ON THIS DAY ·
Evacuation of the Crimea
14–16 Nov 1920 — Some 150,000 soldiers and civilians leave the Crimea for Constantinople aboard 146 ships. The evacuation proceeds in good order. It is the Whites’ Dunkirk: the army escapes, but its cause is lost and its exile permanent.
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The moment in context
The war between Poland and Soviet Russia began over contested borderlands, but both sides saw possibilities beyond a border settlement. Piłsudski hoped to build a federation of nations between Poland and Russia; his forces took Kiev in May 1920 as a step toward that project. The Red counteroffensive drove them back and continued hundreds of kilometers toward Warsaw. Bolshevik leaders now hoped to cross Poland and reach Germany, where they believed revolution was ripe.
From Polish–Soviet War, chapter 12 of The Russian Revolution, 1855–1924 (OCT 1920).
The place: Evacuation of the Crimea — map and full story →
Teach this in 5 minutes
- Why it happened — Two enemies the Reds could not fight at once. Wrangel could hold the Crimea while Red forces were needed against Poland in the west. Once Poland made peace, Moscow could concentrate those forces…
- The turn — The Miracle on the Vistula, August 1920. In August 1920 Piłsudski struck the flank of Tukhachevsky's exhausted armies. The counterstroke split and routed them within a week, giving the Red…
- What it changed — A border drawn to 1939. The Peace of Riga divided the contested borderlands between Poland and Soviet Russia. The frontier endured for eighteen years, until Hitler and…
Then ask the room: The Miracle on the Vistula — Piłsudski’s genius or Tukhachevsky’s blunder? And what did stopping the Red Army at Warsaw decide? The argued answer is on the chapter page →
The atlas that shows it
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