Russia: Revolution and Civil War, 1917-1921

by Antony Beevor

Overview

Notes From Your Bookseller

Antony Beevor, bestselling author of D-Day, gives a complete picture in a gripping narrative that provides context for the Russian Civil War and how it influenced the course of history and even the events currently unfolding in Ukraine, an epic account that provides depth and scope.

“Riveting . . . There is a wealth of new information here that adds considerable texture and nuance to his story and helps to set Russia apart from previous works.”—The Wall Street Journal

An epic new account of the conflict that reshaped Eastern Europe and set the stage for the rest of the twentieth century.

Between 1917 and 1921 a devastating struggle took place in Russia following the collapse of the Tsarist empire. The doomed White alliance of moderate socialists and reactionary monarchists stood little chance against Trotsky’s Red Army and the single-minded Communist dictatorship under Lenin. In the savage civil war that followed, terror begat terror, which in turn led to ever greater cruelty with man’s inhumanity to man, woman and child. The struggle became a world war by proxy as Churchill deployed weaponry and troops from the British empire, while contingents from the United States, France, Italy, Japan, Poland, and Czechoslovakia played rival parts.
 
Using the most up to date scholarship and archival research, Antony Beevor assembles the complete picture in a gripping narrative that conveys the conflict through the eyes of everyone from the worker on the streets of Petrograd to the cavalry officer on the battlefield and the doctor in an improvised hospital.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780593493885
Publisher:	Penguin Publishing Group
Publication date:	09/20/2022
Sold by:	Penguin Group
Format:	eBook
Pages:	592
Sales rank:	84,117
File size:	37 MB
Note:	This product may take a few minutes to download.

About the Author

Antony Beevor is the author of Crete: The Battle and the Resistance (Runciman Prize); Stalingrad (Samuel Johnson Prize, Wolfson Prize for History and Hawthornden Prize); Berlin: The Downfall; The Battle for Spain (Premio La Vanguardia); D-Day (Prix Henry Malherbe and the RUSI Westminster Medal); The Second World War; Ardennes 1944 (Prix Médicis shortlist); and Arnhem. A former chairman of the Society of Authors, he has received a number of honorary doctorates. He is also a visiting professor at the University of Kent and an Honorary Fellow of King’s College, London. He was knighted in 2017.
 

Table of Contents

List of Maps x

List of Illustrations xi

Foreword 1

Part 1 1912-1917

1 The Suicide of Europe 1912-1916 7

2 The February Revolution January-March 1917 14

3 The Fall of the Double-Headed Eagle February-March 1917 27

4 From Autocracy to Chaos March-April 1917 34

5 The Pregnant Widow March-May 1917 46

6 The Kerensky Offensive and the July Days June-July 1917 61

7 Kornilov July-September 1917 74

8 The October Coup September-November 1917 92

9 The Boys' Crusade - Revolt of the Junkers October-November 1917 104

10 The Infanticide of Democracy November-December 1917 117

Part 2 1918

11 Breaking the Mould January-February 1918 133

12 Brest-Litovsk December 1917-March 1918 144

13 The Volunteer Army's Ice March January-March 1918 159

14 The Germans March In March-April 1918 175

15 Enemies on the Periphery Spring and Summer 1918 187

16 The Czechs and Left Socialist Revolutionaries Revolt May-July 1918 202

17 Red Terror Summer 1918 217

18 Fighting on the Volga and the Red Army Summer 1918 225

19 From the Volga to Siberia Autumn 1918 239

20 The Central Powers Depart Autumn-Winter 1918 255

21 The Baltic and Northern Russia Autumn-Winter 1918 267

Part 3 1919

22 The Fatal Compromise January-March 1919 279

23 Siberia January-May 1919 292

24 Don and Ukraine April-June 1919 301

25 Murmansk and Arkhangel Spring and Summer 1919 316

26 Siberia June-September 1919 322

27 Baltic Summer May-August 1919 336

28 The March on Moscow July-October 1919 347

29 Baltic Surprise Autumn 1919 362

30 Siberian Retreat September-December 1919 369

31 The Turning Point September-November 1919 380

32 Retreat in the South November-December 1919 394

Part 4 1920

33 The Great Siberian Ice March December 1919-February 1920 409

34 The Fall of Odessa January 1920 418

35 The Last Hurrah of the White Cavalry January-March 1920 424

36 Wrangel Takes Command and the Poles Take Kiev Spring and Summer 1920 440

37 Poles in the West, Wrangel in the South June-September 1920 452

38 The Miracle on the Vistula August-September 1920 468

39 The Riviera of Hades September-December 1920 479

40 The Death of Hope 1920-1921 491

Conclusion: The Devil's Apprentice 501

Glossary 503

Acknowledgements 505

Abbreviations 507

Notes 510

Bibliography 548

Index 563

Editorial Reviews

07/25/2022

Czar Nicholas II’s abdication in 1917 created a “sudden vacuum of power” that enabled the Bolshevik takeover of Russia, according to this tart history. Beevor (The Battle of Arnhem) takes a critical view of most of the major players, detailing how Aleksandr Kerensky’s Provisional Government struggled to keep Russian troops on the Austro-Hungarian front of WWI while dealing with myriad domestic problems, including grain shortages and rising Ukrainian and Finnish nationalism. Meanwhile, revolutionary leaders Vladimir Lenin and Leon Trotsky were rallying the hungry and war-weary masses with bold promises for peace and land reform. Beevor faults the Bolsheviks for turning the humanist ideals of the Russian intelligentsia into a hard-core ideology that they implemented with a “fanatical determination,” but also blames reactionary monarchists for waging a disorganized and inhumane civil war that resulted in 12 million deaths and Russia’s “utter impoverishment.” Detailed breakdowns of the “see-saw” fighting between the Red and White armies are interwoven with sharp assessments of how White leaders Anton Denikin and Pyotr Wrangel bungled support from foreign units, and other strategic matters. Fine-grained yet fluidly written, this sweeping portrait illuminates the chaos and tragedy of Russian civil war. Agent: Robin Straus, Robin Straus Agency. (Sept.)

Publishers Weekly

One of Barnes & Noble's Best History Books of 2022

“Riveting . . . There is a wealth of new information here that adds considerable texture and nuance to his story and helps to set Russia apart from previous works.”—The Wall Street Journal

"Russia makes compelling use of witness testimony including from Russian archives. . . Beevor hits his stride with the formation of the Volunteer Army and rising military opposition to the Bolsheviks. . . As an account of internecine rivalry the book has panoramic sweep."—Financial Times

"Beevor’s book reads like a novel. . . An excellent place to begin learning about the Soviet period."—Forbes

"[Russia is] welcome because most Westerners have paid little attention to the fratricidal fury of the Russian Civil War, finding it bewilderingly complicated."—The Atlantic

"[A] magisterial history . . . a richly detailed account of the momentous four years of Russian history between 1917 and 1921."—NY Journal of Books

"In this brilliant marshalling of a notoriously complex history, Antony Beevor opens up a magisterial canvas of terror and tragedy."—Colin Thubron, author of Shadow of the Silk Road and The Amur River: Between Russia and China

"Beevor has given us what may be his most brilliant book to date—a masterpiece of historical imagination, in which the tragedy and horror of this colossal struggle is recaptured, in its impact on everyday life as well as its military dimensions, as never before. This is a great book, whose depiction of savage inhumanity speaks powerfully to our present condition.’—John Gray, author of Straw Dogs

“A completely riveting account of how the Russian Revolution, which started with such high hopes and idealism, degenerated into a tangle of civil conflicts marked by hideous cruelty on all sides. Antony Beevor brings his great gifts for narrative, and his deep interest in the people who both make history and suffer it, to illuminate that crucial period whose consequences we are still living with today.” — Margaret MacMillan, author of War: How Conflict Shaped Us and The War That Ended Peace: The Road to 1914

"This is an unmerciful book, agonising, yet always irresistible."—The Times (UK)
 
"A masterpiece of history and a harrowing lesson for today. . . Antony Beevor’s grimly magnificent new book. . . is ground-breaking in its use of original evidence from many archives."—The Daily Telegraph
 
"What makes the new book so readable is its structure. . .  Beevor’s short chapters break up the action to ensure they are digestible while also pointing a clear path through the dark fog of this brutal war. . . This combination of clarity with vividness is Beevor’s defining strength as a historian."—The Sunday Times
 
"A mass of chilling contemporary testimony in a new history of the 1917-21 Russian experience . . . [Beevor] is winning plaudits around the world."—Bloomberg.com
 
"Beevor weaves his way through the enormous complexities of these years with intelligence, wit, and a talent for describing individuals and events. As one might expect he is in his element when describing battles, campaigns, and the down-to-earth realities of war. He conveys well the appalling savagery, casual violence and suffering brought on by the Civil War."—The Times Literary Supplement
 
"A wonderfully lucid writer who marshals the extensive material with great verve and understanding. . . Beevor has captured the tragedy in mesmerising detail."—The Observer

From the Publisher

Rob Heaps’s precise enunciation and steady pacing result in a splendid narration of these detailed accounts of the Russian Revolutions of 1917 and the ensuing civil war that resulted in the establishment of Soviet power. Drawing on numerous firsthand accounts and other sources, Beevor’s history is one that will be enjoyed by history buffs, especially those intrigued by Russia. Heaps’s deep voice and English accent give this production an authoritative tone, and his delivery—pacing, intonation, enunciation—are all excellent. While his British pronunciation of Russian words and names may grate on purists, this is, nonetheless, an excellent work. M.T.F. © AudioFile 2022, Portland, Maine

NOVEMBER 2022 - AudioFile

Rob Heaps’s precise enunciation and steady pacing result in a splendid narration of these detailed accounts of the Russian Revolutions of 1917 and the ensuing civil war that resulted in the establishment of Soviet power. Drawing on numerous firsthand accounts and other sources, Beevor’s history is one that will be enjoyed by history buffs, especially those intrigued by Russia. Heaps’s deep voice and English accent give this production an authoritative tone, and his delivery—pacing, intonation, enunciation—are all excellent. While his British pronunciation of Russian words and names may grate on purists, this is, nonetheless, an excellent work. M.T.F. © AudioFile 2022, Portland, Maine

NOVEMBER 2022 - AudioFile

★ 2022-07-07
The acclaimed British historian tackles the Russian civil war.

Despite current events, Russia is not the colossus that frightened other great powers during much of the 20th century. Although its revolution is no longer a scholarly obsession, Beevor, the winner of the Samuel Johnson and Wolfson prizes, among others, masterfully recounts the violent events that seemed to change everything. When Russia declared war on Germany in 1914, it fielded the identical titanic but shambling army defeated by Japan in 1905, overseen by the same autocratic but dimwitted Czar Nicholas II and a dysfunctional civil government. Sustained by grit and Allied aid, it held together for nearly three years despite catastrophic losses. However, by March 1917, increasing desertion, indiscipline, and violence against officers combined with widespread civilian suffering persuaded the still clueless czar to abdicate. Beevor’s account of what followed is both authoritative and disheartening. No one could correct Russia’s crumbling infrastructure. Hungry city dwellers blamed the new leaders, and crime and violence flourished. Their worst decision was to continue the war, which increased insubordination at the front and perhaps even more so behind the lines. Lenin arrived in April to command the small Bolshevik Party, which grew and ultimately seized power that October. Historians have long stopped portraying him as the good guy in contrast to Stalin and agree that he succeeded as all tyrants succeed: murderous ruthlessness, crushing rivals, and incessantly repeating promises that appealed to his supporters (“all power to the Soviets,” “peace to the peasants”) and then not keeping them. This is a vivid description of a revolution that featured as much mass murder as military action. Readers know the outcome, but the Red triumph was not universal. A few Baltic states won independence, and in the final and perhaps largest campaign, Polish forces routed the Red Army. Always a meticulous researcher, Beevor has done his homework in an era when everyone recorded their thoughts (even the czar kept a diary), delivering a detailed yet unedifying story through the eyes of many participants.

A definitive account.

Kirkus Reviews