Resources on the Russian Civil War.

[Andrei Kuznetsov]

So this summer I've been reading voraciously about the Russian Civil War. I read W. Bruce Lincoln's rather thick Red Victory: A History of the Russian Civil War and the concise (albeit pro-White) The Russian Civil War by David Bullock.

Anyone know of some other good accounts of the Russian Civil War to read? I know Gorky did a good history of it... I'm also looking for ONLINE resources that might help.

Thanks!

[LaRiposte]

I would be very interested to find some too. Specifically a military-history of the war and an objective history of the Red Army under Trotsky.

[Andrei Kuznetsov]

I would be very interested to find some too. Specifically a military-history of the war and an objective history of the Red Army under Trotsky.

Lincoln's Red Victory is a good place to start if you want the military aspect and a good exploration of Trotsky's role in building the Red Army (which, even as a Maoist, I admit admiration for his contributions there). It's still biased against the Bolsheviks, but it's very well-researched (the bibliography in the back is HUGE!) and is very much worth the read.

[Kléber]

How the Revolution Armed by Leon Trotsky:

1918 (http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1918/military/index.htm)
1919 (http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1919/military/index.htm)
1920 (http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1920/military/index.htm)
1921 (http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1921/military/index.htm)
1922 (http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1922/military/index.htm)

[ComradeOm]

I don't like Lincoln's writing style but his book is a pretty decent introduction to the Civil War. You might want to check out Swain's Russia's Civil War for a (concise) work that focuses on the 'green movement'. I've been tempted to pick up Mawdsley's account (imaginatively titled The Russian Civil War) but I think its just another general history of the conflict

The problem with the RCW is that most accounts tend to detail the rather complex military aspect while the political, social, and economic spheres tend to get folded into either broader general histories (covering the whole revolutionary period) or specialist works. If you're interested in those then have a look through the link in my sig to see if anything catches your eye. Figes is very anti-Bolshevik but still work reading for an over-arching history of the period while there are various economic history that detail War Communism and the NEP (particularly Davies works and Nove's Economic History of the USSR)

If you're really interested in the military history then after Lincoln and other introductory works you'd probably be best served delving into operational histories. Most of these would be journal papers that cover a particular front or campaign, such as Sargent's British Military Involvement in Transcaspia (1918-1919). (I think that one's available free somewhere online). These tend to be uniformly written from a foreign perspective but are the place to go if you want to know who was where when on a particular front/campaign

For a complete curveball, given that its concerned as much with Mongolian Buddhism as the Civil War, try James Palmer's Bloody White Baron for a biography of the notorious Ungern von Sternberg and his exploits in the Far East, an often neglected theatre

[chegitz guevara]

Orlando Figues very anti-Bolshevik A People's Tragedy is a wealth of information. You can taste how much he hates the Bolsheviks, and yet his information seems to exonerate them again and again,

[LaRiposte]

I took Lincoln's book out of the library yesterday, reading through it now, thanks for pointing me in that direction comrades.

[ComradeOm]

Orlando Figues very anti-Bolshevik A People's Tragedy is a wealth of information. You can taste how much he hates the Bolsheviks, and yet his information seems to exonerate them again and again,Figes is a good example of how even most anti-Bolshevik historians today cannot ignore the wealth of evidence that points to a popular socialist revolution. Unfortunately the initial response of many is to take the liberal line (which dates from the Mensheviks) - 'Oh the Russia people have overwhelmingly supported the Bolsheviks... the Russian people are idiots'. Hence the title of Figes' book and his reliance on the likes of Gorky for interpretation