The Russian army is rightfully considered one of the strongest and most efficient in history. Evidence of this is the many brilliant victories won by Russian soldiers in battles with opponents superior in strength to them.
1. The defeat of the Khazar Khaganate (965)
The fall of Khazaria was the inevitable result of the weakening of its political and military power in the confrontation with Russia. However, by the time of the eastern campaign of the Kiev prince Svyatoslav, the Khazar Khaganate was still a strong rival. The Russian chronicler says:
“In the summer of 6473 (965), Svyatoslav went to the Khazars. Having heard, the Khazars went out to meet him with their prince kagan and agreed to fight, and Svyatoslav the Khazar defeated him in the battle.
According to one version, Svyatoslav first took the capital of the Khaganate Itil, and then captured Sarkel, which predetermined the final victory.
2. Neva Battle (1240)
Neva Battle
In the summer of 1240, the Swedes and their allies landed at the place where the Izhora flows into the Neva. A small detachment of the Novgorod prince Alexander Yaroslavich advanced towards them. According to legend, the prince inspired the squad with a phrase that later became “winged”: “Brothers! God is not in power, but in truth!
Historians believe that in the balance of power, the advantage was on the side of the Swedes - 5 thousand against 1.4 thousand. However, unable to withstand the powerful and selfless onslaught of the Russian troops, the Swedes fled. For the victory and courage, Alexander received the nickname "Nevsky".
3. Battle on the Ice (1242)
Battle on the Ice
The second famous victory Alexander Nevsky won over the knights of the Livonian Order in April 1242 on the ice of Lake Peipus. This time, together with the Novgorodians, the Vladimir squads also took part in the battle. The outcome of the battle was predetermined by the competent tactics of the Russian troops. They surrounded the German formations from the flanks and forced them to retreat. Historians estimate the number of parties at 15-17 thousand Russians and 10-12 thousand Livonians with mercenaries. In this battle, the knights lost 400 killed and 50 captured.
4. Battle of Kulikovo (1380)
Battle of Kulikovo
The battle on the Kulikovo field summed up the long confrontation between Russia and the Horde. On the eve of Mamai entered into a confrontation with the Moscow Grand Duke Dmitry, who refused to increase the tribute paid to the Horde. This prompted the khan to take military action. Dmitry managed to gather an impressive army, consisting of the Moscow, Serpukhov, Belozersky, Yaroslavl and Rostov regiments. According to various estimates, on September 8, 1380, from 40 to 70 thousand Russians and from 90 to 150 thousand Horde troops met in the decisive battle. The victory of Dmitry Donskoy significantly weakened the Golden Horde, which predetermined its further disintegration.
5. Battle of Molodi (1572)
Battle of Molodi
In 1571, the Crimean Khan Devlet Giray, during a raid on Moscow, burned down the Russian capital, but could not enter it. A year later, having received the support of the Ottoman Empire, he organized a new campaign against Moscow. However, this time the Crimean-Turkish army was forced to stop 40 kilometers south of the capital, not far from the village of Molodi. According to the chronicles, Devlet Giray brought with him a 120,000-strong army. However, historians insist on the figure of 60 thousand. One way or another, the Crimean-Turkish forces significantly outnumbered the Russian army, whose number did not exceed 20 thousand people. Prince Mikhail Vorotynsky managed to lure the enemy into a trap and defeat him with a sudden blow from the reserve.
6. Moscow battle (1612)
The decisive episode of the Time of Troubles was the battle of the forces of the Second Militia, led by Kuzma Minin and Dmitry Pozharsky, with the army of Hetman Khodkevich, who was trying to unblock the Polish-Lithuanian garrison, locked in the Kremlin. The first hours of the battle that unfolded in the Zamoskvorechye region, the Polish-Lithuanian detachments, outnumbering the Russians (12 thousand against 8 thousand), pressed them hard. But, as the chronicles write, the Russian generals took advantage of a short respite and managed to restore the morale of the troops. The counteroffensive of the militia eventually brought confusion to the camp of Jan Chodkiewicz and put the enemy to flight.
“The hope of taking possession of the whole Muscovite state was irrevocably destroyed,” notes the Polish chronicler.
7. Battle of Poltava (1709)
Battle of Poltava
In the autumn of 1708, instead of marching on Moscow, the Swedish king Charles XII turned south to wait out the winter and move to the capital with renewed vigor. However, without waiting for reinforcements from Stanislav Leshchinsky. Having been refused help from the Turkish Sultan, he decided to give a general battle to the Russian army near Poltava. Not all the assembled forces participated in the battle. For various reasons, from the Swedish side, out of 37 thousand, no more than 17 thousand people entered the battle, from the Russian side, out of 60 thousand, about 34 thousand fought. The victory won by the Russian troops on June 27, 1709 under the command of Peter I war. An end was soon put to Swedish dominance in the Baltic.
8. Chesme battle (1770)
Battle of Chesme The naval battle in the Chesme Bay took place at the height of the Russian-Turkish war of 1768-1774. Russian fleet under the command Alexey Orlov, having found Turkish ships in the roadstead, he was the first to decide to attack the enemy.
Despite the fact that the Russian fleet was significantly inferior to the Turkish one (ship ratio: 30/73), it quickly secured a strategic advantage for itself. First, they managed to set fire to the flagship of the Turkish squadron "Burj-u-Zafer", and it was followed by a general fire of the enemy fleet. From 3 am to 9 am, more than fifty Turkish ships burned down. The victory allowed Russia to seriously disrupt Turkish communications in the Aegean Sea and secure the blockade of the Dardanelles.
9. Battle of Kozludzhi (1774)
Battle of Kozludzhi
During the Russian-Turkish war of 1768-1774, Russia won another major victory. Russian army under the command Alexandra Suvorova and Mikhail Kamensky near the town of Kozludzhi (now Suvorovo in Bulgaria), being in a disadvantageous position and outnumbered by Turkish troops (24 thousand against 40 thousand), she was able to achieve a positive result. The action of the Russian troops was seriously hampered by the wooded area, which hid the Turkish forces and made it difficult to use artillery. Nevertheless, during the 8-hour battle in conditions of intense heat, Suvorov managed to drive the Turks off the hill and put them to flight without even resorting to a bayonet charge. This victory largely predetermined the outcome of the Russian-Turkish war and forced the Ottoman Empire to sign a peace treaty.
10. Capture of Ishmael (1790)
The capture of the stronghold - the Turkish fortress of Izmail, fully revealed the military genius of Suvorov. Earlier, Ishmael did not submit to either Nikolai Repnin, or Ivan Gudovich, or Grigory Potemkin. All hopes were now pinned on Alexander Suvorov.
The commander spent six days preparing for the siege of Izmail, working out with the troops the capture of a wooden model of high fortress walls. On the eve of the assault, Suvorov sent an ultimatum to Aidozle-Mehmet Pasha:
“I arrived here with the troops. Twenty-four hours to think - and the will. My first shot is already bondage. Storm is death.
“Rather the Danube will flow back and the sky will fall to the ground than Ishmael will surrender,” the pasha replied.
The Danube did not change its course, but in less than 12 hours the defenders were thrown from the fortress tops, and the city was taken. Thanks to a skillful siege of 31 thousand soldiers, the Russians lost a little more than 2 thousand, the Turks lost 26 thousand out of 35 thousand.
11. Battle of Cape Tendra (1790).
The commander of the Turkish squadron, Hassan Pasha, managed to convince the Sultan of the imminent defeat of the Russian navy, and at the end of August 1790 he advanced the main forces to Cape Tendra (not far from modern Odessa). However, for the anchored Turkish fleet, the rapid approach of the Russian squadron under the command of Fyodor Ushakov was an unpleasant surprise. Despite the superiority in the number of ships (45 versus 37), the Turkish fleet tried to flee. However, by that time, Russian ships had already attacked the front line of the Turks. Ushakov managed to withdraw all the flagships of the Turkish fleet from the battle and thereby demoralize the rest of the enemy squadron.
The Russian fleet did not lose a single ship.
12. Battle of Borodino (1812)
Painting by Louis Lejeune "Battle of Borodino"
On August 26, 1812, in the battle near the village of Borodino, 125 kilometers west of Moscow, significant forces of the French and Russian armies converged. Regular troops under the command of Napoleon numbered about 137 thousand people, the army Mikhail Kutuzov with the Cossacks and militia who joined it, it reached 120 thousand. The outcome of the Battle of Borodino is debatable. However, most historians agree that neither side achieved a decisive advantage. The battle of Borodino was the bloodiest in the history of one-day battles. The Russians, according to various estimates, lost from 40 to 46 thousand people, the French - from 30 to 40 thousand. Napoleon's army, which left about 25% of its composition on the Borodino field, largely lost its combat effectiveness.
13. Battle of Elisavetpol (1826)
Battle of Elisavetpol
One of the key episodes of the Russian-Persian war of 1826-1828 was the battle near Elisavetpol (now the Azerbaijani city of Ganja). The victory then gained by the Russian troops under the command of Ivan Paskevich over the Persian army of Abbas Mirza became a model of military leadership. Paskevich managed to use the confusion of the Persians who fell into the ravine to launch a counterattack. Despite the superior forces of the enemy (35 thousand against 10 thousand), the Russian regiments began to push the army of Abbas Mirza along the entire front of the attack. The losses of the Russian side amounted to 46 killed, the Persians missed 2000 people.
14. Capture of Erivan (1827)
"The capture of the Erivan fortress by Russian troops", F. Roubaud
The fall of the fortified city of Erivan was the culmination of numerous attempts by Russia to establish control over the Transcaucasus. Built in the middle of the 16th century, the fortress was considered impregnable and more than once became a stumbling block for the Russian army. Ivan Paskevich managed to competently besiege the city from three sides, placing cannons around the entire perimeter. “The Russian artillery acted beautifully,” recalled the Armenians who remained in the fortress. Paskevich knew exactly where the Persian positions were located. On the eighth day of the siege, Russian soldiers broke into the city and dealt with the garrison of the fortress with bayonets.
15. Battle of Sarykamysh (1914)
Positions of the Russian army near Sarykamysh
By December 1914, during the First World War, Russia occupied the front from the Black Sea to Lake Van with a length of 350 km, while a significant part of the Caucasian army was pushed forward - deep into Turkish territory. Turkey had a tempting plan to outflank the Russian forces, thereby cutting the Sarykamysh-Kars railway.
On December 12, the Turkish troops, making a roundabout maneuver, occupied Bardus and advanced towards Sarykamysh. Unusually frosty weather helped the Russian defenders of the city, led by General Nikolai Przhevalsky withstand the onslaught of superior enemy forces, push back the Turkish units with the approach of the reserve and surround them. The Turkish army near Sarykamysh lost 60 thousand people.
16. Brusilovsky breakthrough (1916)
Russian infantry
The offensive operation of the Southwestern Front under the command of General Alexei Brusilov, carried out from May to September 1916, became, according to the military historian Anton Kersnovsky, "a victory that we have not yet won in a world war." The number of forces that were involved on both sides is also impressive - 1,732,000 Russian soldiers and 1,061,000 soldiers of the Austro-Hungarian and German armies. The Brusilovsky breakthrough, thanks to which Bukovina and Eastern Galicia were occupied, became a turning point in the First World War. Germany and Austria-Hungary, having lost a significant part of the army, reflecting the Russian offensive operation, eventually gave the strategic initiative to the Entente.
17. Battle for Moscow (1941-1942)
The long and bloody defense of Moscow, which began in September 1941, from December 5 passed into the offensive phase, which ended on April 20, 1942. Near Moscow, Soviet troops inflicted the first painful defeat on Germany, thereby frustrating the plans of the German command to capture the capital before the onset of cold weather. The length of the front of the Moscow operation, which unfolded from Kalyazin in the north to Ryazhsk in the south, exceeded 2 thousand km. On both sides, more than 2.8 million soldiers, 21 thousand mortars and guns, 2 thousand tanks and 1.6 thousand aircraft took part in the operation. German General Günther Blumentritt recalled:
“Now it was important for the political leaders of Germany to understand that the days of the blitzkrieg had sunk into the past. We were confronted by an army far superior in its fighting qualities to all other armies with which we had ever had to meet.
18. Battle of Stalingrad (1942-1943)
Luftwaffe bombing residential areas of Stalingrad, October 1942.
The Battle of Stalingrad is considered the largest land battle in the history of mankind. The total losses of both sides, according to rough estimates, exceed 2 million people, about 100 thousand German soldiers were captured. For the Axis countries, the defeat at Stalingrad turned out to be decisive, after which Germany was no longer able to restore its strength. The French writer Jean-Richard Blok exulted in those victorious days: “Listen, Parisians! The first three divisions that invaded Paris in June 1940, the three divisions that, at the invitation of the French General Dentz, desecrated our capital, these three divisions - the hundredth, one hundred and thirteenth and two hundred and ninety-fifth - do not exist anymore! They are destroyed at Stalingrad: the Russians have avenged Paris!
.The result of the capture of Berlin was the exit of Soviet troops to the Elbe River, where their famous meeting with the allies took place.
Portrait of Lieutenant General Michael Jackson commanding the execution of civilians in Londonderry - Ulster Bloody Sunday - and Kosovo.
Fern Lane, a columnist for the Irish Republican News, called his article that way: to emphasize the historical continuity of these two events.
Let us remind our readers a little about the events of Bloody Sunday in Ulster.
It happened on January 30, 1972 in the Northern Irish city of Londonderry, which the Irish themselves prefer to call Derry. This is how the head of Sinn Féin, Gerry Adams, describes the events of that day in his autobiographical book Before Dawn: operation designed to instill fear in the hearts of all Irish nationalists living under the British yoke - by brutally massacring unarmed people. most of the workers demanding civil rights.
Some suggest that the paratroopers acted emotionally, that they got out of control of the command, but perhaps the most vile thing in this story is just the fact that these events were controlled, decided and planned in advance at the highest political and military level. It was a cold-blooded, deliberate massacre of civilians who were demonstrating peacefully. The demonstration was stopped by the troops, a little fermentation began, several stones were thrown by young guys; but most of the assembled listened calmly to the speeches being made, when suddenly the paratroopers suddenly opened fire - coolly, measuredly and definitely, they aimed at the "legitimate target" - "any men of draft age" in the crowd. They continued to shoot when people ran, and at those who hurried to help the wounded. 13 innocent lives were lost that day, another seriously injured died later; 29 people were injured....
Ireland was in convulsions from Bloody Sunday, which happened - unlike other events - in public, in broad daylight and in the presence of journalists. The TV reports, which caused a chilling silence in the audience, could not be ignored. Everyone had the feeling that this time the British government had really gone too far. Tens of thousands of workers in the Republic of Ireland, in Dublin, stopped work. Even the churchmen and the Dublin government could not remain silent. In Dublin, 3 days of marches and riots culminated in the burning of the British Embassy in front of a crowd of 30,000 people. Barricades began to be erected in Ulster ... In the British Parliament, Bernadette Devlin publicly slapped the British Secretary of State for Northern Ireland ... Money, weapons and recruits poured into the IRA ... "
Was it not then that NATO began to work out the technique of mass murder of "legitimate targets" in the person of civilians?
Wasn't it already doing it then, without blushing, in the face of journalists and the whole world?
Fern Lane writes: "... and it is not surprising that this 'our man in Kosovo' - a man with an endless number of nicknames, "Macho Jackson", "Action Jackson", "Prince of Darkness", turned out to be a veteran of Bloody Sunday, in in which he participated in the rank of adjutant of the 1st Airborne Regiment.
Although he was never called to testify before a tribunal, as noted by Italian photographer and journalist Fulvio Grimaldi (in his 1972 book Blood in the Streets), Jackson "was largely responsible for what happened." In his description of Bloody Sunday in Derry, Grimaldi - whose photographs, along with sound recordings made by his colleague Susan North, are today the most important evidence of what happened on that day - characterizes the English paratroopers as: "soulless mechanical tools, stupid little people incapable of talking to look you in the face and see your eyes unable to listen, and hearing, unable to understand and know... Little robots programmed to use weapons."
It is unclear whether General Jackson will appear before the Saville Inquiry, but he is, in his own words, determined to "defend the dignity" of the British paratroopers, describing the last 30 years in Ulster as "ethnic conflict".
Explanation: The Saville Inquiry (Tribunal) is only now, more than a quarter of a century after Bloody Sunday, undertaking to clarify the events. And even now, after all these years, the progress of the investigation is hindered by the British press and the British government. The chairman of the tribunal, Lord Saville, decided that the names of the soldiers who participated in the execution should be publicly named (they are not even threatened with imprisonment yet - they just want to be called to court so that they "explain their actions"!).
The British Supreme Court in London recently overturned this decision and demanded that the soldiers be guaranteed anonymity. The British Ministry of Defense has spent more than 1 million British pounds to challenge Lord Seville's decision in court. But it is ready to go for more - if only the truth about its dirty deeds does not surface: Secretary of Defense George Robertson said that his department will not only cover all legal costs, but also, if necessary, is ready to pay for protection throughout life and the creation "a new life under a different name", as is done in America, for each of the soldiers.
Tony Blair also remarked that "it would be unethical not to stand by our own troops in the face of any investigation and stand up for them...", though he continues to insist that his government is neutral in the Seville investigation. And all this is said by people who are foaming at the mouth and shouting about the "atrocities of the Serbian special forces in Kosovo"!
The families of those killed and wounded on Bloody Sunday demanded that the tribunal file an appeal. At the same time, they are forced to litigate against 2 British newspapers: the Daily Mail and the Daily Telegraph, which seek to discredit the memory of the dead and the honor of their families. Newspapers also defended "our gallant British warriors" and said that to deprive those who fired at unarmed crowds in 1972 of the right to anonymity was to sign their estimated sentence for the execution of his IRA. With the aim of "moral support" of the paratroopers, both newspapers published hysterical slander against the families of the victims ...
But back to Fern Lane's article.
"A small detail about Jackson's participation in Bloody Sunday seems to have been overlooked by the English press in their enthusiastic description of his career; in particular: in those parts of it in which the authors go out of their way to try to find false "noble" succession between the premise British paratroopers in Kosovo and their activities in the 6 counties of Ulster They prefer to focus on his more general reputation as a "tough guy" with a monastic lifestyle - monastic apart from the fact that he is married and has a weakness for long parties with whiskey…
On June 5, the BBC stated that "the Serbian military may find him more agreeable than other commanders, as his role so far allows him to have no Serbian blood on his hands" - and this was said while that his soldiers shot a Serb just a few hours after entering Kosovo!
And by June 14, despite his supposed role as a "peacemaker", the BBC changed tone, saying of him that "in the face of the enemy, we need an officer who looks active ...".
Jackson spent a total of 6 years in Ulster, in 3 different phases of his service, the second time as commander of the 1978-1980 campaign and the third time in 1989-1992 when he was commander of the 39th Infantry Brigade. He comes from a military background and entered the service at the age of 19, before graduating with a university degree in Russian in Birmingham in the late 60s - which could have been useful to him in his intelligence activities in Berlin at the height of the Cold War. In 1970 he joined the British Airborne Regiment; and his other "military exploits" include being the commander of a British corps in Bosnia. According to some sources, Duke Ellington is the hero of The Prince of Darkness; and, like Margaret Thatcher, he is known for sleeping less than 4 hours a night.
Jackson is also described as a "seriously mentally disabled" officer by a professor of history at Cambridge, where he spent 6 months in 1989. One cannot but agree with this if one listens to his press conferences, which are more rude and intolerant than the quality of his intellect."
And the Russian guys will have to report to such a person!
Irina MALENKO.
Dublin.
For some time now, the opinion has been instilled in us: we must sympathize with the whites. They are nobles, people of honor and duty, the "intellectual elite of the nation", innocently destroyed by the Bolsheviks ...
Some modern heroes, heroically leaving the enemy half of the territory entrusted to them without a fight, even introduce White Guard shoulder straps in the ranks of their militia ... While being in the so-called. "red belt" of the country now known to the whole world ...
It has become fashionable on occasion to cry about the innocently murdered and exiled nobles. And, as usual, the Reds, who treated the “elite” in such a way, are blamed for all the troubles of the present time.
Behind these conversations, the main thing becomes invisible - the Reds still won that fight, and after all, the “elite” of not only Russia, but also the strongest powers of that time, fought with them.
And why did the current “noble gentlemen” take that the nobles in that great Russian turmoil were necessarily on the side of the whites?
Let's turn to the facts.
75,000 former officers served in the Red Army (of which 62,000 were of noble origin), while in the White Army there were about 35,000 of the 150,000 officer corps of the Russian Empire.
On November 7, 1917, the Bolsheviks came to power. Russia by that time was still at war with Germany and its allies. Like it or not, you have to fight. Therefore, already on November 19, 1917, the Bolsheviks appointed the chief of staff of the Supreme Commander-in-Chief ... a hereditary nobleman, His Excellency Lieutenant General of the Imperial Army Mikhail Dmitrievich Bonch-Bruevich.
It was he who would lead the armed forces of the Republic in the most difficult period for the country, from November 1917 to August 1918, and from the scattered units of the former Imperial Army and Red Guard detachments, by February 1918, he would form the Workers' and Peasants' Red Army. March to August M.D. Bonch-Bruevich will hold the post of military head of the Supreme Military Council of the Republic, and in 1919 - chief of the Field Headquarters Rev. Military Council of the Republic.
At the end of 1918, the post of Commander-in-Chief of all the Armed Forces of the Soviet Republic was established. We ask you to love and favor - his high nobility, Commander-in-Chief of all the Armed Forces of the Soviet Republic Sergey Sergeevich Kamenev (not to be confused with Kamenev, who was then shot together with Zinoviev). Regular officer, graduated from the Academy of the General Staff in 1907, colonel of the Imperial Army.
First, from 1918 to July 1919, Kamenev made a lightning-fast career from commander of an infantry division to commander of the Eastern Front, and, finally, from July 1919 until the end of the Civil War, he held the post that Stalin would occupy during the Great Patriotic War. From July 1919 not a single operation of the land and sea forces of the Soviet Republic was complete without his direct participation.
Sergei Sergeevich was greatly assisted by his immediate subordinate, His Excellency Pavel Pavlovich Lebedev, Chief of the Field Staff of the Red Army, a hereditary nobleman, Major General of the Imperial Army. As chief of the Field Staff, he replaced Bonch-Bruevich and from 1919 to 1921 (almost the entire war) he headed it, and from 1921 he was appointed chief of staff of the Red Army. Pavel Pavlovich participated in the development and conduct of the most important operations of the Red Army to defeat the troops of Kolchak, Denikin, Yudenich, Wrangel, was awarded the Order of the Red Banner and the Red Banner of Labor (at that time the highest awards of the Republic).
One cannot ignore Lebedev's colleague, the Chief of the All-Russian General Staff, His Excellency Alexander Alexandrovich Samoilo. Alexander Alexandrovich is also a hereditary nobleman and Major General of the Imperial Army. During the Civil War, he headed the military district, the army, the front, worked as a deputy for Lebedev, then headed the All-Glavshtab.
Isn't it true that an extremely interesting trend can be traced in the personnel policy of the Bolsheviks? It can be assumed that Lenin and Trotsky, when selecting the highest command cadres of the Red Army, set an indispensable condition for them to be hereditary nobles and regular officers of the Imperial Army with a rank no lower than a colonel. But of course it is not. Just a tough wartime quickly put forward professionals and talented people, also quickly pushing all kinds of "revolutionary balabolkas".
Therefore, the personnel policy of the Bolsheviks is quite natural, they needed to fight and win right now, there was no time to study. However, it is truly surprising that the nobles and officers went to them, and even in such numbers, and served the Soviet government, for the most part, faithfully.
There are often allegations that the Bolsheviks drove the nobles into the Red Army by force, threatening the families of officers with reprisals. This myth has been stubbornly exaggerated for many decades in pseudo-historical literature, pseudo-monographs and various kinds of “research”. This is just a myth. They served not out of fear, but out of conscience.
And who would entrust command to a potential traitor? Only a few betrayals of officers are known. But they commanded insignificant forces and are a sad, but still exception. The majority honestly performed their duty and selflessly fought both with the Entente and with their "brothers" in the class. They acted as true patriots of their Motherland should.
The Workers' and Peasants' Red Fleet is generally an aristocratic institution. Here is a list of his commanders during the Civil War: Vasily Mikhailovich Altfater (hereditary nobleman, rear admiral of the Imperial Navy), Evgeny Andreevich Berens (hereditary nobleman, rear admiral of the Imperial Navy), Alexander Vasilyevich Nemitz (personal data are exactly the same).
Why are there commanders, the Naval General Staff of the Russian Navy, almost in full force, went over to the side of the Soviet government, and remained in charge of the fleet throughout the Civil War. Apparently, Russian sailors after Tsushima perceived the idea of a monarchy, as they say now, ambiguously.
Here is what Altfater wrote in his application for admission to the Red Army: “I have served so far only because I considered it necessary to be useful to Russia where I can, and in the way I can. But I did not know and did not believe you. Even now I still don’t understand much, but I am convinced ... that you love Russia more than many of ours. And now I have come to tell you that I am yours."
I believe that the same words could be repeated by Baron Alexander Alexandrovich von Taube, Chief of the Main Staff of the Red Army Command in Siberia (former Lieutenant General of the Imperial Army). Taube's troops were defeated by the White Czechs in the summer of 1918, he himself was captured and soon died in a Kolchak prison on death row.
And a year later, another "red baron" - Vladimir Alexandrovich Olderogge (also a hereditary nobleman, major general of the Imperial Army), from August 1919 to January 1920 commander of the Red Eastern Front - finished off the White Guards in the Urals and eventually liquidated Kolchakism .
At the same time, from July to October 1919, another important front of the Reds - the Southern - was headed by His Excellency, the former Lieutenant General of the Imperial Army Vladimir Nikolaevich Egoriev. The troops under the command of Yegoriev stopped Denikin's offensive, inflicted a number of defeats on him and held out until the reserves approached from the Eastern Front, which ultimately predetermined the final defeat of the Whites in the South of Russia. During these difficult months of fierce fighting on the Southern Front, Egoriev's closest assistant was his deputy and at the same time the commander of a separate military group, Vladimir Ivanovich Selivachev (hereditary nobleman, lieutenant general of the Imperial Army).
As you know, in the summer-autumn of 1919, the Whites planned to victoriously end the Civil War. To this end, they decided to launch a combined strike in all directions. However, by mid-October 1919, the Kolchak front was already hopeless, there was a turning point in favor of the Reds in the South. At that moment, the Whites made an unexpected blow from the northwest.
Yudenich rushed to Petrograd. The blow was so unexpected and powerful that already in October the Whites found themselves in the suburbs of Petrograd. The question arose about the surrender of the city. Lenin, despite the well-known panic in the ranks of his comrades, the city decided not to surrender.
And now the Red 7th Army is advancing towards Yudenich under the command of his high nobility (former colonel of the Imperial Army) Sergei Dmitrievich Kharlamov, and a separate group of the same army under the command of His Excellency (Major General of the Imperial Army) Sergei Ivanovich Odintsov enters the White flank. Both are from the most hereditary nobles. The outcome of those events is known: in mid-October, Yudenich was still examining Red Petrograd through binoculars, and on November 28 he was unpacking his suitcases in Reval (a lover of young boys turned out to be a useless commander ...).
northern front. From the autumn of 1918 to the spring of 1919, this was an important sector of the struggle against the Anglo-American-French invaders. So who is leading the Bolsheviks into battle? First, His Excellency (former Lieutenant General) Dmitry Pavlovich Parsky, then His Excellency (former Lieutenant General) Dmitry Nikolaevich Nadezhny, both hereditary nobles.
It should be noted that it was Parsky who led the Red Army in the famous February battles of 1918 near Narva, so it is largely thanks to him that we celebrate February 23rd. His Excellency, Comrade Nadezhny, after the end of the fighting in the North, will be appointed commander of the Western Front.
This is the situation with the nobles and generals in the service of the Reds almost everywhere. We will be told: you are exaggerating everything here. The Reds had their own talented military leaders and not from nobles and generals. Yes, there were, we know their names well: Frunze, Budyonny, Chapaev, Parkhomenko, Kotovsky, Shchors. But who were they in the days of decisive battles?
When the fate of Soviet Russia was being decided in 1919, the most important was the Eastern Front (against Kolchak). Here are his commanders in chronological order: Kamenev, Samoilo, Lebedev, Frunze (26 days!), Olderogge. One proletarian and four nobles, I emphasize - in a vital area! No, I do not want to belittle the merits of Mikhail Vasilyevich. He is a really talented commander and did a lot to defeat the same Kolchak, commanding one of the military groups of the Eastern Front. Then the Turkestan Front under his command crushed the counter-revolution in Central Asia, and the operation to defeat Wrangel in the Crimea is deservedly recognized as a masterpiece of military art. But let's be fair: by the time the Crimea was taken, even the whites did not doubt their fate, the outcome of the war was finally decided.
Semyon Mikhailovich Budyonny was the army commander, his Cavalry Army played a key role in a number of operations of some fronts. However, we should not forget that there were dozens of armies in the Red Army, and to call the contribution of one of them decisive in victory would still be a big stretch. Nikolai Alexandrovich Shchors, Vasily Ivanovich Chapaev, Alexander Yakovlevich Parkhomenko, Grigory Ivanovich Kotovsky - commanders. By virtue of this alone, with all their personal courage and military talents, they could not make a strategic contribution to the course of the war.
But propaganda has its own rules. Any proletarian, having learned that the highest military positions are occupied by hereditary nobles and generals of the tsarist army, will say: “Yes, this is contra!”
Therefore, a kind of conspiracy of silence arose around our heroes in the Soviet years, and even more so now. They won the Civil War and quietly disappeared into oblivion, leaving behind yellowed operational maps and mean lines of orders.
But “their excellencies” and “high nobility” shed their blood for the Soviet power no worse than the proletarians. Baron Taube has already been mentioned, but this is not the only example.
In the spring of 1919, in the battles near Yamburg, the White Guards captured and executed the brigade commander of the 19th rifle division, the former major general of the Imperial Army A.P. Nikolaev. The same fate befell in 1919 the commander of the 55th Infantry Division, former Major General A.V. Stankevich, in 1920 - commander of the 13th Infantry Division, former Major General A.V. Sobolev. Remarkably, before his death, all the generals were offered to go over to the side of the whites, and everyone refused. The honor of a Russian officer is dearer than life.
That is, do you think they will tell us that the nobles and the regular officer corps were for the Reds?
Of course, I am far from this thought. Here it is simply necessary to distinguish "nobleman" as a moral concept from "nobility" as a class. The noble class almost entirely ended up in the camp of the whites, it could not be otherwise.
It was very comfortable for them to sit on the neck of the Russian people, and they did not want to get off. True, even white help from the nobles was simply scanty. Judge for yourself. In the turning point of 1919, around May, the number of shock groups of the White armies was: Kolchak's army - 400 thousand people; Denikin's army (Armed forces of the South of Russia) - 150 thousand people; Yudenich's army (North-Western Army) - 18.5 thousand people. Total: 568.5 thousand people.
Moreover, these are mainly "bast shoes" from the villages, who, under the threat of execution, were driven into service and who then with whole armies (!), Like Kolchak, went over to the side of the Reds. And this is in Russia, where at that time there were 2.5 million nobles, i.e. at least 500 thousand men of military age! Here, it would seem, is the shock detachment of the counter-revolution ...
Or take, for example, the leaders of the white movement: Denikin is the son of an officer, his grandfather was a soldier; Kornilov is a Cossack, Semyonov is a Cossack, Alekseev is the son of a soldier. Of the titled persons - only Wrangel, and even that Swedish baron. Who is left? The nobleman Kolchak is a descendant of a captive Turk, but Yudenich with a surname very characteristic of a “Russian nobleman” and a non-standard orientation. In the old days, the nobles themselves defined such their brothers in class as poor-born. But “in the absence of fish, cancer is a fish.”
You should not look for the princes Golitsyn, Trubetskoy, Shcherbatov, Obolensky, Dolgorukov, Count Sheremetev, Orlov, Novosiltsev and among the less significant figures of the white movement. The "boyars" sat in the rear, in Paris and Berlin, and waited for some of their lackeys to bring others on the lasso. Didn't wait.
So Malinin's howls about the lieutenants Golitsins and the Obolensky cornets are just a fiction. They did not exist in nature... But the fact that the native land is burning under the feet is not just a metaphor. She really burned under the troops of the Entente and their "white" friends.
But there is also a moral category - "nobleman". Put yourself in the place of "His Excellency" who went over to the side of Soviet power. What can he expect? At most - a commander's ration and a pair of boots (an exceptional luxury in the Red Army, the rank and file were shod in bast shoes). At the same time, the suspicion and distrust of many "comrades", the watchful eye of the commissar is constantly nearby. Compare this with the 5,000 rubles of the annual salary of a major general in the tsarist army, and after all, many excellencies also had family property before the revolution. Therefore, selfish interest for such people is excluded, one thing remains - the honor of a nobleman and a Russian officer. The best of the nobles went to the Reds - to save the Fatherland.
During the days of the Polish invasion of 1920, thousands of Russian officers, including the nobles, went over to the side of Soviet power. From the representatives of the highest generals of the former Imperial Army, the Reds created a special body - a Special Conference under the Commander-in-Chief of all the Armed Forces of the Republic. The purpose of this body is to develop recommendations for the command of the Red Army and the Soviet Government to repel Polish aggression. In addition, the Special Meeting appealed to former officers of the Russian Imperial Army to come out in defense of the Motherland in the ranks of the Red Army.
The wonderful words of this address, perhaps, fully reflect the moral position of the best part of the Russian aristocracy:
“At this critical historical moment in our national life, we, your senior comrades-in-arms, appeal to your feelings of love and devotion to the Motherland and appeal to you with an urgent request to forget all grievances, to voluntarily go with complete selflessness and hunting to the Red Army to the front or to rear, wherever the government of Soviet Workers 'and Peasants' Russia appoints you, and serve there not out of fear, but out of conscience, so that by your honest service, not sparing your life, to defend Russia dear to us at all costs and not allow it to be plundered " .
The appeal is signed by their Excellencies: General of the Cavalry (Commander-in-Chief of the Russian Army in May-July 1917) Alexei Alekseevich Brusilov, General of the Infantry (Minister of War of the Russian Empire in 1915-1916) Alexei Andreyevich Polivanov, General of the Infantry Andrei Meandrovich Zaionchkovsky and many other generals of the Russian Army.
I would like to finish this brief review with examples of human destinies, which in the best possible way refute the myth of the pathological villainy of the Bolsheviks and the total extermination of the noble classes of Russia by them. I will note right away that the Bolsheviks were not stupid, therefore they understood that, given the difficult situation in Russia, they really needed people with knowledge, talents and conscience. And such people could count on honor and respect from the Soviet government, despite their origin and pre-revolutionary life.
Let's start with His Excellency General of Artillery Alexei Alekseevich Manikovsky. Aleksey Alekseevich, back in the First World War, headed the Main Artillery Directorate of the Russian Imperial Army. After the February Revolution, he was appointed Comrade (Deputy) Minister of War. Since the Minister of War of the Provisional Government, Guchkov, knew nothing about military matters, Manikovsky had to become the actual head of the department. On a memorable October night in 1917, Manikovsky was arrested along with the rest of the members of the Provisional Government, then released. A few weeks later, he was arrested again and again released; he was not seen in conspiracies against the Soviet regime. And already in 1918 he headed the Main Artillery Directorate of the Red Army, then he would work in various staff positions in the Red Army.
Or, for example, His Excellency Lieutenant General of the Russian Army, Count Alexei Alekseevich Ignatiev. During the First World War, he served as a military attache in France with the rank of major general and was in charge of the purchase of weapons - the fact is that the tsarist government prepared the country for war in such a way that even cartridges had to be purchased abroad. For this, Russia paid a lot of money, and they lay in Western banks.
After October, our faithful allies immediately laid their hands on Russian property abroad, including government accounts. However, Aleksey Alekseevich got his bearings faster than the French and transferred the money to another account, inaccessible to the allies, and besides, in his own name. And the money was 225 million rubles in gold, or 2 billion dollars at the current gold rate.
Ignatiev did not succumb to persuasion to transfer funds from either the Whites or the French. After France established diplomatic relations with the USSR, he came to the Soviet embassy and modestly handed over a check for the entire amount with the words: "This money belongs to Russia." The emigrants were furious, they decided to kill Ignatiev. And his own brother volunteered to be the killer! Ignatiev miraculously survived - a bullet pierced his cap a centimeter from his head.
We invite each of you to mentally try on the cap of Count Ignatiev and think about whether you are capable of this? And if we add to this that during the revolution the Bolsheviks confiscated the Ignatyev family estate and the family mansion in Petrograd?
And the last thing I would like to say. Do you remember how Stalin was accused at one time, imputing to him that he killed all the tsarist officers and former nobles who remained in Russia?
So, none of our heroes was subjected to repression, everyone died a natural death (of course, except for those who died on the fronts of the Civil War) in glory and honor. And their younger comrades, such as: Colonel B.M. Shaposhnikov, staff captains A.M. Vasilevsky and F.I. Tolbukhin, Lieutenant L.A. Govorov - became Marshals of the Soviet Union.
History has long put everything in its place, and no matter how many Radzins, Svanidzes and other riffraff, who do not know history but know how to get money for lying, try to misrepresent it, the fact remains: the white movement has discredited itself.
The collection of Russian troops was scheduled in Kolomna on August 15. An ambush regiment led by Vladimir Andreevich and Dmitry Mikhailovich Bobrok-Volynsky was placed in the oak forest up the Don.
The core of the Russian army marched from Moscow to Kolomna in three parts along three roads. However, Dmitry, realizing the danger of such a union, on August 26 quickly withdrew his army to the mouth of the Lopasna, crossed the Oka to Ryazan.
Zadonshchina" also mentions 70 Ryazan boyars among the dead on the Kulikovo field. Russian cities send soldiers to Moscow. On the way to the Don, in the Berezuy tract, the regiments of the Lithuanian princes Andrei and Dmitry Olgerdovich joined the Russian army. However, it should be borne in mind that the figures given in medieval sources are usually extremely exaggerated. The leaders of the archaeological expeditions on the Kulikovo field agree with his point of view: O. V. Dvurechensky and M. I. Gonyany.
From chronicle sources it is known that the battle took place "on the Don at the mouth of Nepryadva." In the Moscow army, these were mainly princely servants and city regiments. Historians explain the lack of significant finds of military equipment on the battlefield by the fact that in the Middle Ages “these things were insanely expensive,” so after the battle all the items were carefully collected. Instead of a picture of epic proportions with a construction front length of 7-10 versts, a relatively small forest clearing was localized, sandwiched between the ravines.
Battle of Kulikovo and Kulikovo Field
Miniature from the manuscript "The Legend of the Battle of Mamaev", XVII century. The warrior carries a red banner with an Orthodox cross. On the evening of September 7, Russian troops were lined up in battle formations. The large regiment and the entire courtyard of the Moscow prince stood in the center. It is believed that the ambush regiment stood in the oak forest next to the regiment of the left hand, however, in the "Zadonshchina" it is said about the blow of the ambush regiment from the right hand. The division into regiments according to the types of troops is unknown.
Battle of Kulikovo in ancient Russian literature
On the night of September 8, Dmitry and Bobrok went out for reconnaissance and examined the Tatar and their positions from a distance. Before the start of the battle, Dmitry Donskoy became in the ranks of military people, exchanging clothes with his favorite Mikhail Brenok (or Bryanok). At 12 o'clock the Tatars also appeared on the Kulikovo field. Both combatants fell dead (perhaps this episode, described only in the "Tale of the Battle of Mamaev", is a legend).
The battle in the center was protracted and long. In the center and on the left flank, the Russians were on the verge of breaking through their battle formations, but a private counterattack helped, when "Gleb Bryansky with the regiments of Vladimir and Suzdal stepped over the corpses of the dead." The Tatar cavalry was driven into the river and killed there. At the same time, the regiments of Andrei and Dmitry Olgerdovich went on the offensive.
The Grand Duke himself was shell-shocked and knocked off his horse, but was able to get to the forest, where he was found after the battle under a felled birch in an unconscious state. Immediately after the battle, the task was set to count "how many governors we do not have and how many young people."
Military confrontation between Russia and the Horde on the eve of the Battle of Kulikovo
A. N. Kirpichnikov made a cautious assumption that about 800 boyars and 5-8 thousand people could die in the battle. A. Bulychev, based on a study of similar battles in medieval Europe, made the assumption that the Russian army could lose about a third of all soldiers. When the carts, in which numerous wounded soldiers were taken home, lagged behind the main army, the Lithuanians of Prince Jagiello finished off the defenseless wounded.
Prehistory of the battle
Later interpretations of the legend claim that the Cossacks with the icon arrived at the camp of the Moscow prince Dmitry on the eve of the battle to help him in the battle with the Tatars. Mamai hastily gathered the rest of his forces in the Crimea, intending to go back to Russia as an exile, but was defeated by Tokhtamysh. After the Battle of Kulikovo, the Horde raided many times (the Crimean Horde and under Ivan the Terrible burned Moscow in 1571), but did not dare to fight the Russians in the open field.
Received great fame, thanks to the life of Sergius of Radonezh, the episode with the blessing of the army by Sergius is not mentioned in early sources about the Battle of Kulikovo. In particular, Moscow was burned by the Golden Horde two years after the battle and was forced to resume paying tribute. The Battle of Kulikovo in 1380 is the most important event in the history of medieval Russia, which largely determined the fate of the Russian state.
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Which khan led the army of the Mongol-Tatars in the Battle of Kulikovo?
I think mama
SANDPIPER? OVSKAYA B? ITVA September 8, 1380, the battle of Russian troops led by the Grand Duke Dmitry Donskoy of Vladimir and Moscow and the Tatar army led by the temnik Mamai, who seized power in the Golden Horde, on the Kulikovo field, in the upper reaches of the Don River. The battle ended with the defeat of the Tatar army and marked the beginning of the liberation of the Russian people from the Golden Horde yoke.
Mamai the impostor, ruler of the White Horde (Crimean Khanate) commanded in the Battle of Kulikovo, a battle not sanctioned by the Golden Horde, for which he was killed by Tokhtomysh. There was no question of any liberation from the yoke.
Mamai. I remember my classroom talking after the weekend about "order" in the classroom: "how did Mamai go"))))
100 years after the Battle of Kulikovo, Ivan the Great was ordered to kneel and kiss the cast of the Khan's foot. It seems that little has changed since the Battle of Kulikovo.
He led the army-horde (horde: op-strength, d-good, a-as; together: the power of good aces) in the Battle of Kulikovo, - temnik (10 thousand soldiers in submission) Mamai. Mamai is a Cossack-Russian of Tartaria. Tartarians - people - Russ who did not have religion. In the Battle of Kulikovo, the question of how to elect power was decided. Mamai was for the ancient order of election to power. Time-tested. Allowing you to control power and prevent corruption, etc. To prevent such an order of election to power, when the people are on their own, and the power is on its own, when the government is rich and the people are poor.
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September 21. Victory Day of the Russian regiments led by Grand Duke Dmitry Donskoy over the Mongol-Tatar troops in the Battle of Kulikovo (1380)
Home | Patriotic, spiritual and moral education of schoolchildren | Days of Military Glory and Commemorative Dates of Russia | Days of military glory (victorious days) of Russia | September 21. Victory Day of the Russian regiments led by Grand Duke Dmitry Donskoy over the Mongol-Tatar troops in the Battle of Kulikovo (1380)
Victory Day of the Russian regiments led by Grand Duke Dmitry Donskoy over the Mongol-Tatar troops in the Battle of Kulikovo (1380)
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Icon of Dmitry Donskoy
Terrible disasters brought the Tatar-Mongol yoke to Russian soil.
But in the second half of the XIV century. the disintegration of the Golden Horde began, where one of the senior emirs, Mamai, becomes the de facto ruler.
At the same time, Russia was in the process of forming a strong centralized state through the unification of Russian lands under the rule of the Moscow principality.
The strengthening of the Moscow principality alarmed Mamai. In 1378, he sent a strong army to Russia under the command of Murza Begich.
The army of Prince Dmitry Ivanovich of Moscow met the Horde on the Vozha River and completely defeated them.
Mamai, having learned about the defeat of Begich, began to prepare for a big campaign against Russia. He entered into an alliance with the Grand Duke of Lithuania Jagiello and Prince Oleg of Ryazan. In the summer of 1380, Mamai began a campaign.
Not far from the confluence of the Voronezh River with the Don, the Horde broke their camps, and, roaming, were waiting for news from Jagiello and Oleg.
Prince Dmitry decided to defeat the hordes of Mamai before the troops of Jagiello approached them, in order to prevent the enemy from invading deep into the Russian land.
On the morning of September 8 (21), after the fight between the Russian warrior monk A. Peresvet and the Mongol hero Chelubey, who fell dead from their horses pierced by spears, a fierce battle broke out. Personally, Dmitry Ivanovich fought in the forefront of his troops.
For three hours, Mamai's army (over 90 - 100 thousand people) unsuccessfully tried to break through the center and the right wing of the Russian rati (50 - 70 thousand people), which repelled the onslaught of the enemy. Then he attacked the left flank with all his might and began to push the Russian soldiers. Mamai brought his entire reserve into the planned breakthrough. And at that moment, the Ambush Regiment hit the rear of the enemy cavalry that had broken through. The enemy could not withstand the unexpected blow and began to retreat, and then fled.
Russian squads pursued him for 30 - 40 km. Mamai's army was completely defeated. Detachments of Jagiello, having learned about the victory of the Russians, quickly returned to Lithuania.
The battle on the Kulikovo field seriously undermined the military power of the Golden Horde and accelerated its subsequent collapse. It contributed to the further growth and strengthening of the Russian united state, raised the role of Moscow as the center of the unification.
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Battle of Kulikovo
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Battle on the Kulikovo field
"Battle on the Kulikovo field" - "Shkolfilm" 1982 (00:05:00 black and white). Editing director - S. Zagoskina.
The film is built on static documentary material, Russian chronicles. The form of presentation is a kind of chronicler's story, which appears several times on the screen. At the end of the film, the Kulikovo field is shown from a helicopter: a general view and an image of the monument to Dmitry Donskoy.
The fragment was edited based on the materials of the film: "On the Kulikovo Field" (TSSDF). Video: 49.5 MB, 1269 kbps Audio: 101 kbps
Icon of Dmitry Donskoy
Grand Prince Dmitry Ivanovich Donskoy was canonized as a Saint in 1988 - in honor of the millennial anniversary of the baptism of Russia by his great ancestor, St. Vladimir the Baptist. St. Dmitry Donskoy entered the history of Russia as a successful successor to the unification of lands and principalities around the Moscow principality. In addition, the memory of the Battle of Kulikovo will forever remain in the history of the Russian state, where St. Dmitry Donskoy and his troops repulsed the troops of the Golden Horde, thereby marking the beginning of the liberation of Russia from the Tatar-Mongol yoke. On the icon of Prince Dmitry Donskoy, the Saint is depicted in rich princely attire, with a sword in one hand and the other hand humbly raised, frozen in the gesture "the palm of the righteous." Thus, the character of St. Dmitry is revealed - he revered Christ and was a great warrior.
Dmitry's father was Ivan the Second Red Rurikovich, the great-grandson of the great warrior, wise diplomat and successful ruler - statesman Alexander Nevsky. Ivan Krasny died when Dmitry Donskoy was nine years old. A huge responsibility fell on the little boy - he had to manage the Moscow principality, which was gaining strength and setting itself the goal of subjugating all other principalities. As historical chronicles show, Dmitry Ivanovich Donskoy and the decisions he made from the very first days of accession to the princely throne were strongly influenced by the Holy Wonderworker Metropolitan Alexy of Kyiv and the ambitious Moscow boyars. At this time, within the Golden Horde, to which the principalities of Russia paid tribute, the so-called "great zamyatnya" began - an internecine struggle between heirs and relatives for the khanate, which began with the death of Berdibek, resulting in a frequent change of rulers. As a result of the absence of representatives of the deceased Ivan the Red to receive a label for reigning in Sarai-Batu, the capital of the Golden Horde, Dmitry Konstantinovich, the Suzdal prince, received Moscow reigning. But the most influential Moscow boyars did not want to give up their dominant positions, and at the age of 11 Dmitry Donskoy went with them for a label to reign. At that moment, the khan's power was divided between the shed khan Murad and the favorite of the formidable Mamai Abdullah. Taking advantage of the confusion in the delimitation of powers between the two rulers, Dmitry Donskoy and the Muscovites were able to obtain a princely label for the young prince from the first of them, Khan Murad. So Dmitry Ivanovich became the Moscow prince. Two years after receiving the label, Dmitry, his brother Ivan and their cousin Vladimir stood at the head of the army going to war against Vladimir, where Dmitry of Suzdal occupied the grand prince's throne. Assessing the strength and size of the Moscow army, the Suzdal prince ceded the throne, with virtually no resistance. Mamai, not wanting to hand over the grand-ducal throne to Dmitry Donskoy, who was not under his control, sent with ambassadors another label to reign for the Suzdal prince Dmitry Konstantinovich. But he was able to hold out only 12 days, a little less than two weeks. The Grand Duke's throne still remained with St. Dmitry. This conflict between Mamai and Dmitry Donskoy subsequently turned into heavy bloody battles, increased civil strife and the devastation of many Russian lands. But for Russia, as a free unified state, further history showed the need for Dmitry to reign on the throne of the Grand Duke, even if by increasing enmity with the Golden Horde.
When Dmitry was fifteen years old, he married the daughter of his recent rival Dmitry Konstantinovich, Prince of Suzdal, who wanted to extinguish the conflict between Moscow and Suzdal. His wife, Evdokia Dmitrievna (known in Orthodoxy as the Reverend Saint Euphrosyne of Moscow), at the time of the wedding in the Kolomna Resurrection Church, was only thirteen years old. Despite the young age of both, the marriage was happy and fruitful: Dmitry Ivanovich and Evdokia had 12 children. The holy ascetic Sergius of Radonezh, who was friends with Patriarch Alexy of Kiev, became the godson of his two children. Both Sergiy and Alexy accompanied Dmitry Donskoy all his life, giving him invaluable advice and blessing him for fateful deeds.
All subsequent years, Dmitry Ivanovich, the prince of Moscow, Suzdal and Vladimir, spent in the affairs of the unity of Russia, subjugating the Novgorod, Nizhny Novgorod, Ryazan, Tver, Galich, Kostroma, Starodub princes during his reign. In addition, St. Dmitry won several important skirmishes against the Volga Bulgars, stopped the troops of the Tatar-Mongolian Murza Begich near the Ryazan River Vozha and won the most important battle that went down in the history of Russia forever - the Battle of Kulikovo.
Mamai, the shadow ruler of the Horde, had been preparing for the Battle of Kulikovo for two years. The previous campaign of his Murza Begich ended with the defeat of the Tatar-Mongol, a respite and replenishment of the troops were needed. The rest from the conquests lasted two years, during which time Mamai, with the help of his ambassadors, gathered a huge number of mercenaries from the nomadic tribes of Asia into his troops. In addition, Mamai agreed with the Lithuanian prince Vladislav Jagiello and the Ryazan prince Oleg to meet with their troops on the southern bank of the Oka, from where it was planned to attack the troops of St. Dmitry en masse.
Dmitry Ivanovich, notified by scouts, gathered troops from all the principalities subordinate to him. Surprisingly, forgetting about internecine strife, all the princes, except for Oleg Ryazansky, united around Dmitry. A plan was drawn up: only a small part of the army, a reserve of the main troops, remained in Moscow. The rest of the troops crossed the Oka, and bypassing the Ryazan lands from the west, moved to the Don. Wanting to take the enemy by surprise, Dmitry Ivanovich and his associates crossed the Don, getting to the other side of this great river. Before the departure of St. Dmitry and his army, St. Sergius of Radonezh blessed, prophesying victory. Together with the army, two monks - heroes, Alexander Peresvet and Andrey Oslyabya, set off. Immediately before the battle, the warrior standing on guard had a vision: the Holy Martyrs Boris and Gleb, armed with swords and illuminating their path with lit candles, attacked the Tatar-Mongol warriors, chopping them all to the last. At the same time in Vladimir, the sexton of the church where the tomb of Alexander Nevsky was kept had a vision: two elders raised the great commander from the coffin to help their descendant in the future bloody battle. Stepping out into the courtyard, the figures vanished into thin air.
On September 8, 1380, on the day of the Nativity of the Most Holy Theotokos, at the mouth of the Don and Nepryadva rivers, the great Battle of Kulikovo took place. Surely each of you remembers the painting by Mikhail Avilov for this battle - "The Battle of Peresvet with Chelubey". Peresvet won this single duel, knocking Chelubey out of the saddle. But in the end, both warriors still died, already during the main battle. The fate of the two great warriors became an illustration of the outcome of the Battle of Kulikovo - Russia won, but at the cost of huge losses: out of 150,000 people, only 40,000 survived. Traditions say that the Heavenly Forces helped the Russian army in this battle, the angels, led by the Archangel Archangel Michael, together with princely bogatyrs, they struck enemies with fiery arrows and swords. Dmitry himself, dressed in the armor of a simple warrior, fought the enemy in the forefront. After the end of the battle, the noble prince was found stunned, lying under a tree. His armor was broken, but he himself was intact. On the occasion of the victory, the Don Cossacks presented Dmitry with the image of the Mother of God, later called the Don Icon of the Mother of God. From that day on, the Grand Duke himself was called Donskoy - in honor of the river, next to which he won such an important battle.
The exhausted troops of Mamai returned home, but the place of the ruler had already been taken by a descendant of the Chingizids, Tokhtamysh. Mamai had to hide with his Genoese allies in the Eastern Crimea, where he died at the hands of a traitor. The new Khan demanded that Dmitry Donskoy pay tribute, but the Grand Duke, inspired by the victory at Kulikovo Field, refused. Tokhtamysh, gathering troops. moved to Moscow. Dmitry's army was severely depleted, so the council of princes decided to surrender the city. Tokhtamysh burned down Moscow; its inhabitants, from among those who remained alive, were taken into slavery by its soldiers. Having assessed the situation, St. Dmitry sent a "repentant embassy" to Tokhtamysh, the result of which was the establishment of a new amount of tribute to the Golden Horde and the consolidation of the hereditary Grand Duchy for the Moscow princes. Like St. Alexander Nevsky, the great-great-grandfather of Dmitry Donskoy, the noble prince turned out to be a skillful diplomat.
Unfortunately, the injuries received by the Grand Prince during the Battle of Kulikovo affected his health. He was ill for a long time, and in 1389 he died, having transferred the hereditary power to his son Vasily.
The icon of St. Dmitry Donskoy is prayed with a request to maintain unity, to avert threats from the family, to protect against attacks by enemies, with a request to strengthen faith. Dmitry Donskoy, like his famous ancestor Alexander Nevsky, is the patron of people of military professions.
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September 21 - Victory Day of the Russian regiments led by Grand Duke Dmitry Donskoy over the Mongol-Tatar troops in the Battle of Kulikovo
September 21 is one of the days of Russia's military glory. Established in honor of the victory of Russian regiments led by Grand Duke Dmitry Donskoy over the Mongol-Tatar troops in the Battle of Kulikovo (1380) by the Federal Law of the Russian Federation "On the days of military glory (victorious days) of Russia" dated May 13, 1995. The battle of the Russian army under the leadership The Grand Duke of Vladimir and Moscow Dmitry Ivanovich with the Mongol-Tatar troops, which took place on September 8, 1380 on the Kulikovo field (now the Kurkinsky district of the Tula region) is one of the largest battles of the Middle Ages, which was a turning point in the struggle of the Russian people against the Mongol-Tatar yoke. In the summer In 1380, the Mongol-Tatar army, which also included detachments of Circassians, Ossetians, Armenians, some peoples of the Volga region, as well as mercenary detachments of the Crimean Genoese (total number of 100-150 thousand people), led by the de facto ruler of the Golden Horde, Temnik Mamai, moved to Russia, to break the growing power of the Russian principalities (especially Moscow) and their desire for independence. Mamai's allies were the Grand Duke of Lithuania Jagiello and, according to some sources, the Ryazan prince Oleg. Having received the news of Mamai's speech, Dmitry Ivanovich sent messengers to all Russian principalities with a call to put up all possible forces to protect the Russian land. Detachments of Russian troops gathered on the roads to Moscow - in Kolomna and Serpukhov - in case Mamai tried to forestall their attack. The main core of the Russian army consisted of Muscovites, as well as soldiers of the lands that recognized the power of the Moscow prince. They were joined by Ukrainian and Belarusian detachments. The warriors of Novgorod, Tver, Nizhny Novgorod, Ryazan, Smolensk lands did not participate in the campaign. The Moscow prince counted on active offensive operations, firstly, to prevent the enemy from joining, and secondly, to defeat Mamai's army before it invaded the Russian principalities. On September 6, the Russian army (100-150 thousand people) reached the Don at the mouth of the Nepryadva River. On the same day, a military council was held, which, at the suggestion of Dmitry Ivanovich, decided to cross the Don to the Kulikovo field. Crossing the Don excluded the possibility of an attack by the Lithuanians approaching the city of Odoev, and provided favorable battle conditions for the Russians: the size of the Kulikovo field and the forest along the banks of the rivers that skirted it limited the possibilities of detour maneuvers of the Mongol-Tatar cavalry. On the morning of September 8, the Russians crossed the Don and under under the cover of the guard regiment, they deployed in battle formation on the Kulikovo field, where Mamai's army was already approaching. Dmitry Ivanovich created a deep battle formation: in the center stood a large regiment (grand prince), to the right and left of it - the regiments of the right and left hands, the flanks of which rested on the terrain that was difficult to access for the actions of the Mongol-Tatar cavalry. Ahead of the main forces were sentry and forward regiments. The guard regiment had the task of starting a battle, the advanced regiment - to take the first blow of the enemy cavalry and upset its battle formations. Both regiments were supposed to weaken the force of the enemy strike on the main forces. Behind the large regiment was a private reserve (cavalry). In addition, a strong ambush regiment was created from selected cavalry under the command of experienced military leaders - governor Dmitry Bobrok-Volynsky and Serpukhov prince Vladimir Andreevich. This regiment carried out the task of the general reserve and was secretly located in the forest behind the left flank of the main forces.
On the whole, the battle order of the Russian army provided stability against frontal and flank attacks, made it possible to build up efforts from the depths and to carry out interaction between its individual elements. The battle began at about 12 noon with a duel between the heroes of Peresvet and Chelubey. Both of them died. Then the Mongol-Tatar cavalry, having shot down the guard and defeated the advanced regiment, for three hours tried to break through the center and the right wing of the Russian rati. Russian regiments suffered significant losses. Dmitry Ivanovich himself, who fought in the armor of an ordinary warrior, was also wounded. When Mamai suffered the main blow against the left flank and began to push the Russian regiments, a private reserve was put into action. But the enemy managed to break through the left wing of the Russians and reach the rear of the main forces. At this decisive moment of the battle, the ambush regiment of Governor Bobrok struck at the flank and rear of the Mongol-Tatar cavalry that had broken through. The sudden and swift attack of this regiment, supported by the blow of other regiments, decided the outcome of the battle in favor of the Russians. The enemy army trembled and turned to flight. Russian soldiers captured the Khan's headquarters and for almost 50 kilometers (to the Beautiful Sword River) pursued and destroyed the remnants of Mamai's troops. The losses on both sides were enormous (about 200 thousand people were killed and wounded). The Battle of Kulikovo was of great historical importance in the struggle of the Russian people for liberation from the Mongol-Tatar yoke. She showed the increased desire of the Russian lands for independence and raised the role of Moscow as the center of their unification. Although the victory in the Battle of Kulikovo has not yet led to the elimination of the Mongol-Tatar yoke, however, a crushing blow was dealt to the Golden Horde on the Kulikovo field, which accelerated its subsequent disintegration. The high patriotism of the Russian people, the superiority of Russian military art over the art of the Mongol-Tatars . Relying on the moral superiority of the Russian soldiers who rose to the liberation war, Dmitry Ivanovich acted actively and decisively. Well-established intelligence, which ensured the adoption of the right decision, testifies to the high military art of the Russian commander; the ability to correctly assess the conditions of the terrain, determine the enemy's plan and take into account his tactical methods; the rational construction of the battle order of the Russian army and the close interaction of its constituent parts during the battle; finally, the art of using general and private reserves in battle, and after its completion, the organization of his pursuit. Of great importance in the success of the Battle of Kulikovo were the steadfastness and selflessness of the Russian soldiers and the independent, initiative actions of the military leaders in the battle.
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Russian army in the Battle of Kulikovo
Dmitri Ivanovich called the Russian troops to Kolomna, and this meeting was scheduled for August 15, 1380. The Moscow army went along three different roads in order to avoid any trouble: a part led by Dmitry Ivanovich, a part led by his brother, Vladimir Serpukhov, a part led by the princes of Belozersky, Rostov and Yaroslavl.
Not only the above troops came to Kolomna, but also regiments from Suzdal and Smolensk, led by their princes, who wanted to take revenge on the insatiable Mongols. In addition, there is unconfirmed information about the arrival at the meeting place of a regiment from Tvari, as well as a regiment from Novgorod, which joined almost near the Kulikovo field itself. But, as they say, trust, but verify, and only a time machine can help in our business. So let's focus on the verified data.
In the city of Kolomna, an order of attack on the impudent Mongol-Tatars was formed, the names of the governors and heads of regiments were known. The large regiment, as you know, was under the leadership of Dmitry Ivanovich. Vladimir, his brother, was appointed commander of the regiment of the right hand. The regiment of the left hand was commanded by Gleb Bryansky. The head of the advanced regiment, consisting of only Kolomna, was appointed Prince Kolomna.
The Russian army was not very large in the battle against the Mongol-Tatars, but had to advance immediately in order to prevent Mamai from joining the allies. And Dmitry and his soldiers went to the mouth of the Lopasna, successfully crossed the Oka River, leaving some of their soldiers in Moscow so that not everyone fell and could defend the Russian land, and ended up in the Ryazan lands. Dmitry deliberately made this cunning move and led his soldiers through the Ryazan principality, went along an arc that was west of the center of Ryazan. It was then that seventy more Ryazanians joined him, seventy brave boyars.
Further, more people, Lithuanians, joined the Russian army. The leaders of the brave Lithuanians were the sons of Olgerd: Andrei and Dimitri. And now the regiment of the right hand was no longer led by Dmitry's brother, Vladimir, but Andrei Olgerdovich, now the regiment of the right hand played the role of the Ambush Regiment, and the role of the right regiment was played by the Yaroslavl from the left flank. And there were only five regiments: advanced, large, right hand, ambush regiment and regiment of the left hand. But some historians classify the regiment of Dmitry Olgerdovich not as a regiment of the right hand, but as a separate, sixth regiment. How many people were there in the Russian army? The answer to this question is very difficult to give, because each source says its own. In one literary source you can find data on one hundred thousand Muscovites and fifty to one hundred thousand allies, in another place there is data on as many as two hundred and sixty thousand soldiers, in the third there is information on three hundred and three thousand. Another source will give information about four hundred thousand soldiers. The real numbers are much smaller: the Russians had ten to twenty thousand warriors, among whom were six to seven thousand cavalrymen.
