‘We are.’
‘I have a specific mission for you.’
‘We accept.’
Colonel Stempkowski did not propose ever again to take the great Russian leader head-on, for he knew he must lose: ‘But if we can come at him from the south, and well to his rear, where he won’t be expecting us, we can disrupt this gentleman’s plans. We can disrupt them most confusingly.’
Major Bukowski’s irregulars were to ride well south to a village called Zwodne, ford a small stream at Labunki, and cut sharply north toward Jaroslawiec, where they could expect to find the rear of Budenny’s forces. When they encountered them … well, they were supposed to create such havoc that word of it would rush to the front of Budenny’s forces, which would then be faced with difficult decisions. Only then would the major force of the Polish cavalry be released.
‘It all depends on you, Bukowski,’ the colonel said as he watched the undisciplined Vistula irregulars prepare for a battle they could not even vaguely comprehend. Wiktor rode in the lead, a dashing figure who encouraged his troops with waves of his right hand; Janko positioned himself on the flank, trying to keep his farmers in some kind of order; and Benedykt followed somewhere in the rear, tending the spare horses; and everyone moved with such easy abandon that the colonel shook his head and told his aide: ‘Poor fellows! You’d think they were heading for some country picnic.’
General Semyon Budenny of Russia’s First Cavalry was the world’s ablest commander of mounted troops, a handsome man with monumental mustaches and a vast knowledge of previous cavalry battles. A student of Prince Rupert and J. E. B. Stuart, he had learned on the steppes how most effectively to throw his swift warriors against the weakest point of each enemy’s position, and his uninterrupted surge from the other side of the Dnieper right to the gates of Zamosc gave proof of his ability.
He was a ruthless commander with one simple strategy: ‘Destroy the troops, burn the villages’—and if in prosecuting these ends he also ravaged the civil population, allowing or even encouraging rape, pillage and arson, his foes had to acknowledge that in the end he usually achieved a complete victory.
But now he realized that he must step up the speed of his offensive, for General Tukhachevsky had issued an incendiary threat at the gates of Warsaw: ‘On this day we shall revenge desecrated Kiev and drown the Polish army in its own blood. The pathway to world fire lies across the dead body of Poland. We shall have Warsaw by nightfall.’ If that happened, Budenny would have to subdue Zamosc, sweep on to a crossing of the Vistula at Bukowo, and close the Russian pincers about the heartland of Poland before galloping on to Berlin and Paris.
Budenny was a devoted Communist who never fully understood the movement of which he was such a powerful defender, but he did value it as a dynamic force which would enable Russia to gain the seaports on the Atlantic for which she had always yearned. ‘We shall be the ones to take Antwerp and Bordeaux and Le Havre,’ he assured his staff. ‘This next little target, then nothing to fear in Germany, and our troops on the English Channel before winter.’
The three European journalists who had been allowed to travel with him, barely able to keep up with his dashing tactics, reported that nothing seemed strong enough to halt him: ‘He sets impossible timetables for the advance of his troops, then exceeds all his target dates. He is a modern Attila, a new Genghis Khan, and Europe will never be the same after he passes through.’
His plan for Zamosc was simple. He knew he had crushed the foremost cavalry of Poland and Ukraine and that only second-echelon horsemen remained. But he also knew from careful scouting reports that in centuries past this hard little nut of Zamosc had withstood sieges by the Swedes, by Turks and by Ukrainians and that its walls did not easily surrender to the invader, so he did not approach it lightly.
Of course, at this period Zamosc no longer had outer walls of any dimension; the famous old battlements had been engulfed by the outward growth of the city, but its robust character and the quality of its citizens combined to make it a formidable bastion. On the other hand, once it was passed, an army would enjoy an almost unimpeded avenue into Germany. Zamosc was worth taking and worth taking quickly.
He would make a feint in force at the easternmost point of the city, trusting that this would draw the better Polish cavalry to that area. He would then send a light but noisy detachment to the north, creating the impression that this was to be the major assault, but at the same time he would himself lead his principal force to the south in a thundering rush which would disorganize any remaining Polish troops and allow him easy entrance to the city from the west. Obviously, this plan would mean that Budenny and his best troops would run into Major Bukowski’s irregulars as they moved in unexpectedly from the south. It would be a fearfully uneven skirmish, brief and fatal, but now the two contingents were on their way in the dark of night and nothing could recall them.
At the precise moment when General Budenny’s cavalry was riding forth to confront Major Bukowski’s, Leon Trotsky assembled at Brzesc Litewski, ninety miles north of Zamosc, the representatives Lubonski of Poland, Jurgela of Lithuania and Vondrachuk of Ukraine to dictate to them the humiliating terms under which the victorious Red Army would allow the three defeated nations to exist. As Trotsky revealed in a cynical speech: ‘Words at Brest, swords at Warsaw.’
Late at night, after formal sessions had ended with Communism’s brutal demands on the table, the three envoys met in a shabby hotel to discuss their gloomy future: the Russian chairman had left with them the text of General Tukhachevsky’s insulting battle order: ‘We shall drown the Polish army in its own blood.’
Lubonski refrained from saying ‘I told you so,’ but memories of past discussions did make the air heavy, and now when he spoke from his vast knowledge of nations and their aspirations, he was listened to: ‘We failed in victory. Maybe we can salvage something from defeat.’
‘What?’ Vondrachuk asked.
‘I think that now more than ever we must unite our aspirations … form one nation along the American principle—each area protected in its vital interests and customs, but all under one supreme parliament.’
‘We would be overwhelmed by you two,’ Jurgela protested.
‘And if you don’t join us, you will be overwhelmed by either Germany or Russia.’
‘Then there is no hope for a small nation like us?’
‘There is every hope. If you join us.’
‘But will Russia allow any of us to exist? After Warsaw falls and her armies get into France?’
‘The larger she gets, the more certain it is she will have to organize into smaller units,’ Lubonski said with absolute assurance. ‘She will have learned her lesson from Austria.’
‘You think there will be a Lithuania? Or a Ukraine?’
Now Vondrachuk became the focus, and he said gravely: ‘If Warsaw falls, Ukraine falls. Russia will never allow us our freedom. We will never be a nation.’ He sat silent for some moments, then added: ‘And we wait tonight for news that Warsaw has fallen.’
Count Lubonski could not accept this doleful prediction: ‘We must suppose that Warsaw has fallen and that Tukhachevsky’s troops are on their way to Paris. All Europe is to be Communist. Well, in that moment it is more imperative than ever that we three hold together so that we can achieve the kind of Communism we prefer. If we do, there’s still a chance for a decent national life. But only if we hold together.’
He made his plea so passionately, and with such a wealth of experience and strength of character supporting him, that he almost persuaded his two national enemies to listen, but at this moment in the dead of night a messenger hurried in from Warsaw with the astonishing news that Polish forces were holding the city and even beginning to drive Tukhachevsky’s armies back: ‘There’s a real chance for victory!’
‘Were you there?’ Vondrachuk asked. ‘Did you see with your own eyes?’
‘Of course not. The telegraph came as far as Biala Podlaska. There the Russians stopped it.
They didn’t want you to know.’
‘How did you get here?’
‘On horse, stumbled right into the big meeting place and was almost arrested. But what I tell you is true.’
The meeting continued, but now in a vastly different mood. Vondrachuk said: ‘If only Budenny could be defeated at Zamosc! By God, we’d have them on the run!’
And then everything would be changed, for as Jurgela said: ‘We wouldn’t have to form any kind of union. Lithuania would have its own nation, its own parliament.’
‘Why do you say that?’ Lubonski asked, feeling common sense draining out of the shabby room.
‘Because if Russia loses at Warsaw, and Zamosc too … I mean, both arms of her thrust cut off at the same time …’
‘Budenny does not have a habit of losing,’ Lubonski reminded the men.
‘But if God grants us a miracle at Warsaw, why not a second one at Zamosc?’
Vondrachuk spoke: ‘Jurgela’s right. If Russia absorbs two major defeats, she’ll be too busy to worry about Lithuania and Ukraine. God, this night could be a turning point in world history.’
‘Men! Men!’ Lubonski pleaded. ‘If by some miracle we do win a double victory, it will be more imperative than ever that we form a union to defend ourselves in the long years ahead.’
‘We would be very uneasy with Poland,’ Witold Jurgela said, and in this verdict he summarized the long years when thoughtless and ignorant Polish magnates dominated vast tracts of Lithuanian land, but he conveniently forgot those longer centuries when Lithuanian princes dominated Poland.
‘Our Ukrainians,’ agreed Vondrachuk, ‘could not easily erase memories of our wars with Poland. Especially the wars of the last two years.’
‘Do you hear me,’ Lubonski asked with infinite patience, ‘reciting the horrors that visited Poland when your Cossack Chmielnicki invaded Poland? The hundreds of thousands he slew?’
‘They were mostly Jews,’ Vondrachuk said, ‘and our people had to break out of the bondage your magnates imposed.’ He stopped, looked afresh at the count, and said: ‘Your Lubonski ancestors were among the worst, and now you come asking us to forgive these centuries of abuse?’
‘I do,’ Lubonski said, and he hoped that his reasonable plea would encourage these obdurate men to forget recent history and look instead toward a promising future, but he achieved nothing, for at dawn a telegram arrived confirming what the messenger had reported: POLISH FORCES HAVE DRIVEN THE COMMUNISTS BACK FROM ALL WARSAW BRIDGEHEADS. A ROUT IS UNDER WAY.
Taras Vondrachuk fell to his knees, clasped his hands, and began to pray: ‘Let Budenny be crushed.’ Lubonski, listening to the prayer, suspected that it might be better for eastern Europe if Budenny were not crushed, for he could see in a Polish victory the end of any sensible discussion among the three nations. Arrogance would displace humility, and each would stumble along toward some common disaster which would engulf them all; they would be like simple sheep trying to exist within a circle of wolves.
But even as he phrased these prophetic thoughts, he visualized his rugged old castle at Gorka and the fine new palace at Bukowo and the Lubomirski wonders at Lancut and the peaceful villages between, and he did not want to see them overthrown by the Communists and destroyed, as they had been so often in the past: ‘God, let the miracle happen. Let Budenny’s ravagers be crushed.’
Semyon Budenny had no intention of being crushed. He never had been and he never would be. When word reached him, frantically and with the messenger gasping, that his partner Mikhail Tukhachevsky had suffered a major reverse at Warsaw, he gritted his teeth and told his men: ‘Not here.’
Dispatching riders to his two subordinate commands, the one heading directly at the eastern approaches to Zamosc, the other circling to attack from the north, he gave stern orders: ‘It is essential that Zamosc fall by noon. To give encouragement to our brothers at the north.’ He therefore tightened his own formation and rode with even greater determination toward the victory he felt assured would be his when he struck from the south.
Major Wiktor Bukowski, fifty-two years old, six pounds underweight, still looked rather debonair. Dressed in the uniform of a Polish country gentleman, the kind he had worn when riding at Der Schmelz in Vienna and on the parade grounds inside the fort at Przemysl, he paused occasionally to smooth down his small mustache or brush the dust from his tunic. He knew that within a few hours at the latest he would lead his nondescript men into direct confrontation with the finest mounted army in the world, but he had no way of comprehending the power that the Russian cavalry would have. All he knew was that he must somehow impede it, and what cannon or gunfire he might meet in doing so, he did not care to guess. He was a Polish gentleman out riding on his best horse, and that was enough.
Janko Buk, who had experienced a wide variety of nonsense in his life, from the alleys of Vienna to the formal picnics at Castle Gorka, had a rather better understanding of what lay ahead than his one-time master. ‘Those Russians know how to use the saber,’ he whispered to those riding close to him. He did not want to frighten the troops behind or discourage in any way his leader, but he was apprehensive about the terrible power of Communist cavalry: ‘They didn’t ride so fast from Kiev without killing somebody.’
Benedykt Buk, only nineteen, had no concept of what such a battle might be; he rode his good Arab and led the three replacements. He had no idea whatever of how to keep in touch with Pan Bukowski or his father once the battle started, and since he had no weapons of his own, he supposed he was to stay clear of the fight, waiting till critical moments when someone came back for his spares. He hoped the older men would be able to find him, but as distances increased and confusion grew, he did not see how this was going to be possible. Indeed, he began to look upon the three horses he was leading as detriments which would prevent him from joining the battle. Another groom told him: ‘I think we’re to protect the horses so they can be used in a hurry if we have to retreat.’ The rear of Major Bukowski’s contingent was obviously not hopeful about the outcome, but even they could not imagine the fury with which Budenny’s crack troops would soon fall upon them.
There was, however, one sign of hope: a rather large band of riders had mysteriously come out of the night to occupy Major Bukowski’s right flank, and an even larger mass had evolved on the left flank, so that the Vistula men were in the dead center of a substantial force. It could not be termed an army, or even a regiment, for it lacked any military cohesion or leadership, but it was formidable.
Now a colonel from the regular cavalry rode across the front, west to east, advising the leaders of each contingent: ‘We will not charge first. Let Budenny’s men come at us. Let them break their ranks. Then we cut at them from the flanks.’
He asked if this was understood, but even as the improvised leaders gave their assent, he could see that the restlessness of the civilians behind would make discipline most difficult: ‘Major Bukowski, do you understand?’
‘I do.’
‘Can I rely on you?’
‘To the death.’
And then, out of gloom to the northeast, came the dreaded horsemen of Semyon Budenny’s advance guard, men easy in the saddle, with superb beasts to carry them forward. They had expected an unimpeded canter to the western approaches to the town and this sudden appearance of a real force of mounted adversaries surprised them. But they did not break. In orderly rank they approached to a distance from which they could calculate the strength of the Polish irregulars, then turned and rode back to Budenny himself, who was somewhat distressed to hear that he might have to fight his way to the west.
When dawn was well at hand, the Russians launched a fierce assault on the Poles, one that carried them deep into the civilian mob, and at first the slaughter was terrifying, but then the Polish farmers realized that if one escaped that first awful crush, one had a good chance of doing some damage to the disorganized Russians, and a counterslaughter began.
At the height of the melee, Major Bukowski
was caught up in a great frenzy, and seeing an opportunity to inflict real hurt upon one of Budenny’s exposed columns, he ignored his instructions, rallied his men, and galloped with terrible force right at the heart of the Russian position. It was crazy. It was impossible. It was a band of rural riders going up against the best trained horsemen.
With wild enthusiasm, Wiktor Bukowski, this frivolous man who had never accomplished a constructive thing in his life, this dilettante who had thought more of his waxed mustache or his tailored trousers than of Poland, led his tattered troops with a bravura which would have drawn respect from Julius Caesar or Hannibal. Always in the lead, always cheering his men, he created havoc among the astonished Russians. Miraculously, he held his horsemen together, shooting and stabbing as they galloped on, turning as a well-drilled team behind his dashing figure and raging through the enemy lines.
Bukowski’s irregulars may have accomplished little in this first charge, killing only a few of the foe, yet they accomplished everything, because they diverted attention long enough for the real surprise of this morning battle to be effective.
From the west, obedient to plans spelled out long before, appeared a large body of real Polish cavalry; it had been held in reserve for just such a moment, and when the confusion of the Russians was greatest, agitated by the wild incursion of Bukowski’s men, these professionals saw an opportunity they could not reasonably have anticipated, and they drove with great force at the disorganized Communists.
Budenny had been in tight spots before and had acquired his reputation as the foremost cavalry commander because he knew ways to extricate himself from trouble, so he ordered his men to ignore Bukowski’s gadflies and charge directly at the oncoming Polish regulars. A mighty clash ensued, and for the first time in this Russian sweep to the west, their horsemen were unable to rout the enemy. The Poles maintained their formations, and what was more ominous, they surged purposefully ahead.
Now Bukowski’s men, a totally disrupted rabble, were able to hack and hew, creating enormous confusion, and they were soon augmented by other volunteer units which up to now had obeyed orders and refrained from frontal assault. The fight became a monstrous riot, with rural units of a hundred men or even a thousand completely out of control as they overran the Russian regulars. Had Budenny been free to turn his Cossacks on this Polish rabble, he could have annihilated them, but whenever he tried to do so, the Polish regulars coming at him from the west demanded his full attention, so the peasants and the farmers and the lesser nobility from the Vistula were free to ravage the Russians as they willed.
Poland: A Novel Page 57
