Blucher Vasily Konstantinovich - biography. Marshal of the Soviet Union Legend of the Red Army

Blucher Vasily Konstantinovich (1890-1938) was born into a peasant family in the village of Barshinka, Yaroslavl province. At present, only the name remains of it. There are no permanent residents in it. More than a hundred years ago, the situation was different. In these places there were many villages that stretched along the Volgotnya River (flows into the Rybinsk reservoir).

Vasily was the eldest child in a peasant family. In total, there were four children. The boy graduated from the parish school in 1904. He received an education that in its level did not differ at all from the modern secondary. After that, the father took the teenager to St. Petersburg, where he began to work at a machine-building plant.

But without qualifications good money it was impossible to earn money. Therefore, Vasily left for Moscow in 1909, as they paid well there at the carriage building plant. In 1910, the young man was imprisoned for two and a half years for inciting a strike. After serving time in prison, in 1913 he again got a job at a railway company. Earnings in the railroad industry were the highest at the time.

In 1914, the First World War... Blucher was drafted into the army, and he ended up serving in the Moscow Kremlin. You are simply amazed to learn such facts. Political article, instigator, and he is sent to the honorary service in the center of Moscow. Apparently on excessive liberalism and burned the Russian Empire.

At the end of 1914, the military unit was sent to the front. Here in 1915 Vasily was awarded the St. George Medal of the IV degree. In the same year, he was seriously injured from a grenade that exploded nearby. The soldier's life was saved, but at the beginning of 1916 he was discharged from the army. Our hero got a job in Kazan at a mechanical plant. Joined the Bolshevik Party in June 1916.

From that time on, the campaigning work of the young Bolshevik began. After February revolution he was active political activities in Samara. Here he preached the ideas of equality and brotherhood in the reserve regiment under the personal leadership of Valerian Kuibyshev.

After the victory of the October Revolution, Vasily Konstantinovich Blucher became a Chekist... He took up the post of assistant commissioner of the city of Samara. Apparently the young man has established himself from the very better side, because in 1918 he was sent to the South Urals as a commissar. At that time, each commander of a military unit was assigned a curator from the Bolshevik Party. Such curators were the eyes and ears of the young Soviet regime. They recorded any deviations from the Bolshevik course, and for the commander this meant the most sad consequences.

Vasily Konstantinovich's faith in the victory of the world revolution grew stronger every day. Therefore, the party entrusted him with supervising several military units... But in the summer of 1918 on South Urals there was a very difficult situation. The counter-revolutionary forces cleared almost the entire territory of armed Bolshevik detachments. The scattered remnants of the military units of the young socialist republic united in a consolidated Ural detachment and began to push their way to the west in order to join up with the troops of the Eastern Front. Kashirin was elected commander of the detachment, and Blucher became its commissar.

Gradually, the detachment was transformed into an army and fought its way to the troops of the Eastern Front. For this feat, our hero was the first to be awarded the Order of the Red Banner. In the Red Army, this was the only order until 1930. At that time, in its importance, he was in no way inferior to the golden star of the Hero. Soviet Union.

Vasily Konstantinovich was generally loved by the leaders of the Bolshevik Party. For his activities, he received as many as four Orders of the Red Banner. That is, it became full cavalier... Many other brave commanders did not have a single order on their chests, but here they are hung all over their breasts.

Further combat activity our hero was no less glorious. He fearlessly fought on the Eastern Front and was a member of the revolutionary Military Council (troika). On July 6, 1919, he was appointed commander of the 51st Infantry Division. With the hardest battles, ruthlessly crushing the forces of counter-revolution, she went a long way from Tyumen to Lake Baikal.

In the summer of 1920, our hero with his glorious division was transferred to the Southern Front. Here a strong counter-revolutionary group was formed under the command of Lieutenant General Pyotr Nikolaevich Wrangel (1878-1928). But could an experienced tsarist strategist resist an ideological fighter who wholeheartedly believed in the victory of the world revolution? It was the 51st army that stormed Perekop, and on November 9, 1920, it fell.

After that, there were many more glorious victories. The counter-revolution was defeated, and in February 1921 Blucher was appointed commander of the troops of the Odessa province. Already in the summer of the same year, Vasily Konstantinovich was sent to Far East... Of course, the Black Sea coast is better, but the ideological fighters for the happiness of the people never looked for warm places, but worked where the party sent them.

On distant borders, our hero became the minister of war Far Eastern Republic... Hotbeds of counter-revolution still existed here. They were headed by Baron Ungern. Its units were defeated and retreated to Mongolia. Then the troops of General Molchanov were utterly defeated. Thus, the resistance of the counter-revolution was broken, and Vasily Konstantinovich again rose to the occasion.

In the summer of 1922, Blucher was recalled to Moscow and appointed commissar of the Petrograd military district. The entire military garrison of Petrograd was subordinate to him. But in 1924 our hero was again sent to the distant eastern border. This time he became a military adviser to Chiang Kai-shek in China to assist in planning the Northern Expedition. The task of this campaign was to unite the country by military means.

But our hero was never able to reveal all his organizational talents in this political game. He fell ill and in the summer of 1925 left for treatment in the USSR. However, a year later, the faithful Leninist returned to China again, and in 1927 he departed for Moscow, as his health condition deteriorated again.

In 1928-29, he served in the Ukrainian Military District, and on August 6, 1929, he was appointed commander of the Far Eastern Army. In this high post, he continued his activities. But I must say right away that in the future, Blucher Vasily Konstantinovich did not show himself in anything outstanding... For the sake of objectivity, we note that he was a bad commander.

While our hero went to the commissioners and advisers, he was listed in good standing. But, becoming on for a long time independent leader, showed complete incompetence in many issues. In addition, he had a serious flaw. One of the first marshals of the USSR loved to drink. And he drank hard drinking, which lasted two weeks. But, in spite of everything, our hero in 1934 was elected a candidate to the Central Committee of the CPSU (b), and in 1937 he became a member of the Central Committee of the CPSU (b).

Weak military training of the Far Eastern Army manifested itself during the conflict with Japan at Lake Khasan in 1938. The Red Army suffered very heavy losses, and success was achieved with great difficulty. This embarrassment ended in early August 1938, and On October 22, Blucher was arrested... Already On November 9, 1938, he died in prison... The reason is simple - the former faithful Leninist was beaten and tortured.

The autopsy results showed that our hero died from a blood clot that blocked the pulmonary artery. The body was cremated, and in March 1939 Vasily Konstantinovich was posthumously stripped of his military rank as Marshal and sentenced to death. The indictment said that he was a spy for Japan and a participant in an anti-Soviet conspiracy.

In 1956, the die-hard fighter for the world revolution was rehabilitated. As for the combat capability of the Far East, Corps Commander Grigory Mikhailovich Stern was appointed to the post of commander of the Far Eastern Front. In May 1940, he received the new military rank of Colonel General. Then he went on promotion, but at the beginning of 1941 he was arrested and shot. As commander of the front, he was replaced by General of the Army Iosif Rodionovich Apanasenko.

There is no doubt that Blucher Vasily Konstantinovich made a great contribution to the establishment Soviet power ... He was an ideological Bolshevik, ruthlessly punishing counter-revolutionaries. But violence, as you know, always gives rise to violence. Our hero fell as a result of this violence towards himself.

As for the military leadership gift, the Marshal and Knight of the Order of the Red Banner did not have it. He had organizational skills, corresponding moral and volitional qualities, but the talent of a strategist was absent. This is not surprising, since our hero did not have any military education. All military operations against counter-revolution were developed by former tsarist officers, and Vasily Konstantinovich was only an ideological inspirer. In this field, he succeeded significantly and reached great heights, from which he swiftly fell down.

The article was written by Maxim Shipunov

After the collapse of the USSR, many official biographies were discredited, data declassified, secrets revealed. But this did not affect the biography of Marshal of the USSR Vasily Blucher, the blank spots in which are not explained even now, 102 years after the key event in his life.

One of the first five Soviet marshals, the first holder of the military orders of the Red Banner and Red Star, Vasily Blucher died of brutal torture in the Lefortovo prison of the NKVD 79 years ago, on November 9, 1938. The forensic medical examination of Butyrka concluded: “death came from a blockage of the pulmonary artery by a thrombus in the veins of the pelvis; an eye was ripped out. " The body was cremated. Four months later, in March 1939, he, already dead, was sentenced to supreme measure- execution - for "espionage in favor of Japan, participation in a military conspiracy."

Lover of the merchant Belousova

Where did his unusual surname come from? At one time, they wrote that she was born from a nickname given to one of his serf ancestors, whom, after participating in the war of 1812, the landowner awarded him the nickname "Field Marshal Blucher" after the Prussian commander, participant in a number of anti-Napoleonic campaigns, winner at Waterloo.

By official version Vasily Blucher was born on November 19 (December 1), 1890 (according to some sources, 1889) in the village of Barshchinka, Rybinsk district, Yaroslavl province, in the family of a poor peasant, dropped out of school early, went to wander, and linked his life with the revolution. True, there is testimony from his brother's wife Paul(this couple was also shot later, just in case), according to which Vasya did not participate in the 1905 revolution in any way: “All this is a lie, during this period he was a salesman for the merchant Belousova in Moscow, was her lover and was not in any factories and did not take part in revolutionary activities ”. Blucher himself avoided remembering this period.

This controversial fact from his biography can be confirmed, for example, by the fact that during his service in the tsarist army, Blucher periodically received money transfers that were decent for that time. There is a mention in the Appendices to the orders for the regiment, in which Blucher served a little later: “November 17, 1914 -“ 4th company. Zap. Private Vasily Blucher - 5 rubles; December 31, 1914 - “4th company. Zap. Private Vasily Blucher - 5 rubles. It is difficult to imagine that party colleagues could thus take part in the fate of an ordinary soldier. The State Department, of course, already existed, but almost a century remained before its signature cookies.

From non-commissioned officers to captains?

As you can see, in the war "zap. Private Vasily Blucher "was. But not for long. He managed to receive two St. George's crosses and rose to the rank of non-commissioned officer, but in January 1915 he was seriously wounded, both legs were severely injured. Several times the young non-commissioned officer was transported to the morgue, but he still survived. And it was during this period that Blucher's biography mysteriously intersected with the biography of the captain of the Austro-Hungarian army, Count Ferdinand von Galen.

Blucher and von Galen fought with different sides on one sector of the front. About von Galen himself it is known that he was born on December 5, 1874, a wonderful skier, started the war as a captain, died on January 24, 1915 during a sortie to the location of Russian troops. To investigate this incident, a commission came to the front from Vienna, and this suggests that von Galen was not a simple captain. The corpse was never found then. Later, in March 1917, von Galen's body was nevertheless exhumed and identified by the widow, but the closest relatives strongly doubted her good faith.

One way or another, but after leaving the hospital, the future marshal was miraculously transformed. Firstly, he broke off almost all previous ties and began to travel around the country. His traces are found in Rybinsk, Nizhny Novgorod, Kazan, he does not stay anywhere for a long time, does not meet with his former acquaintances. In 1916, Blucher (or already von Galen?) Becomes a member of the RSDLP (b), after the October Revolution he enters the Red Army and demonstrates incredible abilities there. Vasya Blukher was a brave guy, as evidenced by the two "Georgias", but after being wounded, an outstanding strategist woke up in him.

Official military biography Blucher is so cool that it takes your breath away. For the first time he covered himself with glory in 1918, when he passed through the enemy's rear, gathering scattered like-minded people along the way, and defeated the Cossacks Ataman Dutov... This glorious military march revealed Blucher's military-administrative abilities.

Then he fought against Kolchak beyond the Urals, participated in the capture of Tobolsk and the capital of White Siberia, Omsk. Then the indefatigable red commander fought against Wrangel in the south of Russia, defended Kakhovka, brought his division to Perekop - won everywhere, outwitted everyone. And then he suddenly became Minister of War for the puppet Far Eastern Republic, created as a buffer separating Soviet Russia from hostile Japan.

Blucher did not know defeat, brilliantly planned operations, superior to the best tsarist generals by a head. And this despite the fact that, according to the official biography, he had neither military education, nor pre-revolutionary command experience (the peak of his previous career was a noncommissioned officer with broken legs).

Ga Lin goes hunting

In 1924, Blucher, who carried out particularly important assignments under the Revolutionary Military Council, was sent to China. For conspiracy purposes, he took a name for himself Zoi Vsevolodovich Galin(Ga Lin) - as he explained, by the names of his daughter, son and wife. He made a strong impression on the Chinese, helped the Revolutionary Army Chiang Kai-shek win a row major battles and ... made a lot of envious people at home. From here begins the period of Blucher's life, which led him to such a tragic death.

This was the time of the construction of the young Soviet state, its defense and the strengthening of its external borders. Blucher did this in the east of the country. In the Far East.

He spent the 1930s defending the border from "White Chinese" and occasionally visiting Moscow to treat skin diseases. Thanks to his military successes, Vasily Konstantinovich became a very influential leader in the Far East, which did not suit either Stalin himself or many of his comrades from his entourage. Bathing in the rays of past victories, Blucher abandoned military affairs, began to drink a lot. In 1932 he married a 17-year-old Glafira Bezverkhova, and this was already his third wife, and Stalin did not approve of such "debauchery". By the way, the first two wives of Blucher were subsequently shot for failing to report his anti-Soviet activities, while Glafira received “only” eight years in the camps.

And when, in 1935, together with four other military leaders, he was awarded the first marshal titles in the USSR, his colleagues sarcastically called him "Marshal of the East", meaning not only the place of service, but also the sybarism that came with age, a craving for bliss. It is not surprising that the once invincible commander failed his first serious test in the new rank - a skirmish with the Japanese on Lake Khasan. He suffered a series of defeats and was removed from command; the final victory was achieved by completely different people.

Shaken health, mistrust of the Stalinist entourage, shaky disposition of the "owner", drunkenness, a young wife, great authority in the Far East, friendship with "enemies of the people" - all this was the beginning of the end of the famous Soviet commander Blucher - or the Austrian officer von Galen.

The Germans take over Blucher

Why do many believe that Blucher and von Galen are one person?

Thomas Kufus, a famous German film producer, unveiled the story that in 1938, when news of the Marshal's arrest appeared in German newspapers, people who knew von Galen identified him in Blucher. After interviewing witnesses, historians came to the conclusion that it was von Galen who became the Marshal of the USSR, who took a pseudonym in honor of Field Marshal Blucher, one of the leaders of the anti-Napoleonic coalition.

This confidence was based on several facts. The first is a statement by the orderly von Galen, who was the first to compare the photo in the newspaper with the appearance of his former patron. The second - during his secret mission in China, Blucher had a passport in the name of Z.V. Galina (this could be a coincidence). Third - the conclusion of the professor Richard P. Helmer, who conducted a comparative study of photographs of Captain von Galen and Marshal Blucher and showed the identity of dozens of unchanged features (the shape of the eyebrows and ears, lips and mouth, the location of the eyes, and so on).

But indirect evidence is even more convincing. Glafira Blucher recalled that her non-Soviet aristocratic husband changed his face when he was jokingly called a count. A card of the Gestapo, drawn up on VK Blucher, has survived - the name of von Galen is called the pseudonym of the marshal. Finally, there are numerous inconsistencies in the official biography of the first Marshal of the USSR.

* * *

Much, very much is hidden in the maelstrom of events, the name of which is the revolution, the first world, civil war, Stalinist repression... So many destinies were mixed at that time that even a century was not enough to figure everything out. Perhaps Vasya Blyukher died in the morgue, and the captive captain appropriated his documents. Maybe there was no Blucher, but von Galen invented him - but how did he subsequently agree with his "brother", the only person who knew Vasily Konstantinovich in childhood? Perhaps von Galen, as he was supposed to, died in captivity in 1915, but why did the Gestapo pull out exactly this name for the dossier on the Soviet military leader?

Soviet military leader, Marshal of the Soviet Union (1935).

Vasily Blucher was born on November 19, 1889, in the village of Barshchinka near Rybinsk, into a peasant family. He worked as a mechanic at the Mytishchi plant, where in 1910 he was arrested for calling for a strike and sentenced to almost three years in prison. In 1914, Vasily went to the front, rose to the rank of junior non-commissioned officer, was awarded two St. George's crosses. In 1915 he was demobilized due to injury. In 1916 he joined the Bolshevik Party.

In 1917, Blucher was again in military service, where he was elected chairman of the regimental committee in Samara. In October 1917, he headed the Samara Military Revolutionary Committee. During the establishment of Soviet power in Russia, with a detachment of the Bolsheviks, he arrived in Chelyabinsk, seized power in the city and headed the Military Revolutionary Committee.

In March 1918, Vasily Blucher commanded the eastern detachment that operated against the Cossacks of Ataman Alexander Ilyich Dutov. After the beginning of the uprising of the Czechoslovak corps, he created the Ural Red Detachment, which in July entered the united Ural Partisan Detachment (about 6,000 fighters), Blucher himself became his deputy commander N. Kashirin. The first attempt to break out of the encirclement failed, Kashirin was wounded, and on August 2, 1918, Blucher replaced him, the detachment was soon transformed into the Ural partisan army.

Blucher proposed to break through to the connection with the Red Army not directly, but through the Ural factories. August 5 - September 14, under the command of Vasily Konstantinovich, a raid was carried out from the region of Orenburg and Verkhneuralsk through the Ural ridge in the Kama region with a length of 1.5 thousand km. Defeating seven regiments of Whites, Czechoslovakians and Poles, disorganizing the rear of the Whites, the partisans united with the main forces of the Eastern Front of the Reds. For this campaign, Blucher received the Order of the Red Banner No. 1 (in total, he received five of these orders during his military career).

In September 1918, Blucher was appointed commander of the 4th Ural division (then the 30th rifle division), which fought in the Kungur and Perm directions. From February 1919 - commander of the 3rd Army. From August he commanded the 51st division, which defended the Kakhovsky bridgehead in August-October 1920. Then the commander was appointed commander of the strike group, which took Perekop in November 1920.

In 1921, Vasily Konstantinovich was assigned to the Far East, where in 1921-1922 he commanded the troops of the Far Eastern Republic, in February 1922 he captured the well-fortified positions of the Whites in the Volochaevka area. In both cases, Blucher did not reckon with losses in order to complete the task.

After graduation Civil war Blucher held various command positions, including the head of the Leningrad fortified area. In 1924-1927 he was the chief military adviser to the Kuomintang government in China. Under his leadership, the National Revolutionary Army of China was created and plans for the most important operations of the Northern Expedition of the Kuomintang army were developed. Since 1929 - the commander of a separate Far Eastern Army. He led the Soviet troops during the conflict on the Chinese Eastern Railway, for the first time in the history of the USSR he used tanks in a major operation.

Since 1934 - a member of the Central Committee of the CPSU (b). In 1935 he became one of the first marshals of the Soviet Union. He was directly related to the unleashing of the Great Terror in his army. In June 1937, Blucher headed the military tribunal in the "military case." During the conflict with the Japanese on Lake Hasan in July-August 1938, he commanded the Soviet army. Officially, a major victory was declared in the USSR, but as a result of the operation on Khasan, it turned out that the Red Army had lost significantly more soldiers than the Japanese, and was unable to fully fulfill the assigned task. Blucher was arrested in October 1938. They accused him of a military-fascist conspiracy and tried to force him to confess to sabotage actions during the terror and battles on Khasan.

Vasily Konstantinovich Blucher He did not admit the charges and on November 9, 1938, he died during interrogations in the Lefortovo prison, in Moscow. In 1956 he was rehabilitated.

Vasily Konstantinovich Blucher was born on November 19 (December 1), 1889 in the village of Barshinka, Rybinsk district, Yaroslavl province, into a peasant family. Father - Konstantin Pavlovich Blucher. Mother - Anna Vasilievna Medvedeva. Vasily was the first child in the family. In total, the family had four children.

Great-grandfather Blucher, a serf who was consigned to the army and returned from Crimean War with many awards, the landowner named Blucher after the name of the famous Prussian field marshal during the Napoleonic wars, the hero of the Battle of Waterloo. The nickname eventually turned into a surname.

In 1904, after a year of study at a parish school, his father took Vasily to work in St. Petersburg, where he worked as a "boy" in a store, a laborer at the Franco-Russian machine-building plant, from where he was fired for participating in workers rallies. In search of work he came to Moscow. In 1909 he entered the Mytishchi Railway Car Building Plant near Moscow as a mechanic. In 1910 he was arrested for calling for a strike and sentenced to imprisonment. In 1913-1914 he worked in the workshops of the Moscow-Kazan railway.

With the outbreak of the First World War, he was sent to the front as a private. He served as a private in the 8th Army, commanded by General A.A. Brusilov. For military distinction he was awarded two St. George's crosses and a medal, promoted to junior non-commissioned officers. In January 1915 he was seriously wounded near Ternopil. After 13 months in the hospital, he was released from military service... Entered the Sormovsky shipyard in Nizhny Novgorod, then moved to Kazan and began to work at mechanical plant... He joined the Bolshevik Party.

In May 1917, Blucher met V.V. Kuibyshev, who sent him to the 102nd reserve regiment for agitation, where he was elected to the regimental committee and the city Council of Soldiers' Deputies. By the beginning of the October Revolution, Blucher was a member of the Samara Military-Revolutionary Committee.

During the establishment of Soviet power in Russia, with a detachment of the Bolsheviks, he arrived in Chelyabinsk, seized power in the city and headed the Military Revolutionary Committee.

In March 1918, Vasily Blucher commanded the eastern detachment that operated against the Cossacks of Ataman Alexander Ilyich Dutov. Blucher, after the beginning of the uprising of the White Bohemian corps, created the Ural red detachment, which in July entered the united Ural partisan detachment (about 6,000 fighters), Blucher himself became his deputy commander N. Kashirin. The first attempt to break out of the encirclement failed, Kashirin was wounded, and on August 2, 1918, Blucher replaced him, the detachment was soon transformed into the Ural partisan army.

By mid-July, partisan detachments, pressed by the White Cossack army of Ataman A.I.Dutov, retreated to Beloretsk. Here, at a meeting of commanders on July 16, it was decided to join forces in a consolidated Ural detachment and to break through Verkhneuralsk, Miass, Yekaterinburg towards the troops of the Eastern Front. Kashirin was elected commander, Blucher was his deputy. Having set out on a campaign on July 18, the detachment reached the Verkhneuralsk-Yuryuzan region in 8 days with fierce battles, but due to a lack of forces (4,700 bayonets, 1,400 sabers, 13 guns) was forced to return to the original area. On August 2, the wounded Kashirin was replaced by Blucher. He reorganized the detachments into regiments, battalions and companies and proposed new plan hike: through the Petrovsky, Epiphany and Arkhangelsk factories to Krasnoufimsk, so that you can rely on the workers, get replenishment and food. Having begun the campaign on August 5, the detachment by August 13 with battles overcame the Ural ridge in the Bogoyavlensk region (now Krasnousolsk), annexed the Epiphany partisan detachment of M.V. Kalmykov (2 thousand people), and then the Arkhangelsk detachment of V.L. Damberg (1300 people) and other forces. The detachment grew into an army that included 6 rifle and 2 cavalry regiments, an artillery battalion, and other subunits (a total of 10,500 bayonets and sabers, 18 guns), with iron military discipline.

On August 20, the army defeated the White Guard units in the Zimino area. On August 27, she crossed the Sima River with battles, occupied the Iglino station (12 km east of Ufa) and, destroying a section of the Ufa-Chelyabinsk railway, interrupted the communication of the Whites with Siberia for 5 days. By September 10, inflicting new defeats on the enemy on the Ufa River near the village of Krasny Yar and others, the army entered the Askino area, broke the encirclement near the village of Tyuino-Ozerskaya and on September 12-14 united with the advanced units of the 3rd Army of the Eastern Front. After 10 days, the army arrived at Kungur, where its bulk joined the 4th Ural (from November 11 - 30th) rifle division.

Within 54 days, Blucher's army passed over 1,500 km through mountains, forests and swamps, fought over 20 battles, and defeated 7 enemy regiments. Having disorganized the rear of the White Guards and interventionists, she contributed to the offensive of the troops of the Eastern Front in the fall of 1918. For the successful leadership of the heroic campaign, Blucher was the first among Soviet military leaders to be awarded the Order of the Red Banner.

The award list of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee on September 28, 1918 said: “Former Sormovo worker, chairman of the Chelyabinsk Revolutionary Committee, he united under his command several scattered Red Army and partisan detachments, made with them the legendary passage of fifteen hundred miles across the Urals, waging fierce battles with the White Guards. For this unparalleled campaign comrade. Blucher is awarded the highest award of the RSFSR - the Order of the Red Banner No. 1 ". Although Blucher was the first time awarded the Order of the Red Banner, the order itself, presented to him on May 11, 1919, had the number 114. He received a duplicate of the Order No. 1 only in 1937.

In 1918, Blucher commanded the 30th rifle division in Siberia and fought against the troops of A.V. Kolchak.

From February 1919 - commander of the 3rd Army.

Blucher commanded the Perekop shock group, which delivered the main blow to Wrangel's army from the Kakhovsky bridgehead. In the combat operations of the troops of the Southern Front to liberate Crimea, the Perekop strike group had the most difficult task: its two brigades, together with the 15th and 52nd divisions, crossed the Sivash and then from the Lithuanian Peninsula attacked the flank and rear of the enemy, the other two stormed "Impregnable" Turkish shaft from the front. Blucher and his fighters became heroes of the storming of Perekop and the Ishun positions.

In 1921, he was appointed Minister of War and Commander-in-Chief of the People's Revolutionary Army of the Far Eastern Republic, reorganized it, strengthened discipline and won a victory by taking the Volochaevsky fortified region. He was awarded four more Orders of the Red Banner.

Blucher did not reckon with losses for the sake of completing the task.

In 1922-1924 - commandant and military commissar of the Petrograd fortified area. He was appointed commandant, as one of the most devoted to the cause of the revolution (the memory of the Kronstadt uprising was still fresh, although Blucher himself did not participate in the suppression of the uprising).

In 1924-1927, Blucher was the main military adviser to Chiang Kai-shek in China, participated in the planning of the Northern Expedition (he used the pseudonym "Zoi Galin" in honor of his daughter Zoya and wife Galina). Among others, under the command of Blucher was the young Lin Biao. Under the leadership of Blucher, the National Revolutionary Army of China was created and plans were developed for the most important operations of the Northern Expedition of the Kuomintang army.

In 1929, when Chinese nationalists took over the Sino-Eastern railroad(CER), it was decided to unite all the armed forces located in the Far East into the Special Far Eastern Army. Blucher, who knew the Far East very well, was appointed its commander; he held this position until the end of his military career. Blucher directed the defeat of the Chinese nationalists during the 1929 Sino-Soviet conflict. Special meaning, in the opinion of Admiral N.G. Kuznetsov, who knew the marshal well, Blucher gave intelligence and timely detection of the enemy. For the first time in military history The USSR used tanks. For the victory at the Chinese Eastern Railway in May 1930 he was awarded the Order of the Red Star for No. 1. In 1931 he was awarded the Order of Lenin for No. 48.

Since 1934 - a member of the Central Committee of the CPSU (b). In 1935 he became one of the first marshals of the Soviet Union. He was directly related to the unleashing of the Great Terror in his army. In June 1937, Blucher headed the military tribunal in the "military case", which involved Tukhachevsky, Yakir, Uborevich, Kork, Gamarnik and others. During the year, during the repressions that followed in the Red Army, all Blucher's entourage in the Far East was arrested. In early 1938, Blucher posed the question of self-confidence to Stalin. Stalin assured Blucher that he fully trusted him. Blucher was awarded the second Order of Lenin.

In July - August 1938, the first armed conflict took place on the territory of the USSR - the battles near Lake Khasan. Blucher carried out the general leadership of military operations against the Japanese army in the area.

In view of the aggravation of the situation, on July 6, Stalin sent his emissaries to Khabarovsk: First Deputy People's Commissar of Internal Affairs, Head of the GUGB Frinovsky and Deputy People's Commissar of Defense - Head of the Political Directorate of the Red Army Mehlis with the task of establishing a "revolutionary order" in the DKF troops, increasing their combat readiness and "within seven days to carry out massive operational measures to seize the opponents of Soviet power ", and at the same time churchmen, sectarians suspected of espionage, Germans, Poles, Koreans, Finns, Estonians, etc. who lived in the region. "And" spies ", the emissaries had to find such emissaries at the headquarters of the Far Eastern Front and the Pacific Fleet (66 people were included in their lists of" enemy agents and accomplices "only among the command staff of the Pacific Fleet for 20 July days). It is no coincidence that Vasily Blukher, after Frinovsky, Mekhlis and the head of the political department of the DKF Mazepov visited his house on July 29, confessed to his wife in their hearts: “… sharks have arrived that want to devour me, they will devour me or I don’t know them. The second is unlikely. " As life has shown, the marshal was not wrong.

As a result of the mistakes made, the Soviet troops suffered heavy losses and were able to achieve success only by August 10. The main military council (K. Ye. Voroshilov, S. M. Budyonny, V. M. Molotov, I. V. Stalin and others) noted that "huge shortcomings in the state of the Far Eastern Front" were revealed at Lake Khasan. The main culprit of these "major shortcomings" was first of all named the commander of the DKF. Blucher, among other things, was accused that he "failed or did not want to really implement the cleansing of the front from enemies of the people," as the People's Commissar of Defense emphasized, he surrounded himself with "enemies of the people."

The Main Military Council of the Red Army and the People's Commissariat of Defense recognized Blucher's activities as commander as unsatisfactory, he was removed from office. The illustrious hero was accused of "defeatism, duplicity, indiscipline and sabotage of the armed resistance to Japanese troops."

Leaving Vasily Konstantinovich at the disposal of the Main Military Council of the Red Army, he and his family were sent on vacation to the Voroshilovskaya dacha "Bocharov Ruchei" in Sochi. So, in the fall of 1938, Blucher left the Far East.

On October 22, 1938, Blucher was arrested. Torture and beatings were used against him in prison. On November 9, 1938, while under investigation, V.K.Blyukher died in the Lefortovo prison. According to the conclusion of the forensic medical examination, the death of the marshal came from a blockage of the pulmonary artery by a blood clot formed in the veins of the pelvis; Blucher's eye was ripped out. March 10, 1939 already posthumously retroactively stripped of the rank of marshal and sentenced to death penalty for "espionage in favor of Japan", "participation in the anti-Soviet organization of the right and in a military conspiracy."

Blucher was married three times. Based on the testimony given by Blucher, his two first wives - Galina Pokrovskaya and Galina Kolchugina, as well as brother Captain Pavel Blucher and Pavel's wife were shot. Blucher's third wife, Glafira Lukinichna Bezverkhova, was sentenced to 8 years in labor camp.

Rehabilitated after the XX Congress of the CPSU in 1956. At the same time, the surviving members of his family were rehabilitated. Son Vasily became a scientist, rector of the institute.

Blucher Vasily Konstantinovich (1889 -1937). Soviet military leader, one of the first Red Marshals - commanders of the Red Army, who received this rank in 1935. Cavalier No. 1 of the Order of the Red Battle Banner - the first award Soviet Russia and the Order of the Red Star.

From the Volga peasants. Before the First World War, he was a worker, participated in strikes, for which he was imprisoned.
During the First World War, he received two St. George's Crosses and a medal, as well as the rank of junior non-commissioned officer. After being seriously wounded, he was demobilized.

In the Volga region, where Blucher went after his dismissal from the army, he joined the Bolshevik Party and became an agitator for the Bolsheviks. He was sent to the reserve regiment of the Samara garrison, which served as a military support for the new communist government.

In the winter of 1917/1918, Blucher was one of the organizers of the defeat of the White Cossack movement in the Orenburg region, which ended in the defeat and retreat of the Cossacks. Soon, however, the Reds in the Volga region were defeated. Blucher reorganized the highly motivated, but lack of food and ammunition units and led them into a raid on the rear of the whites. During the campaign, his troops traveled 1,500 kilometers through the mountains, forests and swamps, disorganizing the rear of the Kolchak army. In command positions, Blucher takes part in the battles for Siberia. The 51st Infantry Division, headed by him, becomes an elite part of the Red Army and serves as a striking force for operations on the Eastern Front and in battles against Wrangel.

After the capture of Crimea, Divisional Commander Blucher became Minister of War of the Far East Republic, a buffer state between Japan and the RSFSR. Per short term Having created an army, he completed the expulsion of the interventionists and White Guards from the territory of the country.
With the end of the war, he occupied a number of top positions and in 1924 he again went to the Far East. Having gained vast experience there, Blucher, in fact, becomes a ruler in this remote region.

In 1924-1926, he leads a group of military advisers in China, providing assistance to the friendly forces of the USSR. Leading the Far Eastern Army, he quickly and effectively defeats the troops of Marshal Zhang Xuelyang during the conflict on the Chinese Eastern Railway.
Hero of the Civil War, one of the first five Marshals, a member of the Central Committee of the CPSU (b), the Red Banner Blucher, becomes a legend of the Land of the Soviets.

However, the army led by him was ill-prepared for the conflict with the Japanese on Lake Hasan. The marshal was blamed for low combat readiness, drunkenness and even sabotaging the repulse of Japanese aggression. He was soon arrested and died during the investigation.

Thus ended the life of one of the original Soviet commanders, who left a mark on military, and not only military history.

Interesting Facts and dates from life