The West Russian Volunteer Army or Bermontians was a pro-German military formation in Latvia and Lithuania during the Russian Civil War in 1918–20. History The Western Russian Volunteer Army, unlike the pro-Entente Volunteer Army, was supported and in fact created by Germany. The Compiègne Armistice, article 12, stipulated that troops of the former German Empire were to remain in the Baltic provinces of the former Russian Empire to help fight Bolshevik advances and were to withdraw once the Allies determined the situation was under control. The order to withdraw was given after the Treaty of Versailles was signed in June 1919. However, only a small portion of the Freikorps in the Baltic retired; the rest stayed under the leadership of General Rüdiger von der Goltz. To avoid casting blame on Germany and infuriating the Allies, he withdrew into the background and merged his troops with the "Special Russian Corps", led by Cossack General Pavel Bermondt-Avalov. The two generals recruited about 50,000 men: mostly Freikorps, Baltic Germans, as well as some Russian POWs captured by Germany in World War I and then released on the promise that they would help fight against the Bolsheviks in the Russian Civil War. The Army declared that it joined the forces of Aleksandr Kolchak and marched to attack Bolsheviks, but their real goal was to sustain German power in the Baltic region. Confrontation with the governments of Latvia and Lithuania The political situation in the Baltic region continued to deteriorate. A new government in Lithuania refused to allow White Russians to pass troops through and establish a military base. After initially supporting the White Russians the Weimar government, under pressure from the Entente, banned the transfer of German soldiers to the Russians and ordered the Reichswehr to block the East Prussian border to block Freikorp's supplies. General von der Goltz was finally recalled on October 4. In this circumstances Bermondt-Avalov launched an offensive using Freikorps in attempt to force the Republic of Latvia to negotiate. With the support of British naval artillery and Estonian armoured train, a Latvian counter-offensive followed in November, which forced Bermondt's army to withdraw. Mitau was also lost in loss-making fights. In October 1919, the West Russian Volunteer Army attacked the newly independent states of Lithuania and Latvia, to which Germany had granted independence. It briefly occupied the west bank of the Daugava River in Riga and the government of Kārlis