Bolshevik Leaders correspondence

Bolshevik leadership Correspondence. 1912-1927
Collection of documents 1996.
Compiled by: A.V.Kvashonkin, L.P.Kosheleva, L.A.Rogovaya, O.V.Khlevnyuk.

No. 33

S. i. Gusev - Central Committee of the RCP(b)

December 26, 1918

To the Central Committee of the Russian Communist Party 1

December 26, 1918

Dear comrades.

Let me draw your attention to the completely wrong system of government that has been established in the Revolutionary Military Council of the Republic. I emphasize "the system" so that they don't think I'm going to criticize individuals.

In the organization of command and control of modern armies, the rule is firmly and unshakably established that the high command, in relation to the lower command, is limited to setting strategic tasks (operational assignments, operational directives), but does not interfere at all in the very execution of tasks. This rule was established so unshakably that during the last war it was strictly observed even in the tsarist army. No one, except maybe young communists, would think of arguing against him.

The Revolutionary Military Council of the Republic does not argue against this ABC of military administration, but on the other hand it systematically violates it.

Indeed, how else, if not by violating the ABC of military affairs, not by interfering in operations, to call the orders of the Revvoensov [et] of the Republic continuously pouring into Revvoensovvost 2 : “send such and such a regiment, such and such a division, such and such a battery to the Southern Front "? Nothing can be objected to the transfer of troops from one front to another, since this is caused by military circumstances (although in such cases a corresponding change in the strategic task for the weakened front is necessary, which is not done; even the opposite is done: new active directions are given to the weakened front). But it is absolutely inadmissible that the Revvoensov [et] of the Republic for the Revvoensovvost and for individual armies decide which units can be removed.

This is precisely the interference in the internal affairs of individual armies and fronts, which is extremely harmful to the course of operations.

The Inza division was pulled out of the 1st Army at the moment when the (first) offensive against Ufa was underway. It is known what a catastrophe this offensive ended for the 5th and 1st armies. Meanwhile, it was possible to remove another division without violating operational plans, without spoiling the operations that had begun.

The Third Army was weakened by the pulling out of divisions and regiments of Estonian and Latvian units. More than once, there have been cases when the operations that have been started were suspended or slowed down due to the insistent demand of the Revolutionary Military Council [et] of the Republic: "to urgently send such and such a regiment to the South." And the regiment is in battle, far from the railway. For the time being they will replace him, for the time being he will go to the railroad, at least a week passes. Meanwhile, if we had not been bound by the categorical demand of this regiment, this division, the regiment (the regiment in general) would have been sitting in the cars the next day.

In order to show more clearly what kind of disorganization this system introduces, how it breaks operational plans and frustrates the operations that have begun, how much it unnerves the commanding heads (there is a cry from all the armies: “guard, they are robbing”), I will give the following figures.

Over the past two months, three divisions, ten regiments, three detachments have been withdrawn from the Eastern Front, and six more regiments and two detachments are currently being withdrawn. In total, out of all (pay attention to this) armies of the Eastern Front, twenty-four independent units break out, plus eight batteries.

What about the total population? Only 35 thousand people, a normal division (33 thousand people). If we were ordered to single out and form a division (or three independent brigades, or, finally, nine independent regiments), this would be done not in two months, but in two weeks, and, moreover, completely painlessly, without a desperate breakdown in organization, without exposing important directions, without disrupting operations, without the disorder that the forcible pulling out of thirty-two (!) Units inevitably brings. Thirty-two units are thirty-two cases of intervention of the Revolutionary Military Council of the Republic in the internal affairs of the armies.

No less disorder, disorder, lack of labor in the work of the front and armies is introduced by the constant change of operational tasks "in 24 hours." Here are two samples that I can document.

The Second Army in ten days received five different, mutually exclusive, operational directives (this was back in the era when the Revvoensov[et] of the Republic was in Arzamas, and the Revvoensov[et] of the Eastern Front did not exist).

Recently, the Eastern Front received three directives in five days:

1) The main direction is Orenburg, 2) The main direction is Yekaterinburg, 3) To help the third army.

You can't manage armies the way you manage a regiment. Tasks for companies can be changed every two days, tasks for fronts must be “measured seven times” and cut off once, unless absolutely necessary (a catastrophe on another front or a decisive victory) do not change.

In the case of the second army, it was especially clearly revealed that in the Revolutionary Military Council of the Republic, instead of a system of operational tasks, a system of operational hysterics was established. Shameful and disgusting!

Needless to say, how harmful such a hysterical "twitching" of the armies. The result of this system is obvious: Perm 3 .

If the Ufa operation had not been disrupted in due time by the withdrawal of the Inza division (I repeat, another division could have been withdrawn), if the second army, after the capture of Izhevsk, had not been marking time for ten days due to non-receipt of a directive, then Ufa would have been already in our hands, and the 2nd army would be behind Krasnoufimsk and hung over st. Cousino by December 15-20. The Whites could not even start an operation against Perm, or, in any case, they would be forced to stop. The third army would not have been defeated. The Motovilikha plant would have been saved. Despite the withdrawal of 35 thousand people, there are still enough forces on the Eastern Front. The catastrophe is the result of the management system adopted by the Revolutionary Military Council of the Republic.

To the charms of this system, it must be added that the Revvoensov [et] of the Republic systematically does not respond to the numerous requests of the Eastern Front. I undertake to document that no response has been received to any request.

This situation is no longer tolerated. The catastrophe on the Eastern Front is the first formidable warning. The Central Committee of the RCP must, through its representatives in the Revolutionary Military Council of the Republic, take decisive measures to radically break the system of government established there.

Member of the Revolutionary Military Council of the Eastern Front S. Gusev

PS This message was written before receiving the news [about] the surrender of the Revvoensov Eastern Front to the Tribunal for failure to comply with the order to transfer the CEC detachment. This last fact confirms all of the above, and at the Tribunal the picture of the ruin of the Eastern Front will be revealed completely. S. G.

RTSKHIDNI. F. 5. Op. 2. D. 159. L. 9-10. Typewritten text. Signature and postscript - autograph.

Notes:

1 On the letterhead “RSFSR. Revolutionary Military Council of the Eastern Front. Sent from Arzamas to Moscow.

2 RVS of the Eastern Front.

3 At the end of December 1918, the 3rd Army of the Eastern Front was defeated and surrendered the city of Perm.

No. 34

I. T. Smilga - Central Committee of the RCP(b)

December 26 [1918]

Dear comrades 1 .

I have already told you about the interruptions in command. I fully share the view of S. I. Gusev on the high command.

In connection with the fall of Perm, relations between the Headquarters and Us became extremely aggravated. VATSETIS put us on trial for disobeying an order. I am very happy about this circumstance 2 .

I ask you not to allow reprisals against Kamenev.

A personal meeting is required.

I will let you know when I can be called.

26/XII.

I. Smilga.

RTSKHIDNI. F. 5. On. 2. D. 159. L. 10v. Autograph.

Notes:

1 Written on the back of the last page of document No. 33.

2On December 29, 1918, Vatsetis, reporting to Lenin on measures to help the 3rd Army, blamed the leadership of the Eastern Front for what had happened (Commander-in-Chief of all the Armed Forces of the Republic I. I. Vatsetis, p. 154). On December 31, 1918, Lenin telegraphed Trotsky: “[...] There are a number of party messages from near Perm about the catastrophic state of the army and drunkenness. I am sending them to you. They ask you to come there. I thought about sending Stalin, I'm afraid that Smilga will be soft on Lashevich, who, they say, also drinks and is not able to restore order [...] ”(The Trotsky papers. Vol. 1. P. 228). To clarify the reasons for the surrender of Perm, a commission of the Central Committee headed by Stalin and Dzerzhinsky was created, about which on January 1, 1919 Sverdlov telegraphed the Ural Regional Committee of the RCP (b) and the command of the Eastern Front (From the history of the civil war in the USSR. T. I. S. 398).