The historiography of the Polish-Bolshevik War accumulated a considerable number of accounts by Polish, Russian, Soviet and Ukrainian historians. In interwar Poland military aspects of the war were discussed and argued upon most often. Controversies erupted about the origin of the Polish counteroffensive plan of August 1920. Historians disagreed on the course of events during the Battle of Warsaw. After 1945 the Russian interpretation of the war was deeply influenced by Soviet propaganda, which tended to emphasize the peace-oriented approach of Soviet Russia to foreign policy, contrasting it to the “imperialistic” objectives of the Polish policy towards the Eastern Borderlands (“Kresy wschodnie”). This aspect of the Polish foreign policy was conceptualized in terms of the “exuberant Polish nationalism.” After 1989 historians revisited the problem of the Polish-Bolshevik War, without risking the intervention of censorship. Access to opened former Soviet Union archives facilitated new venues of historical investigation, namely the genesis, course of warfare, and consequences of the war. New research resulted in publication of numerous articles and monographs, though of different quality. Historians focused on eastern allies of Poland, the situation in Ukraine, and changes of identity of the inhabitants of the Eastern borderlands and western republics of the Soviet Union. The recent decade witnessed discussion between Polish and Russian historians, in which the Russian side tended to use the arguments from the previous historical narratives. For instance, Russian historians still consider Piłsudski to be responsible for the escalation of the war. However, new research has shed light on the anticipation of the Red Army’s attack by the Polish military and the connection between this military consideration and the seizure of Kiev in the beginning of May 1920.
The impressive work by Janusz Szczapański shows a colorful panorama of political events, diplomatic and military actions in the period of 1919-1920. The history of this period is analyzed in a verity of contexts. The innovative aspect of the work is the analysis of attitudes of the population on the whole territory of the Second Republic during the Polish-Bolshevik War. This aspect of the war history did not receive attention in the previous Polish historiography. The author is apt to depict a complex picture of population’s attitudes to the war, which varied according to social, national and religious diverse identities.
The title of the work incites question: why “Polish-Bolshevik” and not “Polish-Russian” or “Polish-Soviet?” The author convincingly argues that Poland fought the 1919-1920 war not against the Russian nation, but against the Bolshevik system. Many Russians, Belorussians, and Ukrainians joined Poles in their struggle against Bolsheviks. Another reason for changing the conventional name of this historical event is the fact that the Soviet Union per se was founded in December 1922.
The book is structured chronologically and divided into nine chapters. It begins with introduction and contains helpful indexes of persons and localities, list of abbreviations, bibliography, and a summary in English. The most interesting chapters describe “from below” the population’s behavior during different phases of the war. The author discusses the attitudes toward the war of particular political organizations and parties, the population’s attitudes toward drafting and its perception of the Polish and Bolshevik troops, the efficacy of the war time propaganda, and attempts by Polish communists to organize the so-called Polish Red Army. The book gives an account of relationship between Polish and Ukrainian troops and respective civilian populations. The author also analyzes the situation in the Vilna region, the Polish-Lithuanian relationship in this region and the role of the catholic and orthodox clergy in shaping of identity and attitudes of the peasant population. Observing the complex picture of nationalities and interethnic relations, the book does not leave without mention the Czechs and the Germans on the territory of the Second Republic. Pursuing a history from below perspective Szczepański includes into his narrative the description of life under occupational regimes as well as on the territories affected by the warfare or close to the front. The multitude of threads taken up by the author constitutes the main value of his work. This work contributes to discussion of problems of national identity in the borderland region between Poland and Soviet Union and the Polish-Russian relationships in the XX century.
Szczepański refutes the stereotype of interwar Polish historiography, which associated the Jews with communism. He differentiates between Socialist and Zionist groups of Jewish youth, which actively engaged in new politics, and more numerous groups of orthodox Jews who resented the new order for religious reasons and remained loyal to the Polish State. The author set forth a hypothesis that participation of Jews in formation of soviet authorities and economic life on the occupied territories was due to their pragmatism. This collaboration a way to survive under occupation, given the explicitly anti-Semitic mode of the Red Army’s actions, especially characteristic for its Cossack regiments.
The author strives to achieve a neutrality of narrative. The events of the Polish-Bolshevik War are comprehensively described without unnecessary simplifications and omissions. Polish historians have already filled the blank spots of the war’s history, uncovering such venues as the atrocities committed by the Red Army troops in Poland, the objectives set for the war by the Russian revolutionary leadership, the means of the warfare. The Trotsky’s adage about the march “over the corpse of Poland to the victory of World Revolution” was ironically met with sympathy of almost the whole of Europe toward the Bolshevik Russia despite the fact that the Polish victory at the Battle of Warsaw brought to Europe about a dozen of years of peace. The author brings forth new testimonies about the Red Army atrocities and their planning by the Bolshevik leadership in 1919-1920. He refutes the figure of 60,000 Red Army victims in the Polish POW camps proposed by Soviet historians as much exaggerated. Yet, he is able to give a balanced account, showing a large scale of desertion from the Polish army. The author insists that desertion took place not only among Jews and inhabitants of the borderlands (many of whom were not Polish ethnically) but also it spread among the conscripts from the central Poland. In spring of 1920 pacifism affected Polish soldiers too. Military authorities blamed Bolshevik agitation for it, but this was only one reason. Many Poles were not able to comprehend the war objectives and the principles of Piłsudski’s Eastern policy (the concept of federation). The lack of understanding was accompanied by general resentment toward any new war because of the exhaustion as a result of the First World War. After a long campaign of propaganda the Polish government and clergy succeeded in boosting Polish peasants’ joining the army and their contribution to the warfare. Reasons for peasants’ abstention from war efforts were numerous. Notably, this was due to incompleteness of the land reform, weakness of the state administration, disastrous munitions policy and blameworthy discipline in the Polish troops. It is worth mentioning that refusal to contribute to the war did not mean support of Bolshevik Russia. Only when the collapse of the young Polish state in summer of 1920 became obvious, the whole society consolidated around the defense effort and displayed enormous sacrifice.
Szczepański discovers that part of the Polish military did not perceive Ukraine as an ally but rather treated this territory according to the rules of the occupation. This brought about alienation of non-Polish population from the war efforts of the Polish state. The alienation also resulted in part from the cruel treatment of the Bolshevik POWs by some Polish troops. The non-Polish population remained wary toward the so called “Lords’ Army”, which, in their opinion, was trying to “reintroduce serfdom in the East’. Some groups of non-Polish population tended to perceive the advancing Red Army as their kin in the light of recent Polish offensives.
The author draws his conclusion on a vast source base. Twenty six Polish archives are listed in the bibliography among library and private manuscript collections. The ability of the author to incorporate materials from Russian, Belorussians, Lithuanian and Ukrainian archives as well as from the collections of Polish scientific institutes in London gave a particular strength to the book. The bibliography also includes numerous newspapers, memoirs, and diaries. Given the wide range of used sources, it is particularly sad that the author did not consult secondary works published by Western European, Canadian and US scholars, in particular works by historians of Ukrainian history. Thus the historiographic account of the war’s history remained incomplete, with an unbalanced emphasis on the research by Russian and Ukrainian historians.
The author worked hard on the style of the book, without trying to force the reader to accept his interpretation. To back up his judgements the author included a variety of long or short quotations. However, narrative sometimes works better than quotes facilitating smooth reading. The book is sparingly illustrated, nonetheless, a few included illustrations are published for the first time.
The book under review is distinguished by impressive source base and a number of revisions of conventional historiography of the Polish-Bolshevik War. It sheds new light not only on the history of the war but also contributes to historical investigation of national identity formation of non-Polish population in the Second Republic, notably Ruthenians (Ukrainians) and Belorussians. Thus the book will be of interest not only for the Polish readers.