Pogroms during the Russian Civil War in the context of "Ukrainian People's Republic"

The White movement, also known as the Whites, was one of the main factions of the Russian Civil War of 1917–1922. It was led mainly by the right-wing and conservative officers of the Russian Empire, while the Bolsheviks who led the October Revolution in Russia, also known as the Reds, and their supporters, were regarded as the main enemies of the Whites. It operated as a system of governments and administrations united as the Russian State, which functioned as a military dictatorship throughout the most of its existence, and military formations collectively referred to as the White Army, or the White Guard.

Although the White movement included a variety of political opinions in Russia opposed to the Bolsheviks, from the republican-minded liberals through monarchists to the ultra-nationalist Black Hundreds, and lacked a universally-accepted doctrine, the main force behind the movement were the conservative officers, and the resulting movement shared many traits with widespread right-wing counter-revolutionary movements of the time, namely nationalism, racism, distrust of liberal and democratic politics, clericalism, contempt for the common man and dislike of industrial civilization; in November 1918, the movement united on an authoritarian-right platform around the figure of Alexander Kolchak as its principal leader. It generally defended the order of pre-revolutionary Imperial Russia, although the ideal of the movement was a mythical "Holy Russia", what was a mark of its religious understanding of the world. The positive program of the movement was largely summarized in the slogan of "united and indivisible Russia [ru]" which meant the restoration of imperial state borders, and its denial of the right to self-determination. The Whites are associated with pogroms and antisemitism; while the relations with the Jews featured a certain complexity, the movement was largely antisemitic, with the White generals viewing the Revolution as a result of a Jewish conspiracy. Antisemitism and more broad nationalism and xenophobia of the movement were manifested in the acts of the White Terror, which often targeted non-Russian ethnic groups of the former Russian Empire.

The White Terror (Russian: Белый террор, romanized: Belyy terror) in the former Russian Empire refers to violence and mass killings carried out by the White movement and its governments of Russia during the Russian Civil War (1917–1923). Individual acts against Bolshevik rule, such as assassinations, commenced at least by the end of 1917. Violence on any sizable scale on the part of the Whites arguably began in early 1918, continuing until the defeat of the Whites at the hands of the Red Army from 1920 to 1922. Unlike in the case of the Red Terror, there was no formal decree which kickstarted the White Terror. The White Terror was most acute in the Far East, under warlords such as Grigory Semyonov and Baron Roman von Ungern-Sternberg.

Though the Bolsheviks' Red Terror officially began on September 5, 1918 in response to several planned assassinations of Bolshevik leaders, incidents of violence carried out by Bolsheviks and their supporters had been ongoing since the October Revolution. According to some Russian historians, the White Terror was a series of premeditated actions directed by their leaders; this view is contested by Russian historians who view it as spontaneous and disorganized. According to some historians, the White Terror evolved from a disorganized policy to a system of political repression sanctioned by the Russian State and its system of military dictatorship which targeted not only the Bolsheviks, but members of other parties and other people as well. Some historians believe the antisemitic pogroms carried out by the Whites to be a part of the White Terror.