White Terror: Cossack Warlords of the Trans-Siberian
By Jamie Bisher
An illustrated, encyclopedic chronicle
of revolution and civil war
in the Russian Far East 1918-1922

Available now in paperback for $39.95!
ISBN 0714656909, 552 pages, 20 photos and maps

Author's Note about the Book
I wrote this book to add to the body of knowledge about a forgotten, tragic episode in history, and illuminate the many lessons in diplomacy, terrorism, peace-keeping, nation-building and foreign technical assistance this episode offers. I was excited to find a rich lode of untapped, long forgotten primary sources in the US National Archives, and frustrated that no single English-language book focussed on the maelstrom in the Russian Far East after the World War.
White Terror was never intended to be a 'scholarly book' at all, but a book for the common reader (military and Russian history enthusiasts mostly) with 100 wonderful photographs from the Army Signal Corps collection and Library of Congress... Unfortunately the giant Taylor & Francis swallowed Frank Cass, my original little publisher, branded White Terror as 'scholarly,' and slapped a breath-taking $125 price tag on it. My apologies to my intended audience... jb Table of Contents

CHAPTER 1 * PRELUDE TO TERROR * CREATION - NOVEMBER 1917

Battleground of the Gods
Frontier Siberia
Russia's Asian Neighbors and the Iron Road
Mongolia and the Tournament of Shadows
Ensign Grigorii Mikhailovich Semenov
Semenov in the Great War
Commissar Semenov
Bolshevik Coups Across Siberia

CHAPTER 2 * REVOLUTION AND RED TERROR * NOVEMBER 1917 - MAY 1918

Revolutionary Days in Dauria and Harbin
Semenov's Eight-Man Counter-Revolution
First Offensive
Recruiting Mongols
Red Takeover and Terror
Harbin--The Paris and Gomorrah of the Orient
Strategic Ambitions and the Austro-German Threat
Bullets, Guns and Money
Japanese Advisors, Internationalists and the April Offensive
Kolchak and Semenov
Lazo's May Counteroffensive and the Kolchak-Semenov Meeting

CHAPTER 3 * COUNTER-REVOLUTION * MAY 1918 - OCTOBER 1918

Czechoslovakian Saviors
July Defeat and New Foreign Assistance
Battles for Lake Baikal
Anarchist Locusts Descend Upon Chita
Semenov's Third Offensive: The Conquest of Transbaikalia
Czech Liberation--or Occupation?--of Vladivostok and Nikolsk-Ussuriisk
Internationalists and Interventionists
Russian Railway Service Corps
Ataman Kalmykov
Allied Liberation of Khabarovsk
Blagoveshchensk--The Last Red Bastion

CHAPTER 4 * THE WHITE TERROR BEGINS * OCTOBER 1918 - DECEMBER 1918

Semenov's Realm
Chita
Semenov's Army
Provisional Siberian Government and Fifth Corps
Semenov, Incorporated
Reactionary Backlash
Kalmykov's Khabarovsk
White Nightmare in Blagoveshchensk
Japanese Siberia
Death Trains
The Ataman Versus the Supreme Ruler
Gloomy Omsk at its Peak
Attempt on the Ataman's Life

CHAPTER 5 * RODOMONTADE AND GIRLS WITH DIAMONDS * JANUARY 1919 - APRIL 1919

Likin, Diamond-Studded Mistresses and Jewish Cossacks
Rodomontade, Martinets and Sadists
Crime, Punishment and the Shumov-Natsvalov Affair
White Hell in Kalmykov's Wild, Wild East
Allies and the Atamans
Serbian Mercenaries and Slavic Legions
Foreign Voluntary Organizations
Spring and White Victory in the Air
Interallied Railway Agreement

CHAPTER 6 * WHITE TERROR ON THE MAGISTRAL * MAY 1919 - SEPTEMBER 1919

War on the Rails
Semenov's Armored Train Division
Strategic Railway Resources
Reign of Terror on the Rails
Red Partisans of Transbaikalia
Face-off at Verkhne-Udinsk
Semenov's Golden Days in Chita
O.M.O. Interference on the Rails
Trouble on the Chinese Eastern
Refugees
Killing Fields
Dreams of a Pan-Mongolian Empire

CHAPTER 7 * THE WHITE COLLAPSE BEGINS * SUMMER 1919 - JANUARY 1920

A Black Summer for Siberian Whites
Partisan Growth in the Russian Far East
Atamans' Plot Against the Americans
Battle of Khada-Bulak
The Ataman versus Lieutenant Ryan
The Fall of Omsk
Gajda's Plot Against the Whites
Panic on the Trans-Siberian
The Battle of Irkutsk
A Treasonous White Commander and Murders on Baikal

CHAPTER 8 * RED ONSLAUGHT * JANUARY 1920 APRIL 1920

New Year in White Siberia
Selenga River Valley and Verkhne-Udinsk
Counter-Counter-Revolution in Vladivostok and Nikolsk
Semenov and the Americans
Kalmykov's Waterloo
White Breakdown in Transbaikalia, Red Liberation in Irkutsk
Firesales, Strikes, Mutinies, Collaboration and a Coup

CHAPTER 9 * WHITE-JAPANESE RESURGENCE, PANIC & DISASTER * APRIL 1920 DECEMBER 1920

Massacre at Nikolaevsk and the Japanese Offensive
Frontline Transbaikalia
The Hailar Incident
Forging a Japanese-Mongol Buffer State
Red Panic, Lazo's Fiery Martyrdom, and White Panic
The Fall of White Transbaikalia

CHAPTER 10 * GÖTTERDÄMMERUNG * OCTOBER 1920 - NOVEMBER 1922

Ungern-Shternberg's Liberation of Mongolia (October 1920 - January 1921)
White Götterdämmerung in Mongolia (January 1921 - September 1921)
Ataman's Exile and White Russia's Last Spasms (October 1920 - November 1922)

CHAPTER 11 * DIASPORA, MANCHURIAN REVIVAL & LEGACY * JUNE 1921 - PRESENT

White Diaspora and Ambush by New York Lawyers (January 1921 - June 1922)
Red Dawn (1922 - 1930s)
Semenov in Dairen (1922 - 1939)
Semenov, Godfather of Manchukuo's Reactionary Whites (1939 - 1945)
Epilogue

Appendix 1 - The Magistral

Appendix 2 - OMO Cadre & Staff

Appendix 3 - Proclamations of the Atamans

Proclamation of the Temporary Government of Transbaikal Territory, May 1918
Proclamation of Ataman Kalmykov in Grodekovo District, July 1918

Glossary
Bibliography

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