members of the Directorate of Ukraine, was signed on 21 April 1920. It appeared to be Piłsudski's major success, potentially signifying the beginning of a successful implementation of his long-held designs. Petliura, who formally represented the government of the Ukrainian People's Republic, which had de facto been defeated by the Bolsheviks, fled with some Ukrainian troops to Poland, where he found political asylum. His control extended only to a sliver of land near the Polish-controlled areas. Petliura had therefore little choice but to accept the Polish offer of alliance, largely on Polish terms, as determined by the outcome of the recent warfare between the two nations. By concluding an agreement with Piłsudski, Petliura accepted the Polish territorial gains in western Ukraine and the future Polish–Ukrainian border along the Zbruch River. In exchange for renouncing the Ukrainian territorial claims, he was promised independence for Ukraine and Polish military assistance in reinstating his government in Kiev. Given the powerful opposition against Piłsudski's eastern policy in war-tired Poland, the negotiations with Petliura were conducted in secrecy and the text of the 21 April agreement remained secret. Poland recognized in it Ukraine's right to parts of the former Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth (before 1772) east of the Zbruch. A military convention was added on 24 April; it placed Ukrainian units under Polish command. By 1 May, a Polish–Ukrainian trade agreement was negotiated. It had not been signed, to prevent its far-ranging provisions anticipating exploitation of Ukraine by Poland from being revealed and from causing catastrophic damage to Petliura's political reputation.
For Piłsudski, the alliance gave his campaign for the Intermarium federation an actual starting point and potentially the most important federation partner, satisfied his demands regarding parts of Polish eastern border relevant to the proposed Ukrainian state and laid a foundation for a Polish-dominated Ukrainian state between Russia and Poland. According to Richard K. Debo, while Petliura could not contribute real strength to the Polish offensive, for Piłsudski the alliance provided some camouflage for the "naked aggression involved". For Petliura, it was the final chance to preserve the Ukrainian statehood and at least a theoretical independence of the Ukrainian heartlands, despite his acceptance of the loss of West Ukrainian lands to Poland. The British and the French did not recognize the UPR and blocked its admission to the League of Nations in autumn 1920. The treaty with the Ukrainian republic did not generate any international support for Poland. It caused new tensions and conflicts, especially within the Ukrainian movements that aimed for the country's independence. Regarding the deal they had concluded, both leaders encountered strong opposition in their respective countries. Piłsudski faced stiff opposition from Roman Dmowski's National Democrats, who opposed Ukrainian independence. To protest the alliance and the upcoming war over Ukraine, Stanisław Grabski resigned the chairmanship of the foreign affairs committee in the Sejm, where the National Democrats were a dominant force (their approval would be needed to finalize any future political settlement). Petliura was criticized by many Ukrainian politicians for entering a pact with the Poles and for abandoning western Ukraine (after the destruction of the West Ukrainian People's Republic, western Ukraine was – from their point of view – occupied by Poland). During their occupation of the territory meant for the UPR, Polish officials engaged in forced requisitions, some of which were intended for troop supply, but also in extensive looting of Ukraine and its people. It ranged from activities approved and promoted at the highest level, such as the widespread theft of trains loaded with goods, to plunder perpetrated by Polish soldiers in Ukrainian countryside and cities. In his 29 April and 1 May letters to General Kazimierz Sosnkowski and Prime Minister Leopold Skulski, Piłsudski emphasized that the railroad booty had been enormous, but he could not divulge further because the appropriations took place in violation of Poland's treaty with Ukraine. The alliance with Petliura gave Poland 15,000 allied Ukrainian troops at the beginning of the Kiev campaign, which increased to 35,000 by recruitment and from Soviet deserters during the war. According to Chwalba, 60,000 Polish soldiers and 4,000 Ukrainians took part in the original offensive; there were only 22,488 Ukrainian soldiers on the Polish food ration list as of 1 September 1920.
From Kiev offensive to armistice
Polish forces
The Polish Army was made up of soldiers who had served in the armies of the partitioning empires (especially professional officers), as well as many new enlistees and volunteers. The soldiers had come from different armies, formations, backgrounds and traditions. While veterans of Piłsudski's Polish Legions and the Polish Military Organisation formed a privileged stratum, integrating the Greater Poland Army and the Blue Army into the national force presented many challenges. The unification of the Greater Poland Army led by General Józef Dowbor-Muśnicki (a highly regarded force of 120,000 soldiers), and the Blue Army led by General Józef Haller, with the main Polish Army under Piłsudski, had been finalized on 19 October 1919 in Kraków, in a symbolic ceremony. Within the young Polish state whose continuous existence was uncertain, members of many groups resisted conscription. For example, Polish peasants and small town dwellers, Jews, or Ukrainians from Polish-controlled territories tended to avoid service in Polish armed forces for different reasons. The Polish military was overwhelmingly ethnically Polish and Catholic. The intensifying desertion problem in summer 1920 led to the introduction of death penalty for desertion in August. The summary military trials and the executions often took place on the same day. Female soldiers functioned as members of the Voluntary Legion of Women; they were normally assigned auxiliary duties. A system of military training for officers and soldiers was established with significant help from the French Military Mission to Poland. The Polish Air Force had about two thousand planes, mostly old. 45% of them had been captured from the enemy. Only two hundred could be airborne at any given time. They were used for various purposes including combat, but mostly for reconnaissance. 150 French pilots and navigators flew as part of the French Mission. According to Norman Davies, estimating the strength of the opposing sides is difficult and even generals often had incomplete reports of their own forces. The Polish forces grew from approximately 100,000 by the end of 1918 to over 500,000 in early 1920 and 800,000 in the spring of that year. Before the Battle of Warsaw, the army reached the total strength of about one million soldiers, including 100,000 volunteers.
The Polish armed forces were aided by military members of Western missions, especially the French Military Mission. Poland was supported, in addition to the allied Ukrainian forces (over twenty thousand soldiers), by Russian and Belarusian units and volunteers of many nationalities. Twenty American pilots served in the Kościuszko Squadron. Their contributions in spring and summer 1920 on the Ukrainian front were considered to be of critical importance. Russian anti-Bolshevik units fought on the Polish side. About one thousand White soldiers fought in summer 1919. The largest Russian formation was sponsored by the Russian Political Committee represented by Boris Savinkov and commanded by General Boris Permikin. The "3rd Russian Army" reached over ten thousand battle-ready soldiers and in early October 1920 was dispatched to the front to fight on the Polish side; they did not engage in combat because of the armistice that took effect at that time. Six thousand soldiers fought valiantly on the Polish side in the "Cossack" Russian units from 31 May 1920. Various smaller Belarusian formations fought in 1919 and 1920. However, the Russian, Cossack and Belarusian military organizations had their own political agendas and their participation has been marginalized or omitted in the Polish war narrative. Soviet losses and the spontaneous enrollment of Polish volunteers allowed rough numerical parity between the two armies; by the time of the Battle of Warsaw, the Poles may have had gained a slight advantage in numbers and logistics. One of the major formations on the Polish side was the First Polish Army.
Red Army
In early 1918, Lenin and Leon Trotsky embarked on the rebuilding of the Russian armed forces. The new Red Army was established by the Council of People's Commissars (Sovnarkom) on 28 January, to replace the demobilized Imperial Russian Army. Trotsky became commissar of war on 13 March and Georgy Chicherin took over Trotsky's previous job as foreign minister. On 18 April, the Commissar Bureau was created; it initiated the practice of assigning political commissars to military formations. One million German soldiers occupied the western Russian Empire, but on 1 October, after the first indications of German defeat in the West, Lenin ordered general conscription with the intention of building a multi-million member army. While over 50,000 former tsarist officers had joined the White Army, 75,000 of them ended up in the Red Army by summer 1919. The Revolutionary Military Council of the Russian Republic was established in September 1918. It was chaired by Trotsky. Trotsky lacked military experience or expertise, but knew how to mobilize troops and was a master of war propaganda. Revolutionary war councils of particular fronts and armies were placed under the council of the republic. The system was intended as implementation of the concept of collective leadership and management of military affairs. The Red Army's chief commander, from July 1919, was Sergey Kamenev; he was installed by Joseph Stalin. Kamenev's Field Staff was led by former tsarist generals. His every decision had to be approved by the Military Council. The actual command center was placed in an armored train, used by Trotsky to travel around the front areas and coordinate military activity. Hundreds of thousands of recruits deserted from the Red Army, which resulted in 600 public executions in the second half of 1919. The army, however, conducted operations on several fronts and had remained an effective fighting force. Officially, there were five million soldiers in the Red Army as of 1 August 1920, but only 10 or 12 percent of them could be counted as the actual fighting force. Female volunteers served in combat on the same basis as men, also in Semyon Budyonny's 1st Cavalry Army. The Red Army was particularly weak in the areas of logistics, supplies, and communication. Great quantities of Western arms had been captured from the White and Allied forces and domestic production of military equipment kept increasing throughout the war. Still, the stocks were often critically short. As in the Polish Army, boots had been in short supply and many fought barefoot. There were relatively few Soviet airplanes (220 at the most at the Western Front) and the Polish air formations soon came to dominate the air space.
When the Poles launched their Kiev offensive, the Russian Southwestern Front had about 83,000 Soviet soldiers, including 29,000 front-line troops. The Poles had some numerical superiority, which was estimated from 12,000 to 52,000 personnel. During the Soviet counter-offensive in mid-1920, on all fronts, the Soviets numbered about 790,000, at least 50,000 more than the Poles. Mikhail Tukhachevsky estimated that he had 160,000 combat ready soldiers, while Piłsudski estimated Tukhachevsky's forces at 200,000–220,000. In 1920, the Red Army personnel numbered 402,000 on the Soviet Western Front and 355,000 on the Southwestern Front in Galicia, according to Davies. Grigori F. Krivosheev gives 382,071 personnel for the Western Front and 282,507 for the Southwestern Front between July and August. After the reorganization of the Western Rifle Division in mid-1919, there were no separate Polish units within the Red Army. Within both the Western and the Southwestern Fronts, besides Russian units, there had been separate Ukrainian, Latvian, and German–Hungarian units. In addition, many communists of various nationalities, for example the Chinese, fought in integrated units. The Lithuanian Army supported the Soviet forces to some degree. Among the commanders leading the Red Army offensive were Semyon Budyonny, Leon Trotsky, Sergey Kamenev, Mikhail Tukhachevsky (the new commander of the Western Front), Alexander Yegorov (the new commander of the Southwestern Front), and Hayk Bzhishkyan.
==== Logistics and plans ==== Logistics were very bad for both armies and were supported by whatever equipment was left over from World War I or could be captured. The Polish Army, for example, used guns made in five countries and rifles manufactured in six, each of which used different ammunition. The Soviets had at their disposal many military depots that were left by the German armies after their withdrawal in 1918–1919, and modern French armaments that were captured in great numbers from the White Russians and the Allied expeditionary forces during the Russian Civil War. Still, they suffered a shortage of arms, as both the Red Army and the Polish forces were grossly underequipped by Western standards.
However, the Red Army had at its disposal an extensive arsenal as well as fully functional armament industry concentrated in Tula, both inherited from tsarist Russia. In contrast, the partitioning powers had all deliberately avoided industrializing ethnically Polish territories, let alone permit the establishment of any meaningful armaments industry within them. As a result, there were no firearm factories in Poland and everything, including rifles and ammunition, had to be imported. Gradual progress in the area of military manufacturing had been made and after the war there were in Poland 140 industrial establishments producing military items. The Polish–Soviet War was fought not by trench warfare but by maneuverable formations. The total front was 1500 km (over 900 mi) long and was manned by relatively small amounts of troops. Around the time of the Battle of Warsaw and afterwards, the Soviets suffered from overly long transportation lines and had been unable to supply their forces in a timely manner. By early 1920, the Red Army had been very successful against the White movement. In January 1920, the Soviets began concentrating forces on the Polish northern front, along the Berezina River. British Prime Minister David Lloyd George ordered the Baltic Sea blockade of Soviet Russia lifted. Estonia signed with Russia the Treaty of Tartu on 3 February, recognizing the Bolshevik government. European arms merchants proceeded with supplying the Soviets with items needed by the military, for which the Russian government paid with gold and valuables taken from the imperial stock and confiscated from individuals. From early 1920, both the Polish and Soviet sides had prepared for decisive confrontations. However, Lenin and Trotsky had not yet been able to dispose of all the White forces, including especially the army of Pyotr Wrangel, threatening them from the south. Piłsudski, unconstrained by such limitations, was able to attack first. Convinced that the Whites were no longer a threat to Poland, he resolved to take care of the remaining enemy, the Bolsheviks. The plan for the Kiev offensive was to beat the Red Army on Poland's southern flank and to install the pro-Polish Petliura government in Ukraine. Victor Sebestyen, author of a 2017 biography of Lenin, wrote: "The newly independent Poles started the war. With England and France's backing, they invaded Ukraine in spring 1920." Some Allied leaders had not supported Poland, including former British Prime Minister H. H. Asquith, who called the Kiev offensive "a purely aggressive adventure, a wanton enterprise". Sebestyen characterized Piłsudski as a "Polish nationalist, not a socialist".
Kiev offensive
On 17 April 1920, the Polish General Staff ordered the armed forces to assume attack positions. The Red Army, which had been regrouping since 10 March, was not fully ready for combat. The main goal of the military operation was to create a Ukrainian state, formally independent but under Polish patronage, which would separate Poland from Russia. On 25 April, the southern group of Polish armies under Piłsudski's command commenced an offensive in the direction of Kiev. The Polish forces were assisted by thousands of Ukrainian soldiers under Petliura, who represented the Ukrainian People's Republic. Alexander Yegorov, commander of the Russian Southwestern Front, had at his disposal the 12th and 14th Armies. They faced the invading force, but were small (15,000 battle-ready soldiers), weak, poorly equipped and had been distracted by peasant rebellions in Russia. Yegorov's armies had been gradually reinforced since the Soviets had found out of the Polish war preparations.
On 26 April, in his "Call to the People of Ukraine", Piłsudski told his intended audience that "the Polish Army would only stay as long as necessary until a legal Ukrainian government took control over its own territory". However, although many Ukrainians were anti-communist, many were anti-Polish and resented the Polish advance. The well-equipped and highly mobile Polish 3rd Army under Rydz-Śmigły quickly overpowered the Red Army in Ukraine. The Soviet 12th and 14th Armies had for the most part declined to engage in combat and suffered limited losses; they withdrew or were pushed past the Dnieper River. On 7 May, the combined Polish–Ukrainian forces, led by Rydz-Śmigły, encountered only token resistance as they entered Kiev, mostly abandoned by the Soviet military.
The Soviets proceeded with their first counteroffensive using the Western Front forces. Following the order of Trotsky, Mikhail Tukhachevsky launched an offensive on the Belarusian front before the (planned by the Polish command) arrival of Polish troops from the Ukrainian front. On 14 May, his forces attacked the somewhat weaker Polish armies there and penetrated the Polish-held areas (territories between the Daugava and the Berezina Rivers) to the depth of 100 km. After two Polish divisions arrived from Ukraine and the new Reserve Army was assembled, Stanisław Szeptycki, Kazimierz Sosnkowski and Leonard Skierski led a Polish counteroffensive from 28 May. The result was the Polish recovery of the bulk of the lost territory. From 8 June, the front had stabilised near the Avuta River and remained inactive until July. This Polish thrust into Ukraine was met with Red Army counterattacks from 29 May. By that time, Yegorov's Southwestern Front had been considerably reinforced and he initiated an assault maneuver in the Kiev area. Semyon Budyonny's 1st Cavalry Army (Konarmia) conducted repeated attacks and broke the Polish–Ukrainian front on 5 June. The Soviets deployed mobile cavalry units to disrupt the Polish rearguard and target communications and logistics. By 10 June, the Polish armies were in retreat along the entire front. Following Piłsudski's order, Rydz-Śmigły, with the Polish and Ukrainian troops under his command, abandoned Kiev (the city was not being attacked) to the Red Army.
