ABSTRACT
World War I broke out with the Russian invasion of the Intermarium's peripheral East Prussian area in August 1914. Repulsed in the north, the Russians meanwhile registered some successes in Austrian Galicia. The western and northern parts of the Intermarium emerged free from the carnage of World War I, revolution, and civil strife. In March 1917, a revolution convulsed Russia. The Tsar abdicated. His former realm was crippled by the phenomenon of dual power: an ineffectual liberal regime and a radical central council. In November 1917, the revolution entered its Communist phase. The Bolsheviks under Vladimir Lenin seized power. Practically, all political orientations of the Russian Empire opposed them but failed to unite militarily against the Reds. In March 1918, prostrated, Red Moscow consented to ceding practically the whole of the Intermarium to triumphant, imperial Berlin. From their arrival in the eastern zone of occupation in 1915, the Germanic powers played competing nationalities against one another.
