Civil War
Kulik began his career serving with minimal distinction as a staff artillery non-commissioned officer in the tsarist army. On the outbreak of the Russian Civil War, his friendship with first-generation Bolshevik Kliment Voroshilov caused him to throw his lot in with the Red forces, leading to a personal introduction to Stalin and the command of the artillery of the 1st Cavalry Army (co-led by Stalin and Voroshilov) at the Battle of Tsaritsyn in 1918.
The position was almost entirely political in nature, a reward for Kulik's turning coat to the Reds and his loyalty to Voroshilov; Kulik himself had no experience with gun laying or commanding artillery crews, and the whole Bolshevik artillery force in Tsaritsyn consisted of 3 obsolete artillery pieces. Despite having little to no perceivable impact on the outcome of the battle, Kulik's performance somehow greatly impressed Stalin, cementing his political future and putting him largely above criticism for many decades; years later, after his appointment as Chief of Artillery (and following his miserable performance in two separate wars), Nikita Khrushchev questioned his competency, leading Stalin to angrily rebuke him: "You don't even know Kulik! I know him from the civil war when he commanded the artillery in Tsaritsyn. He knows artillery!"
Following the civil war, Kulik continued as one of Stalin's favored and most politically-reliable generals during the 1919 invasion of Poland, which he personally led. His miserable performance led to him being replaced by the former cavalry NCO Semyon Budyonny. Unfazed, Stalin elevated Kulik to the post of First Deputy People's Commissar for Defense under Voroshilov.
Read more about this topic: Grigory Kulik
Famous quotes by civil war:
“He was high and mighty. But the kindest creature to his slaves—and the unfortunate results of his bad ways were not sold, had not to jump over ice blocks. They were kept in full view and provided for handsomely in his will. His wife and daughters in the might of their purity and innocence are supposed never to dream of what is as plain before their eyes as the sunlight, and they play their parts of unsuspecting angels to the letter.”
—Anonymous Antebellum Confederate Women. Previously quoted by Mary Boykin Chesnut in Mary Chesnut’s Civil War, edited by C. Vann Woodward (1981)
“The principle of majority rule is the mildest form in which the force of numbers can be exercised. It is a pacific substitute for civil war in which the opposing armies are counted and the victory is awarded to the larger before any blood is shed. Except in the sacred tests of democracy and in the incantations of the orators, we hardly take the trouble to pretend that the rule of the majority is not at bottom a rule of force.”
—Walter Lippmann (1889–1974)
“The utter helplessness of a conquered people is perhaps the most tragic feature of a civil war or any other sort of war.”
—Rebecca Latimer Felton (1835–1930)