BIOGRAPHYHow a Baltic aristocrat conquered Mongolia and became one of the 20th century's marginal monsters, writes Max McGuinness
BARON ROMAN Ungern von Sternberg, the sadistic Baltic aristocrat who briefly exercised a frenzied personal tyranny over Mongolia during the Russian Civil War, would not have felt out of place in a Californian ashram. The Baron, who is perhaps the only New Age despot in history, launched a quixotic counter-revolution aiming to create an esoteric empire which would stretch from China to the Urals.
In his doggedly researched and carefully composed debut biography, the first on the subject in English for 70 years, James Palmer notes that Ungern was a "pious, if unorthodox, Buddhist" from his teens, notwithstanding a life-long penchant for appalling cruelty. At the age of 12, he inexplicably tried to strangle his neighbour's pet owl. By the end of the book, almost every page tells of an atrocity, which routinely included the murder of children - "one should not leave a tail behind", Ungern would explain.
YET THE BARON was venerated as a god when he invaded Mongolia in late 1920 and routed the Chinese occupiers. Forming an alliance with the newly-freed Bogd Khan, the country's grotesque traditional ruler (who was so fat he had to be carried by two horses), Ungern proceeded to massacre the Jewish population and pillage until there was nothing left to feed his army.
Increasingly deranged, he then attempted to reinvade Russia where superior Bolshevik forces were waiting to annihilate his depraved soldiers, who themselves had continued to fight largely out of terror at Ungern's disturbingly inventive punishments. These were typically culled from "hell scrolls" found in Buddhist monasteries, which depicted men being burnt alive, devoured by wild beasts and stripped naked on the ice.
The Baron himself met a more traditional end. Finally captured by the Bolsheviks after a belated attempt by his officers to assassinate him, he was shot by firing squad on September 15th, 1921, following a brief, widely publicised show trial.
His Mongolian crusade had been the culmination of six years of ceaseless warfare. After serving the Imperial Army with conspicuous, indeed suicidal, bravery, Ungern made his way to Siberia following the Bolshevik coup. With his equally wicked friend Captain Grigori Semenov, he organised a major part of the White counter-revolution in the Russian Far East, despite being a mere junior cavalry officer. Assisted by a bewildering array of allies, including, at different times, US military advisers, Japanese diplomats, Chinese noblemen and the 13th Dalai Lama, Ungern and Semenov waged war by armoured train, terrorising everyone unlucky enough to live along the Trans-Siberian railway. "I imagine that he would like to be remembered riding through a horde of terrified revolutionary soldiers . . ." writes Palmer in the first sentence of his biography, giving every indication of embarking on another contribution to the increasingly popular genre of "Me History", where the author's own escapades in far-flung places figure as much as those of his subject.
To his credit, Palmer plays it straight, sparing us tall tales of Mongolian drinking games and yak rides along the steppe. The Bloody White Baron is a scrupulous, traditional piece of historical writing and the occasional flashes of local colour are resolutely to the point. The footnotes attest to impressive archival legwork and Palmer has mastered the unlikely range of fields required to make sense of Ungern's life: military history, Russian and oriental languages, early-20th-century Far Eastern diplomacy, and esoteric religion. The combination of erudite expertise and a winning turn of phrase makes for an engaging read. The history of Tibetan Buddhism is, writes Palmer, "like I, Claudius with silk scarves: in every scene somebody is either stabbed, caught in flagrante or shoved over a cliff".
ASIDE FROM A sound digression on the subject of Ungern's probable latent homosexuality, Palmer largely avoids amateur psychoanalysis. Palmer subtly notes that the Baron denied any family history of mental illness at his trial even though his father had spent time in a sanatorium. But the question of whether "the Mad Baron" was truly insane is never directly posed. The portrait that emerges in this book of a determined and methodical butcher suggests Ungern's horror cannot be solely ascribed to innate psychological flaws.
While the madness of Conrad's Kurtz might be seen as a reflection on the nature of colonialism itself, Palmer avoids treating history as a moral parable. At times, this general equanimity prevents him from fully assessing his bibliography and sources. Though Palmer cites a 1938 biography by Vladimir Pozner repeatedly, there is no discussion of its accuracy or objectivity.
It is often unclear which parts of the story are apocryphal as opposed to hard fact: "A legend arose that he fed his tame pack (of wolves) on prisoners and mutinous soldiers" is a typical, un-sourced statement. Notwithstanding such rare lapses, The Bloody White Baron is an excellent and overdue account of one of the 20th century's marginal monsters.
Max McGuinness is a columnist and blogger for The Dubliner magazine. His first play, Up The Republic!, will be performed later this year in Edinburgh and Dublin
The Bloody White Baron By James Palmer Faber and Faber, 268pp. £18.99