1920 - Ukrainian Republic
Having placed the economy under the command of the state, Russian Bolsheviks could create the army that greatly surpassed the number of Denikin's armed forces. At the beginning of February 1920, the Red Army liberated the entire Ukraine. In February 1920 the nominal Government of the Ukraine presented a note to the Peace Conference asking for recognition as being a de facto Administration on the same footing with other states which have arisen amid the ruins of Russia. The note pointed out that the population was firmly opposed to Bolshevistic theories and intent upou independence. It asked for the moral support of "Western Civilization" in its task of overthrowing anarchy, and appealed for material assistance to enable it to reorganize its immense resources. Not only did the Ukraine remain unrecognized, but, by the Peace Treaties, large tracts that were claimed as "Ukrainia" (Galicia, Grodno, Minsk, Volhynia, a part of Podolia, Bukovina, Bessarabia) had been previously assigned to Poland, Lithuania, Czechoslovakia, or Rumania.
At about the same date the country was described as dotted with a number of miniature republics consisting of a dozen or so towns and villages fortified for defence, each having its own armed force. Gen. Pethra was in Warsaw, and M. Mazeppa, his prime minister, with the nucleus of the Ukrainian National Government and an army of about 6,000 strong, at Kamenets Podolskiy, and the Government was proving itself totally incapable of organizing the country.
When the defeat of Denikin was inevitable, the government of Soviet Russia turned its attention to Poland. Some propositions concerning peaceful settlement of the problem with boundaries were made to the government of Poland. Moscow supposedly consented to recognize the line of real demarcation of military forces that were formed in the summer of 1919 to be the state boundary. At the same time, beginning from 1920, V. Lenin began to draw up to the west front the most efficient detachments of the Red Army from everywhere, including the Urals, Siberia and Caucasus.
On the eve of the inevitable war with Soviet Russia, Y. Pilsudskyi, the head of the Polish state, considered it expedient to regulate relations with his former enemy, S. Petliura. Wishing to continue the war for an independent UPR, Petliura accepted his conditions.
The Warsaw agreement was made in April 1920. The Pilsuskyi's government refused from the intentions to expand Poland to the limits of Rich Pospolyta of 1772 and recognized the UPR. This concession was of symbolic value. However, Petliura had to make real concessions when given consent to the state boundary along the line already occupied by Pilsudskyi's troops. After the April 1920 understandings were reached with Poland and Rumania, the Ukrainian army was cooperating with the Poles against the Bolshevist army.
Pilsudskyi did not wait for the end of relocation of Soviet troops, and on April 25, 1920, began the offensive along the 500 km front using the forces of three armies which accounted for about 150 thousand people. Fifteen thousand of Petliura's soldiers advanced together with the Poles. On the strength of this alliance, the joint Ukrainian and Polish armies advanced as far as the Dnipro (Dnieper); but they were unable to check the offensive of Marshal Tukhachevsky's troops and were compelled to retreat to Po1and. It was only when Tukhachevsky had almost reached Warsaw that he was eventually repulsed. On April 27, 1920 the Polish Government formally recognized the Ukraine - or what remained of their claim - as an independent State, and accepted the provisional National "Directory," with Petlura as head, as the Government of the country.
On May 6, they occupied Kyiv. V. Lenin placidly met the first success of Poles because the objective correlation of forces was in favor of Russia. The counter-offensive of soviet troops that started on June 5 soon turned into the broad offensive headed by M. Tukhachevskyi. Moscow had formed a marionette-like government of F. Dzerzhynskyi, whom they planned to make the head of conquered Poland. In May 1920 it was officially stated by Mr. Bonar Law in the British Parliament that conditions in the Ukraine had not been settled enough to warrant the recognition by the Allied Powers of any government set up there.
The threat of losing the state rights conquered in 1918 closely united the broadest ranges of population around the government. Immediate help with arms and ammunition was given by France. Troops of M. Tukhachevskyi were stopped within 23 km of Warsaw and began to retreat in confusion under the destructive Polish attack. In ten days, they were already over the Buh. At the end of September 1919, the front was in the region of Zhytomyr and Berdychiv. The truce that was finalized in October 1919 fixed the consent of the Soviet party to remain Western Ukraine and Western Bielorussia within the boundaries of Poland.
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