The Czech Legion revolt opens the Russian Civil War
40,000 former prisoners of war, trying to go home the long way, end up fighting the Bolsheviks along the Trans-Siberian Railway.
Quick facts
- Czech Legion size
- About 40,000 men
- Allied landings
- Murmansk, Archangel, Vladivostok, Baku
- Civil War deaths (estimated)
- 800,000 soldiers; 5-14 million total
What happened
The Czechoslovak Legion, roughly 40,000 men who were mostly former prisoners of war from the Austro-Hungarian army, had been fighting alongside Russia and was trying to travel east along the Trans-Siberian Railway to reach the Western Front by sea after Brest-Litovsk took Russia out of the war. Tensions with Bolshevik authorities in western Siberia turned into open fighting in May 1918, and the Legion seized long stretches of territory along the Volga and the railway. Allied powers seized on the revolt as an opportunity: Britain, France, and the United States, joined later by Japan, landed troops at Murmansk, Archangel, Vladivostok, and Baku, ostensibly to reopen an eastern front against Germany but in practice supporting anti-Bolshevik forces.
Why it matters
The Czech Legion's revolt is the point many historians mark as the true start of the Russian Civil War, since it gave scattered anti-Bolshevik forces a functioning army and territory to organize around, and it drew in direct foreign intervention on the White side. World History Encyclopedia estimates around 800,000 soldiers died in the civil war that followed, with at least 5 million civilians killed and some historians putting total deaths, including famine and disease, as high as 14 million; these figures remain disputed.
How we know
World History Encyclopedia's dedicated account of the Russian Civil War documents the Legion's size, its revolt along the Volga, and the locations of the resulting Allied landings.
Sources
- World History Encyclopedia. Russian Civil War: The Failed Fightback Against Bolshevism · Reputable sourceworldhistory.org · The domain "worldhistory.org" is on our Reputable source registry. · Link is live and its text matches the event's key terms (Jul 2026)
- World History Encyclopedia. Russian Civil War: The Failed Fightback Against Bolshevism · Reputable sourceworldhistory.org · The domain "worldhistory.org" is on our Reputable source registry. · Link is live and its text matches the event's key terms (Jul 2026)
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