Romanian Eagle

When Romania was stepping up its domestic economic construction, Poland's war against Soviet Russia officially broke out.

On the Belarusian front, Polish troops launched an attack on the Soviet troops on the Berezina front on February 14. Polish troops of 120,000 were attacking the Southwest Front with 80,000 Soviet troops. At the same time, the Polish Third Army, bypassing the Romania-occupied western Ukraine, attacked Kyiv. Piłsudski's dream of a federation of the two seas has not been abandoned, except that the Romanian occupation of Western Ukraine is excluded.

The Polish army progressed smoothly in the early stage, not only conquering Minsk, the capital of Belarus, but also occupying Kyiv. For a time, Poland's war intention to realize Poland's largest territory is about to be realized.

In the face of the Polish attack, the Soviet Union immediately dispatched troops.

At this time, the Red Army had already defeated the White Army, and Denikin had failed and retreated to the Crimean Peninsula to survive. In the Caucasus, the Soviet Union has also advanced to the mountainous areas. As for Kolchak in Siberia, it has completely failed, and he was also captured by the Soviet army.

The opposition that could threaten the Soviet Russian regime for a while has ceased to exist. At the same time, Soviet Russia signed peace agreements with Latvia and Estonia, and the threat on the flank was also lifted.

Therefore, in the face of the Polish attack, Lenin and others sent generals led by Tukhachevsky to grow up through the civil war. This genius general can be said to be very young at this time. Born in 1893, he is only 27 years old even now.

Although young, he has a lot of battlefield experience. He was born in a decaying aristocratic family in Dorogob County, Smolensk Province, Russia.

In 1911, he entered the Moscow Yekaterina No. 1 Armament School to study. The following year, he was elected to the Alexander Military Academy for further studies, and he graduated in 1914 to serve in the Semenov Guards.

After the outbreak of the First World War, Tukhachevsky went to the front with the troops and was captured by the Germans on February 19, 1915. In October 1917, he escaped and returned home. After the August Revolution (formerly the October Revolution) broke out, Tukhachevsky was introduced to the Soviet Red Army and the Communist Party, becoming the first former Tsarist Russian officer to join the Communist Party.

As soon as Tukhachevsky joined the Bolshevik Party, he was entrusted with important tasks. He was ordered to go to the Eastern Front to reorganize the scattered troops and prepare for the establishment of the First Army of the Red Army. He accomplished the task well in a short time, and personally led his troops to defeat the White Guards many times.

Then he appeared in various areas of the civil war, whether it was against Kolchak or Denikin, his excellent command ability helped him win. And now facing the Polish attack, Lenin and others thought of him immediately.

So after he was named commander-in-chief in April, Tukhachevsky immediately dispatched troops. In the following month, Soviet Russia concentrated more than 700,000 people on the front line in Poland, while the Polish army only had 500,000 people. In terms of military strength, the Soviet Union has an advantage. Although Poland is still recruiting, it is impossible for these troops to appear on the battlefield now.

Even so, Tukhachevsky is still gathering troops. Why would he do this?

It turned out that Poland began a military operation to claim "Russian-occupied lands" from Soviet Russia. This greatly violated the patriotism of Soviet Russia, and also hurt the passion and yearning for "world revolution" that almost all leaders of Soviet Russia harbored.

How could a Poland, considered by the leaders of Soviet Russia to be the "red bridge" of the world revolution, become a "passage" against Soviet Russia?

Thus Polish patriotism collided with that of Soviet Russia. On April 29, the Central Committee of the Russian Communist Party (Brazzaville) issued a statement calling on workers and peasants, "respected Russian citizens" to rise up to defend the Soviet Republic.

For the first time, the Russian traditional patriotism and the concept of Russia, criticized by Lenin, were seen by the Soviet regime as a weapon to win the war against Poland, and under the banner of Russian patriotism, what was to be achieved was not only the war against Poland. victory.

A red Poland is in the interests of the Soviet Union, which is why Tukhachevsky still thinks that there are not enough troops. He wants to establish a Soviet regime in Poland, because after Poland is the crossroads of Europe, Germany, and Lenin and others have their own ideas about the current turbulent Germany.

But while waiting for other troops to gather, Tukhachevsky will not do nothing.

The first Polish Army Corps, located in the extreme north, was the first to be attacked. At the end of May, the Soviet Union counterattacked. The Polish First Army was defeated, and the Russian Fifteenth Army recaptured the area between the Daugava and Berezina rivers.

On May 24, 1920, Polish troops in the south encountered Semyon Budyonny's 1st Cavalry Army for the first time. On June 5, Budyonny broke through the Polish front with Cossack cavalry. Soviet Russia then used mobile cavalry to attack the rear of the Polish army for communications and supplies.

By June 10th, the Polish army fully retreated, and on June 13th, Kyiv was abandoned.

At this time, the Polish army was already facing layers of oppression by the Soviet Russian Red Army, and Tukhachevsky sent several troops at this time, which made the Polish army fall into the situation of caring for one and the other in the Belarusian region. For a time, Poland was losing ground, and all the territories it had captured before were lost.

At this time, Tukhachevsky still did not give Poland a chance to regroup, and led the army to continue to march towards the Polish hinterland.

Tukhachevsky launched an offensive along the Smolensk-Brest-Litovsk line on 4 July, crossing the Ota and Berezina rivers. The 3rd Cavalry Corps in the north intends to snatch the Polish army from the north and move closer to the borders of Lithuania and East Prussia. The 4th, 15th and 3rd armies pressed westward, supported in the south by the 16th and Mozarska armies.

By July 7, the Polish army was forced to retreat across the board.

However, due to the stubborn resistance of the Polish army, Tukhachevsky's attempt to break through the Polish front and push the Polish army to the southwest of the Pinsk Swamp failed.

At this time, the Russian army advanced almost 20 miles a day. Grodno in Belarus was lost on July 19, and Brest-Litovsk was occupied by Russian forces on August 1.

At this point the Poles realized that the Russians' goals were no longer limited to moving the border westward, and that Poland's independence was at stake.

At this time, the British government issued a "substantial" ultimatum to Soviet Russia, demanding that Soviet Russia cease hostilities against Poland and the Russian army (the White Army led by Wrangel in southern Russia). As well as accepting the Curzon Line as a temporary border between Soviet Russia and Poland until a permanent border is negotiated. If Soviet Russia refused, Britain threatened to assist Poland in all possible ways, but in reality Britain was also limited by domestic political situation.

On July 17, Soviet Russia rejected the British ultimatum and counter-proposed to negotiate directly with Poland. The British response was to suspend trade negotiations with Soviet Russia if Soviet Russia continued to attack Poland, which was ignored by Soviet Russia.

In fact, Poland had very few allies at this time. France sent an advisory group of 400 people to Poland in 1919, and assisted the "Blue Army", mainly composed of Polish origins and commanded by France during World War I, to arrive in Poland from France.

Hungary expressed its willingness to send 30,000 cavalry troops to support Poland, but Czechoslovakia refused to allow them to cross the border. However, some trains loaded with weapons still arrived in Poland from Hungary.

At this time, Poland looked around, and there was only one country that could help itself, and that was Romania, which had previously defeated Soviet Russia. At this time, in order to maintain its independent status, Poland, on the one hand, requested the help of Britain, France and other countries, and on the other hand, sent a delegation headed by Prime Minister Morachevsky overnight to Bucharest to ask Romania for help. The only one who can save them at the moment is Romania.

It needs to be said here that in order to get to Bucharest quickly, Morachevsky flew directly to Romania on an unarmed plane. This was more than a decade earlier than Chamberlain flew to Berlin for peace. Poland accidentally made history and became the first leader to fly on a business jet.