Mikhail Vasilyevich Frunze is a famous figure during the Civil War. M

Reference books say that he was a revolutionary, a Soviet statesman, as well as one of the most important military leaders of the Red Army during the Civil War in Russia. It was in this capacity that Mikhail Vasilyevich Frunze arrived in Samara at the beginning of 1919, after which our city for a long time became an operational center where the largest operations of the Eastern Front of the Red Army were developed (Fig. 1).

On the wings of revolution

He was born on January 21 (new style February 2), 1885 in the city of Pishpek, Semirechensk region of the Russian Empire (now the capital of Kyrgyzstan, Bishkek). His father was paramedic Vasily Mikhailovich Frunze (1854-1897), a Moldovan by nationality.

Mikhail first became acquainted with revolutionary ideas in a self-education circle when he was studying at a gymnasium in the city of Verny (now Alma-Ata). In 1904, he entered the St. Petersburg Polytechnic Institute, where he joined the Russian Social Democratic Labor Party (RSDLP). In November of the same year, Frunze was first arrested for promoting Marxism, but was soon released. On the famous day of January 9, 1905 (“Bloody Sunday”), Mikhail found himself in the ranks of the demonstrators who came to Palace Square in St. Petersburg, and during the shelling he was wounded in the arm. Later, Mikhail Vasilyevich admitted that it was this event that led him to become a “general of the revolution.”

During the First Russian Revolution of 1905-1907, he was elected a member of the RSDLP committee and conducted party work in Moscow, Ivanovo-Voznesensk and Shuya, acting under the pseudonym “Comrade Arseny.” Other party pseudonyms of M.V. are also known. Frunze - Mikhailov and Trifonych, as well as his literary pseudonyms under which he appeared in print - Sergei Petrov, A. Shuisky, M. Mirsky.

In May-July 1905, Frunze emerged as one of the leaders of the Ivanovo-Voznesensk general strike of textile workers. At the head of the fighting squad of Ivanovo-Voznesensk and Shuya workers, he participated in the December armed uprising of 1905 in Moscow. In 1906, Frunze was elected as a delegate from the Ivanovo-Voznesensk district party organization to the IV Congress of the RSDLP (b), which was held in Stockholm. Here he first met V.I. Lenin.

In 1907 M.V. Frunze was elected as a delegate to the V Congress of the RSDLP, but even earlier he was arrested and sentenced to four years of hard labor. But already being a prisoner, Frunze in February 1907, together with Pavel Gusev, tried to kill police officer Nikita Perlov, for which he was sentenced to death, which was then commuted to 6 years of hard labor. Frunze went through the Vladimir, Nikolaev and Aleksandrovsk convict prisons, after which in March 1914 he was sent to eternal settlement in the village of Manzurka, Irkutsk province. In August 1915, he fled to Chita, where he lived on V.G.’s passport. Vasilenko, worked in the statistical department of the resettlement department and in the editorial office of the weekly newspaper “Zabaikalsky Review”. In 1916, with a passport in the name of Mikhail Alexandrovich Mikhailov, he was able to return to Moscow. On instructions from the party, Frunze accepted the position of statistician in the Western Front Committee of the All-Russian Zemstvo Union (a rear, mainly supply organization) (Fig. 2-4).

After the announcement of the abdication of the Tsar in March 1917, under the same passport and by order of the civil commandant of the city of Minsk, he was appointed temporary chief of police of the All-Russian Zemstvo Union for the Protection of Order in the city of Minsk. Nowadays this date is considered the birthday of the Belarusian police. At the same time, led by M.V. Frunze (Mikhailov), detachments of fighting squads of workers, together with soldiers of the attached units of the Minsk garrison, disarmed the city police, seized the city police department, as well as the archive and detective departments, and took the most important government institutions under protection.

Then, during 1917, Frunze held a number of responsible positions in the authorities of the Minsk and Vilna provinces. He served in Minsk under the name Mikhailov until September 1917. During the days of the October Revolution, he was in Moscow and took part in the battles near the Metropol Hotel building, after which he was elected as a deputy of the Constituent Assembly from the Bolsheviks of the Vladimir province. In the first half of 1918 M.V. Frunze served as chairman of the Ivanovo-Voznesensk provincial committee of the RCP (b), provincial executive committee, provincial economic council and military commissar of the Ivanovo-Voznesensk province, and in August 1918 he was appointed military commissar of the Yaroslavl military district. After this M.V. Frunze took an active part in the construction of the Armed Forces of the young Soviet Republic, rapidly moving up the military career ladder.

Eastern front

At the beginning of 1919, the armies of the red Eastern Front fought fighting across the vast expanse of our country. Despite the temporary setback near Perm, the Red Army then liberated Ufa, from which it advanced 150-200 kilometers towards the Urals, and on the right flank of the front dealt a serious blow to the Orenburg and Ural Cossacks. Then the Red Army captured Orenburg, Uralsk and united with the troops of Soviet Turkestan. In general, the Eastern Front had a length of about 1,700 kilometers. For Soviet troops, this territory became a springboard for an attack on the Urals, Siberia, and Turkestan with the aim of liberating them from interventionists and White Guards.

The 4th Army, part of the Eastern Front, solved an important strategic task, covering the Saratov and Samara-Syzran directions from attacks by the Orenburg and Ural Cossacks from the south and southeast. The total number of the army was over 20 thousand people, and its front stretched for almost 350 kilometers. The enemy in this sector had a great superiority in cavalry.

M.V. Frunze arrived in Samara on January 31, 1919, having already been appointed commander of the 4th Army. The new army commander appealed to all personnel to realize the high importance of the tasks facing them and personal responsibility for the fate of millions of workers and peasants remaining in the rear. Subsequently, the Revolutionary Military Council of the 4th Army, headed by M.V. Frunze directed his main efforts to carefully selecting command and political personnel, strengthening military discipline, and strengthening party-political work in the troops (Fig. 5-9).

In February 1919 M.V. Frunze gave combat orders that characterized not only the concept of the upcoming operation, but also himself as an army commander. His plan was to destroy the main forces of the Ural Cossacks by combining a frontal attack and simultaneous attacks on the enemy’s flank and rear in order to completely clear the Ural region of counter-revolutionary forces. Archival documents show that the offensive of the 4th Army, which began soon, began successfully, and subsequently it developed in two directions - from Uralsk to Guryev and from Aleksandrov Gai to the rear of the Cossack group. In this operation, developed by M.V. Frunze, a feature of his military leadership strategy emerged, consisting in a close connection between operational work and political work, in the desire to convey the essence of upcoming goals and objectives to every soldier, as well as in strengthening the moral and political state of the troops.

In March 1919, the Southern Group of the Eastern Front was formed, the command of which was entrusted to M.V. Frunze. In the first order in his new position, he wrote the following: “By Directive of the Revolutionary Military Council of the Eastern Front dated March 5, 1919 No. 313/k, I was appointed commander of the Southern Group, which, in addition to the 4th Army entrusted to me, included the Orenburg division with an order to deploy it into an army consisting of one infantry and one cavalry divisions; I order this army to be called Turkestan.

The Southern Group is headed by the Revolutionary Military Council, which is also the Revolutionary Military Council of the 4th Army.

The control of the 4th Army is also the control body of the Southern Group.

At the head of the administration of the Turkestan army, pending approval by the center, a Revolutionary Military Council is formed with the admission of the head of the Orenburg division, Comrade Zinoviev, to the post of commander of the army, and Comrade Kafiev to the post of member of the Revolutionary Council of the army.”

The creation of the Southern Group was caused by the dramatically changed situation on the entire Eastern Front. At this time, foreign states intervened in the civil war in Russia, organizing a campaign by the combined forces of external and internal counter-revolution against the young Soviet Republic, placing their main bet on Admiral A.V. Kolchak. As a result, at the beginning of March 1919, Kolchak’s armies from the Urals launched an offensive on the Volga region. The Siberian Army struck in the Izhevsk-Kazan direction, the Western Army operated in the Ufa-Samara direction, and Kolchak’s Southern Group of Forces provided the Western Army with a strike. Cossack troops advanced on Orenburg and Uralsk. Due to a serious superiority of forces, the enemy managed to break through the front of the Soviet troops in the Ufa-Samara direction, after which they achieved serious success in the zone of operation of the 5th Army of the Eastern Front.

In April 1919, the Central Committee of the RCP (b) recognized the Eastern Front as the main one in the entire theater of military operations. Soviet government concentrated its main efforts precisely on this sector, trying at the same time not to weaken the Southern Front. In prepared by V.I. Lenin's theses, adopted by the Central Committee of the RCP (b) on April 11, 1919, formulated the main political and strategic task of the republic: to strain all forces, deploy revolutionary energy in order to quickly defeat Kolchak. “Volga, Ural, Siberia,” wrote V.I. Lenin, - can and must be protected and won” (Lenin V.I. Pol. sobr. soch., vol. 38, p. 246).

The Central Committee of the RCP (b), in its appeal dated April 29, 1919, addressed all provincial and district committees of Soviet Russia with an appeal to provide assistance to the front. Then, on the initiative of M.V. Frunze and V.V. Kuibyshev in Samara, Syzran, Orenburg, Uralsk and other cities, with the active assistance of local party organizations, the formation of communist and workers' companies, battalions and entire regiments began. In total, from January to April 1919, 44,300 workers and peasants were sent to the Red Army from the Samara province alone. The workers of the province also provided great assistance to the front by participating in the construction of defensive structures, donating food, clothing, money, and so on to the Red Army. And in total, by the beginning of May 1919, about 55 thousand recruits were sent to the Eastern Front, military units and formations were transferred here from other fronts, weapons, ammunition, and fuel were delivered (Fig. 10-12).

As mentioned above, at this alarming time for the Soviet Republic, by the directive of the Revolutionary Military Council of the Eastern Front dated March 5, 1919, the Southern Group of the Eastern Front was formed under the command of M.V. Frunze. The first task assigned to him was to complete the operation against the Ural Cossacks, which would allow the Red Army to begin an offensive in the direction of Turkestan. The troops of the 4th Army in this sector achieved quick success, liberating Lbischensk and the village of Slomikhinskaya.

However, soon, due to a significant superiority of forces on the part of Kolchak’s troops, a general retreat of the armies of the Eastern Front began. The situation in the Southern Group areas has also become more complicated. Her troops left Lbischensk, Orsk and began to retreat to Uralsk. In this alarming situation, M.V. Frunze did a lot of work to reorganize the group’s troops, especially the Turkestan Army, which distinguished itself in subsequent battles with Kolchak’s troops. This is evidenced by Order No. 1 to the troops of the Southern Group of March 17, which determined the organization of the group’s troops. To strengthen political work in the troops, at the request of M.V. Frunze, the Samara Provincial Party Committee sent V.V. to the Southern Group. Kuibyshev as a member of the Revolutionary Military Council.

"Chapan" uprising

It was at this time in the rear of the Red troops, on the territory of the Simbirsk and Samara provinces, that the so-called “chapanny” uprising broke out. It was one of the most massive uprisings of peasants dissatisfied with the food policy of the Bolsheviks, and primarily with surplus appropriation.

In Soviet historical literature, these protests by the peasantry against the communist regime were called nothing more than “kulak uprisings” or “SR petty-bourgeois uprisings.” And only open in Lately For researchers, archival documents of that time clearly show that the majority of participants in these performances (sometimes up to 90 percent) were representatives of the poorest class of ordinary farmers. And then the peasants were brought to the point of an ax and a pitchfork by the cruelest food policy of the local Soviet authorities, when food detachments swept out all the grain from the peasant barns to the last grain, leaving nothing for the peasants even for spring sowing work.

This is exactly what happened in the Samara and Simbirsk provinces in March 1919, when one of the largest peasant uprisings of the era of military communism began here, which in historical literature was called the “chapan war” (from the word “chapan” - long-skirted peasant clothing) (Fig. 13) .

Even in official Soviet chronicles you can sometimes find the number of participants in those events - up to 150 thousand people. And although modern experts consider these data to be underestimated by at least two times, still the scope of the “chapan war” cannot but amaze. After all, only about 50 thousand peasants took part in the famous “Antonov” uprising in the Tambov province, and even less in the Kronstadt rebellion - about 30 thousand soldiers and sailors. But if mention of the last two uprisings can be found even in school textbooks history of the Soviet era, then about the “chapan war” on Middle Volga Until the 90s, only local historians knew.

It all started on March 5, 1919, with disobedience to the authorities by the residents of the wealthy Volga village of Novodevichye (then it belonged to the Sengileevsky district of the Simbirsk province, now to the Shigonsky district of the Samara region). Here the peasants defeated the food detachment under the leadership of Commissar Belov, and then also killed the food detachment that arrived to the rescue of the security officers from Sengiley. During the day, residents of most nearby large villages also learned about the events in Novodevichy: Yagodnoye, Musorka, Usolye, Staraya Binaradka, Usinskoye, Fedorovka and others. As a result, by the evening of March 6, a spontaneous peasant army of at least 50 thousand people was formed in the Syzran, Sengileevsky and Stavropol districts, led by the former tsarist officer A.V. Dolinin (Fig. 14-16).

By noon on March 7, the peasant army entered Stavropol, which greeted it with bread and salt and the ringing of bells in numerous churches. The leaders of the city committee of the RCP (b) and many representatives of the executive committee of the city council fled Stavropol the day before. In fact, the city was occupied by the rebels without any resistance from the official authorities and without a single shot being fired (Fig. 17-19).

By March 10, the peasant uprising had already covered the entire south of Simbirsk and western Samara provinces. By this time, in Samara, where the headquarters of the Southern Group of the Eastern Front under the command of M.V. Frunze, have already realized the seriousness of the current situation. The provincial executive committee and the provincial committee of the RCP (b) by a joint decision created the so-called revolutionary field headquarters to lead the fight against the kulaks. So on March 10, by order of M.V. Frunze and V.V. Kuibyshev, to suppress the uprising, a punitive detachment of 1,200 people was sent to Stavropol, which was given an artillery platoon and other military units (Fig. 20, 21).

On March 12, a bloody battle for Stavropol began, and the very next day the advanced detachment of punitive forces under the command of Kraskom E. Sugar, with the help of guns and machine guns, stormed the headquarters of the rebels. The cleansing of the city from rebels continued for another day, as they would say now, after which punitive measures spread to the surrounding villages, which most actively helped the “kulak rebellion.” The methods by which the Red troops pacified those undesirable to the communist regime in these villages can be clearly seen from the report that on March 18 M.V. Frunze sent to the Revolutionary Military Council of the Republic and personally to Lenin. This document is reproduced below in full.

"No. 624. Samara

Dear Comrade [Lenin]!

Aware of the seriousness of the military and political situation created in the middle and southern part of the Eastern Front, I decide to draw your special attention to it. I will not touch upon the state of affairs at the front itself, confident that you know it well. I will only say that according to the latest reports I received from people who deserve complete trust, the 5th Army has almost lost its combat capability. Its regiments roll back at the first onslaught of the enemy and immediately clear large spaces. At the army headquarters (5th) fears were expressed about the possibility of a retreat to Samara and Simbirsk. That says it all.

I turn to the characterization of the situation in the immediate rear of the army - the provinces of Samara, Simbirsk, Ural and Orenburg. There is complete trouble here, the rear is shaky. On March 8, a peasant uprising broke out in the districts of Samara, Syzran, Sengileevsky, Stavropol and Melekessky. On the night of March 10-11, an attempt was made to raise the same in Samara itself.

The 175th Regiment rebelled; Having destroyed the artillery depots and dismantled the berdanks that were there, he tried to raise other units, and first of all the engineer battalion of my (4th) army. The appeal was unsuccessful, and by 3 o'clock in the morning the case was liquidated. In the districts, uprisings have also been liquidated to date. The center of the rebels - Stavropol - was taken on March 13, and by the 16th the last centers of the uprising were occupied.

The movement was massive and organized. Its goal was to capture the cities of Samara, Syzran, and Stavropol. The leaders had connections with the Kolchakites, and they undoubtedly timed the uprising to coincide with the moment of the decisive blow prepared and delivered by Kolchak in the Ufa-Birsk region. The uprising went under the slogans: “Long live Soviet power on the platform of the October Revolution! Down with the communists and the commune!”

Volost “military-revolutionary” headquarters were formed in cities, volosts and villages. During the suppression of the movement, at least 1,000 people were killed, according to incomplete information. In addition, over 600 leaders and kulaks were shot. The village of Usinskoye, in which the rebels first exterminated our entire detachment of 170 people, was completely burned. The movement grew out of dissatisfaction with economic hardships and measures. And due to ignorance, the population was directed and used properly.

Now everything has calmed down, but, of course, only externally, that is, the immediate rear of the army is unstable, and the artery of the Soviet Republic is again in mortal danger.

In the Ural region, from a military point of view, things are good, but Soviet work is not improving. There is not a single major responsible employee, and there is no system or planning in the work. In both the Ural and Orenburg provinces, our policy is especially responsible, while its bearers are not up to the task. In the Orenburg province, for example, along with a cascade of economic and financial measures that caused ferment even among the workers, such things as the failure to take timely measures to disarm the Cossacks, who dispersed to the villages with weapons, were allowed to happen.

Given the seriousness and complexity of the situation, I have outlined the following:

1. All provinces included in the sphere of influence of the Revolutionary Council of the Southern Group of the Eastern Front (4th and Turkestan armies, headquarters - Samara), i.e. Samara, Ural, Orenburg and Turgai are placed under direct subordination to the Revolutionary Council of the group, not only militarily, but generally in civil terms.

The revolutionary committees and executive committees of the indicated regions and provinces will be ordered to carry out all orders of the group's Revolutionary Council without any delay or communication with the center.

2. The Revolutionary Committees of the Ural, Orenburg and Turgai were given orders to prepare their apparatus for the announcement of the mobilization of the non-resident population, as well as the horse army.

3. If necessary, the military reserves of the Samara province will be used outside of any planned orders for the speedy organization of armed forces.

In order to give all these partly planned, partly carried out measures the necessary authority, it is necessary for the center to grant the indicated rights to the Revolutionary Military Council of the Southern Group. I should note that the Revolutionary Council of the Southern Group (aka the Revolutionary Council of the 4th Army) was not approved by the Revolutionary Military Council of the Republic, but exists only on the basis of a directive from the Eastern Front. This, in my opinion, is not enough, and an appropriate securing order from the Revolutionary Council of the Republic is needed.

Regarding the role of the center, I consider it absolutely necessary to immediately send a sufficient number of experienced workers to the indicated areas and to the armies themselves. This applies both to general civil institutions and to extraordinary committees and special departments. The latter (extra-comms) unforgivably missed the preparation of the uprising, which, as can be seen from the report made to me today by the head of the punitive detachments, has been planned and quite openly for a long time.

I consider the current state of affairs to be very serious. But at the same time, I am confident that if the center evaluates it seriously enough and takes appropriate measures, then we will avoid any danger.

With friendly greetings.

Commander of the 4th and member of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee M.V. Frunze-Mikhailov.

P.S. If the center sanctioned the existence of the Revolutionary Council of the Southern Group, as such, I would earnestly request that one of the responsible workers be sent to my disposal.

The main danger for armies from the instability of the immediate rear lies in the composition of the majority of regiments. They consist of 3/4 natives of the Samara province; the news of these unrest, of course, will have a bad effect. It would be highly desirable to break decisively with the system of local replenishment. M.F.

(Central State Archive of the Soviet Army (TsGASA), f. 33987, op. 1, d. 87, l. 87-88).

Archival documents discovered in recent years convincingly show that many of those executed during the suppression of the “Chapan War” in the Middle Volga cannot in any way be called not only kulaks, but even middle peasants. These were ordinary illiterate peasants who were literally forced by the barbaric policies of the Bolsheviks to take up the ax (Fig. 22).

Those arrested on suspicion of participation in the “kulak rebellion” were taken to Syzran - as stated in official documents, “to places of concentrated detention.” It turns out that who and when concentration camps were first invented - back in 1919 by the Bolshevik government! There were so many arrested that the head of this camp, Goldstein, repeatedly signed acts with approximately the following content: “Based on the order of the Special Commission for the unloading of places of detention in the city of Syzran dated May 12, 1919, to execute the following persons.” And after the act there were always long lists of names.

In 1996, the then President of the Russian Federation Boris Yeltsin signed the Decree “On Peasant Uprisings of 1918 - 1922,” which recognized that participants in the mass protests of those years against the military-communist regime were not members of gangs, but politically repressed, and for this reason were subject to rehabilitation .

last years of life

After the suppression of the “Chapan” uprising, in order to prepare a counter-offensive against Kolchak’s troops, at the suggestion of M.V. Frunze strengthened the Southern Group of the Eastern Front. From April 11, 1919, by decision of the command of the Eastern Front, the 1st and 5th armies were transferred to the operational subordination of the commander of the Southern Group.

The counteroffensive plan was developed by M.V. Frunze and then set out in an order to the troops of the Southern Group. The plan of the operation provided for the creation of an attack force in the Buzuluk area and its attack on the enemy’s left flank with the aim of throwing it back to the north. The main idea of the Southern Group's operation was to deliver a powerful blow to the section between units of the enemy's 3rd and 6th Corps in the general direction of Buguruslan, Zaglyadino, Sarai-Gir with the goal of finally disuniting these corps, defeating them in parts and intercepting initiative.

To carry out the Buguruslan operation M.V. Frunze created a powerful fist, including forces from secondary sectors, including the 25th Infantry Division of V.I. Chapaeva. On these same days M.V. Frunze and V.V. Kuibyshev sent a letter to the Samara Provincial Party Committee and the Samara Economic Council with a request for assistance and improvement of political and educational work in the troops. And on April 15, M.V. Frunze turned to the Central Committee of the RCP (b) with a request to immediately send possible quantity political workers to work on the formation of the four armies of the Southern Group.

Speaking at general meeting Communists of Samara on April 25 with a report on the situation on the Eastern Front, M.V. Frunze noted that “favorable changes in the situation on the Eastern Front in the direction of the working people were created due to the fact that all workers realized the situation and made timely appropriate conclusions.”

During the preparation and conduct of the counteroffensive of the Southern Group, the troops of the 4th Army were entrusted with the task of holding the Ural and Orenburg directions. The enemy pushed back the army troops; on May 6, 1919, he surrounded Uralsk and approached Orenburg. The heroic defense of Uralsk continued until its liberation on July 11, 1919.

Even during the Buguruslan operation M.V. Frunze correctly assessed the significance of Belebey and developed a plan for the Belebey operation, carried out on May 15-19, 1919. During the Buguruslan operation, M.V. Frunze set the task for the troops of the Southern Group to attack Belebey in order to cut off the enemy’s withdrawal routes to Ufa, disrupt the concentration of his operational reserves, with the further immediate task of quickly reaching the Bugulma road and the highway from Belebey to the north. By this time, the 5th Army had already been withdrawn from the group. As a result of this operation, the preconditions were created for an attack on Ufa.

The Ufa operation was carried out from May 25 to June 19, 1919 by troops of the Turkestan Army under the direct command of M.V. Frunze. He outlined the plan for the operation on May 18 in a direct wire report to front commander A.A. Samoilo about the advisability of carrying out the Ufa operation after Belebeyskaya and measures to strengthen troops in the Ural-Orenburg region. The essence of the plan was to relentlessly pursue the enemy to disrupt his organized retreat across the Belaya River, and then deliver the main blow with the troops of the right flank of the Turkestan Army south of Ufa, cross the Belaya and go to the rear of the White Guard troops.

As a result of this operation, on the evening of June 9, units of the 25th Infantry Division entered Ufa, and by June 10, the 31st Division cut the Ufa-Zlatoust railway. In general, the entire Ufa operation ended on June 19. Successful actions of the Southern Group of Forces under the command of M.V. Frunze created the preconditions for launching an offensive of the entire Eastern Front and liberating the Urals. Following the instructions of V.I. Lenin, in the fall of 1919, the Red Army completely drove the White Guards out of the Urals and began to advance to Siberia.

As for M.V. Frunze, then from July 19, 1919 he already commanded the entire Eastern Front. For carrying out successful offensive operations against the main forces of Admiral A.V. Kolchak he was awarded the Order of the Red Banner. Then he was the commander of the Turkestan Front, a member of the Turkestan Commission of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee and the Council of People's Commissars. In 1920 M.V. Frunze turned out to be one of the “organizers” of the revolution in the Bukhara Emirate through the invasion of the Red Army. He directly led the assault on Bukhara on August 30 - September 2, 1920.

From September 27 of the same year, Frunze commanded the offensive of the Southern Front in Crimea, during which the troops of General P.N. were driven out of the peninsula. Wrangel. At the same time, he waged the fight against counter-revolution in alliance with the Insurgent Army N.I. Makhno, with whom in October 1920 he signed an agreement on unity of action against the white troops and established good personal relations. And after the defeat of Wrangel, by order from Moscow, Frunze already supervised the liquidation of the Makhnovists on the territory of Ukraine, for which he was subsequently awarded the second Order of the Red Banner (Fig. 23-27).

In March 1924 M.V. Frunze was appointed deputy chairman of the Revolutionary Military Council of the USSR and at the same time deputy people's commissar for military and naval affairs. In April 1924, he also became chief of staff of the Red Army and head of the Military Academy of the Red Army. Since January 1925, M.V. Frunze is the Chairman of the Revolutionary Military Council of the USSR and People's Commissar for Military and Naval Affairs. At this time, he also became a candidate member of the Politburo of the Central Committee and a candidate member of the Organizing Bureau of the Central Committee of the RCP (b).

Under his leadership in 1924-1925, military reform was carried out, including a reduction in the size of the army, the introduction of the principle of unity of command, the reorganization of the military apparatus and political management of the Red Army, a combination in the structure Armed Forces standing army and territorial militia formations. In general, the entire military doctrine developed by Frunze was based on the application of Marxism to military theory and assigned a special place in the army to political departments and communist cells.

Mikhail Vasilyevich Frunze died on October 31, 1925 after surgery for a stomach ulcer from general blood poisoning (official conclusion). According to other sources, he died from cardiac arrest resulting from the effects of anesthesia, the anesthetic chloroform, into which Frunze was intolerant.

There is a version that his death was not accidental, but was organized by Stalin, who especially insisted on carrying out the operation. This version is reflected by Pilnyak in his “The Tale of the Unextinguished Moon”, in Aksenov’s novel “The Moscow Saga”, as well as in films based on these works. The version of the organization of the murder is also described in Bazhanov’s book “Memoirs of Stalin’s Former Secretary.”

Mikhail Vasilyevich Frunze was buried on November 3, 1925 on Red Square in Moscow near the Kremlin wall (Fig. 28-31).

In Samara in honor of M.V. Frunze in December 1925 renamed the former Saratovskaya street, on which there is now a memorial museum of the Soviet commander (Fig. 32, 33).
Bust of M.V. Frunze is installed in Samara in front of the administrative building of OJSC Kuznetsov, which in Soviet time was called the Kuibyshev Engine Production Association named after M.V. Frunze" (Fig. 34, 35). "Kuznetsov"

Valery EROFEEV.

Addition

Museum M.V. Frunze in Samara

This museum is now a branch of the Samara Regional Museum of History and Local Lore named after P.V. Alabina. It opened on February 23, 1934 and then became the first personal museum in Samara, having not only a memorial, but also a historical and revolutionary profile. In Samara it is located at 114 Frunze Street.

The building of the future museum was built back in 1891 according to the design of A.A. Shcherbachev, a famous Samara architect, and is now declared an architectural monument. In 1919-1920, it was here that Mikhail Vasilyevich Frunze lived and worked, the commander of the Southern Group of Forces of the Eastern Front, an outstanding commander who did not lose a single battle during the Civil War.

Having lived in the city of Samara for only one year, Mikhail Vasilyevich Frunze managed to make an invaluable contribution to the development and establishment of the city’s culture. The commanders of the 1st and 5th Armies visited his home office: the commander of the 25th Infantry Division, V.I. Chapaev and his political commissar D.A. Furmanov, M.N. Tukhachevsky and G.G. Guy, Chief of Staff of the Southern Group of Forces F.F. Novitsky, fortification engineer, General D.N. Karbyshev. Until 1974, the museum was directly subordinate to the House of Officers of the PriVO Headquarters, and since 1974 it became a branch of the Kuibyshev (now Samara) regional museum of local lore.

The main exhibition of the museum is dedicated to the activities of Mikhail Vasilyevich Frunze and highlights it in the context of the events of the Civil War of 1918-1920. Among the most famous of them: the confrontation on the Eastern Front, desertion in the ranks of the Red and White armies, the “chapan” war and others.

The museum not only engages in excursion activities, but also conducts educational and research work, organizing classes for students and students dedicated to the history of the Civil War in Russia and the role of Mikhail Vasilyevich Frunze in the history of the Fatherland. On the eve of the 70th anniversary of the museum on February 23, 2004, a new, third exhibition was opened in it, which presented new materials previously hidden under the heading of secrecy (Fig. 36-40).

Bibliography

Aldan-Semenov A.I. Thunderstorm over Russia. The story of Mikhail Frunze. M.: Politizdat, 1980. (Series “Fiery Revolutionaries”). 414 p., ill.

Alexandrov V.A. M.V. Frunze about the physical training of a warrior. - Theory and practice of physics. culture. 1950. T. XIII. Vol. 2. pp. 98-104.

Arkhangelsky V. Frunze. M.: Mol. Guard, 1970. (Series “Life wonderful people"). 509 p.: ill.

Berezov P.I. Mikhail Vasilievich Frunze. Brief biographer. feature article. M.: Moscow. worker, 1947.110 p.: portrait.

Borisov S. M. V. Frunze: Brief biography. Feature article. M.: Voenizdat, 1938. 138 p.

Vigilyansky N.D. The Tale of Frunze. M.: Sov. writer, 1957. 191 p.: ill.

Voroshilov K.E. About youth. M.: Partizdat, 1936. - 158 p.: ill.

Civil war and military intervention in the USSR: Encyclopedia. M., 1983.

Ilyichev Ya.I. Turkish caravan. Roman: [About M.V. Frunze]. L.: Lenizdat, 1987. 510 pp.: ill.

CPSU about the Armed Forces Soviet Union. Documents 1917-1968. M., 1969, p. 57.

M.V. Frunze on the Eastern Front: collection of documents. Comp. T.F. Karyaeva (responsible compiler), V.V. Bobrova, V.G. Krasnov. Kuibyshev, Kuib. book publishing house 1985. 272 p.

M.V. Frunze on the fronts of the civil war: a collection of documents. M.: Voenizdat, 1941. 471 p.: ill.

M.V. Frunze: Life and work. Under general ed. F.N. Petrova. M.: Gospolitizdat, 1962. 350 pp.: ill., portrait.

Mirsky M. European civilizers and Morocco. Shtal A.V. Small wars of the 1920s–1930s. M.: ACT; St. Petersburg: Terra Fantastica, 2003. 544 p.: ill. (Military History Library).

Mikhail Vasilievich Frunze. General activity. Sat. articles. M., 1951.

About the Komsomol and youth: Collection. IN AND. Lenin. M.I. Kalinin. CM. Kirov. N.K. Krupskaya. V.V. Kuibyshev. A.V. Lunacharsky. G.K. Ordzhonikidze. M.V. Frunze. K.E. Voroshilov. M.: Mol. Guard, 1970. 447 p.

About Mikhail Frunze: Memoirs, articles by contemporaries. M.: Politizdat, 1985. 287 p.

Political parties of Russia. Late XIX- beginning of the 20th century. - M., 1996.

Popov F.G., Mashkovtsev L.V. The life of remarkable Bolsheviks: V.V. Kuibyshev, M.V. Frunze, V.P. Artsybushev, N.E. Vilonov, A.A. Maslennikov, P.A. Vavilov, V.P. Myagi, F.I. Ventsek, S.I. Deryabina, A.A. Buyanov, O. Aveide, A.P. Galaktionov. Kuibyshev: Kuib. book publishing house, 1938. 78 p.

Samara province during the civil war (1918-1920). Kuibyshev: Book. publishing house, 1958.

Topolyansky V.D. Death of Frunze. - “Questions of History.” 1993, no. 6.

Trotsky L.D. In memory of M.V. Frunze. News No. 259 (November 13, 1925). (Speech at a funeral meeting dedicated to the memory of Mikhail Vasilyevich Frunze, in Kislovodsk on November 2, 1925).

Frunze M.V. About youth. M.: Mol. Guard, 1937. 118 p.: portrait.

Frunze M.V. Selected works. M.: 1950.

Frunze M.V. Selected works. T.1: 1918-1925 M.: Voenizdat, 1957. 472 pp.: portrait.

Frunze M.V. Selected works. T.2: 1921-1925 M.: Voenizdat, 1957. 498 pp.: ill.

Frunze M.V. Selected works. Preface M. Gareeva. M.: Voenizdat, 1977. 480 pp.: ill.

Frunze M.V. Unknown and forgotten: Journalism, memoirs, documents and letters. M.: Nauka, 1991. 272 p.

Frunze M.V. Unified military doctrine and the Red Army. – “Krasnaya Nov”, magazine. Ed. A.K. Voronsky. M., 1921. No. 1. P. 94-106.

Frunze Mikhail Vasilievich. Born into the family of a paramedic.

After graduating from the Pishpek City School, Frunze entered the Verny gymnasium, from which he graduated with a gold medal. In 1904 he became a student at the economics department of the St. Petersburg Polytechnic Institute. Actively participating in student and workers' circles, he joined the Bolshevik faction of the RSDLP, after his arrest he was expelled from the capital, joining the number of professional revolutionaries.

He worked in Moscow and Ivanovo-Voznesensk, becoming one of the organizers of the famous textile workers' strike. In December 1905 he took part in the battles at Krasnaya Presnya in Moscow. In 1906, Frunze was a delegate to the IV Congress of the RSDLP in Stockholm, where he met V.I. Lenin. In 1907 he was elected as a delegate to the V Congress of the RSDLP, but was arrested and sentenced to 4 years of hard labor.

Already a prisoner, he was charged with armed resistance to the police and twice sentenced to death, commuted under pressure from public opinion to 6 years of hard labor.

In March 1914 he was sent to permanent settlement in Eastern Siberia. In 1916 he escaped and, being in an illegal situation, carried out revolutionary work among the soldiers of the Western Front.

By the beginning of the February Revolution of 1917, Frunze was the leader of a revolutionary organization with a center in Minsk and branches in the armies of the Western Front. He took an active part in the preparation and conduct of the October Revolution of 1917, after the victory of which he headed the Ivanovo-Voznesensk provincial executive committee, the party committee, and the military commissariat; was a deputy of the Constituent Assembly from the Bolsheviks.

Since 1918, Frunze was one of the most active participants in the civil war: in 1919 he commanded the Southern Army Group of the Eastern Front, which defeated A.V. Kolchak, was the commander of the troops of the Turkestan Front, a member of the commission of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee and the Council of People's Commissars of the RSFSR on the affairs of Turkestan.

In 1920 he fought against the army of the Bukhara emir and led the defeat of P.Ya. Wrangel. When the Red Army took Crimea in the fall of 1920, Frunze gave the order to spare those who surrendered, telegraphed to Wrangel an offer of complete forgiveness to all those who surrendered their weapons and the possibility of emigration for those who wanted it, for which he received a strict scolding from V.I. Lenin, surprised by the “exorbitant compliance of the conditions.”

Frunze did not participate in the senseless massacre of white officers in Crimea, carried out by the punitive troika (G.L. Pyatakov, R.S. Zemlyachka, B. Kun), because was sent to Ukraine to fight N.I. Makhno. He was appointed commander of all the Armed Forces of Ukraine and Crimea, authorized by the Revolutionary Military Council of the Republic.

For skillful military leadership he was awarded the Honorary Revolutionary Arms and two Orders of the Red Banner. In 1924 he was confirmed as deputy. Chairman of the Revolutionary Military Council of the USSR and people's commissar for military and naval affairs of the USSR, at the same time being the chief of staff of the Red Army and the Military Academy.

Under the leadership of Frunze, the USSR completed what L.D. started. Trotsky's military reform of 1924 - 1925. In 1925, Frunze was appointed chairman of the Revolutionary Military Council of the USSR and People's Commissar for Military and Naval Affairs.

Frunze died after the operation, becoming, according to the convincing results of research by R.A. Medvedev and V.D. Topolyansky, one of the many victims of the establishing Stalinist dictatorship.

Mikhail Vasilyevich Frunze (party pseudonyms Mikhailov, Trifonych, Arseny, literary pseudonyms Sergei Petrov, A. Shuisky, M. Mirsky). Born on January 21 (February 2), 1885 in Pishpek, Semirechensk region - died on October 31, 1925 in Moscow. Revolutionary, Soviet statesman and military leader, one of the most prominent military leaders of the Red Army during the Civil War, military theorist.

From the bourgeoisie, the son of a paramedic, Moldovan Vasily Mikhailovich Frunze (1854-1897), who served in Pishpek (Bishkek).

He is married to Sofya Alekseevna Popova, the daughter of a Narodnaya Volya member. I first became acquainted with revolutionary ideas in a self-education circle at a gymnasium in the city of Verny (now Alma-Ata). In 1904 he entered the St. Petersburg Polytechnic Institute and joined the Russian Social Democratic Labor Party. In November, he was arrested for the first time for his revolutionary ideas.

On Bloody Sunday, January 9, 1905, he took part in a demonstration on Palace Square in St. Petersburg and was wounded in the arm. Later, Mikhail Vasilyevich admitted that it was this event that led him to become a “general of the revolution.”

During the revolution of 1905-1907, he conducted party work in Moscow, from May - in Ivanovo-Voznesensk and Shuya (under the pseudonym “Comrade Arseny”), a member of the RSDLP committee. One of the leaders of the Ivanovo-Voznesensk general strike of textile workers (May - July 1905). At the head of the fighting squad of Ivanovo-Voznesensk and Shuya workers, he participated in the December armed uprising of 1905 in Moscow. In 1906 - delegate to the IV Congress of the RSDLP in Stockholm from the Ivanovo-Voznesensk district organization, where he met.

In 1907 he was elected as a delegate to the V Congress of the RSDLP, but was arrested and sentenced to 4 years of hard labor.

On February 21, 1907 (already a prisoner), together with Pavel Gusev, he tried to kill police officer Nikita Perlov near the village of Dmitrovka. On March 24, he was arrested in Shuya and charged in the case of armed resistance to the police. For attempted murder twice (January 27, 1909 and September 22-23, 1910) he was sentenced to death, which was commuted under pressure from public opinion to 6 years of hard labor. After imprisonment in the Vladimir, Nikolaev and Aleksandrovsk convict prisons, in March 1914 he was sent to permanent settlement in the village of Manzurka, Irkutsk province.

In August 1915, after being arrested for creating an organization of exiles, he fled to Chita, where he lived on the passport of V. G. Vasilenko, worked in the statistical department of the resettlement department and in the editorial office of the weekly newspaper “Zabaikalsky Review”.

In 1916 he moved to Moscow, and then in early April with a passport in the name of Mikhail Aleksandrovich Mikhailov and a direction from the All-Russian Zemstvo Union to Belarus.

In April 1916, Frunze, on instructions from the party, under the name Mikhailov, entered the position of statistician in the Western Front Committee of the All-Russian Zemstvo Union (a rear, mainly supply organization).

On March 4, 1917, by order of the civil commandant of the city of Minsk, Mikhail Aleksandrovich Mikhailov was appointed temporary chief of police of the All-Russian Zemstvo Union for the Protection of Order in the city of Minsk. This date is considered the birthday of the Belarusian police.

On the night of March 4-5, 1917, detachments of workers' combat squads led by M. V. Frunze (Mikhailov), together with soldiers of the assigned units of the Minsk garrison, disarmed the city police, seized the city police department, as well as the archive and detective departments, and took protection of the most important state institutions.

In addition to police affairs (Head of the Minsk city police), by the summer of 1917 Frunze held the following positions: chairman of the executive committee of the Council of Peasant Deputies of the Minsk and Vilna provinces, editor of the Peasant Newspaper, one of the editors of the Bolshevik Zvyazda, organizer and member of the Minsk City Committee of the RSDLP , member of the soldiers' committee of the Western Front, member of the executive committee of the Minsk Council of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies (chairman - Lyubimov, I. E. from July 8 (21) to August 1917). Mikhailov served in Minsk until September 1917, and then the party transferred him to the city of Shuya.

Created underground party cells in the 3rd and 10th armies of the Western Front.

Since the end of August, the chairman of the Shuya Council of Workers', Peasants' and Soldiers' Deputies, the chairman of the district zemstvo government and the city duma; Shuya's representative at the All-Russian Democratic Conference in Petrograd.

During the days of the uprising in Moscow in October 1917, he took part in the battles near the Metropol Hotel building.

Member of the Constituent Assembly from the Bolsheviks of the Vladimir province.

In the first half of 1918 - chairman of the Ivanovo-Voznesensk provincial committee of the RCP (b), provincial executive committee, provincial economic council and military commissar of the Ivanovo-Voznesensk province.

From August 1918 - military commissar of the Yaroslavl military district.

In February - May 1919, the commander of the 4th Army of the Red Army, which defeated the Whites during the spring offensive, in May-June - the Turkestan Army, in March-July - also the Southern Group of Forces of the Eastern Front, from July 19 to August 15 - the entire Eastern Front. For carrying out successful offensive operations against the main forces of Admiral A.V. Kolchak, he was awarded the Order of the Red Banner.

From August 15, 1919 to September 10, 1920 - commander of the Turkestan Front. Member of the Turkestan Commission of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee and the Council of People's Commissars (October 1919 - July 1920); supporter of the “organization” of the revolution in the Bukhara Emirate through the invasion of the Red Army, led the assault on Bukhara on August 30 - September 2, 1920.

From September 27, he commanded the Southern Front, organizer of the expulsion of the troops of General P. N. Wrangel from Northern Tavria and Crimea. The fight against the Wrangelites was carried out jointly with the Insurgent Army by N. I. Makhno, with whom in October 1920 he signed an agreement on unity of action against the white troops and established good personal relations. After the assault on Perekop, he sent a telegram to Wrangel’s troops inviting them to freely leave Crimea in exchange for a cessation of resistance.

On December 3, 1920, he was appointed commissioner of the Revolutionary Military Council in Ukraine and commander of the armed forces of Ukraine and Crimea, at the same time elected a member of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the Communist Party (Bolsheviks) of Ukraine, and from February 1922 - deputy chairman of the Council of People's Commissars of the Ukrainian SSR.

By order from Moscow, he led the defeat of the Insurgent Army of Makhno (for which he was awarded the second Order of the Red Banner in 1924) and the detachment of Yu. O. Tyutyunnik.

In November 1921, he headed the Extraordinary Embassy to Ankara to establish relations between Ukraine and Turkey, and negotiated with Ataturk.

From March 1924 - Deputy Chairman of the Revolutionary Military Council of the USSR and People's Commissar for Military and Naval Affairs, from April 1924 - simultaneously Chief of Staff of the Red Army and Head of the Military Academy of the Red Army.

Since January 1925, Chairman of the Revolutionary Military Council of the USSR and People's Commissar for Military and Naval Affairs.

Under the leadership of Frunze, the military reform of 1924-1925 was carried out. - reduction in the size of the army, introduction of the principle of unity of command, reorganization of the military apparatus and political management of the Red Army, combination of a standing army and territorial police formations in the structure of the Armed Forces. Author of a number of military theoretical works.

The military doctrine developed by Frunze was based on the application of Marxism to military theory and assigned a special place in the army to political departments and communist cells.

Member of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee, Presidium of the Central Executive Committee of the USSR. From 1921 - member of the Central Committee of the RCP (b), from 1924 - candidate member of the Politburo of the Central Committee, candidate member of the Organizing Bureau of the Central Committee of the RCP (b).

During the Civil War, he repeatedly gave security guarantees on his own behalf to those opponents of Soviet power who voluntarily laid down their arms and confessed to the Cheka (the Trans-Ural Cossacks, army officers in the Crimea, Bukhara “Basmachi”, Makhnovists).

He died after surgery for a stomach ulcer from general blood poisoning (official conclusion). According to other sources, he died from cardiac arrest resulting from the effects of anesthesia, the anesthetic chloroform, into which Frunze was intolerant.

The probable causes of the death of Mikhail Vasilyevich Frunze became the topic of one of the episodes of the TV show “After Death” on Channel Five, aired on November 20, 2009. In addition to the presenters of the program Lev Lurie and Tatyana Ustinova, invited experts took part in the discussion: Viktor Topolyansky (Associate Professor at the Moscow Medical Academy named after I.M. Sechenov, author of a book investigating the death of the first persons of the Soviet state “A Draft from the Past. Time and Documents”); forensic expert Vyacheslav Popov (Honored Scientist of the Russian Federation, Doctor of Medical Sciences, Professor, Chairman of the Forensic Medical Association of the North-West of Russia, creator of two scientific schools, author of the book “Forensic Medicine. Competence and morality"); historian Sergei Poltorak.

This is what Frunze himself wrote to his wife Sofya Alekseevna in Yalta: “I’m still in the hospital. There will be a new consultation on Saturday. I’m afraid that the operation will be denied.” “At the consultation, it was decided to perform the operation” (TsGLSA. F. 32392. Op. 1. D. 142. L. 3-5. Autograph). Mikhail Vasilyevich writes to his wife that he is satisfied with this decision. Not a word about the fact that he would like to refuse the operation. On the contrary, he hopes that doctors will “once and for all take a good look at what is there and try to outline a real treatment.”

Mikhail Frunze - Special folder

Family of Mikhail Frunze:

Father - Vasily Mikhailovich Frunze (1854 - February 1897) was a native of the peasants of the Kherson province, a Moldovan by nationality. After graduating from the Moscow paramedic school, he was drafted into the army and sent to Turkestan. After serving time military service in 1879, settled in Pishpek, where he worked as a paramedic.

Mother - Mavra Efimovna Bochkareva (1861 - 1933), a peasant woman from Russian settlers in the Voronezh province. In 1879 she married V. M. Frunze.

The family of V.M. and M.E. Frunze had five children: sons Konstantin and Mikhail and daughters Lyudmila, Claudia and Lydia.

M. V. Frunze’s elder brother, Konstantin Vasilyevich (1881-1940), graduated from the Vernensky gymnasium with a gold medal, which gave privileges when entering higher educational institutions. He continued his education at the medical faculty of Kazan University, which he graduated in 1906. He took part in the Russo-Japanese War and worked as a zemstvo doctor in Pishpek. During the Civil War and after it, he worked as a military doctor. Since 1928 in forensic medicine. Honored Doctor of the Tajik SSR, Hero of Socialist Labor. In 1940, due to deteriorating health in retirement. In 1940 he moved to Moscow, died in Moscow on December 25, 1940. He had two sons: Mikhail, Boris, daughter Nina. The descendants of Konstantin Vasilyevich live in Moscow.

M. V. Frunze's sister, Klavdia Vasilievna Frunze-Gavrilova (1887-1948), graduated from the Vernensky gymnasium in 1906 with a gold medal. After marriage, she went to Italy, where her husband studied. Then she returned to Moscow, where she continued her studies. She had two daughters: Yulia and Olga. Descendants live in Moscow.

The second sister of M. V. Frunze is Lyudmila Vasilievna Frunze-Bogolyubova (1890-1959). Graduated from the women's gymnasium in Verny and St. Petersburg medical school General practitioner by profession. She worked as a local doctor in Kyrgyzstan. After the death of her husband, she lived in China with her sons and father-in-law, and worked at the Russian trade mission in China. From June 1930 until the end of her life she worked in Moscow in central medical institutions. Participant of the Great Patriotic War, colonel of the medical service. She has two sons - Igor Semyonovich and Vladimir Semyonovich. Descendants live in Moscow.

The third sister of M. V. Frunze - Lidia Vasilievna Nadezhdina-Frunze (1898-1978) was born after the death of her father. After graduating from the Vernensky girls' gymnasium, she could not study further, so she began to work. She lived with her mother in Pishpek. She married geologist Alexei Mikhailovich Nadezhdin. She had a daughter, Lydia Alekseevna. Descendants live in St. Petersburg.

Wife - Frunze (nee Popova, then Koltanovskaya) Sofya Alekseevna (12/12/1890 - 09/04/1926). She committed suicide.

Frunze had two children, who, after the death of their father in 1925 and mother in 1926, grew up with their grandmother Mavra Efimovna Frunze (1861-1933). After the grandmother’s serious illness in 1931, the children were adopted by their father’s friend K.E. Voroshilov, who received permission for adoption by a special resolution of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks.

Son - Frunze, Timur Mikhailovich (1923-1942) - fighter pilot, Hero of the Soviet Union (posthumously).

Daughter - Frunze, Tatyana Mikhailovna (b. 08/02/1920) - professor, doctor of chemical sciences, in the 1960-1970s - a major specialist in organic chemistry. Graduated from the Moscow Institute of Chemical Technology. Her husband is Pavlov, Anatoly Georgievich (04/22/1920 - 01/04/2007) - a prominent Soviet military leader, colonel general. From 1978 to 1989 - First Deputy Chief of the GRU of the General Staff of the USSR Armed Forces. Their son Timur Frunze (06.10.1944 - 26.10.2008), candidate of chemical sciences, graduated from the Faculty of Chemistry of Moscow State University. His wife, Lyubov Anatolyevna Besedina, graduated from the Faculty of History of Moscow State University.

They have a daughter, Elena Timurovna, who graduated from MGIMO and is currently a co-director of a large company.

Their daughter Elena (b. 12/10/1948), candidate of chemical sciences. Husband Sergei Yuryevich Gladkov (b. 07/25/1950), head of the Econ company. Natalya Sergeevna Gladkova (born 1972), candidate of chemical sciences, she is married to Alexander Zotikov, they have a son, Pyotr Alexandrovich (born 02/28/2005) and a daughter, Ekaterina Alexandrovna (born 2007).

Anatoly Sergeevich Gladkov (b. 01/02/1983). Graduated from MEPhI. Worked abroad, now works in Russia. Wife Olga. They have a daughter, Anastasia (born 2009).

Bibliography of Mikhail Frunze:

Frunze M.V. About youth / Frunze M.V. - M.: Mol. Guard, 1937

Frunze M.V. Selected works. - M.: 1950

Frunze M.V. Selected works. T. 1: 1918-1925. / Frunze M.V. - M.: Voenizdat, 1957

Frunze M.V. Selected works. T. 2: 1921-1925. / Frunze M.V. - M.: Voenizdat, 1957

Frunze M.V. Selected works / Preface. M. Gareeva. - M.: Voenizdat, 1977

Frunze M.V. Unknown and forgotten: Journalism, memoirs, documents and letters / Frunze M.V. - M.: Nauka, 1991

Frunze M.V. Unified military doctrine and the Red Army // Krasnaya Nov: magazine / ed. A.K. Voronsky. - M., 1921. - No. 1

M. Mirsky. European civilizers and Morocco. - Stahl A.V. Small wars of the 1920–1930s. M.: ACT; St. Petersburg: Terra Fantastica, 2003 - Military Bulletin, 1925.

Frunze Mikhail Vasilyevich (1885-1925) - leader of the revolutionary movement, Soviet military leader. Born on January 21 (February 2), 1885 in Pishpek, Semirechensk region, in the family of a military paramedic
Frunze Mikhail Vasilievich - Soviet commander and one of the organizers of the Soviet Red Army and the founder of Soviet military science. Communist commander Mikhail Vasilyevich Frunze is one of the small number of military leaders of all times and peoples who have not lost a single battle.
During the Civil War, M. V. Frunze deservedly gained fame as an outstanding, talented Soviet commander who did not know defeat. And during the transition of the Red Army to a peaceful situation, he was one of the organizers and direct leader of the military reform, which laid the foundations for the future power of the Soviet Armed Forces. Frunze is one of the founders of Soviet military science and military art and left a theoretical legacy that is of great value to this day.
M. V. Frunze is the author of works that became the basis for the strategy of the Red Army. Among them are the Reorganization of the Red Army (1921), the Unified Military Doctrine and the Red Army (1921), Front and Rear in the War of the Future (1924), as well as the book Lenin and the Red Army (1925). In 1924-1925 he participated in the military reform aimed at reducing military spending and introducing the territorial principle of army recruitment.

1. Formation of political convictions Frunze M.V.

Mikhail Vasilyevich Frunze - born on January 21 (February 2), 1885 in Pishpek, Semirechensk region, in the family of a military paramedic. (father is Moldovan, mother is Russian)
After graduating from the Pishpek City School, Frunze entered the Verny gymnasium, from which he graduated with a gold medal. M. V. Frunze embarked on the path of revolutionary struggle in his youth. This was facilitated by his early acquaintance with advanced literature, as well as his personal qualities - natural intelligence and breadth of soul, a heightened sense of justice and the ability to see and experience the grief of others.
The desire to understand the meaning of life, the causes of deep social contrasts, the poverty of some and the wealth of others, to find his place in the struggle for the reconstruction of society on new, fair principles led young Frunze to one of the self-education circles, which united the revolutionary-minded youth of the city of Verny (now Alma- Ata). They met secretly, in secluded places, especially often in a concrete anti-seismic trench laid in the foundation of the gymnasium building
In 1904 he became a student at the economics department of the St. Petersburg Polytechnic Institute, where he joined the Bolshevik Party and became a professional revolutionary.
The stormy social and political life of the capital immediately captured him entirely. He establishes contact with the Bolshevik underground. Through a letter of recommendation from the city of Verny, Frunze met the populist writer N.F. Annensky, at whose apartment in November 1904 he first met Maxim Gorky. The writer’s words sank deep into the heart of young Frunze that victory would be won not by a superhero with his Herculean exploits, but by a simple worker. But he needs to be helped in this, he needs to go to factories and factories, organize people, raise them to fight the capitalists and autocracy.
Actively participating in student and workers' circles, he joined the Bolshevik faction of the RSDLP, after his arrest he was expelled from the capital, joining the number of professional revolutionaries.
At the beginning of 1905, the RSDLP MK was sent to Ivanovo-Voznesensk and Shuya for underground work. In May 1905 he was one of the leaders of the Ivanovo-Voznesensk strike and the first Council of Workers' Deputies.
In August 1905, M. V. Frunze, as a delegate from the Ivanovo-Voznesensk organization, took part in the All-Russian Conference of Bolshevik organizations on the agrarian issue. Returning from Kazan, where the conference was held, Frunze made a report on its work at a party meeting. As a result of discussing this issue, it was decided to organize party groups in the villages and send agitators there. Frunze himself traveled a lot to villages and gave presentations there. He revealed to the peasants the meaning of Lenin's directive to ensure the alliance of the working class and the peasantry in the struggle against the exploiters. His performances left a deep imprint on peasant hearts. M. V. Frunze wrote a leaflet that was released by the Ivanovo-Voznesensk Committee. “Join you, peasants, in this glorious struggle for people’s freedom,” it said. - Enough sleep for you, wake up! Don’t these groans and tears of your brothers, sons, touch you, hasn’t much people’s blood been shed... So wake up, comrade peasants, join our glorious struggle, and united, we will go together and overthrow the vile autocracy with armed force and achieve, so that power passes from the king to the people..."
In December 1905 he took part in the battles at Krasnaya Presnya in Moscow. In 1906, Frunze was a delegate to the IV Congress of the RSDLP in Stockholm, where he met V.I. Lenin. In 1907 he was elected as a delegate to the V Congress of the RSDLP.
On March 23, 1907, M. V. Frunze held an illegal meeting of workers of the Tolchevsky foundry and mechanical plant and stayed overnight in a safe house in the house of worker S. I. Sokolov. Late at night on March 24, police burst into the house and Frunze was arrested. During his arrest, two revolvers were found on him. During the search, weapons and ammunition, important party documents, leaflets printed in the Limonov printing house, protocols of the IV (Unification) Congress of the RSDLP and revolutionary literature were found. There was a lot of evidence. On the same day, Bolshevik Pavel Gusev, who lived not far from Sokolov’s house, was also arrested.
The news of the arrest of Frunze and Gusev spread throughout the city with lightning speed. At 9 o'clock alarming factory beeps were heard. “The Shuya workers...” wrote A. S. Bubnov, “twice fifteen thousand people approached the prison where Arseny was then sitting in order to free him.” By evening, the Bolsheviks organized a rally of thousands of people protesting against the arbitrariness of the tsarist authorities.
On March 25, M. V. Frunze and P. D. Gusev were imprisoned in the Polish detention center, which was known for the particularly cruelty of the prison regime.
From the very first days, M. V. Frunze organized the education of the illiterate, conducted political conversations and information during prisoners’ walks. Frunze established contacts with them immediately, easily and simply. His good-natured character predisposed him to be sociable with people.
For the creation of a political organization of exiles in the village of Manzurka, for reading and distributing illegal literature and revolutionary propaganda, M. V. Frunze and 13 other exiles were arrested on July 31, 1915 and sent in stages to the Irkutsk provincial prison. At the last stop, 30 versts from Irkutsk, in the village of Os, M.V. Frunze managed to escape. In Irkutsk, he obtained documents in the name of the nobleman V. G. Vasilenko, went to Chita and got a job as a traveling agent of the Transbaikal Resettlement Administration.
In 1916 he was sent by the party for revolutionary work in the active army. Under the name Mikhailov he served in the committee of the All-Russian Zemstvo Union at Western Front, led the Bolshevik underground in Minsk with branches in the 3rd and 10th armies.
M. V. Frunze directs his main efforts to the formation of detachments of the people's militia. On March 7, the newspaper “Izvestia of the Minsk Council” published an appeal by M. V. Frunze to the population of the city. It said: “The protection of public safety must be in the hands of the workers... The faithful servants of the old order... will make attempts to restore the old order for them. The working class itself needs to monitor them, to be ready at any moment to suppress the slightest attempt by the dark forces.”
The consistently Bolshevik line pursued by M. V. Frunze in the activities of the workers' militia caused dissatisfaction among the local authorities of the Provisional Government. Sharp disagreements arose between Frunze and the provincial commissar of the Provisional Government. In August 1917, Frunze and other police officers wrote a letter to the city government, in which they indicated that they had joined the police for purely ideological reasons and remained faithful to their difficult, sometimes unpleasant duties. But the provincial commissar imposes on the police functions of political investigation that are alien to it. They see their task as maintaining revolutionary order, and therefore will not fulfill demands that are not the duties of the police.
The activities of M. V. Frunze as one of the leaders of the Bolshevik organization in Belarus were not limited to work in the police. He actively participated in solving other tasks set for the party by V.I. Lenin in his famous April Theses. In particular, Frunze deserves great credit for rallying the Belarusian peasantry around Bolshevik slogans.
Soon after the victory of the February Revolution, M. V. Frunze led the work on preparing the congress of peasant delegates of the Minsk and Vilna provinces. The Belarusian landowners, having created their own national committee and received the support of the Provisional Government, tried in every possible way to prevent the Bolshevik solution to the agrarian question.
M. V. Frunze’s desire to return to revolutionary work in Shuya, which was close to his heart, where his path as a professional revolutionary began, coincided with the wish that V. I. Lenin expressed to him in a personal conversation during the peasant congress in Petrograd. A week after the Second Congress of Belarusian Peasants, Arseny-Mikhailov-Frunze left for Shuya, the place of his fighting youth.
Frunze's transition to revolutionary work in the Ivanovo-Voznesensky region was a deeply deliberate and overdue step. Third after Moscow and Petrograd in terms of the number of workers and the volume of industrial output, the Ivanovo-Voznesensky district was to play an important role in the impending socialist revolution. Naturally, he needed leaders of the revolutionary masses of the caliber and experience that M.V. Frunze had.
It is no coincidence that the city of Shuya initially becomes his place of work. Among the peasants of the district, the Socialist Revolutionaries enjoyed noticeable influence, who needed to be isolated in order to ensure reliable support for the Bolsheviks from the poor peasantry in the upcoming decisive battle for power. In addition, a 20,000-strong garrison of soldiers was stationed in Shuya itself. Their attraction to the side of the Bolsheviks was also of no small importance in the successful outcome of the revolutionary struggle, and not only in the district, but throughout the entire Ivanovo-Voznesensk industrial region.
From the very first days of his activity in the Ivanovo-Voznesensky region, M. V. Frunze became involved in active work to explain and implement the decisions of the VI Congress of the Bolshevik Party, which set a course for preparing an armed uprising. As the generally recognized leader of the Shuisky and then the Ivanovo-Voznesensky district committee of the RSDLP (b), he spoke at party meetings, at meetings and rallies of workers, peasants, soldiers and intellectuals.
The vigorous activity of M. V. Frunze to win the masses over to the side of the Bolsheviks in this pre-October period unfolded on a broad front and in all directions. He paid his main attention to strengthening the positions of the Bolsheviks in the Soviets, which were to become the illuminator of the new proletarian power. In the district Council of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies, the Bolsheviks had a stable majority since its formation during the February Revolution. But the district Council of Peasants' Deputies, organized in April 1917, was under the influence of the Socialist Revolutionaries. Frunze often attended meetings of this Council, sent his comrades there and ensured that at the district congress of peasants in October 1917, the Bolsheviks won a victory, and the Socialist Revolutionary leadership was replaced by the Bolshevik. A decision was also made to merge the Soviets into a single district Council of Workers', Soldiers' and Peasants' Deputies. M. V. Frunze was elected chairman of the joint executive committee of the Council.
The campaign for elections to the city duma ended in August 1917 with a convincing victory for the Bolsheviks, led by M. V. Frunze. Fulfilling the demands of the Central Committee of the RSDLP (b), the Bolsheviks of Shuya and the entire Ivanovo-Voznesensk region used the preparation and holding of these elections in the interests of fighting for the masses, mobilizing them for a decisive struggle against the bourgeoisie and the Mensheviks and Socialist Revolutionaries who supported it. Of the 102 elected vowels in Ivaiovo-Voznesensk, there were 58 Bolsheviks. In Shuya, where Frunze ran, out of 40 elected vowels there were 30 Bolsheviks. M. V. Frunze is elected chairman of the city duma, and the Bolshevik worker I. P. Volkov is elected city mayor. All leading positions in both the Duma and the city government were occupied by the Bolsheviks.

2. Military-organizational and military leadership activities of M. V. Frunze

Frunze's interest in military affairs awoke from a young age, when he enthusiastically studied military history, and gained experience in armed struggle in the difficult conditions of the revolutionary underground, in the barricade battles at Krasnaya Presnya in Moscow. In Siberian exile, Frunze used all available opportunities to study military affairs. He organized a special circle of exiled Bolshevik revolutionaries, which its participants called a “military academy.”
During the First World War, M. V. Frunze, who closely followed the course of military operations, often amazed his comrades with his subtle understanding of special issues of military art and surprisingly accurate prediction of the outcome of many military operations. Frunze significantly expanded his knowledge and developed his military outlook while conducting revolutionary work on the Western Front, where he was on assignment from the party in 1916-1917.
M.V. Frunze had all the qualities necessary for a military leader. He had an iron will, organizational talent, the ability to be close to the masses and an extraordinary capacity for work.
He knew special military literature well, especially the works of great Russian commanders. Fluent in several foreign languages, Frunze read literature on military issues by prominent Western European military theorists.
In a word, with his entire life, as well as with his tireless, never-ending work on self-education and self-education, M. V. Frunze prepared himself for the arduous activity of military leadership. “Mikhail Vasilyevich,” wrote K. E. Voroshilov, “became a commander and leader of the armed proletarian forces, having gone through the difficult school of an underground Bolshevik, which filled in a lot of gaps in the special military knowledge of this extraordinary man. It may seem like a miracle that yesterday’s convict, hunted fugitive and exiled settler first becomes an exemplary military organizer in the post of Yaroslavl district commissar, and then heads the most important operations to defeat the counter-revolutionary forces that threatened the still fragile, fragile proletarian state.”
Active participation in the construction of a new army began for M. V. Frunze during his work in Shuya. Under his leadership, in January 1918, the first detachment of the Red Army was created here. Shuya became the gathering place for all the detachments of the new army created in the Ivanovo-Voznesensky region. Subsequently, the 57th Shuisky Regiment was formed from them.
When the German hordes launched an attack on Petrograd, work on creating the Red Army began with renewed vigor.
In response to the increased intervention against the Soviet Republic, by decision of the V All-Russian Congress of Soviets, a transition was made from the volunteer principle of recruiting the Red Army to general mobilization, and compulsory military training was introduced. M. V. Frunze headed the Ivanovo-Voznesensk provincial military commissariat. On his initiative, instructor courses for general education were organized, to which the entire party activists of the province were enrolled. In one of his speeches, he called for “the entire province to be turned into a military camp.”
The provincial military registration and enlistment office, headed by M. V. Frunze, successfully completed the tasks of forming and sending new units of the Red Army to the front. The Ivanovo-Voznesensk province was one of the leaders in this work in the Soviet Republic. During the civil war, the provincial military registration and enlistment office carried out a total of about 90 different mobilizations, during which many thousands of soldiers and commanders were sent to the front.
Taking into account the high military-organizational qualities of M. V. Frunze, the Ivanovo-Voznesensk provincial conference unanimously recommended him for the post of military commissar of the Yaroslavl military district. This recommendation was supported by the All-Russian Bureau of Military Commissars, and in accordance with its request, the party decides to transfer Frunze to military work.
Under Frunze's leadership, a radical restructuring of party-political work is being carried out in the troops and institutions. Great help This was supported by D. A. Furmanov, who was seconded at the request of Mikhail Vasilyevich to the district headquarters, who worked with Frunze in the provincial executive committee and the provincial party committee, showing himself to be an energetic and skillful employee. In a short time, the publication of the daily district newspaper “Armed Poor” (since 1919 “Nabat”) was established.
At the direction of Frunze, courses for training agitators for parts of the district are being created at the provincial commissariats. The course program included studying the economic situation and economic policy of the party, current military-political issues, and the history of the Russian revolutionary movement. Issues of propaganda art were also not overlooked.
M. V. Frunze attached great importance to the cause of educating the Red Army soldiers, especially the elimination of illiteracy. He saw this as one of the decisive means of increasing their political consciousness, morale and combat training. He believed that every fighter should be convinced of the justice of the goals for which he is fighting. On his instructions, literacy schools were established in parts of the district, in which compulsory education was introduced for the illiterates; In the same schools, groups were created for the illiterate and for the literate in order to improve their educational level.
During M.V. Frunze's tenure as district military commissar, the most significant features of the style of his military activities clearly emerged. First of all, this is high competence. Those who happened to work with him at that time admired the knowledge with which he approached the solution of special military issues. Thus, the experienced lawyer A. A. Ern, who once defended Frunze and Gusev at the trial, and was invited in 1918 to the post of legal adviser of the Yaroslavl Military District, recalled: “Every week I had to participate in meetings of the district meeting, which were chaired by Mikhail Vasilyevich, and I was amazed at the skill and knowledge that he displayed when discussing specifically military issues, which were, of course, completely unfamiliar to him before.”
Another old military specialist who knew Frunze from working together at the headquarters of the Yaroslavl Military District, F. F. Novitsky wrote in his memoirs: “M. V. Frunze had an amazing ability to quickly understand the most complex and hitherto unknown to him issues, to separate the essential from the secondary... What was especially striking was the speed with which he mastered such a complex matter as mobilization work. In the old army it was carried out by specially trained people."
However, the high professionalism that distinguished Frunze can only partly be explained by natural talent. This is primarily the result of self-education, a highly developed sense of personal responsibility for the work entrusted by the party. Having become a military leader, Mikhail Vasilyevich strove to master military affairs to perfection. He could be seen late at night at home, bent over books and maps. He spared no time in business conversations with people from whom he could gain the knowledge he needed.
Another significant feature of M. V. Frunze’s style of military activity is a creative, proactive approach to business. He placed executive discipline and strict compliance with orders and instructions from higher authorities above all else. At the same time, when solving any issue, Frunze strove to find all available opportunities, to show innovative initiative and independence, and boldly took upon himself full responsibility for the decisions he made.
Showing initiative and a creative approach to business, Frunze highly valued these qualities in others and in every possible way contributed to their development in the troops under his command. In the very first orders for the district, he pointed out to some leaders that they lacked the proper energy and initiative in mobilization work.
A determined opponent of the cabinet style of leadership, M. V. Frunze often visited the troops and met with soldiers and commanders. As eyewitnesses recall, Frunze came to the field not as a formidable inspector, but as an authoritative leader. Delving into all aspects of the life of units and formations, revealing shortcomings in the organization of service, equipment, weapons, food supply and quartering of troops, in establishing cultural, mass and party-political work, he immediately gave practical instructions and advice on how to eliminate them, taught the inexperienced , strictly asked the careless ones.
At the same time, M. V. Frunze, who was distinguished by his high demands and intransigence towards shortcomings, refrained from imposing strict penalties during all the years of his command activity. His authority among the troops was so high that there was simply no need for them.
Thanks to the efforts of Frunze, who relied on local party organizations in his military activities, numerous mobilization tasks of the center and fronts were carried out quickly and efficiently. From September 1918 to February 1919 alone, in the Ivanovo-Voznesensk province alone, the number of volunteers and mobilized people amounted to over 70 thousand people. In September 1918, 50 marching companies and 20 marching teams with a total number of 15 thousand people were sent to the fronts of the civil war. The formation of two full-blooded divisions (1st and 7th) and many special units was launched, which were sent to the front as soon as they were ready
The military talent of M.V. Frunze, which manifested itself so clearly in the post of military commissar of the rear district, was especially necessary on the fronts of the civil war, where at the beginning of 1919 a difficult situation arose in connection with the onset of the offensive of Kolchak’s army. By order of the Revolutionary Military Council of the Republic No. 470 of December 26, 1918, M.V. Frunze was appointed commander of the 4th Army, which operated on the southern wing of the Eastern Front. This appointment corresponded to the desire of Mikhail Vasilyevich himself to go to the front as quickly as possible, which he repeatedly told his friends and comrades about.
With the appointment of M. V. Frunze to the post of army commander, a new chapter begins in his life - the period of military leadership activity
At the end of January 1919, Frunze arrived at the headquarters of the 4th Army of the Eastern Front, which was then located in Samara. The appointment to such a high post of a person who had no previous experience of leading troops in front-line conditions might seem at first glance not entirely justified. Mikhail Vasilyevich himself was ready to take a more modest post in the active army. But the Central Committee of the party, which knew Mikhail Vasilyevich well and highly valued his exceptional organizational skills, decided otherwise. It didn't take long for it to become clear how far-sighted and successful this choice was.
On the Eastern Front, M. V. Frunze prepared and successfully carried out an offensive operation (counterattack on Kolchak), which was included in textbooks on the history of military art.
M. V. Frunze found a difficult situation in the army troops. They were poorly armed and littered with hostile people. There were riots here and there. There were cases of disobedience and refusal to carry out orders to attack. Units and formations resembled semi-partisan formations, which lacked basic order and military discipline.
Mikhail Vasilyevich decisively demanded that commanders take urgent measures to create disciplined, trained regular units from semi-partisan, unstable formations.
M. V. Frunze skillfully combined firmness and flexibility when establishing military order. He had, for example, to face the direct disobedience of the strong-willed, energetic, but reluctant brigade commander Plyasunkov, who distinguished himself in the battles for Uralsk, but reluctantly obeyed the higher command and was capable of rash actions. The latter refused to take part in the appointed garrison parade of troops in the city of Uralsk due to the fact that it was not his brigade that was given the honor of marching at the head of the parade columns. In the form of an ultimatum, the brigade commander demanded that M.V. Frunze appear for an explanation at a meeting of brigade commanders.
Among the particularly urgent and important measures taken by the army commander to increase the combat effectiveness of the troops was the strengthening of command personnel. Having carefully studied them, M. V. Frunze came to the disappointing conclusion about the need for major personal changes. He reported this in a telegram to the Chairman of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee Ya. M. Sverdlov. In poorly disciplined units, some commanding officers were replaced.
Mikhail Vasilyevich had a special instinct for good workers, knew how to correctly assess their merits, find an approach to everyone, and awaken the desire to selflessly serve the cause of the party and the interests of the working people. He boldly promoted people from the people to command positions. He, in particular, deserves the credit for the fact that his commanding talent was so clearly demonstrated. legendary hero civil war by V. I. Chapaev. This name became known from the battles of 1918. After returning to the front from the Military Academy of the Red Army, where he was sent to study, V.I. Chapaev was ready to fight in any, even the most modest position. But Frunze, appreciating Chapaev’s remarkable leadership abilities, appointed him commander of the Algai group, and then head of the 25th Infantry Division.
At the same time, M.V. Frunze also had great respect for the old military specialists who served honestly in the new army; he was one of the most consistent proponents of Lenin’s line to attract them to the side of Soviet power.
It took M.V. Frunze less than two months to strengthen discipline and organization among the troops, increase their combat effectiveness, and make them combat-ready to conduct active offensive operations.
In the defensive operations of the 4th Army against Kolchak, M.V. Frunze shows an example of a creative, innovative approach to solving combat missions. Faced with an experienced opponent who skillfully used special fighting techniques in each individual case, Frunze carefully studies his tactics and develops original ways counter-actions that invariably led to victory. He immediately showed himself to be a supporter of maneuver operations. Even during the period of heavy defensive battles, Frunze actively maneuvered his troops and launched decisive counterattacks in directions where the enemy least expected them.
Everyone who knew M. V. Frunze at that time through joint, combat work, noted his exceptional firmness and consistency in implementing the decisions made, his constant focus on always being at the center of decisive events, being in the area where main battles. In the most difficult conditions, Frunze was able to prepare and successfully carry out an operation to defeat the White Guard troops, which led to the liberation of the villages of Slompkha and Lbischensk in the Ural region. Assessing the activities of M. V. Frunze as army commander, F. F. Novitsky wrote: “From the very first days of his military service, immediately occupying the large post of army commander, i.e., a post that in the old days was given towards the end military career“Mikhail Vasilyevich immediately began to carry out his combat work in the full sense of the word brilliantly and in accordance with all the rules, the laws of military science.”
M.V. Frunze did not stay long as army commander. With his skillful actions, he attracted the attention of V.I. Lenin, the Central Committee of the party. And when the Southern Group of Forces of the Eastern Front was created, which was entrusted with the task of stopping Kolchak’s offensive and then launching a counteroffensive, M. V. Frunze was put at its head.

3. Defeat of Wrangel

September 21, 1920 M.V. Frunze is appointed commander of the troops of the Southern Front, formed to defeat the anti-Bolshevik forces and interventionists in the south of Ukraine and the Russian army of Lieutenant General P.N. Wrangel in Crimea. The commander in the shortest possible time - in just 50 days - prepared the troops of the Southern Front for military action. Then he developed and carried out in just 20 days two major military operations in Northern Tavria and an operation to capture the fortified areas of Perekop and Chongar
Before going on the offensive, Frunze decided to wear out the striking forces of the technically equipped enemy in stubborn defensive battles. Until October 18, front troops fought fierce defensive battles with Wrangel’s troops in Northern Tavria and on the Dnieper. In these battles, the Southern Front deprived the enemy of offensive capabilities. Particular attention was paid to the defense of the Kakhovsky bridgehead, which was of great operational importance and from which it was planned to deliver the main blow to the army of Lieutenant General P.N. Wrangel. In order to firmly hold the Kakhovsky bridgehead, for the first time, a deep-in-depth anti-tank defense was created there with the involvement of artillery and anti-tank barriers. After all, Wrangel’s command had 35 armored vehicles and 25 tanks, while the Red Army formations opposing them had no tanks at all, and only later received armored vehicles. However, in the very first battles, the artillerymen successfully repelled a tank attack by the White Guards.
After the front had stabilized, preparations for the operation began. To carry out the offensive operation, the Southern Front had the 4th, 6th and 13th armies (commanders V.S. Lazarevich, A.I. Kork, I.P. Uborevich) and the 1st, 2nd cavalry armies (commanders S.M. Budyonny ; F.M. Mironov, then O.I. Gorodovikov). Frunze managed to create an almost triple superiority in men and artillery.
The Southern Front under the command of Frunze carried out two successive operations in depth and time: a counteroffensive in Northern Tavria (October 28-November 3) and Perekop-Chongar (November 7-17), which ended with the liberation of the entire Crimean Peninsula.
The defeat of Wrangel's troops is one of the major stages of Frunze's military leadership. After the victory over the enemy, Frunze issued an appeal to the officers and soldiers of the White Guard army, promising them forgiveness if they remained in Russia. Tens of thousands of people believed Frunze, who was respected even by his enemies, but the party leadership (including B. Kun) ignored Frunze’s promises and launched a bloody terror in Crimea. Thus, the name Frunze became, perhaps against his will, associated with the massacres of prisoners of war.
On final stage During the Civil War, during the operation, Frunze showed all his military leadership talent, multifaceted experience, and high organizational skills, enriching the young Soviet military art with new ways of preparing and conducting a major operation. Thus, through the deep operational formation of front troops, the successful development of a tactical breakthrough into an operational one (bringing the 1st and 2nd Cavalry armies into battle), in three or four days, units and formations of the Red Army in the Perekop-Chongar operation broke through a heavily fortified, deeply echeloned positional defense enemy. In addition, this same operation gave experience in crossing Sivash at night in order to get the Red troops behind the main group defending on Perekop. It should be emphasized that Mikhail Vasilyevich comprehensively took into account the experience of Field Marshal P. Lassi, when Russian troops under his command twice, in 1737 and 1738, bypassed the Perekop fortifications of the Crimean Khan through Sivash. At that time, Lassi took advantage of Sivash's temporary cross-country ability.
By resolution of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee of November 25, 1920, for the extraordinary energy demonstrated, for the skillful and correct personal leadership of the troops and the unusually rapid defeat of Wrangel’s army, M.V. Frunze was awarded an Honorary Revolutionary Weapon - a saber with the inscription “To the People's Hero”. We emphasize that the Honorary Revolutionary Weapon was a special type of award in the Workers 'and Peasants' Red Army in 1919-1930. and was awarded to the All-Russian Central Executive Committee and the Russian Military Revolutionary Revolutionary Military Service “for special military distinctions” to the highest commanders of the active army. A total of 20 people were awarded, including S.S. Kamenev, S.M. Budyonny, M.N. Tukhachevsky, I.P. Uborevich, F.K. Mironov, A.I. Cork, N.D. Kashirin, A.I. Egorov, I.S. Kutyakov and others.
Thus, during the Civil War M.V. Frunze deservedly earned himself an outstanding, talented Soviet commander who never knew defeat. And during the transition of the Red Army to a peaceful situation, he was one of the organizers and direct leader of the military reform, which laid the foundations for the future power of the Soviet Armed Forces. Frunze is one of the founders of Soviet military science and military art and left a theoretical legacy that is of great value to this day.

4. M. V. Frunze - commander of the Soviet armed forces

From December 1920 to March 1924 he was the authorized representative of the RVSR in Ukraine, commander of the troops of Ukraine and Crimea and at the same time a member of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the Communist Party (Bolsheviks) of the Ukraine, deputy chairman of the Council of People's Commissars of the Ukrainian SSR (from February 1922) and deputy chairman of the Ukrainian Economic Council. In November 1921 - January 1922 he headed the Ukrainian diplomatic delegation to Turkey at the conclusion of a treaty of friendship between the Ukrainian SSR and Turkey.
In March 1924 M.V. Frunze was approved as Deputy Chairman of the Revolutionary Military Council of the USSR and People's Commissar for Military and Naval Affairs of the USSR, and from April 1924 he also became the Chief of Staff of the Red Army and the Head of the Military Academy. Under his leadership, what L.D. started was completed in the USSR. Trotsky's military reform of 1924-1925. It was carried out in an environment of economic revival caused by the NEP. And relative political stability had also been established by that time - the white armies were defeated, the opposition was suppressed, and all conflicts took place only within the Bolshevik party and were of little interest to the majority of the population, who did not care about Trotsky, Zinoviev, or Stalin. Therefore, it was possible to reduce the army and optimize the management level in a short time.
M. V. Frunze was unusually perspicacious in determining the prospects for the development of the Red Army. He raised the question of accelerating its technical equipment.
By 1924, some experience had already been accumulated in the transition to territorial militia formations in areas with the most united proletarian population. The fact is that large military expenditures were unsustainable for the economy and hampered recovery and further development National economy, but even in these conditions it was necessary to ensure reliable military protection of the Soviet state. This problem could be solved by combining personnel and territorial formations. “The presence of territorial police formations,” wrote M. V. Frunze, “allows us to increase the number of contingents passing through the ranks of our army. In addition to this consideration, we also take into account the fact that this system allows for military service without a long break from the economy, which is a big win for the population, and, finally, that it adequately provides for the interests of training. That is why, on the issue of the structure of our armed forces, we took the point of view of a standing army plus militia formations. We don’t have and cannot have any other way out under the given conditions and the number of our peaceful personnel.”
Foreign policy conditions were favorable to the reduction of the Soviet Armed Forces, since at that time international imperialism had not yet managed to overcome the consequences of anti-war protests in their countries, as well as the economic recession that broke out after the World War. The period of diplomatic recognition of the USSR in 1924 was regarded by some political observers as the second triumphal march of Soviet power. The ominous shadow of intervention hanging over the Soviet borders was gradually dissipating. Germany, suffering from the indemnity of the Entente and the loss of Alsace-Lorraine, was forced to be the first to resume diplomatic relations with Soviet Russia.
In implementing the Soviet military reform, it was necessary to proceed from the fact that the limit on the permanent strength of the Soviet Armed Forces on October 1, 1924 was set at 562 thousand people, not counting the variable (registered) composition.
The mixed system of military construction provided very noticeable savings. The maintenance of one Red Army soldier in cadre units cost an average of 535 rubles, and in territorial units - 291 rubles. It was also important that with significantly smaller material costs the territorial system made it possible to significantly increase the number of conscripts passing through the ranks of the army.
On March 21, 1924, the Central Executive Committee and the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR approved a resolution on the terms of service in the Red Army, the Red Army and the OGPU troops, which regulated the new procedure for military service. For all branches of the ground forces, a two-year service life was determined, for specialists in the air fleet - 3 years and in the Navy - 4 years.
Call-up to active service was established once a year, in the fall. The conscription age was raised to 21 years, the service life was shortened for citizens who enjoyed benefits marital status, was cancelled.
The order of the Revolutionary Military Council of the USSR dated June 9, 1924, signed by M. V. Frunze, provided for the creation, in addition to the six national military schools that already existed by that time, of a number of new ones intended for the training of national command personnel. By November 1924, 18 military educational institutions were functioning, among them the cavalry school of the North Caucasian mountain nationalities, the 6th united Tatar-Bashkir school, the 3rd united school (Polish) of the Red Communards named after Unschlicht in Moscow, etc.
By the end of 1924, four Ukrainian divisions, a Belarusian, two Georgian, an Azerbaijani and an Armenian division had been deployed. Rifle and cavalry divisions were formed in the Uzbek SSR, and one cavalry division each in the Turkmen SSR and the Kirghiz ASSR. In the autonomous republics of the Russian Federation, the following were formed: a rifle regiment - in the Yakut Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic, a cavalry regiment - in the Buryat-Mongolian Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic, one rifle division with a cavalry regiment - in the Bashkir and Tatar Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republics.
At the end of April 1924, under the chairmanship of M.V. Frunze, a meeting of the Main Charter Commission was held, at which subcommittees were created to develop regulations for individual branches of the military. It was decided to give all the manuals of the military branches the name “Combat Manual”. The Field Manual was to become common to all branches of the military. Already in 1924, the Red Army received new regulations - the Internal Service Charter, the Garrison Service Charter, the Combat Regulations (two parts), the Infantry Regulations, the Cavalry Combat Regulations (two parts), the Artillery Combat Regulations, the Red Army Armored Combat Regulations; in 1925 - Disciplinary Charter of the Red Army, Charter of the Naval Service of the RKKF. In addition, several different instructions were published.
M. V. Frunze spoke about the need to introduce new governing documents immediately after the war. As an initiative, the headquarters of the troops of Ukraine and Crimea under active participation The commander developed draft regulations for cavalry and infantry, a draft manual for aviation commanders, which M.V. Frunze reported on at the meeting of military delegates of the XI Congress of the RCP (b).
The demobilization of older members of the Red Army after the end of the civil war also entailed a reduction in command personnel. The most trained and loyal commanders to Soviet power were retained in the cadres.
On July 30, 1924, the Revolutionary Military Council of the USSR issued an order to assign the entire command staff the single rank of “commander of the Red Army.” In the fall of the same year, the sleeve insignia was slightly changed. Mikhail Vasilyevich began to wear on his sleeves the blue cavalry braid of the commander of the 14th category with a red star and four red diamonds. On the chest of the tunic there are three “conversations” - cloth stripes of blue color, like the buttonholes.
In November - December 1924, the plenum of the Revolutionary Military Council of the USSR, chaired by M. V. Frunze, developed the requirements for the training program for troops. This document indicated that personnel must be trained, first of all, for active offensive operations, and during training, it is necessary to achieve clear interaction between the types of troops in combat and operations.
Since March 1924, Frunze decided on the most important issues in the country's military department. Based on the decision of the Plenum of the Central Committee, the Presidium of the Central Executive Committee of the USSR on January 26, 1925 accepted Trotsky’s proposal to relieve him of his duties as People’s Commissar for Military Affairs and Chairman of the Revolutionary Military Council of the USSR. M. V. Frunze was appointed People's Commissar for Military and Naval Affairs and Chairman of the Revolutionary Military Council of the USSR, and I. S. Unshlikht was appointed his deputy. The Revolutionary Military Council included P. I. Baranov, A. S. Bubnov, S. M. Budyonny, K. E. Voroshilov, A. I. Egorov, V. P. Zatonsky. V. I. Zof, M. M. Lashevich, G. K. Ordzhonikidze, Sh. Z. Eliava, Khedir-Aliev.
February 10, 1925 Council People's Commissars appointed M.V. Frunze a member of the Council of Labor and Defense of the USSR.
Back in July 1924, the Organizing Bureau of the Central Committee of the RCP (b) adopted a resolution on the gradual transition to unity of command in the Soviet Armed Forces, entrusting the solution of this task to the Revolutionary Military Council of the USSR. On March 2, 1925, the Revolutionary Military Council of the USSR issued an order introducing unity of command. In March 1925, the Central Committee of the RCP (b) sent a directive letter to the party committees “On unity of command in the Red Army,” in which it proposed to maximally assist the political bodies of the army in carrying out practical measures to strengthen unity of command and strengthen party influence in the army.
Military reform was accompanied by a great upsurge in military theoretical work. Numerous congresses and meetings of the command staff of various branches of the armed forces were held throughout the Armed Forces and in military districts, at which operational-tactical issues, long-term tasks of training and education of this type of troops were discussed. So, in 1924-1925. Congresses of infantry, cavalry, artillery chiefs, communications, supply chiefs and others were held. Members of the Revolutionary Military Council of the USSR, headed by M. V. Frunze, took part in their work. Creative discussions on all topical issues of military development took place on the pages of the military press. The discussion on the problem of organizing rifle troops, which began on Frunze’s initiative, was especially active. At this time, military scientific societies expanded their activities more and more widely.
In 1925, there were 77 divisions in the Red Army - 31 personnel and 46 territorial. The mobilization readiness of the Red Army was strengthened by the concentration of the main armed forces, mainly personnel units, in the border districts. “From the point of view of army deployment,” noted M. V. Frunze, “the situation not only has not become worse than it was before, but in some respects there are even serious improvements.” By mid-1925, the main reform measures were completed.
Mikhail Vasilyevich was involved in car accidents twice and received serious injuries that undermined his health. Despite the objections of M.V. Frunze, in September 1925, he, accompanied by the head and chief surgeon of the Central Military Hospital, P.V. Mandryka, was sent for treatment to the Crimea. I.V. Stalin, K.E. Voroshilov, and M.F. Shkiryatov, who were vacationing there, visited Frunze. At times he felt better. Once, Mikhail Vasilyevich even managed to get out with his attending physician Mandryka, Voroshilov and Shkiryatov to the foothills of Ai-Petri to hunt. For some time there was an improvement. However, soon the bleeding began again and the headaches returned. Doctors insisted on M.V. Frunze returning to the capital for hospitalization. On September 29, together with members of the Central Committee who were vacationing in Crimea, he left for Moscow.
On October 27, M. V. Frunze was transferred to the Soldatenkovskaya (now Botkin) hospital, and on October 29, Professor Rozanov operated on him. After the operation, Mikhail Vasilyevich did not regain consciousness for almost two days. Doctors fought unsuccessfully against heart failure. At 5:20 a.m. on October 31, the patient’s situation became extremely difficult. This was reported to I.V. Stalin, I.S. Unshlikht and A.S. Bubnov by telephone. At 5:40 a.m. M. V. Frunze passed away.
On the same day at 10 o’clock in the morning, a meeting of the Revolutionary Military Council of the USSR was held and an order was issued to organize the funeral of M. V. Frunze. From November 1 to November 7 inclusive, a week of mourning was declared for the Red Army and Navy. Taking into account the outstanding merits of M. V. Frunze, the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks and the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR decided to bury him on Red Square.

This question is answered by his suicide letter, which is published in full for the first time.

In the late autumn of 1925, Moscow was agitated by a rumor that Trotsky’s people had killed Frunze. However, very soon they started saying that this was the work of Stalin! Moreover, “The Tale of the Unextinguished Moon” appeared, which gave this version almost an official sound, because, as the son of the author of “The Tale” Boris Andronikashvili-Pilnyak recalls, it was confiscated and destroyed! What really happened 85 years ago? What do the archives show? The investigation was conducted by Nikolai Nad (Dobryukha).

The well-known personal conflict between Stalin and Trotsky was a reflection of the political clash in the party of the two main trends of which they were leaders. The fire of this conflict, which had been smoldering within the party core even under Lenin, after his death in January 1924, flared up by the fall so that it threatened to “burn” the party itself.

On the side of Stalin (Dzhugashvili) were: Zinoviev (Radomyslsky), Kamenev (Rosenfeld), Kaganovich, etc. On the side of Trotsky (Bronstein) are Preobrazhensky, Sklyansky, Rakovsky and others. The situation was aggravated by the fact that military power was in the hands of Trotsky. He was then the Chairman of the RVS, i.e. the main person in the Red Army for military and naval affairs. On January 26, 1925, Stalin managed to replace him with his comrade-in-arms in the Civil War, Mikhail Frunze. This weakened the position of Trotsky’s group in the party and state. And she began to prepare a political battle with Stalin.

This is what it all looked like in Trotsky’s notes: “... a delegation of the Central Committee came to me... to coordinate with me changes in the personnel of the military department. In essence, it was already a pure comedy. The renewal of personnel... has been carried out for a long time full swing behind my back, and it was only a matter of observing decorum. The first blow inside the military department fell on Sklyansky. "..." To undermine Sklyansky, in the long term and against me, Stalin placed Unshlikht in the military department... Sklyansky was removed. Frunze was appointed in his place... Frunze discovered during the war his undoubted abilities as a commander..."

Trotsky describes the further course of events as follows: “In January 1925, I was relieved of my duties as People's Commissar for Military Affairs. Most of all they were afraid... of my connection with the army. I gave up my post without a fight... in order to wrest from my opponents the weapon of insinuations about my military plans."

Based on these explanations, Frunze’s unexpected death as a result

The “unsuccessful operation” turned out to be to Trotsky’s advantage in that it gave rise to a lot of talk. At first there was a rumor that Trotsky’s people did this in retaliation for the fact that the “troika” Stalin-Zinoviev-Kamenev replaced Trotsky with their Frunze. However, having gained their bearings, Trotsky’s supporters blamed Stalin’s “troika” for this. And to make it look more convincing and memorable, they organized the creation by the then famous writer Boris Pilnyak of “The Tale of the Unextinguished Moon,” which left a heavy aftertaste in our souls.

The “Tale” indicated the deliberateness of eliminating yet another Chairman of the Revolutionary Military Union, disliked by Stalin’s “troika,” who had not worked for even 10 months. The “Tale” described in detail how a completely healthy commander of the Civil War tried to convince everyone that he was healthy, and how he was finally forced to undergo surgery by man No. 1. And although Pilnyak addressed Voronsky “sorrowfully and friendly” on January 28, 1926, in publicly stated: “The purpose (photo: Izvestia archive) of the story was in no way a report on the death of the People’s Commissar of Military Affairs,” readers came to the conclusion that it was not by chance that Trotsky saw his own in Pilnyak, calling him a “realist”... The “Tale” clearly pointed to Stalin and his role in this “case”: “The not hunched man remained in the office... Without hunching, he sat over the papers, with a red thick pencil in his hands... People from that “troika” entered the office - one and the other. , which accomplished..."

Trotsky was the first to speak about the existence of this “troika” that decided all affairs: “The opponents whispered among themselves and groped for ways and methods of struggle. At this time, the idea of a “troika” (Stalin-Zinoviev-Kamenev) had already arisen, which was supposed to be opposed to me... "

There is evidence in the archives of how the idea for “The Tale” came about. It began, apparently, with the fact that Voronsky, as a member of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee, was included in the “Commission for organizing the funeral of Comrade M.V. Frunze.” Of course, at the Commission meeting, in addition to ritual issues, all the circumstances of the “unsuccessful operation” were discussed. The fact that Pilnyak dedicated “The Tale of the Unextinguished Moon” to Voronsky suggests that Pilnyak received the main information about the reasons for the “unsuccessful operation” from him. And clearly from Trotsky’s “angle of view”. It is not for nothing that already in 1927 Voronsky, as an active participant

Trotskyist opposition, was expelled from the party. Later, Pilnyak himself will suffer.

So, Pilnyak was part of Voronsky’s literary circle, which, in turn, was part of Trotsky’s political circle. As a result, these circles closed.

Cut or stabbed?

Despite the mutual accusations of politicians, public opinion still laid the blame for the death of Frunze most of all on the doctors. What happened in the operating room was quite reliable and was widely discussed in the newspapers. One of these openly expressed opinions (it, like many other materials cited here, is stored in the RGVA) was sent on November 10, 1925 to Moscow from Ukraine: “... doctors are to blame - and only doctors, but not a weak heart. According newspaper information... Comrade Frunze's operation was performed for a round duodenal ulcer, which, by the way, had healed, as can be seen from the autopsy report. The patient had difficulty falling asleep... did not tolerate anesthesia well and remained under the last 1 hour 5 minutes, receiving during this time, 60 grams of chloroform and 140 grams of ether (this is seven times more than the norm. - NAD) From the same sources we know that, having opened the abdominal cavity and not finding in it the work that consultants and surgeons expected out of zeal or for other reasons, they took an excursion to the area where the abdominal organs are located: the stomach, liver, gallbladder, duodenum and cecum region. The result was “weakness of cardiac activity” and 1.5 days later, after a terrible struggle between life and death, the patient died of “heart paralysis”. Questions arise naturally: why was the operation not performed under local anesthesia - as is known, general anesthesia is less harmful..? On what grounds do surgeons justify the examination of all abdominal organs, which caused a certain injury and required time and unnecessary anesthesia at a time when the patient, with a weak heart, was already terribly overloaded with it? "And, finally, why did the consultants not take into account that in the heart of Comrade Frunze there is a pathological process - namely, parenchymal degeneration of the heart muscle, which was recorded by the autopsy? “These are the main points that, with all the ingenious subtlety and multi-layered diagnosis, post factum make the issue the property of a criminal chronicle...”

But there were representatives of another group, which no less passionately defended “the necessity of surgical intervention,” referring to the fact “that the patient had a duodenal ulcer with a pronounced scar seal around the intestine. Such seals often lead to disruption of the evacuation of food from the stomach , and in the future - to obstruction, which can only be treated surgically."

As it turned out, Frunze’s internal organs were thoroughly worn out, which doctors warned him about back in the summer of 1922. But Frunze delayed until the last minute, until the bleeding began, which frightened even him. As a result, “the operation became his last resort to somehow improve his condition.”

I managed to find a telegram confirming this fact: "V. (instruct) Urgently. Tiflis People's Commissariat of Military Affairs of Georgia Comrade Eliava Copy to OKA Commander Comrade Egorov. According to the resolution of the council of doctors at the Central Committee of the RCP, Comrade Frunze back in May was supposed to go abroad for treatment despite To this end, under all sorts of pretexts, he has been postponing his departure until now, continuing to work yesterday, after receiving all the documents, he completely abandoned the trip abroad and on June twenty-ninth he is leaving to visit you in Borjomi. The health situation is more serious than he apparently thinks, if the course of treatment in Borjomi is unsuccessful, he will have to resort to for surgery, it is extremely necessary to create conditions in Borjomi that are somewhat replacing Carlsbad, do not refuse the appropriate orders, three dashes, four rooms are needed, possibly isolated “June 23, 1922...”

By the way, the telegram was given when Frunze was not yet a member of the Pre-Revolutionary Military Council and a candidate member of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the RCP (b). In other words, three years before the tragic death of Mikhail Frunze. Naturally, with such a critical state of the body, colleagues from Frunze’s entourage turned to Stalin to convince their illustrious commander to take their health seriously. And, apparently, already at that time Stalin made some suggestions. When Frunze was appointed People's Commissar of Military Affairs, that is, one of the main leaders of the country, the entire Stalinist part of the leadership became concerned about his well-being. Not only Stalin and Mikoyan, but also Zinoviev, almost as an order (you belong not only to yourself, but also to the party, and above all to the party!) began to insist that Frunze take care of his health. And Frunze “gave up”: he himself began to seriously fear the pain and bleeding that tormented him more and more often. Moreover, the story of advanced appendicitis, which almost killed Stalin, was fresh. Dr. Rozanov recalled: “It was difficult to vouch for the outcome. Lenin called me in the hospital morning and evening. And not only inquired about Stalin’s health, but also demanded the most thorough report.” And Stalin survived.

Therefore, regarding the treatment of the People's Commissar of Military Affairs, Stalin and Zinoviev also had a detailed conversation with the same surgeon Rozanov, who, by the way, successfully removed the bullet from the seriously wounded Lenin. It turns out that the practice of taking care of one’s comrades has been around for a long time.

Last days

In the summer of 1925, Frunze's health again deteriorated sharply. And then the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR decided: "Allow Comrade Frunze's leave from September 7th of this year." Frunze leaves for Crimea. But Crimea does not save. Famous doctors Rozanov and Kasatkin are sent to Frunze and prescribed bed rest

But alas... On September 29, I have to urgently go to the Kremlin hospital for examination. On October 8, the council concluded: an operation is needed to establish whether the ulcer is the only cause of the suspicious bleeding? However, doubts about the advisability of surgical intervention remain. Frunze himself writes about this to his wife in Yalta like this: “I’m still in the hospital. There will be a new one on Saturday.

consultation I'm afraid that the operation will be denied..."

Fellow members of the Politburo, of course, continue to monitor the situation, but mainly by encouraging the doctors to be more diligent in order to resolve the issue once and for all. However, because of this, doctors could overdo it. Finally, a “new consultation” took place. And again, the majority decided that it was impossible to do without surgery. The same Rozanov was appointed as the surgeon...

Frunze is announced to be moving to the Soldatenkovsky (now Botkin) hospital, which was then considered the best (Lenin himself underwent surgery there). Nevertheless, Frunze is agitated by the doctors’ hesitation and writes a very personal letter to his wife, which turns out to be the last in his life...

By the way, when Rozanov operated on Stalin, he was also “overdosed” on chloroform: at first they tried to cut under local anesthesia, but the pain forced him to switch to general anesthesia. As for the question - why did the surgeons, without finding an open ulcer, examine all (!) organs of the abdominal cavity? - then this, as follows from the letter, was the desire of Frunze himself: since they have cut it up, everything should be examined.

Frunze was buried near the Kremlin wall. Stalin made a short speech. Trotsky was not seen at the funeral. Frunze's widow, according to rumors, was convinced until her last day that he was “stabbed to death by doctors.” She survived her husband by only a year.

P.S. These and other unknown materials about Stalin’s time will soon see the light of day in the book “Stalin and Christ,” which will be an unexpected continuation of the book “How Stalin was Killed.”

The commander to his wife Sophia: “Our family is tragic... everyone is sick”

"Moscow, 26.10.

Hello dear!

Well, my ordeal has finally come to an end! Tomorrow (actually the move took place on October 28, 1925 - NAD) in the morning I will move to the Soldatenkovskaya hospital, and the day after tomorrow (Thursday) there will be an operation. When you receive this letter, you will probably already have a telegram in your hands announcing its results. I now feel absolutely healthy and it’s even somehow funny not only to go, but even to think about surgery. Nevertheless, both councils decided to do it. Personally, I am satisfied with this decision. Let them once and for all take a good look at what is there and try to outline a real treatment. Personally, more and more often the thought flashes through my mind that there is nothing serious, because, otherwise, it is somehow difficult to explain the fact of my rapid improvement after rest and treatment. Well, now I need to do... After the operation, I still think about coming to you for two weeks. I received your letters. I read them, especially the second one - a big one, right with flour. Is it really all the illnesses that have come upon you? There are so many of them that it’s hard to believe in the possibility of recovery. Especially if, before you even start breathing, you are already busy organizing all sorts of other things. You need to try to take treatment seriously. To do this, you must first pull yourself together. Otherwise, everything is somehow going from bad to worse. It turns out that your worries about your children are worse for you, and ultimately for them. I once heard the following phrase about us: “The Frunze family is kind of tragic... Everyone is sick, and all the misfortunes are falling on everyone!..”. Indeed, we imagine some kind of continuous, continuous infirmary. We must try to change all this decisively. I took up this matter. You need to do it too.

I consider the doctors’ advice regarding Yalta to be correct. Try spending the winter there. I’ll somehow manage the money, provided, of course, that you don’t pay for all the doctors’ visits from your own funds. There won't be enough income for this. On Friday I am sending Schmidt with instructions to arrange everything for living in Yalta. IN last time took money from the Central Committee. I think we will survive the winter. If only you could stand firmly on your feet. Then everything will be fine. And after all, all this depends solely on you. All doctors assure you that you can certainly get better if you take your treatment seriously.

I had Tasya. She offered to go to Crimea. I refused. This was shortly after my return to Moscow. The other day Schmidt repeated this proposal on her behalf. I said that he should talk about this with you in Crimea.

Today I received an invitation from the Turkish ambassador to come with you to their embassy for the celebration of the anniversary of their revolution. I wrote a response from you and myself.

Yes, you ask for winter things, and don’t write what exactly you need. I don’t know how Comrade Schmidt will resolve this issue. He, poor fellow, doesn’t have a home either, thank God. Everyone is barely able to cope. I’m already telling him: “Why is this burden placed on you and me to have sick wives? Otherwise, I say, we’ll have to make new ones. Start with you, you’re older...” And he fingered himself and grinned: “He says he’s walking...” Well, you’re not even walking. It's just a shame! No good, signora cara. Therefore, if you please, get better, otherwise, as soon as I get up, I will definitely have a “lady of my heart”...

Why is T.G. furious? Here you are, woman... It seems that you are “disappointed” once again. Apparently, you are only afraid, remembering my numerous past ridicules, of bursting out with praises (just not of a flattering nature

) at her address. I'll think about Tasya, though. She, it seems, wants to go to Yalta herself. However, as you know. If you get on your own feet, of course, there will be no need for this.

Well, all the best. I kiss you warmly, get well soon. I am in a good mood and completely calm. If only it was safe for you. I hug and kiss you again.

Mikhail Vasilyevich Frunze is a famous figure during the Civil War. M

Cut or stabbed?

Last days

The commander to his wife Sophia: “Our family is tragic... everyone is sick”

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