Stanisław Bułak-Bałachowicz
Stanisław Bułak-Bałachowicz
Anti-Soviet partisan commander who moved from Estonia to Belarus, changing camps as he went
Pilsudski judged him 'a bandit, but not only a bandit: today a Russian, tomorrow a Pole, the day after a Belarusian.'
He went from the Red Army to the Whites, took Pskov in 1919, broke with Yudenich to side with Estonia and in 1920 moved to Poland for a Belarusian expedition. His troops' anti-Jewish violence is on record; he was killed in occupied Warsaw in 1940.
Career timeline
- 1914Mobilized into the tsarist army; awarded the George Cross and St George medal
- 1918Joined the Red Army; formed the Luga cavalry regiment with Trotsky's sanction
- 1918.11Defected to the Whites with about 400 men
- 1919Colonel then major-general; took Pskov in the Yudenich offensive
- 1920.01Arrested Yudenich and sided with Estonia
- 1920In Polish service took Pinsk and formed the Russian People's Volunteer Army
- 1920.11Invaded Soviet Belarus and proclaimed himself head of a Belarusian state; after defeat fled to Poland
- 1939Helped defend Warsaw; killed in May 1940