Brest-Litovsk Peace

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BREST-LITOVSK PEACE

The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk between Soviet Russian and Imperial Russia, signed in March of 1918, ended Russia's involvement in World War I.

In the brief eight months of its existence, the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk was labeled an obscene, shameful, and dictated peace by various members of the Soviet government that signed it. Since then, it has been condemned by Western and Soviet historians alike. Under threat of a renewed German military advance, Russia agreed to give up 780,000 square kilometers of territory, fifty-six million people, one-third of its railway network, 73 percent of its iron ore production, and 89 percent of its coal supply. What remained of the former Russian empire now approximated the boundaries of sixteenth-century Muscovy.

An onerous separate peace with an imperialist power was far from what the Soviet regime had hoped to achieve by promulgating Vladimir Lenin's Decree on Peace within hours of the October Revolution. This decree, which appealed to all the peoples and governments at war to lay down their arms in an immediate general peace without annexations or indemnities, was to the Bolsheviks both a political and a practical necessity. Not only had Bolshevik promises of peace to war-weary workers, peasants, and soldiers enabled the party to come to power—but the Russian army was on the verge of collapse after years of defeat by Germany. The Allies' refusal to acknowledge this appeal for a general peace forced the Bolsheviks and their partners in the new Soviet government, the Left Socialist Revolutionaries (SRs), to begin negotiations with the Central Powers.

The German-Soviet armistice signed at German divisional headquarters in Brest-Litovsk in mid-December was only a short-term triumph for the Bolshevik-Left SR government. When negotiations for a formal treaty commenced at the end of the month, the German representatives shocked the inexperienced Russians by demanding the cession of areas already occupied by the German army: Poland, Lithuania, and western Latvia. Debates raged within the Bolshevik Party and the government over a suitable response. Many Left SRs and a minority of Bolsheviks (the Left Communists) argued that Russia should reject these terms and fight a revolutionary war against German imperialism. Leon Trotsky proposed a solution of "neither war nor peace," whereas Lenin insisted that the government accept the German terms to gain a "breathing space" for exhausted Russia. Trotsky's formula prevailed in Petrograd, but after Trotsky announced it at Brest-Litovsk, the Germans resumed the war and advanced toward Petrograd. With Lenin threatening to resign, the Soviet government reluctantly bowed to Germany's demands, which now became even more punitive, adding the cession of Ukraine, Finland, and all of the Baltic provinces. Soviet representatives signed the treaty while demonstratively refusing to read it; the fourth Soviet Congress of workers', soldiers', and peasants' deputies ratified it, signifying the immense popular opposition to continuing the war. The Left SRs, however, withdrew from the government in protest.

The Brest-Litovsk peace exacerbated the civil war that had begun when the Bolshevik Party came to power in Petrograd in October 1917. The SRs, the dominant party in the Constituent Assembly dissolved by the Soviet government in December 1917, declared an armed struggle against Germany and the Bolsheviks in May 1918. In July 1918 the Left SRs attempted to break the treaty and reignite the war with Germany by assassinating the German ambassador. Various Russian liberal, conservative, and militarist groups received Allied support for their ongoing war against the Bolshevik regime. Thus the effects of the Brest-Litovsk peace continued long past its abrogation by the Soviet government when Germany surrendered to the Allies in November 1918.

See also: civil war of 1917–1922; germany, relations with; world war i