Green Armies - Reasons For Failure

Reasons For Failure

Aside from the Bolshevik response, a number of internal aspects of the Green movement led to its failure. Green activity often amounted to senseless violence without an actual goal outside of murdering Communists and interrupting their economic and political activity. Thus, the armies rarely moved outside of their original geographic region. When the Greens conquered towns or villages, they neglected to install themselves politically and simply left the territory to be retaken later by Reds. Furthermore, there was a great deal of tension within the bands, which often included agrarian peasants, kulaks, workers, and Whites, many of whom possessed preexisting resentment towards each other. The Green armies were permanently underfunded, low on supplies, and would never have stood a chance against the Red armies which, despite their own flaws, were much more organized and whose soldiers’ morale improved as a result of greater, more frequent victories.