tortured another to death and burnt his mother’s house to ashes.

His first army consisted of only 40 men who committed a number of reckless yet successful attacks on German army posts in 1918. Official German military records say in April-June alone 118 attacks were carried out. Makhno’s army constantly grew: local workers, peasants, sailors from sunken ships and ex-servicemen joined him, and later a group of anarchists from Kiev added their forces – and “ideological base.” The ideology consisted of five main postulates: suspicion of all political parties, rejection of all dictatorships, negation of any State concept, rejection of any “transition periods” or “proletarian dictatorships” and self-management of all workers through free workers’ councils.

Image from www.kdkv.narod.ru

The Makhno army received wide popular support, as his men, unlike the othersides in the war, never robbed the locals. The core of his army was a small mobile group (up to two thousand cavalry, 800 carriages with automated rifles and artillery numbering not more than 5000 people altogether) that, together with locals, was mobilized for each separate attack. Depending on the area, 10 to 15 thousand people joined the army, and after the battle local workers and peasants went home. Makhno was the ultimate decision maker of his army, he ordered the publishing of newspapers to educate people and personally distributed the loot among the villagers. He was given the popular title of Bat’ka – a colloquial way of saying “father” and is known in history as Bat’ka Makhno.

It was rumored that Nestor Makhno was an anti-Semite, but this