As he assumed the title of Supreme Ruler of Russia in 1918,[1] he headed a military dictatorship,[2][3][4] which ruled over the territory of the former Russian Empire controlled by the Whites.

He was wounded and taken prisoner during the Russo-Japanese War at the siege of Port Arthur, and upon his return he advocated for strengthening the fleet to the State Duma, including with the introduction of submarines and aircraft.

As he assumed the title of Supreme Ruler, his authority was recognized by the other leaders of the White movement,[10][6] although Anton Denikin enjoyed more power than Kolchak.

[6] After initial successes in early 1919, Kolchak's forces lost ground due to a lack of support by the local populace and a failure to unite the leaders of counterrevolutionary movements.

[11] In December, he was betrayed and detained by the chief of the Allied military mission in Siberia, Maurice Janin, and the Czechoslovak Legion, who handed him over to local Socialist-Revolutionaries in January 1920;[12][13][14] the Bolsheviks executed him the next month in Irkutsk.

After being commissioned as a midshipman in the Imperial Russian Navy he served in the Baltic and Pacific Oceans on several ships between 1895 and 1899, and began publishing articles on hydrology during that time.

[citation needed] In December 1903, Kolchak was en route to St. Petersburg to marry his fiancée, Sophia Omirova, when, not far from Irkutsk, he received notice of the start of war with the Empire of Japan and hastily summoned his bride and her father to Siberia by telegram for a wedding, before heading directly to Port Arthur.

[citation needed] Returning to Saint Petersburg in April 1905, Kolchak was promoted to lieutenant commander and took part in rebuilding of the Imperial Russian Navy, which had been almost completely destroyed during the war.

His study, Ice of the Kara and Siberian Seas,[19] was printed in the Proceedings of the Russian Imperial Academy of Sciences and is considered the most important work on this subject.

[citation needed] The onset of the First World War found him on the flagship Pogranichnik, where Kolchak oversaw laying of extensive coastal defensive minefields and commanded the naval forces in the Gulf of Riga.

Commanding Admiral Essen was not satisfied to remain on the defensive and ordered Kolchak to prepare a scheme for attacking the approaches of the German naval bases.

During the autumn and winter of 1914–1915, Russian destroyers and cruisers started a series of dangerous night operations, laying mines at the approaches to Kiel and Danzig.

When news of these plots found their way to then Naval Minister of the Provisional Government, Alexander Kerensky, he ordered Kolchak to leave immediately for America.

When passing through London he was greeted cordially by the First Sea Lord, Admiral Sir John Jellicoe, who offered him transport on board a British cruiser on his way to Halifax in Canada.

He was instructed to join the British military mission in Baghdad, but when he reached Singapore, was ordered to turn back and go via Shanghai and Beijing to Harbin, to take command of Russian troops guarding the Russian-owned Chinese Eastern Railway in Manchuria, which the British government had decided could be a base for overthrowing the Bolshevik government and getting Russia back into the war with Germany.

Joining a 14-man cabinet, he was a prestige figure; the government hoped to play on the respect he had with the Allies, especially the head of the British military mission, General Alfred Knox.

He has no plans, no system, no will: in this respect he is soft wax from which advisers and intimates can fashion whatever they want, exploiting the fact that it is enough to disguise something as necessary for the welfare of Russia and the good of the cause to be certain of his approval.

[24] The American historian Richard Pipes wrote that Kolchak's only strengths were his courage, patriotism, integrity, and a strong sense of honor, writing that he was "... in many ways, along with Wrangel, the most honorable White commander in the Civil War", but his weaknesses, such as his tendency to suffer from manic depression and inability to "understand people or communicate with them", made him into "an execrable administrator in whose name were committed unpardonable acts of corruption and brutality that he personally found utterly repugnant.

The program of the Kolchak government included: ending Bolshevism and restoring law and order; re-establishing the Russian armed forces; convoking a new Constituent Assembly; introducing economic reforms; and maintaining the territorial integrity of Russia.

I set as my main objective the creation of an efficient army, victory over Bolshevism and the establishment of law and order, so that the people may choose the form of government which it desires without obstruction and realize the great ideas of liberty which are now proclaimed in the whole world.

I summon you, citizens, to unity, to struggle with Bolshevism, to labor and to sacrifices"The Left SR leaders in Russia denounced Kolchak and called for his assassination.

[30] Kolchak acknowledged all of Russia's debts, returned nationalized factories and plants to their owners, granted concessions to foreign investors, dispersed trade unions, persecuted Marxists, and disbanded the soviets.

Political intrigues were unknown to them and they were ready to work with men of any political party, so long as they knew that these men were sincere in their endeavours to free Russia... and to make it possible, after the end of the war, for a National Assembly, chosen by the people, to decide the character of the future Government of Russia.In November 1918, after seizing power in Siberia, Kolchak pursued a policy of persecuting revolutionaries as well as socialists of several factions, Jews and dissidents.

Kolchak's government issued a broadly worded decree on December 3, 1918, revising articles of the criminal code of Imperial Russia "in order to preserve the system and rule of the Supreme Ruler".

On November 15, 1919, they delivered a memorandum to the Allied representatives in Vladivostok:The military authorities of the Government of Omsk are permitting criminal actions that will stagger the entire world.

The burning of villages, the murder of masses of peaceful inhabitants, and the shooting of hundreds of persons of democratic convictions and also those only suspected of political disloyalty occurs daily.

The northern army under the Russian Anatoly Pepelyayev and the Czech Rudolf Gajda seized Perm in late December 1918 and after a pause other forces spread out from this strategic base.

The newly formed Red Army proved unwilling to fight and retreated instead, allowing the Whites to advance to a line stretching from Glazov through Orenburg to Uralsk.

The 7,000 or so American troops in Siberia were strictly neutral regarding "internal Russian affairs" and served only to maintain the operation of the Trans-Siberian railroad in the Far East.

The White Army under the command of General Vladimir Kappel advanced toward Irkutsk while Kolchak was interrogated by a commission of five men representing the Revolutionary Committee (REVKOM) during nine days between 21 January and 6 February.