The Battle of Berestechko was fought between the Zaporozhian Cossacks, led by Hetman Bohdan Khmelnytsky, aided by their Crimean Tatar allies, and a Polish army under King John II Casimir. It was a battle of a Cossack rebellion in Ukraine that took place in the years 1648–1657 after the expiration of a two-year truce. Fought from 28 to 30 June 1651, the battle took place in the province of Volhynia, on the hilly plain south of the Styr River. The Polish camp was on the river opposite Berestechko and faced south, towards the Cossack army about two kilometers away, whose right flank was against the River Pliashivka (Pliashova) and the Tatar army on their left flank. It is considered to have been among the largest European land battles of the 17th century.
The Cossacks are a predominantly East Slavic Orthodox Christian people originating in the Pontic–Caspian steppe of Ukraine and southern Russia. Historically, they were a semi-nomadic and semi-militarized people, who, while under the nominal suzerainty of various Eastern European states at the time, were allowed a great degree of self-governance in exchange for military service. Although numerous linguistic and religious groups came together to form the Cossacks, most of them coalesced and became East Slavic-speaking Orthodox Christians. The Cossacks were particularly noted for holding democratic traditions. The rulers of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth and Russian Empire endowed Cossacks with certain special privileges in return for the military duty to serve in the irregular troops. The various Cossack groups were organized along military lines, with large autonomous groups called hosts. Each host had a territory consisting of affiliated villages called stanitsas.
Anton Ivanovich Denikin was a Russian military leader who served as the acting supreme ruler of the Russian State and the commander-in-chief of the armed forces of South Russia during the Russian Civil War of 1917–1922. Previously, he was a general in the Imperial Russian Army during World War I.
Andrei Grigoriyevich Shkuro was a Lieutenant General (1919) of the White Army.
Pyotr Nikolayevich Krasnov, also known as Peter Krasnov, was a Russian military leader.
The Battle of Wołodarka was a clash between the Polish Army and Siemion Budionnyi's First Cavalry Army. It took place between 29 and 31 May 1920, near the Ukrainian village of Volodarka, in the course of the Polish Offensive on Kiev during the Polish-Soviet War.
The 1st Cavalry Army was a prominent Red Army military formation. It was also known as "Budyonny's Cavalry Army" or simply as Konarmia.
The Southern Front was a military theatre of the Russian Civil War.
Ukrainian Galician Army, was the Ukrainian military of the West Ukrainian People's Republic during and after the Polish-Ukrainian War. It was called the "Galician army" initially. Dissatisfied with the alliance of Ukraine and Poland it joined the army of Anton Denikin in November 1919, was renamed the "Ukrainian Galician Army" and later joined the Red Army as the "Red Ukrainian Galician Army" in 1920.
Controversies of the Polish–Soviet War, fought in 1919–20, concerning the behaviour of the military forces and crimes they committed. Each side charged the other with violations of international law in an effort to sway public opinion in the West, which was felt to be important for both sides.
The Polish 4th Rifle Division was a Polish military unit, forming, together with the Polish 5th Rifle Division of the Blue Army, the only part of the Polish military which took part in the Russian Civil War. Under the command of General Lucjan Żeligowski, it operated as an ally of the White movement from autumn 1918 to August 1919 in southern Russia and Bessarabia.
Petro Havrylovych Dyachenko was Ukrainian Military Leader, commander of the Black Zaporozhets, the 2nd division of the Ukrainian National Army, the anti-tank brigade "Free Ukraine".
The Ukrainian People's Army (Ukrainian: Армія Української Народної Республіки), also known as the Ukrainian National Army (UNA) or by the derogatory term Petliurivtsi (Ukrainian: Петлюрівці), was the army of the Ukrainian People's Republic (1917–1921). They were often quickly reorganized units of the former Imperial Russian Army or newly formed volunteer detachments that later joined the national armed forces. The army lacked a certain degree of uniformity, adequate leadership to keep discipline and morale. Unlike the Ukrainian Galician Army, the Ukrainian People's Army did not manage to evolve a solid organizational structure, and consisted mostly of volunteer units, not regulars.
During the Polish–Soviet War fought from February 1919 to March 1921 between Soviet Russia and the Second Polish Republic – after the conclusion of World War I in Europe – the Polish order of battle included broad disposition of personnel, strength, organization, and command structure.
The Red Cossacks was a military formation of Bolsheviks and the Soviet government of Ukraine. Red Cossacks was a collective name for one of the biggest cavalry formations of the Workers' and Peasants' Red Army (RKKA) and was part of the Ukrainian, Southern, and Southwestern fronts during the Russian Civil War and later was stationed in the Ukrainian SSR.
Ivan Samosenko was a Ukrainian military leader and a war criminal who was involved in anti-Jewish pogroms in Ukraine for which he was executed. However, some sources say that he was released.
Prokofy Logvinovich Romanenko was a Ukrainian Soviet Army colonel general.
During the Russian Civil War of 1917-1923, a number of former Tsarist officers joined the Red Army, either voluntarily or as a result of coercion. This list includes officers of the Imperial Russian Army commissioned before 1917 who joined the Bolsheviks as commanders or as military specialists. For former Tsarist NCOs promoted under the Soviets, see Mustang.
The Advance on Moscow was a military campaign of the White Armed Forces of South Russia (AFSR), launched against the RSFSR in July 1919 during the Russian Civil War. The goal of the campaign was the capture of Moscow, which, according to the chief of the White Army Anton Denikin, would play a decisive role in the outcome of the Civil War and bring the Whites closer to the final victory. After initial successes, in which the city of Oryol at only 360 kilometres (220 mi) from Moscow was taken, Denikin's overextended Army was decisively defeated in a series of battles in October and November 1919.
The Ukrainian Death Triangle refers to a historical situation of Ukrainian national forces in 1919, when the Ukrainian People's Army, or UPA, found itself in the general area south of Kyiv surrounded by Bolshevik, White Guard and Polish troops. In Ukrainian, this is also sometimes called the Quadrangle of Death or Rectangle of Death, in connection with the also hostile Kingdom of Romania.
