From Marx-Engels-Lenin Institute; Stalin

 (...)

In the spring of 1918, the British and French imperialists instigated a revolt of the Czechoslovak Corps (formed of prisoners of war from the Austro-Hungarian army), which, after the conclusion of peace with Germany, was making its way to France via Siberia.

The revolt of the Czechoslovaks, which was timed to coincide with revolts engineered by Whiteguards and Socialist-Revolutionaries in twenty-three cities on the Volga, a revolt of the Left Socialist-Revolutionaries in Moscow, and a landing of British troops in Murmansk, unleashed all the force of counter-revolution. The moment was a highly critical one. The country had only just extricated itself from the imperialist war. The misrule of the capitalists and landlords had brought the country to the verge of disaster. The workers in Moscow and Petrograd were receiving a bare two ounces of bread a day. The republic was cut off from the granaries of the Ukraine and Siberia. The southeast, the Volga region and the North Caucasus, were the only areas from which gram could be obtained, and the road to them lay by way of the Volga, through Tsaritsyn. To save the revolution it was imperative to get grain. Lenin appealed to the workers of Petrograd to organize expeditions into the countryside to help the poor peasants against the grain profiteers, kulaks and usurers. Stalin left for the South, invested by the Central Committee with extraordinary powers to superintend the mobilization of supplies in the south of Russia.

On June 6, 1918, Stalin arrived in Tsaritsyn with a detachment of workers. Combining as he did the talents of a political leader with those of a military strategist, Stalin at once realized the importance of Tsaritsyn, as the point at which the counterrevolutionary forces were likely to deliver their main attack. The capture of Tsaritsyn would have cut off the republic from its last sources of grain supply and from the oil of Baku, and would have enabled the counter-revolutionaries in the Don region to join forces with Kolchak and the Czechoslovaks for a general advance on Moscow. Tsaritsyn had to be retained at all costs. After clearing the city of Whiteguard plotters with a stern hand and dispatching substantial supplies of food to the starving capitals, Stalin turned his whole attention to the defense of Tsaritsyn. He ruthlessly broke down the resistance of the counter-revolutionary military experts appointed and supported by Trotsky and took swift and vigorous measures to reorganize the scattered detachments and to expedite the arrival from the Donbas of Voroshilov’s units, which subsequently formed the nucleus of the Tenth Army. Thanks to Stalin’s iron will and masterly foresight, Tsaritsyn was saved and the Whites were prevented from breaking through to Moscow.

The epic defence of Tsaritsyn coincided with the debacle of German imperialism in the Ukraine. In November 1918, revolution broke out in Germany and Austria-Hungary. The Central Committee commissioned Stalin to organize the Ukrainian Front and assist the Ukrainian workers and peasants. Twenty leading Party workers from the Tenth Army, headed by Comrade Voroshilov, were placed at his disposal. At the end of November the Ukrainian insurrectionary troops advanced against Petlura and the Germans and liberated Kharkov. Minsk, in the West, was also liberated. Stalin performed inestimable service in the liberation of the Western regions and the formation of the Byelorussian Republic.

(...)

While the Red Army was engaged in routing Kolchak in the East, Denikin seized the Donetz Basin and invaded the Ukraine along a broad front. Trotsky’s treacherous activities had disorganized the Southern Front, and the Red forces sustained defeat after defeat. Acting in support of Denikin, the Polish Whites captured Minsk. Yudenich launched a new offensive against Petrograd, while Kolchak tried to make a stand on the Tobol. Never had the enemy been within such close reach of the Soviet capital. The Donetz capitalists even offered a reward of a million rubles to the first White regiment to enter Moscow.

(...)

In the brief respite that the Soviet Republic received after the defeat of Denikin, Lenin placed Stalin in charge of restoring the war-devastated economy of the Ukraine. In February and March 1920, he headed the Council of the Ukrainian labour army and led the fight for coal. At this moment “coal is just as important for Russia as the victory over Denikin was,”2 he said, in an address to the labour army in March 1920. And under Stalin’s guidance the Ukrainian Bolsheviks registered substantial achievements in supplying the country with fuel and improving the work of the railways.

In May 1920, the Central Committee commissioned Stalin to the South-Western Front against the Polish Whites, who formed the spearhead of the third Entente campaign against the Soviet Republic. Here Stalin took part in directing the operations that broke the Polish Front and led to the liberation of Kiev and the advance of the Soviet troops to Lvov. In the same year Stalin organized the defence of the southern Ukraine against Wrangel, and outlined a plan for the destruction of his forces. Stalin’s recommendations formed the basis of Frunze’s plan of operations, which ended in Wrangel’s utter defeat.