Anarchy
In 1919 total chaos engulfed Ukraine. Indeed, in the modern history of Europe no country experienced such complete anarchy, bitter civil strife, and total collapse of authority as did Ukraine at this time.
Six different armies – those of the Ukrainians, the Bolsheviks, the Whites, the Entente, the Poles, and the anarchists – operated on its territory. Kiev changed hands five times in less than a year. Cities and regions were cut off from each other by the numerous fronts. Communications with the outside world broke down almost completely. The starving cities emptied as people moved into the countryside in their search for food. Villages literally barricaded themselves against intruders and strangers. Meanwhile, the various governments that momentarily managed to establish themselves in Kiev devoted most of their attention and energy to fending off the onslaughts of their enemies. Ukraine was a land easy to conquer but almost impossible to rule.As he observed the collapse of one authority after another from his self-sufficient village, the peasant’s attitude was one of wishing a pox on the city people and all their governments. His prime concern was to keep his land and, if possible, to obtain more of it. The peasant was willing to support any government that seemed able to satisfy these desires. But the moment that government was unable to fulfill his expectations or placed demands on his land and harvest, the peasant turned against it and went over to a rival. The peasant knew that he did not want the return of the old order, yet he was uncertain of what he wanted to replace it. This made him a rather unpredictable element throughout the Civil War.
Peasant attitudes were all the more important because for the first time in centuries the peasantry had the will and ability to fight. During the Hetman period, hundreds of otamany and partisan bands, imbued with a spirit of neo-Cossack anarchism, arose throughout Ukraine.
Some favored the nationalists, others backed the Bolsheviks, many switched sides frequently, and all were most concerned with protecting the interests of their villages and districts. If in the process they had a chance to plunder “class enemies” or vent their age-old resentment against Jews, so much the better. Like Chinese warlords, their otamany scoffed at all authority and acted as if they were a law unto themselves.Two of the most powerful partisan leaders were based in the steppes of the south where the richest, most self-confident peasants lived. One was Matvii Hryhoriiv (Grigoriev), a swashbuckling former tsarist officer who led a force of about 12,000 in the region of Kherson and maintained close links with the radical Ukrainian left. The other was the legendary Nestor Makhno, a Russified Ukrainian peasant and an avowed anarchist. In mid 1919 his forces, based in Huliai Pole, numbered between 35,000 and 50,000 men, and they often held the balance in the struggle for southern Ukraine. Thus, as regular armies fought for control of cities and railroad lines and partisan forces dominated the countryside, the only regime that was recognized throughout Ukraine was the rule of the gun.