Anti-Bolshevik Alternative: The White Movement and the Civil War in the Russian North

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By  Liudmila Novikova

University of Wisconsin Press, 2018

Andrew Huebner, Reviewer

Originally Presented in H-Net, June 2022

An Anti-Bolshevik Alternative: The White Movement and the Civil War in the Russian North is Liudmila Novikova’s critical analysis on the rise and fall of the White Russian government that occupied Arkhangelsk, the site of the famous joint British-American Allied intervention, from 1918 to 1920. The Arkhangelsk White government often receives little attention as a “backwater” holdout compared to the Allied interventionists. Indeed, Novikova’s study follows other researchers in showing the complexity of the northern White government in the Russian Civil War. However, Novikova stresses that the White movement in Arkhangelsk was not a “counterrevolutionary” government; rather, “the Arkhangelsk government presented an alternative to the Bolsheviks—a less radical, but still revolutionary variant of political development for the country” (p. 153). By presenting a regional case study, Novikova reimagines the Arkhangelsk White government as a separate strain of revolutionary politics arguably more in common with the Bolsheviks than any other White movements.

Novikova’s challenging work, originally published in 2011, has finally reached English-speaking audiences thanks to the translation work of Seth Bernstein. This book is the culmination of Novikova’s work published extensively while acting as deputy director of the International Center for the History and Sociology of World War II and Its Consequences. Readers will quickly find that the book has a great deal to contribute toward multiple fields, including political, social, and military history, each given a fair deal of attention.

Novikova begins her work by demonstrating how the political landscape of northern Russia paved the way for a uniquely moderate government. Arkhangelsk’s position on the far peripheries of the Russian Empire made it a weak bastion for monarchial influence yet paradoxically fertile ground for centralization and political bipartisanship. Throughout the First World War and the February Revolution, Arkhangelsk was mostly shielded from the systematic destruction witnessed in other regions. Neither tsarist nor early Bolshevik politicians managed to hold onto the region as citizens politically leaned toward a middle-ground, liberal representative government. In this view, the regional political movements play a greater role as the driving force of the local White movement, contesting pro-Allied or anti-Bolshevik perspectives. Socialists, specifically Social Revolutionaries and Social Democrats (Mensheviks), remained a key part of the White Russian North’s war effort both in the beginning and even into its final twilight.

Novikova’s emphasis on the sociopolitical lens redefines for scholars how we are to view the northern Russian government. Though the region had a great deal of political heterogeneity, its turn toward military dictatorship reflects concerns of regional stability over grander national aims. Indeed, the eventual dictator of the government, General Evgenii Miller, was the result of considerable compromises. Miller is portrayed as a pragmatic anti-Bolshevik who emphasized a unified, strong government to contest Bolshevik threats. Many Whites believed that only under a military regime could the region survive the conflict while promoting the growth of a uniquely socialist political culture. Though discordant early government politics and the promises of the Allied intervention support play a role in the foundation of Miller’s regime, Novikova asserts it was for all northerners “a dictatorship by consent” (p. 92).

Officers and Men of the White Forces

Prudently, Novikova examines the relationship between the northern White Russian movement and the Entente powers, though little new is revealed in her assessment. What is novel is how she views the tensions between the Entente intervention forces and the northern government. For the White government, the Allied presence was a double-edged sword; they craved foreign support but feared becoming victims of Entente colonialism. For the Allies, the intervention was an indecisive move that ultimately was voided by the end of the Great War and plummeting morale among Allied soldiers. The inevitability of Allied withdrawal exacerbated but did not completely spell the end for the northern government.

Novikova’s argumentative cornerstone points to one of the successes of the northern government as a socialist-driven political movement. The northern White government, after military expenditures, spent the most financial and legislative efforts on education and land redistribution initiatives. Indeed, she argues that the land policies in the northern region were “the most radical of all the White governments” (p. 141). Miller’s government intentionally catered to issues over welfare, separation of church and state, and representation. However, a desire for a unified front among White governments did affect such policies. In one notable case, northern White negotiations with Finland to hand over the Karelian territory in exchange for military support were rescinded due to the protests of the White Siberians. Despite such interferences, Novikova asserts, socialist policies contributed to the brief survival of the White government and gave cause for many to fight.

Indeed, the strength of the northern government’s politics naturally feeds into Novikova’s argument of the northern White movement as a true “people’s war.” The surveillance state of the Whites operated in a similar manner to other White governments, though not as brutally, compared to other White factions. The militia conscription and partisan efforts of the Whites demonstrated the limits and strengths of both government policies. Militia units, though militarily insufficient, were highly motivated with a peak of almost ten percent of the regional population serving under arms. Partisan bands, however, were incredibly effective fighting units within the regions under White control—but only in home territories. Partisans likewise tended to fight for self-preservation and personal grudges over political allegiance. As a result, brutal killings of prisoners can be hardly defined as true examples of northern “White terror” policies as much as settling scores (p. 183). For all of its political strengths, the short-lived northern government was trampled by military realities. As the campaigns of 1919 shifted in favor of the Red Army and Allied support withdrew, the unsustainable northern movement collapsed under its own weight. Indeed, geography and a lack of military strength, not political weakness, destroyed the northern government.

An Anti-Bolshevik Alternative is a much-needed work in Western historiography. The Arkhangelsk government has finally received the attention it deserves thanks to Novikova’s multilayered analysis. Readers will find that her thesis confirms the findings of scholars like Peter Holquist, who view the White movement as a continuation of revolutionary policies. Militarily, the book challenges historians to reevaluate the Whites’ military effectiveness and adds a different dimension to the Allied interventions in the Russian Civil War. Military historians will do good to pay attention to the importance of partisan units in this crucial conflict. Any scholar studying this period of revolution, civil war, and crisis should add this book to their repertoire.