To be honest I don't know the details of the campaigns against Kolchak and Denikin. I should review that later. In the Polish war, Tukhachevsky was defeated by Pilsudski under Warsaw because at a critical point he did not have any strategic reserves. It seems his military theory rejected the need for this. Pilsudski claims that the Red Army failed because of an inability of Tukhachevsky to properly command his troops.
As a side point, the invasion of Poland was a key part of the communist strategy for world revolution. Germany at this point was at the point of collapse. Some of its states, like Bavaria and Bremen were already forming 'Soviet republics'. The entrance of the Red Army into Germany at this time would have finished it off. Germany was the immediate goal of the Polish invasion and there are orders signed by Tukhachevsky and others, as well as popular newspaper campaigns that prove this.
It is too simplistic to write off everything that happened in a certain time period as 'Civil War'. For instance, in 1921 a few million peasants were dying of starvation. Peasants in the Tambov province revolted because they had no food and the State was requisitioning whatever food remained. Tukhachevsky's practice was to take, say, 100 hostages from every village and shoot them if 'rebel leaders' were not delivered. He would also attack villages with poison gas and military shelling. THIS was Tukhachevsky's specialty. Just looking at collections of military orders, it can be seen that most of his deal with hostages and executions.
As long as there was no external war, Stalin was fine to have an efficient executioner in the army. But in 1936, when preparations were beginning for war, all people like this were removed. It is well known that an army that has sullied its uniforms with the blood of its own people is incapable of fighting against outside enemies. Everyone who had actively participated in this could no longer be a troop leader.
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Hancock_the_Superb
13 years ago
It is too simplistic to write off everything that happened in a certain time period as 'Civil War'.
I don't necessarily agree. There were so many factions involved in the Civil War that drawing distinctions is difficult. (Of course, Red repression of the Kulaks continued long after the last Whites were routed.) No one would deny Tukhachevsky's cruelty, but I don't see him as uniquely brutal or violent in an era that produced monsters like Stalin, Gregory Semenov or the Baron Ungern-Sternberg.
As a side point, the invasion of Poland was a key part of the communist strategy for world revolution.
True, though "world revolution" by force of arms wasn't universally agreed upon by the Bolshevik leadership. Certainly it was not smart in strategic terms when the Reds still hadn't seized effective control over their own country. How much Tukhachevsky can be blamed for this is highly debatable.
"My child is God to billions of Asians!"
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Kristoff_V
13 years ago
Korolenko writes in 1921, “Now, when the Civil War has ended, repression was not to be reduced but intensified!” (from Archipelag Gulag)
That is the distinction. But I agree - he was not the worst general. I would say the worst was Zhukov.
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Hancock_the_Superb
13 years ago
We seem to have drifted a bit. I don't mean to deny or downplay Tukachevsky's atrocities. But that's something quite different from military skill. Let alone whether or not he was the inspiration for Strelnikov.
"Greater love hath no man than this, that he lay down someone else's life for his own."
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