The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk (March 3, 1918)

The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, signed between Soviet Russia and the Central Powers, marked Russian defeat and the end of her participation in World War I.

The Bolshevik government had come to power in Russia after the October Revolution, but was in a desperate situation a few months later. The revolutionary government, as a first step in foreign affairs, released a decree about peace during the second All-Russian Congress of the Soviets on October 26, 1917. The decree, authored by Vladimir Lenin, proposed all belligerent countries to start negotiations to create a “fair democratic world.”



The Entente (Great Britain, France, United States, and Italy) rejected the decree and Soviet Russia went forward to sign a separate peace with the Central Powers. The negotiations started in Brest-Litosvk on December 9, with the participation of Russia, Germany, Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria, and the Ottoman Empire. The Soviet delegation, headed by Adolph Joffe, brought as conditions the evacuation of troops from occupied territories, freedom to nations enslaved during the war, relinquishing to all war compensations and penalties, et cetera.

The German delegation countered with its own plan, which included the annexation of the Baltic region to Germany and the division of Poland. Germany, besides, wanted to keep the Russian occupied regions in order to exploit their resources.

The Allies did not agree to negotiate peace, and Soviet Russia started separate negotiations with Germany on December 27. One month later, the Central Powers came to an agreement with the Central Rada (the all-Ukrainian revolutionary parliament) to obtain food from Ukraine in exchange for military aid. On the same night, Germany submitted an ultimatum to Russia to comply with German conditions, which entailed to take the German border to Narva, Pskov, and Dvinya. The next day, Lev Trotsky, who had taken over the Soviet delegation, answered that Russia would not sign the agreement, ceased the hostilities, and evacuated its troops. The Central Powers went on the offensive on February 18 in the entire Eastern front. The Russian armies could not resist and consented to an agreement on February 19. However, the Germans continued their offense and only stopped on February 22, dictating even harsher conditions.

The Central Committee of the Communist Party agreed to the signature of a peace treaty. The Treaty of Brest-Litosvk was signed on March 3, 1918. The harsh conditions of the treaty were humiliating. Russia lost the Baltic lands and part of Belorussia; Ukraine and Finland were declared autonomous republics, with the subsequent evacuation of the Red Army. More importantly, it also ceded to the Ottoman Empire the regions of Kars and Ardahan, which were Armenian territories, and Batum (Georgian territory) in the Caucasus. It is important to remember that, after the October Revolution and the retreat of the Russian troops, Turkey had gone on the offense and reoccupied the territories of Western Armenia lost to Russia in 1916, later invading the Caucasus. Interestingly, Russia no longer had effective presence in the region, and maintained a purely nominal attachment after the revolution.

The end of the hostilities allowed Germany to concentrate its forces on the southern front and start an offense from March 21 to June 17, 1918, but this was unsuccessful, as the Allied forces countered with a tactic of continuous attacks that finally ended in German defeat.

It is important to note that the Bolsheviks were not the legal and recognized authority of Russia in 1918, and therefore had no legal right to sign a treaty on behalf of the country. However, this signature allowed the Bolshevik government to keep the power and dismiss their opponents, particularly the Socialist Revolutionaries. In the end, this would also become a motive for the beginning of the bloody civil war in Russia that would last four years.

A supplementary agreement signed in Berlin on August 27 established the payment of six billion German marks by Russia to Germany as war compensation. However, the Treaty of Brest Litovsk was declared null and void by Russia on September 20 and after the end of the war, by Turkey on October 30, and by Germany on November 13.

Death of Valerian Madatov (September 4, 1782)

The Russian army had a string of Armenian generals, both during the imperial period and its successor, the Soviet Union. One of the most remarkable was Prince Valerian Madatov, who was also involved in the campaigns leading to the incorporation of Eastern Armenia into the Russian Empire.

Madatov was born Rostom Madatian in 1782 in the village of Chanakhchi (nowadays Avetaranots), which was part of the historical district of Varanda in the khanate of Karabagh, then under Persian rule. He belonged to a family of minor nobles or meliks. He left his birthplace at the age of fourteen with his uncle, in 1797, along with a delegation of Armenian meliks seeking Russian support in their efforts to liberate the region from Muslim rule.

 

Non-Russian names and last names were usually turned into Russian ones as part of a trend to blend into the majority. Madatian’s first and last name became Valerian Madatov. He joined the Russian army at the rank of junior officer , and spent the next ten years training and serving in lower officer ranks. Madatov entered military action for the first time in 1808 during the Napoleonic wars. He joined a regiment of hussars in 1810 as a captain and then rose to the rank of major. He distinguished himself in Moldavia and Valachia during the Russo-Turkish War of 1806-1812, which earned him the Order of St. George of fourth degree in 1811. He was granted the rank of colonel for his feats during Napoleon’s invasion of Russia. In 1813 he was seriously injured in Leipzig, but, even not fully recovered from his wound, he commanded his men in a march over Paris. He was granted the rank of major-general at the age of thirty-one. He remained in France as one of the commanders of the forces of occupation after the defeat of Napoleon in 1814.

He was called back in 1815 to serve in the Caucasus, given his familiarity with the region and his knowledge of most of the major languages spoken there. He brokered peace with local regional rulers and helped consolidate Russian power in the area. In 1816 he was appointed commander-in-chief of the Russian forces in the khanate of Karabagh.

Persia tried to retake the territories lost in the first quarter of the century to Russia and attacked Karabagh in 1826, thus starting a new Russo-Persian war that would last until 1828 and end with a conclusive victory of Russia. Madatov hurried to Tiflis, where he took command of Russian forces. Leading a force of 2,000 men, they routed the 10,000-strong Persian army on the banks of the Shamkhor River and retook Elizavetpol/Gandzak (nowadays Ganja) on September 5. After defeating a Persian attempt to occupy the city again together with General Ivan Paskevich, Madatov was made lieutenant general in late September.

However, due to Paskevich’s intrigues to have his predecessors removed from the area, Madatov was ordered to move to Tiflis and later to Petersburg.

He went back to the battlefront during the Russo-Turkish war of 1828-1829, where he fought the enemy in the European front and won several significant victories. On September 4, 1829, two days after the war ended with the signature of a peace treaty, Prince Valerian Madatov died near the village of Shumla, from a pulmonary disease, sharply aggravated by the burdens of marching during the war. He was buried in the yard of the Alexander Nevsky monastery in St. Petersburg.