Order by the Chairman of the Revolutionary War Council of the Republic and People’s Commissar for Military and Naval Affairs (Order No.55)

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by the Chairman of the Revolutionary War Council of the Republic and People’s Commissar for Military and Naval Affairs, November 4, 1918, No.55, Tsaritsyn

While touring the front of the Tenth Army I was able to acquaint myself with the units stationed there. Most of them already have great services to their credit. There are units which, after breaking out of a ring of enemies, marched for hundreds of versts under conditions of immense difficulty and privation. Most of these units display internal unity and a bond with the commanding personnel the necessary condition of military success. Among the soldiers and commanders are many real heroes, whose names must be made known to the whole country. To the Steel Division, the Communist Division and the Morozovsk Division [Morozovsk is a town in the Donbas.] and the Don-Stavropol Brigade I presented banners of honor, on behalf of the All-Russia CEC of the Soviets.

It is clear to all serious workers that we cannot rest content with the successes achieved. Further steps are needed for organising and welding the Tenth Army into a single whole.

On the Tenth Army’s front there are some military units which bear the title of divisions but which are not in fact divisions. All military groupings and groups can and must be reduced, within a short time, to a few divisions composed according to the establishment laid down, after these divisions have been ensured the necessary commanding apparatus and supply services.

Political work has hardly begun in the units so far. Every division, every regiment and every independently-operating brigade must be provided with commissars, in whose hands the ideological leadership of the life of their units must be concentrated.

The expenditure of military Stores is proceeding without anything like the necessary circumspection. Resolute and systematic measures must be taken against this. It is necessary that the commanding personnel themselves be filled with the idea, and that they fill their units with it, that weapons and military stores are public property which has to be very carefully preserved, and expended with all due care. The commanders of units where excessive expenditure of artillery material takes place must be punished, and, contrariwise, those units in which order prevails in this matter must be given special awards.

Certain units which emerged from the guerrilla struggle are still far from having grasped the idea that they are now no longer independent forces but units of a centralised army. The result of this is sometimes a lack of co-ordination in operations. Commanders exist who do not realise that an order is an order and must be obeyed unconditionally. There have been cases when a commander who does not want to carry out an operational order has put it to a meeting for discussion, and hidden behind that meeting. This evil must be burnt out with a red-hot iron. As citizens, soldiers may in their free time hold meetings on any subject. As soldiers, on service and at the front, they will carry out unquestioningly the military orders of the authority established by the workers’ and peasants’ government. If d body of troops refuses to carry out an order, the guilt for this lies with the commanders and commissars. In those cases where commanders and commissars are up to their jobs, units never refuse to fulfill their revolutionary duty. Therefore I order that, when cases occur of causeless retreat, panic or non-fulfillment of military orders, the respective commanders and commissars be immediately removed from their posts and court-martialed.

The basic military formation in our army is the division. The commanders and commissars of a division have an immense task to perform and carry immense responsibility. While establishing, together with the commissar, strict discipline in his division, the divisional commander must at the same time give a personal example of strict and unconditional obedience to the operational orders of the army commander, just as the army commander, in his turn, has to work in strict conformity with the directives of the commander of the Southern Front. Only thus will the work of the Tenth Army bring the maximum results, and the heroism of its Red regiments, their efforts and sacrifices, lead us very soon to decisive victory over the Krasnovite-Cadet bands.

As I leave the Tenth Army’s area of operations I send fraternal greetings to all its honorable soldiers.