Causation
When
the guns fell silent across the scarred fields of France
and Belgium
in the fall of 1918, the war only ended for one side. Wracked by mutiny and revolution, Germany stopped
fighting. On the verge of ethnic
disintegration, Austria-Hungary
also stood down. But for the Allies and
their Associate, the United
States, the conflict was not over. From the Arctic Ocean to the Black Sea and
across Eurasia to the Pacific, soldiers
continued to fight and die. Russia became
the battlefield where the world's first socialist state fought for its
existence against most of the world's major powers.
The
involvement of the United
States in the Russian Civil War is not
widely remembered. The slaughter on the
Western Front dwarfs other arenas of World War I, as it saw Europe
tear itself apart. Deployed both to the
European Arctic and to Siberia, the expeditionary forces sent to Russia are
overlooked in most texts. But these
interventions, which drew the United
States into the struggle between the
Bolshevik Reds and their White adversaries, are vital for understanding the
development of world history. While it
was not until after the Second World War that the hostility between the United States and the Soviet Union took center
stage, the roots of this enmity lie in the fateful decisions that sent American
soldiers to Russia.
In
looking for the reasons behind these decisions, historians must keep in mind
the complex nature of causation. Human
choices are not always easily understood and interpreted. Indeed, full comprehension of past decisions
is never obtainable. Actions that at
first glance appear to be motivated by a single factor often, upon closer
examination, are found to spring from the interplay of various influences.
Historians' subjects can be even less useful in providing evidence than the
most uncooperative of witnesses. The
only links to the historian's subjects are what was deliberately chosen to
survive or accidentally preserved. It is
from these clues that the relationships between disparate and often competing
factors are to be studied and pieced together.
Not
all of these motivations to action are created equal. Some can be considered sufficient to
bring about the resulting effect. These
influences, in and of themselves, are enough to cause an action. This does not imply that other influences
were not present; they simply were not needed.
If cause was required for an effect to occur, but it alone was insufficient,
then it is considered necessary.
Necessary causes are by far the most numerous, as most decisions are the
product of multiple causes, each of which influences the outcome, but could not
have brought it about singularly.
One
type of necessary cause that has great importance in this analysis of the
American interventions in Russia
is known as a trigger. Triggers,
as their name implies, are the final step needed to convert latent causes into
action. These ingredients, such as past
experience, prejudices, and advice, often require an outside force for a
decision to be made. Another analogy
that may better explain a trigger's function is that of a chemical
catalyst. These compounds bring together
the necessary reagents in such a way that the obstacles to their reaction are
reduced or removed entirely. Triggers
can be external or internal influences, such as an unexpected battlefield
victory or a new perspective on a problem gained after long deliberation. These factors take the preexisting components
of a situation and bring something new out of them.
In
looking for and identifying these different types of causes, historians must
guard against dividing the myriad influences upon historical agents into neat,
easily classifiable categories. Causes,
like human beings, depend upon one another to produce effects. They cannot be mechanically sorted and
isolated from their surroundings.
Context, that most powerful tool of historical understanding, is vital
to interpreting past decisions. And
unlike chemical catalysts, triggers cannot be isolated from the reaction and
examined separately. There are no lab
experiments in history.
To
find them, and illustrate a trigger's relationship to other causes, it is
necessary to look for the point(s) of change in periods of relative
equilibrium. If new influences appeared at the point of change,
then these may likely be the triggers of change. A similar process can be followed with
decision-making. If all other influences
are present, but no decision has been reached, then the introduction of the
final one before the choice is quite likely its trigger.
The Prime Suspect and His Motives
In
studying the American expeditions to Russia, where should the search for
the decisions begin? Both at home and
abroad, Wilson
occupied center stage. While Congress
alone has the authority to declare war, these operations fell within the
prosecution of the war against Germany. Therefore, it was not necessary for new
congressional approval to be given or even sought before the activities of the
United States Armed Forces were expanded into the Russian Arctic and Far East.
Following the chain of command to the top, the responsibility for both
interventions is found to lie with President Woodrow Wilson. While it is true that his cabinet and military
staff wielded power and offered counsel, the president held the final authority
and ultimate responsibility for his administration's actions. Men like Secretary of State Robert Lansing
and Secretary of War Newton D. Baker did influence Wilson's
decisions but, in the end, he alone could authorize the dispatch of American
soldiers to Russia.
This
simple observation is reinforced by the increasingly prominent role Wilson played in
international affairs following the American entry into the Great War. Part of this importance was due to the United States'
position amongst the great powers after almost three years of grueling
war. Both sides were growing exhausted
and looked more and more to the United
States for loans and war materials. Britain and France each owed
millions of dollars to American banks, and later, to the federal
government. The United States
held financial leverage against both of these nations.
Additionally,
the United States
became a party to the war as an Associate of the Allies, its untapped manpower
reserves promised finally to turn the tide against the German juggernaut. Both Britain
and France
were running low on manpower and could ill afford the predicted heavy
causalities any war-winning offensive would entail. Thus, even a small Allied expedition to Russia would
have at least required tacit American approval.
Apart
from the material dependence of the Allies upon the United States, Woodrow Wilson also
came to enjoy a sort of moral authority greater than any of the Allied
leaders. His hopeful vision of
international peace and cooperation stood in stark contrast to the
imperialistic aims of the other leaders, such as Clemenceau and Lloyd George,
who hoped to seize Germany's
colonies and overseas interests. As war
weariness and social unrest began seriously to threaten the stability of the
European nations, Wilson's
support was of great, if incalculable, importance in retaining popular backing
for the war. This too gave the president
leverage against his counterparts in Paris and London.
The
last reason to focus upon Woodrow Wilson's decisions is his record of armed
intervention in other locations. From
the beginning of his presidency, he was involved in the use of force all across
Central America and the Caribbean. He ordered soldiers and marines into Haiti, the Dominican
Republic, and twice into Mexico. The involvement of the United States in the Mexican Revolution,
especially the occupation of the port
of Veracruz and the failed punitive
raid against Pancho Villa, shared some similarities with the twin expeditions
to Russia. By utilizing both the links between these
interventions and the factors that triggered Wilson's fateful choices, new
light can be shed upon these pivotal events and their place in the storied
relationship between the United States and the Soviet Union.
Since
the American expeditions to Russia
were among the first major interactions between the United States and Bolsheviks,
considerable attention has been devoted to discerning Woodrow Wilson's
motivations. The uneasy and oft-hostile attitudes
between the two states have been traced, as previously stated, to this dispatch
of American soldiers to Russia. If this act was the first step toward the
Cold War, was Woodrow Wilson the first Cold Warrior?
Some
have argued that while he was not as dedicatedly opposed to the Bolsheviks as
men such as Robert Lansing, Wilson did in fact
seek to “roll back” the Bolsheviks' control of Russia. From the use of military force in the Russian
Arctic and Far East to clandestine support for Cossack generals such as Kaledin
and Semenov, It is argued that Wilson
pursued an actively hostile policy against Lenin and his fellow
revolutionaries.
While
he did possess significant leverage over the Allies, Wilson was not immune to their diplomatic
pressure. Facing a stalemate on the Western
Front, the British and French feared that a collapse of the Russian military
would leave them alone to face the full force of Germany's formidable army. Both governments urged Wilson
to help bolster the Russians through American reinforcements, or, if worse came
to worse, recreate an Eastern Front with Allied troops that would force Germany to retain some of its divisions in Russia. Combined with the Japanese, who in seeking to
protect and expand their mainland interests eyed Siberia enviously, the Allies
exerted considerable effort to draw the United
States into Russia. Bowing to these demands in the interest of
Allied cooperation and solidarity, Wilson sent
American soldiers as “the precursors of collective security” that he hoped to
establish as part of the League of Nations.
Wilson's military
involvement has also been attributed to his vision of a worldwide liberal
capitalist order, based upon democratic institutions and economic competition,
rather than autocracy and imperialism.
The apparent conversion of Russia to democracy after the
Tsar's abdication had raised his hopes of accomplishing this goal. However, the Bolshevik seizure of power
threatened the establishment of Russian democracy. Just as he co-opted many of the socialists of
western Europe and the United States
into support of a war that could help create this system, Wilson hoped that the same could be achieved
with the Bolsheviks. When this failed,
due to their rejection of the last democratic fig leaves of the Soviet
Congress, he came to view them as a threat to the entire liberal capitalist
order. As the specter of anarchy and starvation cast
shadows over Europe in the wake of the Great War, Wilson sought to neutralize Bolshevism’s
appeal through food aid and renewed attempts to absorb them into a Russian
democratic government.
While
not without significant merit, each of these proposed explanations of Wilson's actions during
1917 and 1918 falls short. Projecting
the Cold War backwards to 1917 fails to account for the massive differences in
the balance of power throughout the world and gives an incorrect impression of
the views of the historical agents involved.
The variety of anti-Communism so influential in the creation of the Cold
War had yet to take shape. Few among the
elites of the Western European and North American democracies understood the
Bolsheviks' motivating ideology. More
common was the view that this was a form of anarchy that threatened to destroy
civilized society. The expansionist,
dictatorial Communism, that so concerned American strategists in the late
1940s, was still decades away. Being
anti-Bolshevik, as many American officials were, did not translate into
opposition to socialism. The use of
terror and non-democratic methods employed during the Bolsheviks' rise to power
and efforts to consolidate control alienated many democratic socialists who
were much in favor of increased government control of the economy.
Another
aspect of the decisions this explanation fails to account for is the hesitation
to use force and the limited nature of the expeditions. If Wilson
truly intended to “roll back” Bolshevik rule in Russia, he did not commit to it
readily or employ sufficient armed force, whether directly or through the
Whites, to force the Bolsheviks from power.
Instead, he sent the expeditions into Russia with limited numbers and
equipment, to fulfill missions that did not include fighting the Reds. He also did not enthusiastically support any
of the Bolsheviks' opponents in the ensuing civil war.
In
a similar fashion to backdating the Cold War, focusing on Allied pressure for
intervention as the primary motivation for Wilson's decision misinterprets the
relationship between the president and the Allied governments. Holding the upper hand, Wilson did not have to bow to Allied demands
to maintain unity within the coalition. Britain and France
needed the United States
far more than they cared to admit. The
intensity of their demands for a renewed Eastern Front illustrated not only
their fear of German reinforcements, but also their understanding that they
needed the United States
to implement any such plan.
Additionally,
some of Wilson's stated policies towards Russia ran
counter to Allied pressure. While
standing on a platform that called for the restoration of Russian territorial
and political sovereignty, he could hardly acquiesce to Allied action that
would likely end in Japanese expansion in Siberia and a possible wholesale
dismantling of the Russian Empire by its traditional imperialist rival, Great Britain.
Lastly,
the pressure from London and Paris
for a renewed Eastern Front continued for months without any indication that Wilson was prepared to
back such moves. The long-standing
nature of this factor argues against its importance as a trigger for
intervention, though it very probably acted as a necessary precondition for it.
The
argument that Wilson's policies toward Russia sprang
from his vision of a liberal capitalist world order stands upon a somewhat
stronger basis. Wilson's attempt to carve out a middle ground
between autocratic imperialism and revolutionary socialism by seeking to steer
socialists into democratic forms of government helps explain his hesitation to
employ force in dealing with “the Russian problem.” But it does not adequately explain his
eventual turn to force as a solution.
Fear that Bolshevism would spread throughout Europe
and the world did not become widespread until after the end of the war. The onset of the “Red Years,” including the
short-lived Hungarian Bolshevik government, brought this worry to the Western
elites' attention. But, in late 1917 and
throughout 1918, Bolshevism remained a Russian issue. The armed intervention by the United States before the end of the war against Germany does
not appear to have its origins in a fear of worldwide revolution.
This
last explanation describes Wilson's
motivations more accurately than the rest because it highlights his belief in
democracy. With the collapse of the ancien
régime in Russia, Wilson celebrated the
apparent success of democracy and praised the Russian people for having thrown
off the vestigial organs that had suppressed their democratic spirit. As the Bolsheviks gained power, eventually
wiping away the appearance of representative institutions, Wilson did not look to a counter-revolution
to defeat these new radicals. Instead, he
stated that “every moral influence”
should be provided “to the support of democratic institutions.” Wilson
wanted neither the autocracy of the Tsars nor the class tyranny of the
Bolsheviks.
This “moral influence”
could only be maintained through non-interference in the settlement of Russian
political affairs. While the Bolsheviks
would certainly have laughed at the notion that they were not engaged deciding Russia's political future, Wilson attached a unique meaning to this
idea. To the president settling one's
political affairs, whether in Mexico
or Russia,
meant the election of a representative body to govern a state. The restoration of a monarch or the creation
of a military dictatorship did not count in his eyes, nor did the imposition of
a puppet regime by a foreign power. Wilson felt that the creation of new democratic order in Russia had to
be the business of Russians alone.
Through his conviction
that democracy would take root, Wilson
was able to hope that the Bolsheviks could be brought around to orderly,
representative government. His desire to
see democratic institutions and principles succeed in Russia molded
his response to the development of the Revolution. That is not to discount other factors. Democracy, so to speak, was the lens through
which Wilson viewed any solution to Russia's
problems. Other influences built upon
this foundation. For example, the
pressure exerted by the Allied governments in favor of a reopening of the
Eastern Front played a significant role in shaping the American expeditions,
specifically in expanding their involvement far beyond Wilson's original intent.
The growth of a
hostile attitude towards the Bolsheviks on the part of Wilson
and his administration also played an important part in breaking down
resistance to the application of military force to the many problems in Russia. The domestic victory that the Bolshevik
government achieved in securing a separate, if dramatically unequal, peace with
the Central Powers in the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, reinforced the belief that
their success translated to increased power for Germany,
the primary target of Wilson's
crusade for democracy.
More grievous to the
president than this aid and comfort to the enemy was the Bolsheviks'
“rejection” of democratic institutions.
While democracy as Wilson
understood it was never a goal of Lenin and Trotsky, they still maintained
involvement with the Constituent Assembly, left over from the Provisional Government. When in early 1918 this body failed to
support their efforts, the Bolsheviks withdrew and precipitated its collapse. Woodrow Wilson took this as a rejection of
democracy and its institutions, though in truth the Bolsheviks had merely been
using it as a tool. Combined with Russia's
withdrawal from the war, this development marked the end of his belief in the
possibility of co-opting the Bolsheviks into a representative democracy and
removed a major obstacle to the dispatch of the American expeditions.
But this did not
directly lead to intervention in Russia. It took more than four months before the
first of two decisions were made to commit fighting men to the Arctic ports and
the Russian Far East. This delay, along
with his responses to later events, suggests that Wilson did not consider these motivations as
enough to warrant a military solution.
He wrestled with the Russian problem and on more than one occasion
complained of the difficulty it presented him. Therefore, the desire to see Russian
democracy succeed and the growing animosity felt toward the Bolsheviks can be
best described as necessary causes of the intervention.
The twin expeditions
to Russia
sprang from the intervention of contingency.
New problems arose that Wilson
felt he must address. A perceived German
threat to vast military stockpiles in the Arctic ports and the predicament of
the Czechoslovak Legion, apparently trapped along the Trans-Siberian Railway,
provided the sparks that kindled the fuel of the longstanding motivations for
intervention. Without these triggers,
the American involvement in Russia
may have taken a different form.
The fact that these
events were the problems that intervention was intended to solve is evident
from the composition of the expeditions themselves. Both were rather small in size, especially
when compared to the massive forces allotted by Wilson's
War Department to the fighting in France. Less than 5,000 men were sent to guard
supplies in the Arctic, with another 7,000
allocated to secure the line of communication, the Trans-Siberian Railway, of
the Czechs and Slovaks. These were not
sufficient to alter radically the political situation in Russia alone.
The public
justifications that the administration provided reveal that the expeditions
were not simply solutions to the aforementioned trigger events however. In addition to guarding supplies and aiding
the Czechs and Slovaks, Wilson
stated that the last of the legitimate objectives of the operations would be to
“steady any efforts at self-government or self-defense” that the Russians might
accept. Wilson's
combination of these objectives brought a political motivation to the
expeditions that had originally been envisioned as dealing with concrete,
practical matters of supplies and evacuations.
This vague and open-ended mission would prove crucial in determining the
path that these expeditions would follow.
Ultimately, the
expeditions were unable to achieve their objectives. The war with Germany ended three months after
the bulk of the force arrived at the Russian ports, thus removing the need to
guard them from German seizure. The
Czechoslovak Legion executed an about face and headed back westward, away from Vladivostok and the ships that would bear them to Europe. Along with
the American soldiers sent to Russia,
the Legion became embroiled in the civil war between the Reds and Whites. Thus all the stated reasons for intervention,
all of the mission goals assigned to the expeditions, had evaporated, save for
the aid of Russian democracy. Combined
with Allied influence and command decisions, this declared aim of Woodrow
Wilson's pulled the United
States into the fighting. That conflict effectively ended Wilson's hope of seeing democratic institutions
established within Russia
and poisoned relations between the newborn Soviet Union and the United States.
Descent
into Chaos
As the greatest clash between the European powers since
the Napoleon Wars entered its third calendar year, the tremendous costs of war
lay heavily upon the belligerents. On
the Western Front, British and French attempts to batter through German
defensive lines, at the Somme and Verdun,
had paid out hundreds of thousands of dead for a few hundred yards of no man's
land. On the other side of Eurasia,
fresh from its seizure of German possessions in China
and the Pacific, Japan
looked greedily upon the Siberian and Far Eastern territories of its
rival-turned-partner Russia. In the North Sea and Atlantic, Germany's
U-boats attempted to draw the noose ever tighter 'round the British Isles, in
retribution for the blockade of its ports that had named that winter the
“turnip winter,” due to widespread hunger in Germany.
Russia,
meanwhile, was locked in combat with all of the Central Powers. In the Caucasus
Mountains, Ottoman and Russian empires continued their
centuries-long feud. In the Ukraine and Russian Poland, Germany and Austria-Hungary leaned hard on an
army that, while seemingly endless in numbers, was low on weapons, supplies,
and morale. But while the French and
British spilled gallons of blood, the fighting in the east took on a more
mobile nature. The vast steppes and the
willingness of Russian generals to trade space for tactical advantage allowed Russia to tie
up numerous enemy divisions and prevent a French defeat in the first months of
the war. Two-and-a-half years later, it
was Russia who bore the
brunt of Germany's
efforts to end its two-front war, and the strain of doing so was starting to
show. If Russia was forced to sue for peace,
then the Central Powers would be free to concentrate their combined force on
the Western Allies and perhaps emerge victorious.
In the spring of 1917, that scenario seemed closer than
ever. Despite some successes on the
battlefield, morale amongst the army and civilian population reached new
lows. Millions died in combat against
superior German troops and shortages of food and other essentials brought
misery upon peasant and worker alike. Despairing
of any sort of victory, soldiers began to desert and even mutiny in greater
numbers.
All of this weakened the Tsar's tenuous hold on
power. Nicholas II, the last of the
Romanovs, had assumed direct command of the army at the front, leaving the
government in the hands of his wife, who proved less than equal to the
task. Discontent over the influence of
Rasputin, the notorious mystic of the royal family, weakened the nobility's
support for the Tsar's government. As
these forces began to coalesce, riots broke out in Petrograd
on March 2, 1917.
Demanding bread, these rioters soon joined forces with
the industrial workers who were on strike throughout the capital. In an attempt to suppress the disorder and
restore war production, the government sent police and army units to put down the
disturbances. While initially these
orders were carried out, often with bloody results, disaffected elements of the
security forces began mutinying and joined the workers in their protests. Within days the government's control of the
capital had all but disintegrated.
As he hurried back from the front, Tsar Nicholas II was
confronted by his ministers and convinced that the best antidote for the
country's ills would be for him to abdicate the throne. This he did, on March 15, passing his crown
to his brother, who wisely refused it.
The Tsar's power was legally transferred to the Provisional Government,
a body designed to implement constitutional governance. While originally supported by the workers'
and soldiers' councils, or soviets, set up during the Petrograd
riots, these bodies soon began eclipsing the Provisional Government. Owing to the military forces that it
controlled, the Petrograd Soviet became a rival power center in the struggle
for rule. This would be demonstrated
most clearly in the disputes over the government's policy of continuing
Russia's participation in the war carried on by its leaders, first Prince Lvov,
a moderate aristocrat, and later Alexander Kerensky, a member of the Social
Revolutionary Party.
In the United States,
the abdication of the Tsar and the promise of a democratic Russia were greeted with widespread
joy, especially among Progressives and Russian Jewish immigrants. Woodrow Wilson captured the public attitude
toward its newfound democratic brothers in his war message to Congress of April
2, 1917. In it he claimed to speak for
“every American” when he expressed his hope for “the wonderful and heartening
things that have been happening with the last few weeks in Russia.” The collapse of autocracy and the hope that Russia would
soon take its place among the few democracies of the world stirred liberal
hearts and gave proof to their belief in the political and moral progress of
mankind.
Influenced by the writings of Russian “experts” such as
George Kennan (a cousin of the Cold War strategist's grandfather), Americans
had come to believe that Russia
was, in fact, a democratic nation. The
Tsar was a relic, who had kept the democratic spirit of Russia from
breaking free. By stating that “Russia was known by those who knew her best to
have been ...democratic at heart,” Wilson
was following conventional wisdom.
Wilson gave the proposal serious thought.
Lost Hope
Just
one day before this idea gave the president pause, events unfolded that would
close the door to any cooperation between the United States and Bolshevik Russia. On January 19, the Bolshevik Party withdrew
from the Constituent Assembly, the last vestige of the Provisional Government
and last fig leaf of democratic rule; without its support the Assembly promptly
collapsed. This rejection of democratic
means, while of little importance to the situation on the ground in Russia, killed Wilson's hope that the Bolsheviks might be
brought around to Western democracy.
Further developments bolstered his suspicions of Bolshevik complicity
with German intrigue and spurred the first large-scale, direct American
involvement in Russia. From this point on, Wilson
effectively abandoned any attempts to work through the Bolsheviks, but still
sought to help the establishment of democracy in Russia.
When
word reached Wilson
of the collapse of the Constituent Assembly due to Bolshevik actions, he was
deeply upset. In a letter to Samuel
Gompers, the head of the American Federation of Labor and no friend of
Bolshevism, he called their actions “reckless” and bemoaned the fact that “things
so repeatedly go to pieces” in Russia. In another letter that same day, Wilson expressed
frustration over the fact that his desire to help Russian democracy was
constantly thwarted by the changing conditions on the ground.
Compounding this anger, new evidence surfaced of
Bolshevik collusion with Germany. In what would become known as the “Sisson
documents,” Lenin and Trotsky appeared as part of a grand German scheme
“to sow disorganization in Entente
countries.”Sent
by Ambassador Francis in response to a request for information on Bolshevik
intentions and later proved to be forgeries, these papers bolstered the
suspicions of Americans about the Bolsheviks.
In spite of this, the
Allied governments still hoped that Russia would rejoin the war. When the negotiations between the Bolsheviks
and the Central Powers broke down in early February, optimism rose. But when the French offered aid to the
Bolsheviks in the event that fighting broke out again, Wilson refused to join. Opposed to “encouraging” them in case of
renewed conflict, he quashed any possibility of American participation in the
scheme. Lansing
wrote that such assistance was “out of the question.”
Wilson's administration did just the
opposite; moves were soon taken to regain control of vital war supplies in
Russian ports. The fear was that German
collaborators, Bolshevik or otherwise, would transport these supplies to Germany, where
they would undermine the Allied blockade.
On February 14, Lansing
telegraphed Ambassador Francis, informing him that the government had released
one million dollars for the purchase of these supplies.
Even
more astounding was a memorandum that Wilson
drew up and passed on to Lansing
on March 1. Referring back to Allied
requests for the dispatch of troops to Siberia and the Far East, the president
wrote that he had “no objection” to these proposals, but felt that it would be
wiser if the United States
did not participate. Such a reversal of policy went against much
of the administration's previous statements, from Lansing's
opposition to Japanese landings at Vladivostok
to the president's own Fourteen Points, which called for the removal of all
foreign troops from Russia. This shift did not go unnoticed or
unchallenged however. The advocate of
liberalizing Allied war aims, Edward House wrote to Wilson regarding the dangers of such
intervention. After speaking with
Ambassador Francis and others, House advised the president that such action on
the part of the Allies would “throw Russia into the arms of Germany,”
compounding the problems of the Allies on the Western Front. Wilson subsequently watered down his new
position, stating in a diplomatic note to the Allied governments that the
United States agreed that Japan should be the main player in such an
undertaking, while warning that, at the moment, “the wisdom of intervention seems... ...most questionable.”
By the time the
Bolsheviks and the Central Powers signed a separate peace in the Treaty of
Brest-Litovsk on March 3, 1918, Wilson and his administration had written off
the Bolsheviks as future democratic partners.
When he prepared a statement of the United States' policy in regard to
Russia on March 5, Wilson formalized the division between the Bolsheviks and
the Russian people that had appeared early in American thinking. While stating that America
still considered the Russians “allies against the common enemy,” Germany, he
argued that there was “in fact, no Russian government to deal with.” Flirtations with de facto recognition
of the Bolsheviks were set aside and work began on aiding “the Russian people.” None of the Bolsheviks' actions were to be
considered legitimate, including the withdrawal of Russia from the war. In a parting shot at the Bolshevik Party,
Woodrow Wilson addressed a letter to the Russian people, delivered through the
Soviet Congress. Expressing the sympathy
that the American people felt towards the Russians, he wished them well in
their efforts to break free “from autocratic government,” implying that the
task had not ended with the abdication of the Tsar.The
Bolshevik response was also a veiled insult, as it thanked the American working
classes for their support and expressed the Party's hope for worldwide
socialist revolution.
Inching
Closer
Within the next few months, the pressures upon Wilson to decide in favor
of intervention grew considerably. The
separate peace signed by Russia
had ended Germany's
two-front war. Soon German divisions
were sent across Europe to the Western Front,
in preparation for a final push to end the war.
The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk also gave Germany
access to badly needed natural resources, such as wheat from the Ukraine. With Russia permanently out of the war and
the United States still building up its military strength, Germany looked able
to push on to victory against the Allies.
In addition, unoccupied Russia also looked vulnerable to
German influence. The Bolsheviks were
not yet in control of most of the country, and the Allies suspected them of
pro-German sympathies. This fueled fears
that even more vital war materiel, such as the supplies sitting at Russian
ports, would soon be available for German use.
If the Bolsheviks did not turn the supplies over, then perhaps the newly
freed Finns, believed to be operating “under German domination,” would take
advantage of Russia's
confusion.
To further complicate matters, Russia's peace treaty had freed
thousands of German and Austro-Hungarian prisoners of war. But due to the chaos that had engulfed Russia,
including major transport arteries, they remained deep inside the country. These large, relatively well-organized units
looked ready to interfere with the “political development” that Wilson hoped would be
free of foreign influences. Some reports
even suggested that these groups were influencing the actions of local soviets,
especially in Siberia.
These threats prompted the British government on March 4
to request the dispatch of an American warship to the Russian Arctic ports,
where British naval squadrons were already on station. Wilson
eventually agreed to this request and ordered the USS Olympia to the Arctic Ocean.
Anxious to avoid unwanted entanglement in Russia
however, he instructed that the captain be warned “not to be drawn in further
than the present action,” without first obtaining new orders from the United States. The Olympia's
arrival on May 24, 1918 marked the first instance of an American military force
in Russian territory.
This small contribution, however, did not satisfy the
British. Having somehow obtained the
notion that the Bolsheviks might welcome Allied assistance against the Germans,
the British repeatedly pressed Wilson to join
them in proposing a joint intervention, to include landings in the Arctic and Siberia. Both
Foreign Minister Balfour and Ambassador Lord Reading tried to convince Wilson
and Lansing of the merit of this plan. While not recommending cooperation with the
proposal, Lansing did advise the president that
he felt there was more “military advantage” in expeditions to the Arctic ports
of Murmansk and Archangel.
The Japanese also brought pressure to bear on Wilson. April 5 saw the first Japanese soldiers land
at Vladivostok,
the eastern end of the Trans-Siberian Railway and largest Russian port on the
Pacific. Ambassador Ishii remarked to Lansing during one
meeting that the Japanese government would welcome American landings in the
region, perhaps to give legitimacy to and shield their own designs from
criticism. Another prod, more indirect, was the revival
of discussion within the Japanese government during May of a full-scale
expedition to Siberia. This was duly reported to Washington by Ambassador Morris.
The Allies were not alone in urging American intervention
in Russia. American officials – namely Minister Reinsch
to China, Ambassador Francis, and John F. Stevens, a member of the American
railroad commission in Russia – recommended and even pleaded with Wilson to
give his consent and support to military intervention. Reinsch wrote to the president, arguing that
the situation in Siberia was “more favorable
than ever” for action. When Lansing
advised Wilson
that the time was not yet right, Reinsch tried again, taking a different
approach. Reporting that “all sources
[in Siberia] indicate extreme need” for action, he appealed to Wilson to act before it was too late. Presumably the factors that drove such
requests were atrocities like those that had been reported before. Ambassador Francis echoed these sentiments. Stevens also warned of the danger of delay,
as rapid action would be needed to combat “German propaganda, influence, [and]
occupation.” Both Allied and American officials pressed
the president to take action.
Their entreaties did not fall upon deaf ears. Having already expressed some manner of
support for Allied action in Siberia, though he doubted its wisdom, Wilson sought the means
to act upon these appeals. He wanted to
aid the Russians against the threat of German domination, which, in his mind,
probably included the tyranny of the Bolsheviks. Speaking at the Metropolitan Opera House in New York for a Red Cross event, he declared that he would
not give Germany
a free hand in the east, even if it could end the war. He “intend[ed] to stand by Russia as well as France,” and was vigorously
applauded for this statement.
In spite of those strong words, Wilson was still undecided about what means
to employ in pursuit of his policies.
The situation in Russia
was, in his mind, “confused and even problematical,” which prevented the
application of an easy solution. Additionally, his military advisors agreed
that current shipping needs outpaced supply and that “no sufficient military
force” could be spared to do anything of consequence in Siberia. Further complicating matters, the German army
had launched its spring offensive, hoping to end the war before American troops
could arrive in force. Allied defenses
were overrun in several places and all available soldiers were earmarked for
deployment in France.
With all of this in mind, Wilson
penned a policy statement that described his position on any expedition to Russia. In it, he clung to the principles of “Russian
territorial and political independence,” much as had been laid out in the
Fourteen Points. He also expressed his
willingness to cooperate with “any practical military effort” that should be
undertaken at the Arctic ports. But the
president argued that such action should only be conducted without
“interference with the political liberty of the Russian people.”
Opposing the Bolsheviks by seizing the ports and supplies
may appear to be political interference, but Wilson did not see it as such. To explain this, it is necessary to look at Wilson's use of force
during the Mexican Revolution. The
president himself compared the two situations in a meeting with Mexican
newspaper editors in June 1918. While
declaring that the United States
“had no right to interfere” with Mexican politics, Wilson argued that this use of the American
military did not constitute interference or intervention. This was due, both in the occupation of Veracruz and the expedition against Villa, to the United States'
“desire is to do disinterested service” in ridding the Mexicans of those
individuals who impeded the proper development of their political institutions. Much as in the war against Germany, America sought “no selfish ends”
and thus was above the imperialistic interventions of the European powers. The president applied this same reasoning to
the Russian situation. Because the United States could not “make anything out of
standing by Russia,”
his motivations in intervening obviously only had the best interests of the
Russian people at heart. Conversely, this same logic required Wilson to respond with
force only in “extraordinary circumstances.”
Acting “too practical” or with only its own interests in mind would
weaken America's
moral superiority over both the autocracies of the Central Powers and the
imperialists in the Allied governments.
Decision
in the Arctic
By the beginning of June 1918, Wilson saw compelling reasons to justify the
dispatch of American forces to the Russian Arctic. As the German army drove deeper into France and threatened Paris,
the need to prevent any strengthening of Germany's war effort grew. Worries about German seizures of the stockpiles
in the Arctic, as well as control of Russian
natural resources, had pushed the president to accept the necessity of armed
intervention. This prompted him to order
a small expedition to support the British in securing the supplies at Murmansk and Archangel. But when the Allies continued to press for
action in Siberia, Wilson
steadfastly refused. Up until the end of
June, he retained his doubts as to the military soundness of operations east of
the Ural Mountains. It would take news of the Czechoslovak
Legion's ordeal in Russia to
persuade Wilson
to become involved in the Russian Far East.
The decision to send a force to the Arctic
was conditionally taken on June 1. In a
conference between the president and Lansing, recorded by the Secretary two days
later in a memorandum, it was agreed that the United
States would divert some forces from deployment in France to aid in the occupation of Murmansk. This action would only be taken however, if
Marshal Foch, commander of the combined Allied armies in France,
approved of the transfer. With the
fighting still raging on the Western Front, Wilson did not want to jeopardize Allied
fortunes with this move. This decision
was soon passed along to the British ambassador, Lord Reading. In addition to providing guards for the
supplies, the administration expanded efforts to purchase them back. Having previously allocated one million
dollars to this end, Ambassador Francis wrote to Lansing requesting additional
funds, a request that was then passed on to the president.
There is evidence to suggest that this planned military
operation would not be concerned solely with safeguarding vital war materials
however. On June 12, in response to
another request from Ambassador Francis for instructions, Lansing
detailed the policy of the United
States in the event that the Bolsheviks
should fall from power. Stating that
since the United States had
“never ceased to consider” the Russians partners against Germany, it would only recognize a
government that was representative and seen as chosen by “collective action.”
In providing this contingency plan for a collapse of
Bolshevik power, the administration made explicit what it had been hinting at
before. It seems likely that this was
done because Lansing, and possibly Wilson, thought that the arrival of Allied
and American troops in Russia
might destabilize Lenin's government. No
such plans had been formalized during the previous months of Bolshevik rule,
either before or after the dissolution of the Constituent Assembly. It is possible to infer, from this and later
statements regarding the goals of American forces in Russia,
that Wilson may
have hoped that the interventions would act as catalysts for the formation of a
democratic government that would displace the Bolsheviks.
Having agreed to support Allied action in the Arctic, Wilson stuck to his previous opposition to involvement in Siberia. In his
mind, the two ends of the Russian empire were different situations, despite the
attempts of the Allied governments to link them. He saw no “military advantage” to an
expedition to Vladivostok,
or anywhere else east of the Urals. Being so far from German-occupied territory,
such as the Ukraine,
the difficulties involved in sustaining a force along one tenuous supply-line
would not produce sufficient results, such as tying down German divisions in
the east.
Warnings from Minister Reinsch in China that Siberia would soon “be in German
control” did not sway Wilson's
position. Even Foch, whose opinion the president had
valued in contemplating the deployment of American troops to the Arctic, had no impact.
His belief that intervention in Siberia would prove “a very important
factor for victory” and insistence upon immediate action in this regard could
not overturn Wilson's
appraisal of the plan.
By
July, the Allies played their last card in hopes of prodding the United States into action in Siberia. On July 2, the Supreme War Council wrote to Wilson that “a complete change has come over the
situation” in Russia, which
demanded immediate action on Wilson's
part so expeditions could be launched “before it is too late.” The factor that had so altered the situation
was the outbreak of hostilities between the Bolsheviks and the Czechoslovak
Legion.
The Legion's Ordeal
Woodrow
Wilson's receipt of the news of the Czechoslovak Legion's situation during the
summer of 1918 triggered the final decision to commit the United States to military involvement in Russia. In order to understand his response, a brief
history of the Legion's origins and activities during the war is essential. Aiding them was presented by the president as
one of the main justifications for the subsequent expeditions to Russia.
For
complicated reasons including its multi-ethnic composition and pan-Slavic pretensions,
the Russian empire had become the home of large numbers of Czechs and
Slovaks. After war broke out between
Austro-Hungary and Russia,
many of these men joined the army to fight against those they saw as oppressing
their peoples. Their ranks were swelled
by many Slavic prisoners of war captured from the Austrian army, who turned on
their former rulers. They were
eventually organized as a separate unit within the Russian armed forces,
numbering between 80,000 and 90,000 and led by Russian officers, many of whom
proved to be stridently anti-Bolshevik.
As
the morale of the army disintegrated during 1917, the Legion remained
relatively unaffected, likely due to a clearer view of their own
objectives. Because of this loyalty,
they were given the task of guarding sensitive positions, especially weapons
depots. They took advantage of this
opportunity to become one of the best-equipped units in Russia by the time of the armistice between Russia and the
Central Powers.
With Russia no
longer fighting the Central Powers, the Czechs and Slovaks were stranded far
from the conflict and unable to continue their own fight. Having been organizationally combined with
other freed Czech and Slovak POWs fighting against Germany
in France, the decision was
made to leave Russia
and join the fighting on the Western Front.
To do this, they would travel across Russia,
via the Trans-Siberian Railway, to Vladivostok. From there, the Allies would provide shipping
to take them to the United States
and then to France. The Bolsheviks, through their supporting
local soviets, controlled most of the railroads and initially gave the Legion
passage eastward.
With
the Japanese landings in the Far East however,
Bolshevik suspicions of the Czechoslovaks grew.
The possibility that these soldiers, theoretically part of the combined
Allied forces, would join any anti-Bolshevik interventions appeared too real to
ignore. Since the Legion had armed
itself from Russian stockpiles, the Bolsheviks ordered the Legion to turn over
their weapons before leaving the country.
Given their position, spread out along the railway and in the midst of a
country in turmoil, it should come as no surprise that the Czechs and Slovaks,
along with their Russian officers, refused to comply with these demands. As conflicting orders went out to local
soviets, alternating between allowing the Legion to continue or halting their
progress, the decision was taken to push through to Vladivostok, even if this resulted in
hostilities.
Fighting
did break out, after the lynching of a Hungarian POW and the subsequent arrest
and breakout of the involved Czechs and Slovaks at Chelyabinsk, just east of the
Urals. Upon receiving this news,
Trotsky, now in charge of the Red Army, ordered the Legion to be forcibly
disarmed and impressed into service. On
May 25, Bolshevik forces and the Legion came to blows all along the rail
line. In addition, as the Legion
attempted to continue their journey to Vladivostok,
they encountered and fought groups of freed German and Austro-Hungarian POWs,
who had been held in Siberia. Initially victorious, partly due to their
recently acquired weapons, elements of the Czechoslovak Legion arrived in Vladivostok and captured
the Soviet headquarters there on June 29.
When this conflict reached the port, the British and
Japanese warships in the harbor landed contingents of troops to help the Legion
suppress the Bolsheviks. On board USS
Brooklyn, which had moved from Japan to Vladivostok in response to the
increased chaos in Siberia, Admiral Knight informed Washington that he had
taken the liberty of landing U.S Marines “to guard [the] Consulate only.” He also predicted that there would be no more
fighting in the city, as the “change [was] welcomed by [the] majority [of the]
population.”
Justifying
Intervention
This development quickly created a stir among Wilson and
his advisors. As the champion of
self-determination and advocate for oppressed minorities, especially those
under Austro-Hungarian rule, the president could not afford to stand by while
armed representatives of those peoples fought to rejoin the war against
autocracy. In short order, the president
had drawn up a plan of action that would insert American forces directly into
the growing disorder in Russia. While he specifically limited the means at
the disposal of the American expedition, the goals the president outlined would
commit it to far more than he had originally intended. In his official justification for the twin
expeditions to Russia, Wilson linked securing supplies, aiding the evacuation of
the Czechs and Slovaks, and supporting Russian efforts to attain
self-government and democracy together as objectives of the United States. Sometime between his decision to deploy
soldiers to the Arctic and the drafting of this document, Wilson decided to veer away from purely
practical objectives and attach the goal of promoting Russian self-government
to both expeditions. With this
combination of reasons, the president felt he had finally found a means to
achieve his vision of democracy in Russia.
The first outline of Woodrow Wilson's ideas on what
exactly the expeditions to Russia
would look like and seek to accomplish appeared on July 6. In a conference at the White House attended
by Secretary of State Lansing, Secretary of War Newton D. Baker, Secretary of
the Navy Josephus Daniels, and top military brass, Wilson
presented a rough copy of what would become the “Aide-Mémoire” of American
policy in Russia. In it he stated that the primary goal of
American involvement would be providing aid to the Czechoslovak Legion, as it
struggled to unite its forces spread out along the Trans-Siberian Railway. While adding that it would be “physically
impossible” to reestablish the Eastern Front across such vast distances, he
suggested that American and Allied soldiers might best serve the Legion by
securing both the port of Vladivostok and the railroads heading west to
Irkutsk, nearly 2500 miles away. This
not-inconsiderable distance would be protected by a force of 14,000 soldiers,
to be apportioned equally between the United
States and Japan. Perhaps in an attempt to quiet Russian fears
of Japanese ambition, Wilson intended to show
publicly that the only goal would be to “aid Czecho-Slovaks against German and
Austrian prisoners” with no involvement in Russia's “internal affairs.” Accompanying the expeditions would be
supplies of arms and ammunition for the Czechs and Slovaks to aid their journey
to Vladivostok.
The ink had barely dried on Wilson's paper before American forces took
action. Later that day, Secretary of the
Navy Daniels sent a message to Admiral Knight at Vladivostok.
Relaying the president's wish to use the port as a base for the
Czechoslovaks, he instructed the admiral to hold the city and to request
assistance from nearby Allied forces to do so.
The Secretary ordered Knight to refrain, however, from becoming “involved
in any political question.” Much as with the port
of Veracruz, this occupation of the
territory of a sovereign nation did not seem to constitute a political move in
the view of Wilson's
administration.
Wilson's
advisors and staff did take other actions to prepare for the eventual landing
of American troops. On July 8, the
Japanese ambassador received word of the proposal, which he promised to present
in a favorable light to his government. When a response did not arrive within the
next few days, a member of the State Department suggested that if the United States
expressed its willingness to have a Japanese officer in overall command of the
expedition, a reply would soon be forthcoming. Wilson agreed
with this proposal, though it seemed in conflict with his worries of Japanese
ambition, and a Japanese general did in fact lead the operations in the Far
East and Siberia.
By the middle of the month, Wilson
had formulated a more complete outline of American military involvement in Russia. It contained not only the reasoning behind
the expedition to Siberia, but also guidelines for all American soldiers in Russia. The president began his justification by
adamantly opposing any attempt to reopen the Eastern Front through external
pressure. Such a course of action “would
add to the present sad confusion... rather than cure it.” and would not further
the primary goal of defeating Germany
and its allies. In keeping with his view
of the disinterested nature of America's
involvement in the war, Wilson supported this
position by stating that such an attempt would be “making use of Russia, not a
method of serving her.”
In addition to refraining from using Russia as a
battleground, the expeditions were not to interfere with its politics or
sovereignty. But Wilson did believe that American and Allied
troops should render such assistance as would be accepted by the Russian people
to help them “regain control of their own affairs, their own territory, and
their own destiny.” This included
helping them with “any efforts at self-government or self-defense.” His previous justification for the Arctic
expedition, the desire to guard war supplies, appeared almost as an
afterthought in this document. It is not
clear, however, how Wilson
intended the American military forces to remain aloof from political issues
while aiding the development of self-government, a distinctly political
goal. He provided no suggestions or
concrete proposals on how this was to be accomplished.
The next day, after review by his top advisors, Wilson had the final version of this document sent to the
representatives of the Allied nations in Washington,
D.C. Arguing that the United States was “not in a
position” to expand intervention beyond the Arctic ports or the Trans-Siberian
Railway west of Irkutsk, the president asked that the Allies pledge to respect
Russia's territorial integrity and refrain from interfering with the political
development of its people. While having decided in favor of action that
the Allies had long argued for, Wilson hoped to
be able to restrain them from interfering in Russia's future, while at the same
time promoting Russian efforts to establish democratic self-government. It was a lofty set of goals for such limited
forces.
Though his concerns over the intentions of his associates
would prove well-founded, the president did not see the danger inherent within
his own plans. He considered both
expeditions to be limited both in size and mission. But the language that Wilson used to define the expeditions'
objectives was vague and ambiguous. What
exactly did helping the Russians with their self-defense and self-government
mean? Did this include an overthrow of the
Bolsheviks? Were only Russians with
democratic aspirations to be provided aid?
Even the president's desire to help the Czechoslovak Legion was
ill-defined. Were they to be escorted
out of the country via Vladivostok? After they later made an about-face and
headed westward across the Urals, would Wilson's
support continue, despite the Legion's involvement in the civil war? Though he intended a limited and targeted use
of force, the directives Woodrow Wilson provided for his military commanders
left many questions unresolved. As
American soldiers arrived in Russia
and began cooperating with Allied operations already underway, the folly of
such confusing language quickly became apparent.
Planning
the Expeditions
Soon after the president presented his case for the use
of force, work began on hammering out the details of the expeditions. Though Wilson
had settled upon sending 7,000 American soldiers to Siberia, no concrete plans
existed for the force to be sent to the Arctic. Secretary of War Baker, after conferring with
British representatives, proposed the dispatch of one to three battalions,
along with a company of engineers, to join the British already in theater. Interestingly, he recommended that these units
not be accompanied by artillery.with
previous statements of American intentions, this suggests that these soldiers
were not intended for offensive maneuvers or even expected to see heavy
action. By this stage of the war, as was
likely known by the American army, most large-scale infantry operations were
supported by sustained artillery bombardments.
In deliberately removing this capability from the arsenal of this
expedition, the administration signaled its intentions to stick to guard duty
around the warehouses in Murmansk.
By July 21, General Pershing – who had led the punitive
raid into Mexico against
Pancho Villa and now commanded American forces in France
– had been ordered to select the units to embark for Russia. Just a few days later, however, the
preparations for the expeditions came to a screeching halt. Having remained silent since Ambassador
Ishii's receipt of the Siberian expedition's plans, the Japanese gave notice to
Wilson and his
administration that the American-imposed limits on troop strength were not
acceptable. They rejected the seemingly
arbitrary number of 7,000 Wilson had imposed
upon them and instead informed the president that at least one Japanese
division, or about 12,000 soldiers, would be deployed to Vladivostok and the railway. Then, depending upon the level of resistance
encountered from “the Bolsheviks, Austrian and German prisoners,” Japan might
reinforce its army on the Asian mainland.
As Frank L. Polk, counselor to the State Department, observed in his
letter relaying this information to Wilson,
the biggest concern over Japanese intentions was the fact that they were
“reserving the right to send more [soldiers] later,” rather than the initial
increase. In a later message, Polk struck even closer
to the true source of concern. If the
Japanese reserved to themselves the right to augment their forces in Russia,
suspicion might be aroused that this operation “had more in view than merely
assisting the Czechs.”
Wilson
shared these concerns about Japanese intentions, but was unsure how to deal with
the situation. He felt that he had “to
do some very lonely thinking” about whether or not the expedition should go
ahead if the Japanese insisted upon their demands. He expressed his frustration to Secretary
Daniels, who had passed along an inquiry from Admiral Knight in Vladivostok as to the
status of American reinforcements. “The
whole matter is in suspense,” Wilson
wrote, because the Japanese had made demands “to which we cannot consent.” While the two sides argued over this issue, Wilson put the Siberian
expedition on hold.
Through the last days of July and the beginning of
August, the Japanese plan for the intervention remained unacceptable to Wilson's
administration. By August 3, the
Japanese had deferred to Wilson
on most points, save their right to send more soldiers if it was deemed
necessary. In an interview with Polk,
Ambassador Ishii insisted that Japan
had no intention of using more force than was necessary to help the
Czechoslovaks, but disagreed with the president over the troop level required
to be effective. However, in the
interests of speedy action, Japan
accepted Wilson's
outline for intervention, while postponing the issue of reinforcements until
they appeared to be needed.
Perhaps Wilson
felt that the Czechs and Slovaks could wait no longer for help. Maybe he had grown tired of inaction in
regards to Russia. For whatever reason, Wilson deemed these terms acceptable and
ordered the expedition to go forward. In
a restatement of his Aide-Mémoire, Wilson made
public the intention of the United States
to send the twin expeditions to Russia
on August 5, 1918. Assuring the world
that the United States
“contemplates no interference,” he announced his expectation that the other
participating Allied nations, especially Japan,
would publish “similar assurance[s]” promising to respect Russia's
sovereignty. With that, planning for the expeditions went
forward with haste. Secretary of War
Baker informed General William S. Graves, who
had been chosen to lead the Siberian expedition, of his orders. After receiving a copy of the Aide-Mémoire
that described as the policy he was to follow, Graves was cautioned by Baker
that operating in Siberia would akin to
“walking on eggs loaded with dynamite.” A few days later, the Japanese announced that
General Kikuzo Otani would be in overall command of the joint expedition.
Though the decision-making process took long months, the
deployment of American soldiers to Russia was accomplished in
surprisingly little time. On August 1, U.S. Marines from the USS Olympia
landed in support of the British occupation of Archangel. By August 16, the first Americans arrived
“over there” in Vladivostok,
where they “were well received, being cheered by crowd.” On September 4, 4,800 more soldiers arrived
at Archangel, where they would remain until
June 1919. It would not be until 1920
that the last one was withdrawn from Siberia.
“The
situation is getting beyond our control...”
Early on, events in Russia
indicated that Wilson's
desire for non-interference and limited expeditions was being compromised. Both the British and the Japanese took
actions that expanded the scope of the interventions and pulled the United States
into a conflict with the Bolsheviks that would become the Russian Civil
War. Though not desirous of such
involvement, Wilson's own actions did little to
halt it and may have contributed to the “mission creep” that the American
forces experienced in Russia.
In the Arctic, the cooperation of the United States
with the British forces already present brought about this entanglement. As the junior partner in terms of numbers,
American forces had been placed under the command of Britain's
General Poole, whose own orders went far beyond the guidelines Wilson had provided for American
involvement. Secretary of War Baker
received notification from General Tasker H. Bliss in Europe that Poole's
primary objective was to enable Russia to halt “German influence and
penetration” as well as helping the Russians to “ take the field... for the
recovery of Russia.” In essence, this
amounted to a restoration of the Eastern Front, which Wilson
had expressly denounced as unfair to Russia herself in his
justifications. To this end, the British
government instructed Poole to make contact
with the Czechoslovak Legion and to aid “any administration which may... be
friendly to the Allies.” No mention was given to safeguarding supplies
in the Arctic ports nor to the evacuation of the Czechs and Slovaks from Russia. Even if Wilson
had been prepared to recognize any one of the governments that Poole might have
supported as democratic and representative of Russia, there is no indication that
he would have wanted to support them with military force. That the British had no intention of
respecting the president's wishes is shown by the fact that within twenty-four
hours of landing, elements of the American Arctic expedition had made contact
with Bolshevik forces and engaged them in combat. They had been instructed by accompanying British
officers that Germans were leading the Russian soldiers though, conveniently,
the Germans “usually appear[ed] in Russian uniform” and could not be
distinguished from the native population.
Events in Siberia also turned against Wilson.
The Legion, apparently under Allied influence, had reversed its course
and headed westward, back across the Urals.
Informed of this development on August 30, the president could hardly
believe the “utter disregard” that General Poole and the Allies had shown
toward his declared wishes. Almost
sputtering with rage, he wrote to Lansing
on September 5 in an attempt to find some way to get his message across. This suggests he did not want to keep the
Legion in Russia
as a means to fight the Bolsheviks. The
anger expressed over British actions in this regard illustrates that Wilson's stated aim of
aiding the evacuation of the Czechs and Slovaks was not merely an attempt to
fight a proxy war against the Bolsheviks.
In a move that could hardly have come as a surprise to
the administration, the Japanese ignored even the revised troop levels that had
been agreed to by Wilson. Using reports of advances into China by Soviet forces, allegedly under the
command of German prisoners of war, Japan
rushed additional soldiers into Siberia. Where the president had found even 12,000
soldiers unacceptable, the Japanese army ultimately moved 72,000 into Russian
territory. Even Robert Lansing, who is always portrayed
as the most anti-Bolshevik of Wilson's
top advisors, found this situation intolerable and declared that “the situation
is getting beyond our control.” Having committed the United States to the use of force to achieve his
ends, Wilson
found himself sucked into the beginnings of a violent and bloody civil war.
Vastly outnumbered by the Japanese, the American
expedition to Siberia also had to contend with
the fragmented and factional nature of Russian politics east of the Urals. Several different generals, local elected
bodies, and the Czechoslovak Legion all competed for control. The Japanese often played one against
another, as they sought to weaken Russian control over Siberia. General Graves fended off demands for a more
interventionist role for American troops, but was able to achieve little more
than this. Though by now the Legion was
heavily engaged on the western side of the Urals, Wilson
kept the expedition in and around Vladivostok. This was done partly to maintain an exit
route and partly to keep an eye on the ambitious Japanese. Both of these kept the expedition in Siberia far longer than its Arctic counterpart, though it
sat idle along the railway. There it
would stay until the end of 1919, when the first units began leaving. Due to the difficulties inherent in operating
along a long single rail line, the last American soldier would not leave Siberia until April 1920.
Contrary to Wilson's
intentions, by the fall of 1918 American soldiers were interfering in a very
direct way in Russia's
political future. From east and west,
large forces of Allied troops advanced on the Bolsheviks, intent upon
destabilizing their regime and taking advantage of the chaos to pursue their
own particular interests. Wilson's desire to help the Czechs and Slovaks leave Russia to fight
for their own state had fallen to pieces, as the Legion and its anti-Bolshevik
Russian officers threw themselves enthusiastically into the fray. Even the Americans' objective of supporting
Russian efforts to establish democracy would come to naught, as the Red Army
slowly expanded the Bolsheviks' control over the country.
The justifications that Woodrow Wilson provided for the
employment of military force in Russia
went unfulfilled or quickly became irrelevant.
As stated before, the Legion involved itself intimately in the war
between Reds and Whites, whose battles destroyed any hope of Russian
democracy. With the end of the Great War
in November 1918, the perceived German threat to the supplies at the Arctic
ports evaporated as well. In no respect
did the expeditions achieve anything beyond fueling the growing animosity
between the United States
and the newborn Soviet Union.
Democratic
Motivations, Chance Triggers
From the beginning of the Russian Revolution, Woodrow
Wilson had hoped to see democracy succeed in Russia, which he and many other
Americans felt was the Revolution's natural outcome. This desire, along with his belief in
self-determination free from foreign interference, provided the preconditions
for the eventual decisions on the use of force in Russia. As the president hoped that its people would
be able to settle their own affairs and choose to create representative
institutions, he opposed any intervention that might favor a counter-revolution
to restore the Tsar or result in foreign domination, such as was feared would
follow Japanese involvement in Siberia.
For Wilson, however, such
concerns did not mean that the United
States could not help the Russians in
securing democratic rule. As a
“disinterested” power in the world, free from selfish motivations, America was ideally placed to aid other peoples
on their path to freedom, whether in Mexico
or Russia. In the president's view, the fact that others
might not see American actions in the same favorable light was only due to
their being misinformed or influenced by German propaganda.
But this hope for democracy did not bring about the
interventions in Russia
without assistance. Repeated attempts by
the Allies to force Wilson
to act played an important, if often overstated role. British requests for assistance in the Arctic
and the eagerness of the Japanese to involve themselves in substantial numbers
in Siberia helped determine the locations where the United States intervened. Once committed, the expeditions were
overwhelmed by the conditions that the Allies created on the ground and dragged
into the civil war. The decision to
cooperate with and put the expeditions under the overall command of Allied
officers resulted in the United
States being lumped together with other
nations as invaders in Bolshevik eyes.
In much the same way, the growth of hostility toward the
Bolsheviks within the Wilson
administration influenced the eventual intervention, but did not force the
president's hand. His early hope that
Lenin and Trotsky might embrace democratic means appeared to have almost resulted
in a de facto recognition of their government. Only with the withdrawal of the Bolsheviks
from the Constituent Assembly and its subsequent collapse did Wilson turn his back on them. Though his anger over this development was
considerable, it would take several months and the emergence of new factors
before he committed to wielding military power to achieve his ends.
In a manner of speaking, it was non-political events that
triggered Wilson's
choice to use force. The threat of
German domination over western Russia
and possible seizure of vital war supplies convinced him that American troops
should be used to occupy the Arctic ports.
Though he did include the support of Russian democrats in his
justifications for intervention, it was in the context of aiding the evacuation
of the Legion from the country. It
became combined with this goal as Wilson
and his administration came to see “assistance to the Czechs [as] amount[ing]
to assistance to the Russians.” Given adequate reasons to send soldiers to Russia, Wilson
sought to use the development to attempt to support the establishment of
democracy.
Despite the best intentions of helping the Russians sort
out their political future, the expeditions failed miserably. A combination of factors, similar to those
that influenced the decisions in the first place, came together to frustrate
the limited military goals of the interventions. First, as the situation on the ground
changed, the concrete objectives Wilson
set for the soldiers became irrelevant or exceedingly problematic to
achieve. The end of the war with Germany removed
one threat to Russian sovereignty and perhaps the need to guard the war
materials. Additionally, the about-face of the
Czechoslovak Legion made the president's goal of extricating them from Russia difficult, and when combined with the
armistice with Germany
in November, less pressing. Only the
goal of assisting Russian democracy remained after November 11, 1918.
Wilson
was not gifted with the foresight to anticipate such developments. He did fear Allied intentions and ambitions
in relationship to Russia
however, and thus is responsible for failing to consider adequately these
factors before committing himself to aiding their operations. Britain
and Japan, as Russia's
traditional imperial rivals, should have been recognized as less than
trustworthy in such matters.
The primary cause of the failure of the two expeditions
to accomplish anything of value however, was their directive to aid the
development of democracy. If the only reasons
for sending soldiers to Russia
were the defense of supplies and the evacuation of the Czechs and Slovaks, they
could have easily been withdrawn after these became unnecessary and
impossible. But assigning this
additional goal, worded in vague and ambiguous language, gave a limited force a
tremendous task. Both forbidden and
required to become involved in Russia's
political future by Wilson's
orders, the American forces started off in a no-win situation. Combined with a situation as fluid as the Russian
political scene the expeditions faced an uphill battle with little hope of
success. By the time the last American
soldier left, any chance that democracy would thrive in Russia within
the near future had been smashed asunder by the Red Army's boot.
Selected Bibliography
Baker, Ray Stannard, Woodrow Wilson: Life and Letters. New York:
Doubleday, Doran & Company, Inc.,
1939. vol. VI, VII, VIII.
Bunyan, James. Intervention, Civil War, and Communism in Russia: April –
December
1918. New York:
Octagon Books, 1976.
Calhoun, Frederick S. Power and Principle: Armed
Intervention in Wilsonian Foreign Policy.
Kent State University
Press, 1986.
Fic, Victor M., The Bolsheviks and the Czechoslovak
Legion: The Origin of Their Armed Conflict,
March – May 1918. New Delhi:
Abhinav Publications, 1978.
Filene, Peter G. Americans and the Soviet Experiment,
1917-1933. Cambridge,
Harvard University Press, 1967.
Foglesong, David S. America's
Secret War Against Bolshevism: U.S.
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1917-1920. Chapel Hill: University
of North Carolina Press, 1995.
Gardner,
Lloyd C. Wilson and Revolutions: 1913-1921. ed. Harold M. Hyman. New York:
J.B. Lippincott Company, 1976.
Gordon Levin Jr., N. Woodrow Wilson and World Politics: America's
Response to War and
Revolution. New York, Oxford University
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Kennan, George F. Soviet-American Relations, 1917-1920
Volume II, The Decision to
Intervene. London:
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Leffler, Melvyn P. The Specter of Communism: The United States
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Mayer, Arno. Wilson
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Saul, Norman E. War and Revolution: The United States & Russia 1917-1921. University Press of Kansas, 2001.
Stevenson, David, The First World War and International
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Press, 1988.
Trani, Eugene P.
“Woodrow Wilson and the Decision to Intervene in Russia: Reconsideration,” Journal of Modern History 48. (September 1976): 440-461.
Wade, Rex A., The Russian Revolution, 1917. New York: Cambridge
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Government Documents
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Papers Relating to the Foreign Relations of the United States, 1918, Russia,
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