The Churchill-Mannerheim Collaboration in the Russian Intervention, 1919-1920

Abstract

THE SLAVONIC AND EAST EUROPEAN REVIEW Volume 8o, Number i January 2002 The Churchill-Mannerheim Collaboration in the Russian Intervention, I 9 -9I 920 MARKKU RUOTSILA THE importance of anti-communism forWinston Churchill is well known toallfamiliar withChurchill's career andvalues. Itisalsowell knownthatChurchill playeda centralrolein the campaign for a military intervention inSovietRussia betweeni9I9 andI92 . Asthe Secretary of Statefor WarChurchill had plansdrawnup for a comprehensive militaryassaulton the Bolshevik regime,and he consistently strove tohavetheseplansaccepted andimplemented by theBritish WarCabinet andtheVersailles PeaceConference. When thisfailed, heundertook thesupply ofarms andtechnical assistance to various 'White' anti-Bolshevik forces andwasresponsible formilitary operations inthenorthandsouthofRussia andinSiberia. Churchill wasso dedicated to theanti-communist causethatPrimeMinister LloydGeorge tookhimto taskforwhathecalledthisunhealthy and overriding 'obsession'. 1 Lesswellknown istheextent ofthedetailed consulting andplanning inwhichChurchill engaged withseveral foreign collaborators andcoconspirators inthecourseofhisinterventionist activity. In 1919-20, Churchill energetically sought backing fromabroad hissupporters athomewerefewandfarbetween andtheplenary elitesatVersailles distinctly unenthusiastic aboutallfurther military ventures. Inrespect of Churchill's searchforsupport, historians havecoveredin some Markku Ruotsila is a lecturer at the University of Tampere, Finland and is a Founding Member of the Churchill Center, Washington, DC. ' Cambridge, Churchill Archives Centre, Winston Churchill Papers (hereafter, CHAR). CHAR I6/i I, Letter from David Lloyd George to Winston Churchill, 22 September 9I 9. 2 THE CHURCHILL-MANNERHEIM COLLABORATION detail his vain attempt to convince PresidentWoodrow Wilson of the meritsof Allied militaryintervention.Attention has also been given to Churchill's more successful cultivation of French politicians and generals (especiallyMarshalFoch). Some attention has also been paid to Churchill's clandestine contacts with the German military in late I919.2 It is our contention that Churchill'ssearch for foreign supportwas much more systematic,broad, and protractedthan has hitherto been realized. It included extensive and prolonged secret contacts and detailed preparations for military operations with representativesof several of those new states bordering on Soviet Russia which were interested in anti-communist intervention but whose initiatives had been spurned by the Versailles Conference. Early on, Churchill was told of plans draftedby militaryauthoritiesin these states,envisioning a concerted militaryassaulton St Petersburg,the main Baltic Sea port under Bolshevikrule. Churchill set out to cultivate representativesof these states, encouraged them to proceed with the elaboration of their plans, and (unofficially)committedhimselfto theirimplementation. Carried out mostly through the offices of Churchill's Versailles representative,General Sir Edward Spears, these contacts amounted to the defactoconstructionof a war coalition that would be alternative to, and partly independent of, the official remit of the British War Office and of the VersaillesPeace Conference. Itwas intendedthat this alternative coalition would launch operations against St Petersburg and outlying areas largely irrespective of Allied political decisions. Sustained by Churchill's friendly interest and assistance, such a war coalition could, once it had achieved its aims, effectivelypresent the VersaillesConferencewith afait accompli. Historianshave not, however, paid much attention to this scheme within the broader context of Churchill'sactivities,butwith theavailabilityofpreviouslyunconsulted setsof documentarysourcesit is now possibleto sketchitsoutlines. Finland andthe Militarg Intervention ofRussia (November igi 8-AprilI9I9) When he became Secretaryof State forWarinJanuary I9 I9, Winston Churchill hoped to effect a joint Allied intervention in Russia, in 2 Most studies of Churchill's role in the intervention debate concentrate on these themes, as well as on Churchill's interest in supplying the 'White' forces and his fostering of operations in the north of Russia. Very little attention has been paid to the abortive St Petersburg operation and even less to the secretive scheming with foreign anti-communists. See especially David Carlton, Churchilland the Soviet Union, Manchester, 2000; Martin Gilbert, Winston S. Churchill, Volume 4, I9I7-I922, London, I975 (hereafter,Gilbert); Michael Kettle, Churchill andtheArchangel Fiasco,London I 992 (hereafter, Kettle). Somewhat more attention ispaid in Alex P. Schmid, Churchillsprivater Krieg. Intervention undKontrerevolution im russischen Buirgerkrieg, Zurich, I974, but this work is overly tendentious in its ideological colouring of the evidence. MARKKU RUOTSILA 3 conjunction with the various 'White' Russian troops and all the borderingstates.Allied troopshad been sent to Russia duringthe First WorldWarin orderto reconstitutean easternfrontagainstthe Central Powers, and after the Armistice these troops remained theoretically availablefor new, specificallyanti-Bolshevikoperations.If so directed, they could cooperate with local 'Whites' and with the Border States and together destroyBolshevism.This plan, which its Frenchsupporters called the 'encirclement of Bolshevism on all fronts', was inspired by the convictionthatthe Bolshevikswere a...