Alexander Wassiljewitsch Kolchak

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AW Kolchak
Coat of arms of the Kolchak government

Alexander Kolchak ( Russian Александр Васильевич Колчак , scientific. Transliteration Aleksandr Vasil'evič Kolčak ; born November 4, jul. / 16th November  1874 greg. In Saint Petersburg , † 7. February 1920 in Irkutsk ) was an admiral of the Russian Navy , Monarchist and one of the leaders of the White Army in the Russian Civil War .

Live and act

Kolchak came from a family of officers . He took part in Russian polar expeditions as a hydrologist from 1900 to 1903 under Eduard von Toll and from 1909 to 1911 (see: Hydrographic Expedition of the Northern Arctic Sea ). In the Russo-Japanese War 1904/1905 Kolchak commanded the mine-layer Amur and was taken prisoner by the Japanese.

First World War

At the beginning of the First World War , as a sea ​​captain , he was chief of operations staff in the Baltic Fleet under Admiral Nikolai Ottowitsch von Essen . After his death in May 1915, he took over command of the 1st Destroyer Division with the modern Novik boats and finally switched to the Russian Black Sea Fleet as Commander in Chief in 1916/1917 .

exile

After the outbreak of the revolution, Kolchak went into exile in England. He later went to a series of lectures in the USA. There he met u. a. with then President Woodrow Wilson. After this stay in the USA he officially joined the British armed forces to continue the fight against the Central Powers. Instead of the planned deployment in Mesopotamia, Kolchak, in consultation with the British, reached Siberia via the Russian Far East. He should organize the struggle against the Bolsheviks from there.

Russian civil war

During the Russian Civil War , Kolchak recruited an army, the so-called Kolchak Army, in November 1918 as War and Navy Minister for the "Siberian Government" residing in Omsk . At this time the political crisis had broken out in Omsk. On November 18, Cossack officers arrested the four leaders of the Siberian government (known as the "Directory") and overthrew the "government" in which the SRs had a majority. As a result of the coup, Kolchak came to power. By a secret election of the Council of Ministers, Kolchak was appointed Supreme Regent of Russia. He was de facto recognized and supported by the Entente and de jure by the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes .

In an appeal to the population, Kolchak called for the liberation from Bolshevism and external influences in order to be able to convene the new constituent assembly called for by the Council of Ministers. Under the "extremely difficult conditions of the civil war" he did not want to take the "path of retribution [lit. "Reaction"] or partisanship "go. The main goal is the “creation of an efficient army, a victory over Bolshevism and the establishment of law and order so that people can choose a free government at their own will, and the great ideal [lit.“ idea ”] of Freedom will be realized that will be proclaimed all over the world. "

Admiral Kolchak (seated), the head of the British mission General Sir Alfred Knox (standing behind Kolchak) and other British officers on the Eastern Front of the Russian Civil War.

He established a dictatorial rule and, with material help from Great Britain and France, initially successfully led the fight against the Red Army in Siberia until April 1919. His troops (part of the White Army ) penetrated as far as Kazan and across the Volga and captured 148 tons of the tsar's gold , which they submitted to the Ufa board of directors .

A part of this tsarist gold, 54,529,880 tsarist gold rubles, was supplied to Japan by Kolchak under two Russian-Japanese agreements signed on October 6, 1919. In return, the delivery of weapons for the army of Alexander Kolchak was promised. On the Japanese side, the promised arms deliveries were never implemented. The reason given was the rapid defeat of Kolchak, which no longer made delivery possible. Some weapons were delivered to the forces of the ataman Grigory Semenov .

Due to a double game of the Entente, the untenable long front and political intrigues, his army suffered a heavy defeat against the Red Army at Samara ; on November 14, 1919 Omsk had to be evacuated. Kolchak's army and the Allied military missions in Siberia as well as 200,000 civilians moved, mostly on foot, across the Siberian tract to the east, and on January 14, 1920 Maurice Janin Kolchak in Nizhneudinsk ultimately placed "under Allied protection". The Czechoslovak legions took him to Irkutsk , where the Social Revolutionary City Council wanted to allow him to pass if Kolchak was extradited. Janin, who was already in Vladivostok, approved it, and the legions negotiated 30 more wagons of coal. The City Council was shortly after the Bolsheviks assumed that Kolchak on 7 February 1920 summarily executed and his body in an ice hole in the Angara sunk.

reception

Monument to Kolchak in Irkutsk

In the Soviet Union, Kolchak was seen as a puppet of foreign powers. Beyond the Soviet perspective at the time, Kolchak is one of the most controversial historical figures in modern Russia. Two rehabilitation applications were rejected by a regional military court in 1999 and the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation in 2001. Monuments dedicated to Kolchak were erected in Saint Petersburg in 2002 , in Irkutsk in 2004 and in Omsk in 2016 , despite objections from some communist politicians and Soviet veterans. Its monuments are a frequent target of vandalism. The Russian Navy was considering naming the third frigate of the new Admiral Grigorowitsch class after Kolchak, but rejected this.

Above all, his close cooperation with Great Britain during the civil war and the hope he placed in the Entente is viewed critically.

Others

Edwin Erich Dwinger fought on Kolchak's side , who wrote the book Between White and Red about his experiences . In it Dwinger describes Kolchak's execution, including the note that the admiral himself gave the order to fire.

At the beginning of October 2008, a film adaptation of his relationship with Anna Wassiljewna Timirjowa (1893–1975) with Konstantin Chabensky and Elisaveta Boyarskaja in the leading roles in Russian cinemas came under the title Admiral (Russian Адмиралъ, director: Andrei Kravtschuk ) .

Koltschak is portrayed by Wolf von Gersum in Wolfgang Schleif's TV film Civil War in Russia (ZDF 1967/68) .

literature

Web links

Commons : Alexander Kolchak  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Bettina Brand in Gerhard Hirschfeld, Gerd Krumeich , Irina Renz (eds.): Encyclopedia First World War , 2nd edition, Paderborn, 2014, p. 620
  2. ↑ a b c Alexej Timofejtschew: Admiral Kolchak: Russian patriot or British spy? November 30, 2017, accessed June 11, 2020 (German).
  3. ^ Berthold Seewald: Russian Civil War: Why the Bolsheviks Defeated the Whites . In: THE WORLD . May 2, 2019 ( welt.de [accessed June 11, 2020]).
  4. ↑ М. И. Смирнов. Александр Васильевич Колчак (краткий биографический очерк). Париж, 1930.
  5. ↑ Золото Колчака: за что Япония должна России шесть миллиардов долларов. Retrieved June 11, 2020 (Russian).
  6. ↑ Controversy over the memorial: How Russia's ex-head of state heats up tempers
  7. ↑ В Петербурге доску Колчаку вновь закрасили черной краской , Lenta. February 10, 2017. Retrieved February 12, 2017. 
  8. ↑ Admiral on film.ru
  9. ↑ Admiral. Internet Movie Database , accessed May 22, 2015 .
personal data
SURNAME Kolchak, Alexander Wassiljewitsch
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Колчак, Александр Васильевич (Russian); Kolčak, Aleksandr Vasil'evič; Kolchak, A. Wassiljewitsch; Kolchak, AW
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Russian admiral
DATE OF BIRTH November 16, 1874
PLACE OF BIRTH St. Petersburg
DATE OF DEATH February 7, 1920
Place of death Irkutsk