Leaders of the Russian Civil War

The Leaders of the Russian Civil War listed below comprise the important political and military figures of the Russian Civil War. The conflict, fought largely from 7 November 1917 to 25 October 1922, though with some conflicts in the Far East lasting until late 1923 and in Central Asia until 1934, was fought between numerous factions, the two largest being the Bolsheviks (The "Reds") and the White Movement (The "Whites"). While the Bolsheviks were centralized under the administration of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic and the Russian Communist Party (Bolsheviks), led by Vladimir Lenin, along with their various satellite and buffer states, the White Movement was more decentralized, functioning as a loose confederation of anti-Bolshevik forces united only in opposition to their common enemy, though from September 1918 to April 1920, the White Armies were nominally united under the administration of the Russian State, during which, for nearly two years, Admiral Alexander Kolchak served as the overall head of the White Movement and as the internationally recognized Head of State of Russia. In addition to the two primary factions, the war also involved a number of third parties, including the anarchists of the Revolutionary Insurgent Army of Ukraine, and the non-ideological Green Armies.

Unlike the Bolsheviks and the White Movement, the various third party factions which took part in the conflict did not form a united front and often fought against each other as much as they fought against the larger belligerents, occasionally forming alliances when convenient, and breaking them almost as often. For instance, the Black Army fought alongside the Bolsheviks against the forces of Anton Denikin in South Russia, while the members of the Socialist-Revolutionary Party frequently cooperated with the White Army. A number of foreign nations also intervened against the Bolsheviks for various reasons, including the principal Allied Powers of World War I, and their German and Austro-Hungarian opponents. In addition, a number of independence movements took the opportunity to break free from Russian control in the aftermath of the collapse of the Russian Empire, primarily fighting against the Bolsheviks, as well as against the White Army on occasion.