Belarusian People’s Republic 1918: a failed statehood

Abstract

This article analyses the events and trends that determined the fate of attempts to form the Belarusian state in the conditions of the finale of World War One. The author has based his research on the study of the German occupation policy and the process of implementing the Brest-Litovsk peace treaties. It demonstrates that the foundations for the negative factors that blocked the appearance of a united Belarus were laid long before the beginning of the Soviet-Polish war. The BPR leaders’ interaction with the occupational authorities was determined not only by different subjective factors, but also by the fundamental refusal to place Belarus on the political map of 1918. This moment is not properly reflected in modern historiography of the issue, especially the Belarusian one. The role of neighbouring states and various national forces in the reconfiguration of post-imperial spaces under the pressure of the German Empire, within the framework of the Brest system of international relations created in 1918, is examined. Within its framework the RSFSR was to receive the place of the most important counteragent, who sought to obtain the maximum influence on the basis of mutually beneficial deals with the military-political leadership of the Kaiserreich. Although the projects of German hegemony in Eastern Europe were thwarted by the defeat of the Central Powers, the period of the First German Occupation and the partition of Belarusian territories between Soviet Russia and its western neighbours became the geopolitical basis for the fate of the nations of Belarus throughout the interwar period.