Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic

Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic Белорусская Советская Социалистическая Республика Беларуская Савецкая Сацыялістычная Рэспубліка
← 1920–1991 →
Flag Coat of arms
Anthem Anthem of Byelorussian SSR
Capital	Smolensk, Minsk
Language(s)	Belarusian, Russian (...)
Religion	Secular state
Government	Marxist–Leninist single-party socialist republic
Head of party
- 1920–1923	V. Knorinsh (first)
- 1990–1991	A. Malofeyev (last)
Head of government
- 1920–1924	A. Chervyakov (first)
- 1990–1991	V. Kebich (last)
Head of state
- 1920–1937	A. Chervyakov (first)
- 1990–1991	M. Dzyemyantsyey (last)
Legislature	Congress of Soviets (1920–1938) Supreme Soviet (1938–1991)
Historical era	Russian Civil War, WWII, Cold War
- Republic declared	31 July 1920
- Admitted to USSR	30 December 1922
- Annexation of Western Belarus	15 November 1939
- UN Membership	24 October 1945
- Independence	26 December 1991
- Formalised	25 December 1991
Area
- 1989 census	603,700 km2 (233,090 sq mi)
Population
- 1989 census est.	10,199,709
Density	16.9 /km2  (43.8 /sq mi)

History of Belarus
This article is part of a series
Early East Slavs
Principality of Polotsk
Kievan Rus'
Grand Duchy of Lithuania
Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth
Russian Empire
Belarusian People’s Republic
Socialist Soviet Republic of Byelorussia
West Belarus
Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic
Modern Belarus
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The Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic (abbreviated as Byelorussian SSR or BSSR) (Belarusian: Беларуская Савецкая Сацыялістычная Рэспубліка, Беларуская ССР Byelaruskaya Savyetskaya Satsyyalistychnaya Respublika, Byelaruskaya SSR; Russian: Белору́сская Сове́тская Социалисти́ческая Респу́блика, Белорусская ССР Belorusskaya Sovetskaya Sotsialisticheskaya Respublika, Belorusskaya SSR) was one of fifteen constituent republics of the Soviet Union. It was one of the four original founding members of the Soviet Union in 1922, together with the Ukrainian SSR, the Transcaucasian SFSR and the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (RSFSR). The BSSR, along with the Ukrainian SSR and the Soviet Union, were founder members of the United Nations Organization in 1945.

The Soviet republic, Socialist Soviet Republic of Byelorussia (SSRB), in the lands of Belarus was declared on 1 January 1919, but it took a few years to define its status. Byelorussia was also one of several Soviet republics occupied by Nazi Germany during World War II. The end of the Soviet Republic occurred in 1991 and the country was later renamed the Republic of Belarus. In earlier time periods Byelorussian territory was commonly referred to in Western Europe as White Russia, and therefore the republic was sometimes known during its early existence as the White Russian Soviet Socialist Republic.

History

Beginning

Main article: Western Oblast (1917–1918)

Prior to the First World War, Belarussian lands were part of the Russian Empire, which it gained from the Partitions of Poland more than a century earlier. During the War, the Russian Western Front's Great Retreat in August/September 1915 ended with the lands of Grodno and most of Vilno guberniyas occupied by Germany, and a front at 100 kilometres to the west of Minsk.

After the Russian February Revolution in March 1917, the All-Russian council of Soviets created the Western Oblast which consisted of the Vilno, Vitebsk, Mogilev and Minsk guberniyas (or parts unoccupied by German troops) to administer the Belarusian lands in the pre-front zone. On 25 October (7 November), the Minsk Soviet of workers and soldiers deputies took over the administration of the city. A month later, on 26 November (6 December) the executive committee of workers, peasants and soldiers deputies for the Western Oblast was merged with the Western front's executive committee, creating a single Obliskomzap. During the autumn/winter of 1918, the Western Oblast was headed by Aleksandr Myasnikyan as head of the Western Oblast's Military Revolutionary Committee, who passed this duty on to Karl Lander, instead taking over the role as chair of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party's (RSDRP(b)) committee for Western Oblast and Moisey Kalmanovich as chair of the Obliskomzap.

However, due to the failure of Soviet side to negotiate a deal at the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, the Germans renewed their offensive and seized most of the Western Oblast in February 1918. This forced the Obliskomzap to evacuate to Smolensk, and the Smolensk guberniya was now passed to the Western Oblast. Four days after the German occupation of Minsk, the Belarus National Republic was proclaimed as a nominally independent state. De facto it was a puppet government to the German Empire.

Creation

Main article: Socialist Soviet Republic of Byelorussia

The initial and provisional borders of the SSRB in dark green

After the German defeat in the First World War, it announced its evacuation from the occupied territories of Belarus and Ukraine, leaving the puppet national republics to their fate. As the Germans were preparing to depart, the Bolsheviks were keen to follow them and re-claim Byelorussia, the Ukraine, and the Baltics to realize Soviet premier Vladimir Lenin's desire to continue into Central Europe and create the World revolution. On 11 September 1918 the Revolutionary Military Council ordered the creation of the Western Defence region in the Western Oblast out of Curtain troop garrisons stationed there. Simultaneously the Western Oblast was re-arranged into a Western Commune. Then, on 13 November, Moscow annulled the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, and two days later the Defence region was transformed into a Western army, which began an initially bloodless advance westward on the 17th. The Belarusian National Republic barely put up any resistance and evacuated Minsk on 3 December. The Soviets maintained a distance of about 10–15 kilometres (6.2–9.3 mi) between the two armies, and took Minsk on the 10th.

Encouraged by their success, back in Smolensk on 30/31 December 1918, the Sixth Western Oblast Party conference met and announced its split from the RSDRP(b), proclaiming itself as the first congress of the Communist Party of Byelorussia (CPB(b)). The next day, the Soviet Socialist Republic of Byelorussia was proclaimed in Smolensk, terminating the Western Commune, and on 7 January was moved to Minsk, with Aleksandr Myasnikyan as head of the All-Byelorussian Central Executive Committee and Zmicier Zhylunovich as head of the provisional government. The new Soviet republic initially consisted of seven districts: Baranovichi, Vitebsk, Gomel, Grodno, Mogilev and Smolensk. On 30 January, the republic announced its separation from the Russian SFSR and is thus renamed from the Socialist Soviet Republic of Byelorussia to the Soviet Socialist Republic of Byelorussia. This was conferred by the First congress of workers, soldiers and red army-men deputees on the which met on the 2–3 February 1919, adopting a new Socialist constitution. At the same time the Red Army continued its westward advance, the city of Grodno was captured on New Year's Day in 1919, Pinsk on 21 January, Baranovichi on 6 February 1919, thereby enlarging the republic.

Litbel

Main article: Lithuanian–Belorussian Soviet Socialist Republic

The Litbel, was a Soviet attempt to justify its irredentist ambition by drawing on a historic parallel

The western winter offensive described above was not limited to only Byelorussia, moving parallel to the north was the Soviet advance into Lithuania. On 16 December the Lithuanian Socialist Soviet Republic was proclaimed in Vilnius.

However, it became soon apparent that both the Lithuanian operation and continuing the conquest of Byelorussia would be under threat, for the German withdrawal of Ober-Ost, put a new power on the rise in Central Europe - the Second Polish Republic. However the conflict with Poland did not break out and the Soviet High Command's 12 January directive was to cease advance on the Neman-Bug rivers. However, the region to the east of those lines was historically mixed between the Belarusians, the Poles and the Lithuanians, and had a sizeable Jewish minority. The local communities of each respective group wanted to be part of the respective states that were establishing themselves.

The conclusion of the 1918/1919 winter Soviet conquest of Byelorussia, Ukraine and Lithuania was it facing a new enemy - Poland

Fighting broke out between the self-organized Polish militias in the Kresy ("Borderland") areas of Lithuania, Belarus and western Ukraine (the Samoobrona Litwy i Białorusi numbering approximately 2,000 soldiers under General Wejtko) clashed with local communist and advancing Bolshevik forces, each trying to secure the territories for its own incipient government. The newly formed Polish Army began sending its organised units to reinforce the militias. On 14 February, the first clash between regular armies took place and a constant front emerged.

Eager to win support, the Bolshevik government turned to history and decided to restore the Great Duchy of Lithuania by merging the Lithuanian and Byelorussian republics into the Lithuanian–Belorussian Soviet Socialist Republic, or Litbel on 28 February 1919. Its capital was proclaimed as Vilnius, with five guberniyas: Vilno, Grodno, Kovno, Suwalki and Minsk. The Vitebsk and Mogilev guberniyas were transferred to the Russian SFSR, and were soon joined by the Gomel Governorate which was created on 26 April.

However by the start of spring 1918, the Russian Civil War began to ignite around the rest of the country, and the Soviet government had much more urgent areas where it needed men desperately: Aleksandr Kolchak on the Volga and Anton Denikin in the south. Moreover the operations in Lithuania brought the front close the East Prussia, and the German units who withdrew there, soon found themselves assisting the Lithuanian forces, and the offensive against Kaunus in February 1919 was repelled.

In March 1919, Polish units opened an offensive and forces under general Stanisław Szeptycki captured the city of Slonim (2 March) and crossed the Neman, whilst Lithuanian advances forced the Soviets out of Panevėžys. One final Soviet counter-offensive retook Panevėžys and [Grodno in early April, but the Western Army was too thinly spread to fight both Polish, Lithuanian, and the German units assisting them. The Polish offensive quickly gained momentum, and Vilna offensive in April 1919, forced Litbel to evacuate the capital first to Dvinsk (28 April), then to Minsk (28 April), then to Bobruysk (19 May). As the Litbel lost territory, its powers were quickly stripped by Moscow, for example on 1 June Vtsik's decree put all of Litbel's armed forces under the command of the Red Army. On 17 July, the Defence Soviet was liquidated, and its function was passed to Minsk's Milrevcom. However, on 8 August Polish forces captured Minsk, that same day the capital was once again evacuated to Smolensk, and on 28 August Lithuanian forces took Zarasai (the last Lithuanian town held by Litbel) and the same day Bobruysk fell to the Poles.

However by late summer of 1919 the Polish advance was also exhausted. The banishment of the Red Army opened another historic disagreement between Poland and Lithuania, whose disagreements over the city of Vilnius soon erupted into a military conflict, with Poland winning. Soviet Russia, facing Denikin and Kolchak was unable to spare men to the western front, and a stalemate resulted in only localised skirmishes.

The pawn on a chessboard

The stalemate and the occasional (though fruitless) negotiations gave the RSFSR a much needed pause to concentrate on other regions. During the latter half of 1919 the Red Army successfully defeated Denikin in the South, taking over the Don, North Caucasus and Eastern Ukraine, pushed Kolchak from the Volga, beyond the Ural mountains into Siberia. In autumn of 1919, Nikolai Yudenich's advance on Petrograd was checked, whilst in the far north the Evgeny Miller's army was pushed into the Arctic. On the diplomatic front, on 11 September 1919, the People's Commissar of Foreign Affairs of Soviet Russia, Georgy Chicherin, sent a note to Lithuania with a proposal for a peace treaty. It was a de facto recognition of the Lithuanian state. Similar negotiations with Estonia and Latvia, gave way for a peace treaty with the former on 2 February 1920 and a cease-fire agreement with the latter a day earlier.

Having secured several frontiers and breaking the "Ring of Fronts" the Soviet government began building up its forces for the massive offensive westwards, bringing the World Revolution to Europe. However the Polish role of preventing this and creating a "buffer zone" at the expense of Belarus was not its sole goal. The new leader Józef Piłsudski rallied the Poles under a nationalist rhetoric to re-create the historic Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, the Międzymorze, which would include Lithuania, Ukraine, Belarus and push the eastern border as far as possible into Russia.

War continues

After the decisive Polish victory in Warsaw, the Red Army was forced to retreat from Polish territories, but attempts to hold Western Belarus were lost after the Polish victory on the Nieman River

In April 1920 Poland initiated its major offensive. However the Soviet Red Army was much more organised then it was a year earlier, and though Polish troops managed to make several gains in Ukraine, notably the capture of Kiev, in Byelorussia, both of its offensives towards Zhlobin and Orsha were thrown back in May.

In June, the RSFSR was finally ready to open its major Western advance. To preserve the neutrality of Lithuania (though the peace treaty was still being negotiated) on 6 June, the exiled government of Litbel was disbanded. Within a few days, the 3rd Cavalry Corps under command of Hayk Bzhishkyan broke the Polish front, causing a collapse and a retreat. On 11 July Minsk was re-taken, and on 31 July 1920 once again the Soviet Socialist Republic of Belorussia was re-established in Minsk.

As the front moved west, and more Belarusian lands were adjoined to the new republic, the first administrative decrees were issued. The entity was divided into seven uyezds: Bobruysk, Borisov, Igumen, Minsk, Mozyr and Slutsk. (Vitebsk, Gomel and Mogilev remained part of the RSFSR.) This time the leaders were Aleksandr Chervyakov (head of Minsk's milrevcom) and Wilhelm Knorin (as chairmen of the Central Committee of the Belarusian Communist Party). The SSRB sought to join further territories, as the Red Army crossed into Poland, but the decisive Polish victory at the Battle of Warsaw in August ended these ambitions. Once again, the Red Army found itself on the defensive in Belorussia. The Poles were able to successfully break the Russian lines at the Battle of the Niemen River in September 1920. As a result the Soviets were not only forced to abandon their World Revolution targets, but Western Belarus too. However early autumn rains halted the Polish advance, which exhausted itself by October. A cease-fire agreed on 12 October, came into effect on 18 October.

The Slutsk uprising

Main article: Slutsk Defence Action

A Belarusian caricature showing the division of their country by Poles and Bolsheviks

As the negotiations between the Polish Republic and the Russian Bolshevik government took place in Riga, the Soviet side saw the armistice as only a temporary setback in its western advance. Seeing the failure of overcoming the Polish nationalist rhetoric with Communist propaganda, the Soviet government chose a different tactic, by appealing to the minorities of the Polish state, creating a fifth column element out of Belarusians and Ukrainians. During the negotiations, RSFSR offered all of BSSR to Poland in return for concessions in Ukraine, which were rejected by the Polish side. Eventually a compromising armistice line was agreed, which would see the Belarusian city of Slutsk handed over to the Bolsheviks.

News of Belarus' upcoming permanent division angered the population, and using the town's Polish occupation, the local population began self-organising into a militia. On 24th of November the Polish units left the town, and for nearly a month the Slutsk partisans resisted Soviet attempts to re-gain control of the area. Eventually the Red Army had to mobilise two divisions to overcome the resistance, when the last units of Slutsk militia crossed the Moroch River and interned by the Polish border guards.

Early Soviet years

In February 1921, the delegations of the Second Polish Republic and the Russian SFSR finally signed the Treaty of Riga putting an end of hostilities in Europe, and Belarus in particular. Six years of war have left the land neglected and looted, and the endless change of occupying regimes, each worse than the previous have left their mark on the Belarusian people, who were now divided. Almost half (Western Belarus) now belonged to Poland, Eastern Belarus (Gomel, Vitebsk and parts of Smolensk guberniyas) were administered by the RSFSR. The rest was the SSRB, a republic with 52,400 square kilometres and a population of a mere 1,544 million people.

An interesting paradox arose in the status of SSRB within the future Bolshevik state. One one hand its small geographic, population and almost negligent economic indicators did not warrant it much political weight on Soviet affairs. In fact the leader of the Communist Party of Byelorussia (Bolshevik), Alexander Chervyakov would represent Byelorussian communists at seven party congresses in Moscow, but not once be elected into the party's Central Committee. Moreover the weak national sentiment of Belarusian people would've easily allowed SSRB to be disbanded and annexed to the RSFSR, unlike for example Ukraine.

On the other hand, the region's strategic role decided its fate, as a full Union republic within the negotiations upon forming the future state. For one Leo Trotsky and his supporters within the Soviet leadership still supported its World Revolution concept, and as said above, viewed the Treaty of Riga as only a temporary setback to the process, and a future advance would require a prepared bridgehead. This justified giving the SSRB the status of a full union republic within the Treaty on the Creation of the USSR that was signed on 30th of December 1922.

However the politics in Moscow took a different course of events, and eventually the accession of Joseph Stalin saw a new policy adapted Socialism in One Country. In accordance to which, expansionist and irredentist claims were removed from Soviet ideology, which instead would focus on making regions economically viable. Thus on March 1924, by decree of VTsIK, Russia returned most of territories that made up the Vitebsk and Mogilev Governorates, as well as parts of Smolensk. The passing of land that largely survived the destruction of war not only doubled the SSRB's area to 110,600 square kilometres, but also raised the population to 4,2 million people.

SSRB in the mid-1920s

According to its entry in the Great Soviet Encyclopedia, in 1925 SSRB was a largely rural country. Out of the 4,342,800 people that inhabited it, only 14.5 % lived in urban areas. Administratively it was split into ten districts: Bobruysk, Borisov, Vitebsk, Kalinin (admin centre in the city of Klimovichi), Minsk, Mogilev, Mozyr, Orsha, Polotsk and Slutsk; all of whom contained a total of 100 raions and 1,229 Selsoviets. Only 25 towns and cities and an additional 49 urban settlements (mestechkos)

Trotsky's plan for the SSRB to act as a future magnet for the minorities in the Second Polish Republic is clearly evidenced in the national policies. The republic initially had four official languages: Belarusian, Russian, Yiddish and Polish, despite the fact that the Poles made up only 2% of the total population (most lived next to the state border in the Minsk and Borisov districts). The most important minority was the Jewish population of Belarus, which in 1925 made up almost 44% of the urban population. Indeed the Soviet Belarusian government went to great lengths in exploiting this potential workforce, and in 1924 created a whole committee - Belkomzet to allocate land to Jewish families, in 1926 a total of 32,700 hectares were given for 6,860 Jewish families. Jews would continue to play a major role in Byelorussian politics, society and economy right up to the Second World War, in fact between 1928 and 1930 the First secretary of the Communist Party of Byelorussia, was Yakov Gamarnik, a Jew.

Yet, the titular nation of the SSRB were the Belarusians, which made up 82% of the rural population, but less than half of the urban one (40.1%). The Belarusian national sentiment was a lot weaker than that of neghbouring Ukraine, this was greatly exploited by the Bolshevik-Polish power struggle in the Polish-Soviet War. (In fact to avoid being annexed to Poland, at the census of 1920, many chose to be label themselves as Russians. ). To appeal to the Belarusians of Western Belarus and also to prevent the nationalist element of the exiled Belarusian National Republic from having any influence on the population (i.e. to avoid another Slutsk uprising), a policy of Korenizatsiya was widely implemented. Belarusian language, folklore and culture was put at front of everything else. This went on par with the Soviet policy of liquidation of illiteracy (likbez).

Economically the republic remained largely self-centred, and most of the effort was put into restoring and repairing the war-damaged industry (if in 1923 there was only 226 different fabrics and factories, then by 1926 the number climbed to 246, however the employed manpower jumped from 14 thousand to 21.3 thousand workers). The majority was food industry followed by metal and wood working combines. A lot more was centred in local and private sector, as allowed by the New Economic Policy of the USSR, in 1925 these number 38.5 thousand who employed almost 50 thousand people. Most being textile workshops and lumber yards and blacksmiths.

To further make the republic prosperous and to continue the creating of well-defined national territorial units. On the 6th of December 1926 the SSRB was once again enlarged by passing parts of RSFSR's Gomel governorate, which included the cities of Gomel and Rechytsa. This increased the area to 126,300 square kilometres and the 1926 Soviet census that was held at the same time reported a population of 4,982,623. Of the latter 83% was rural, and Belarusians made up 80.6% (though only 39.2% of urban, yet 89% of rural).

On the 11th of April 1927, the republic finally adopts its new Constitution, bringing its laws in tie with those of the USSR and changing the name from the Soviet Socialist Republic of Byelorussia to the Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic The head of government (chairman of the Soviet of People's Commissars) was taken up Nikolay Goloded, whilst Wilhelm Knorin remained the first secretary of the Communist Party.

The Stalinist years

SSR Byelorussia became a founding member of the Soviet Union in 1922 and became known as BSSR.

In September 1939, the Soviet Union annexed the Polish-held West Belarus during the 1939 invasion of Poland and incorporated it into the BSSR. Part of it, including the city of Vilno, was later transferred to the Lithuanian SSR. During World War II, the territory was governed by the Belarusian Central Rada.

After World War II, the Byelorussian SSR was given a seat in the United Nations General Assembly together with the Soviet Union and Ukrainian SSR, becoming one of the founding members of the UN. This was part of a deal with the United States to ensure a degree of balance in the General Assembly, which, the USSR opined, was unbalanced in favor of the Western Bloc.^{[citation needed]} A Byelorussian, G.G. Tchernouchtchenko, served as President of the United Nations Security Council from January–February 1975.

Dissolution

Following the August Coup, the Supreme Soviet of Belarus declared independence from the Soviet Union on 25 August 1991. The republic was renamed the Republic of Belarus on 19 September 1991. On 8 December 1991 it was a signatory, along with Russia and Ukraine, of the Belavezha Accords, which replaced the Soviet Union with the Commonwealth of Independent States. Belarus received independence on 25 December 1991. A day later the Soviet Union ceased to exist.

Belarus is the legal successor of the SSR Byelorussia and in its Constitution is states, "Laws, decrees and other acts which were applied in the territory of the Republic of Belarus prior to the entry into force of the present Constitution shall apply in the particular parts thereof that are not contrary to the Constitution of the Republic of Belarus."

Demographics

According to the 1959 Soviet Census, the population of the republic were made up as follows:

Nationalities (1959):

• Belarusians - 81%
• Poles - 16%
• Lithuanians - 5%
• Ukrainians - about 1%
• Russians - <1%

Other ethnic/religious groups (1959):

• Jews - about 1%

The largest cities were:

• Minsk
• Brest
• Homel
• Hrodna
• Mahilyow
• Vitsebsk
• Babruisk

External links

• Byelorussia : speeding towards abundance by Tikhon Kiselev