Battle of Zborów
Members of the 7th company in the Zborow trenches
| date | July 1. bis 2. July 1917 |
|---|---|
| place | Sboriw , today Ternopil Oblast , Ukraine ; then Galicia |
| output | Victory of the Czechoslovak legions |
| Parties to the conflict | |
|---|---|
| Commander | |
|
Colonel Vyacheslav P. Trojanow |
Colonel-General Eduard von Böhm-Ermolli |
| Troop strength | |
| 3500 men | 5500 men |
Eastern Front (1914-1918)
1914
East Prussian operation ( Stallupönen , Gumbinnen , Tannenberg , Masurian Lakes ) - Galicia ( Kraśnik , Komarów , Gnila Lipa , Lemberg ,
Rawa Ruska ) - Przemyśl - Vistula - Krakow - Łódź - Limanowa - Lapanow - Carpathians
1915
Humin - Mazury - Zwinin - Przasnysz - Gorlice-Tarnów - Bug Offensive - Narew Offensive - Great Retreat - Novogeorgiewsk - Rovno - Swenziany Offensive
1916
Lake Narach - Brusilov offensive - Baranovichi offensive
1917
Aa - Kerensky offensive ( Zborów ) - Tarnopol offensive - Riga - Albion company
1918
Operation Punch
The Battle of Zborów (Czech. Bitva u Zborova , ukr. Зборівська битва 1917 ) on July 1 and 2, 1917 was, besides the attack on Kalusz, the only operation of the Kerensky offensive that was successful for Russia . The Russian 11th Army under General Iwan Georgijewitsch Erdeli managed to break through the front of the Austro-Hungarian 2nd Army .
During the attack, the first-time Czechoslovak legions on the Russian side proved their worth . After the end of the First World War, their successful use formed a cornerstone of Czechoslovak patriotism and also legitimized the formation of the national state.
background
After the reliability of many Russian units was questioned, only volunteer units were used in the Kerensky offensive. Among them was the Czechoslovak Rifle Brigade ( Československá střelecká brigáda ), which consisted of three regiments of Czech and Slovak prisoners of war.
- 1st rifle regiment "Mistr Jan Hus ",
- 2nd Rifle Regiment " Jiří z Poděbrad ",
- 3rd Rifle Regiment " Jan Žižka z Trocnova"
The brigade (around 3,500 men) was poorly equipped and poorly trained, and in particular there was a lack of machine guns . Furthermore, this was the first use of the entire brigade as an independent combat unit. Before that, the Russian command had only used parts of the brigade, mostly for reconnaissance missions. The brigade was commanded by the Russian Colonel VP Trojanow, but the attack tactics had been prepared by Czech officers. The brigade was deployed near Zborow, today's Ukrainian city of Sboriw (Polish: Zborów ), in a secondary section of the front. The neighboring sections of the front were held in the north by the 4th Russian Division and in the south by the 6th Division.
Opposite the Czechoslovak rifle brigade were the following parts of the kuk combat troops:
- from the 32nd Infantry Division (Budapest)
- the Infantry Regiment No. 86 (Szabadka / Subotica)
- the Infantry Regiment No. 6 (Budapest)
- from the 19th Infantry Division (Pilsen)
- the Bohemian Infantry Regiment No. 35 (Pilsen / Plzeň)
- the Bohemian Infantry Regiment No. 75 (Neuhaus / Jindřichův Hradec)
Their deployed total strength was about 5,500 men, who were relatively well equipped and armed.
course
At dawn on July 2, the second day of the offensive, small groups of legionnaires began to attack enemy lines with hand grenades from 5.15 a.m. after receiving prior artillery support (see raid troop tactics). After they broke through the barbed wire barriers, more units followed. By 3:00 p.m. the legions had penetrated up to 5 km into enemy territory and penetrated all of the Austrian defense lines. 3,300 enemy soldiers (including 62 officers) were captured; 20 cannons and large amounts of military equipment were captured. The losses on the Czechoslovak side amounted to 167 fallen, 17 fatally wounded, 11 missing and about 700 wounded.
consequences
The military success had no effect on the Russian Kerensky offensive, which was lost altogether. The victory in this battle gave the leadership of the Czech and Slovak resistance considerable tailwind.
The success of the Czechoslovak units was so surprising that the Russian Provisional Government thereafter lifted any restrictions on the formation of new units from Czech and Slovak prisoners of war.
In addition, the Czechs in Austria-Hungary heard for the first time that Czech resistance fighters were fighting on the side of the Entente. However, the authorities censored any reference to Czech volunteers fighting the Central Powers. However, after the surprising victory, some Austro-Hungarian politicians called for alleged treason cases to be looked for in the regular Czech units of the Austro-Hungarian Army , which indirectly made the victory of the legionaries known throughout the monarchy.
After the war, the battle was used to stage the military hero cult around the Czechoslovak legions , which formed one of the patriotic cornerstones of the new Czechoslovak state. During the German occupation of Czechoslovakia in 1939–45 and after the Communists came to power in 1948 , the story was either kept secret or ignored.
further remarks
- In the Battle of Zborow two future Czechoslovak presidents fought on the opposing sides: Klement Gottwald on the Austrian side and Ludvík Svoboda on the Russian side.
- The 1st Rifle Regiment fought near Zborow under the name Regiment Svatý Václav ('Regiment St. Wenceslas '). After the battle, when Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk visited the soldiers, as President of the Czechoslovak National Council he allowed himself to be renamed Regiment Mistr Jan Hus ('Regiment Magister Jan Hus'). Together, the above Regiments honored by the Russian leadership with the honorary name Regiment June 18 (according to the Gregorian date of the battle) and awarded the Ribbon of the Order of St. George for the troop flag.
- After Zborow, Tomáš G. Masaryk tried to enlarge the first brigade by two more regiments (the above-mentioned 3rd regiment Jan Žižka z Trocnova and the 4th regiment Prokop Holý Veliký ) and the establishment of a second division, whose first rifle regiment was named after him was (5th Regiment TG Masaryk ). The Jan Jiskra z Brandýsa cavalry regiment and the Nitra Cossack cavalry regiment also emerged as a result of Masaryk's negotiations. When Masaryk left Siberia (March 7, 1918), the third division and the 9th Jan Sladký Kozina z Hrádku and the 10th Karel Havlíček Borovský rifle regiment were formed . When Masaryk arrived in Vladivostok as the quartermaster of the Czech legionaries, they were already fighting with twelve rifle regiments and two armored trains .
literature
- Richard Lein: Duty or High Treason - The Czech soldiers of Austria-Hungary in the First World War. Lit, Berlin et al. 2011, ISBN 978-3-643-50158-5 .
swell
- Rudolf Medek , Vojtěch Holeček: Bitva u Zborova a československý odboj ( Battle of Zborov and the Czechoslovak Resistance. ) 1922.
- Jan Galandauer: July 2, 1917 Bitva u Zborova - Česká legenda ( July 2, 1917 Battle of Zborov - a Czech legend. ) 2002, ISBN 80-86515-16-8 .
