Within areas of their control, the Commune closed churches, nationalised industry and the banks[7] and outlawed representatives of the Provisional Government.

However, a counter-offensive begun on 7 January 1919 by the Estonian People's Force (Rahvavägi) under Commander-in-Chief Johan Laidoner eventually drove the Red Army out of Estonia, with international military aid primarily from the British Empire.

The Commune was thus rendered defunct, claiming a government in exile in Pskov, then Luga and finally, from 17 May 1919, in Staraya Russa.

The Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic (RSFSR) formally recognised the ETK on 7 December 1918 and remained the only government to do so.

[12] Just before Tartu was seized, the Bolsheviks carried out the Tartu Credit Center Massacre executing clergymen and other prisoners in the basement of the town's bank,[11] among the victims were Bishop Platon, the priest Sergei Florinski [et] and the pastor Traugott Hahn [et].