Noble Blood - The Mad Baron in Mongolia (Part 2)

Episode Date: April 21, 2026

For eight months, Roman von Ungern-Sternberg took control of the capital of Mongolia, in a campaign that was less about international politics and more about his own warped sense of purpose. Support Noble Blood:—PRE-ORDER 'THE ARCANE ARTS'— Bonus episodes, stickers, and scripts on Patreon— Order Dana's book, 'Anatomy: A Love Story' and its sequel 'Immortality: A Love Story'See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an I-heart podcast. Guaranteed Human. Hey, I'm Dr. Maya Shunker, a cognitive scientist and hosts of the podcast, a slight change of plans, a show about who we are and who we become when life makes other plans. I wish that I hadn't resisted for so long the need to change. We have to be willing to live with a kind of uncertainty that none of us likes. You can have opinions. You can have like a strong,

dance and then there's your body having its own program. Listen to a slight change of plans on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Will Ferrell's Big Money Players and IHeart Podcasts presents Soccer moms. So I'm Leanne. This is my best friend, Janet. And we have been joined at the hips since high school. Absolutely.

A redacted amount of years later, we're still joined at the hip. Just a little bit bigger hips. This is a podcast. We're recording it as we tailgate our youth soccer. games in the back of my Honda Odyssey with all the snacks and drinks. Why did you get hard seltzer instead of beer? Oh, they had a

bogo. Well, then you got them. Listen to soccer moms on the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Kristen Davis, host of the podcast, Are You a Charlotte? In 1998, my life was forever changed when I took on the role of Charlotte York on a new show called Sex and the City. Now I get to

sit down with some of my favorite people. and relive all of the incredible moments this show brought us on and off the screen. Listen to Are You a Charlotte on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome to Noble Blood, a production of IHeart Radio and Grimm and Mild from Aaron Manky. Listener discretion advised. This is the second part of our two-part episode on Roman von Ungern-Sternberg. So if you haven't listened to Part 1 yet, please start there. Why Roman von Ungernsternberg went to Mongolia in October of 1920 remains a mystery.

Historians now call his eight-month stint in the area his Mongolian campaign. But even that label is controversial. Willard Sunderland suggests that using the word campaign implies that Roman had, quote, a reason for being there. Instead, the decision was haphazard. Roman had originally intended to move west rather than east to cut off the Red Army advancing on Cheetah, according to his military orders. But when he found out that the Reds had already taken the city, he had to change his plans. So he went rogue, leading what remained of the Asiatic Division of the White Army, across the Mongolian border. His forces included about 800 men trailed by horses and a train of carts,

covered wagons, and pack animals. He would later tell the Reds that his plan was, quote, a product of happenstance and fate. It wasn't totally out of the question for him to go to Mongolia, since the whites had an established military presence there. But what Roman did next had more to with his own personal politics. He decided to conquer Urga, the capital of Mongolia. He concocted this plan in the heat of the moment after learning that the Chinese commander in Urga had arrested a group of white officers. Roman saw Urga as a, quote, red town, according to an account from Roman's aide-de-camp. Because most of the Russians that lived there were Bolshevik sympathizers. Moreover, 1919, Chinese Republicans had invaded, holding the city under military occupation and putting the

Baghdad Khan under house arrest. To Roman, the Bolsheviks and Chinese Republicans were one and the same. He described the Chinese Republican leader Sun Yat-sen as, quote, that famous revolutionary Bolshevik. Even though Russia and China were often at odds, Roman, saw his fight against socialist revolution as a personal crusade that disregarded borders and nations. He was going to take matters into his own hands, and he didn't care how much force he would need to use. I'm Dana Schwartz, and this is Noble Blood. Roman tried to take over the Mongolian capital erga three times. The first two times in October and November of 19.

his army was defeated by the Chinese. Then he took a few months over the winter to regroup, stocking up guns and other supplies from Manchuria and recruiting additional soldiers. There were many disaffected Mongolians who were sympathetic to Roman's cause, llamas and nobles who wanted to free the Bogdha, nationalists that wanted to kick the Chinese out of the country. There were even some stray white officers and sarist officials around the area who were willing to join Roman's forces. And I should be clear, when I say white in this case, I mean the white army as opposed to the red Bolshevik army. The white anti-Bulshivic forces, not with any respect to race or nationality. In February 1921 with 5,000 men, Roman descended on Urga.

In broad daylight, he rescued the Bogda from house arrest and occupied the city. By the end of the month, the Chinese had withdrawn entirely. Erga was his. Roman reinstalled the Bogda as the national ruler, and in return, the Bogda gave him the title of great hero general, builder of the state, and the privilege of wearing a three-eyed peacock plume in his Manchu-style velvet cap, a symbol of the highest nobility. You have taken Urga, one Mongol leader wrote to Roman not long after his titling ceremony.

Your good deed shall shine across the world like the rays of the sun. tacitly working under the Baghda, Roman's men repaired roads and bridges, reopening the printing press and electric plant. Roman seized gold and valuables from Russian and Chinese banks and confiscated cars, cannons, rifles, and machine guns to shore up his army. But he didn't stop there. Upon taking over Urga, Roman launched a pogromed.

Grom, giving his men three days to, quote, eliminate any Jews and reds they found in Urga. The whites already had lists of Jewish families and others they determined to be Bolshevik, quote, sympathizers. While some Jewish people managed to hide or escape the city, over 300 people were killed during Romans' three-day rampage. One person who managed to escape, Abega gave an interview to a Bolshevik newspaper, describing how Romans men hunted down entire Jewish households, slaughtering even their farm animals. By the end of Romans' campaign, Erga's tiny Jewish community essentially ceased to exist. Romans' anti-Semitism was deeply rooted in his time in the Russian army, going back to his teenage years when he witnessed the

Estonian riots of 1905. Aristocrats dismissed the legitimate grievances that fueled various early 20th century rebellions by blaming them on Jewish manipulation. In 1903, a tract called the Protocols of the Elders of Zion was published in Imperial Russia before spreading throughout Europe in the 1920s and 30s. The pamphlet is a fabricated document that, purported to lay out a Jewish plot for world domination by steering hapless peasants toward revolution. Roman believed this conspiracy wholeheartedly.

Like other anti-Semites in white military leadership, he saw socialists and Jews as one and the same. When asked later why he hated Jewish people so much, he replied simply, they caused the revolution. He wrote that, quote, in their hearts, the people remained loyal to the Tsar, faith, and fatherland, but the Jewish menace had led them astray. Roman's reign of terror continued beyond that three-day rampage. He set up a security office to find, quote, unreliables, and eventually executed them at what was considered one of the worst white torture chambers in the Russian and. Empire, which James Palmer wrote, quote, was a considerable achievement in the brutal environment of the Civil War. This reputation attracted more sadistic officers, as Roman tacitly allowed his men to murder whoever they wanted without reproach. One official bludgeoned and drowned 31 hostages in Lake Baikal and later earned the nickname, quote,

the strangler of Transpacalia. Roman enforced military discipline with the utmost brutality. For minor infractions, the most common punishment was a beating with a bamboo lash, and for serious infractions, he sentenced his men to the death penalty. Roman imagined himself as a new Genghis Khan. He wanted to unite the ethnic and religious groups of the people. the region into a quote, central Mongolian state, one that would stretch over most of the step region of central Eurasia, from roughly the western edges of Manchuria to the Caspian Sea.

This had almost nothing to do with Russia. In 1915, the Russians had agreed to leave Mongolia alone, and the newly ascendant Bolsheviks had other priorities. Instead, this idea, seemed like a relic from Roman's childhood, where he believed that native Estonians and Germans, like his own family, should submit to the ideals of whoever showed the strongest force, which just so happened to be Russia. But curiously, diverging from the rest of the white army, he also felt that those on the outskirts of the empire were superior to the Russians themselves. Roman believed that people like him who had grown up on the imperial frontier, whether they were Mongols, Cossacks, or members of the nomadic step societies, preserved a strength and purity that the center of Russia had lost. He figured that while Mongolia would be a mostly politically independent state, Russia would serve as a kind of feudal overlord, like a king-ruling.

ruling over his vassals. It's hard to imagine how this plan would have actually worked in practice, but that was no problem for Roman. Most of his plans were pretty fuzzy and abstract anyway. Nevertheless, Roman wanted to extend his territory by invading Kiyakta, a strategically placed town and route back to Siberia, creating a white stronghold in the region. He told a Chinese ally, quote, All my efforts are directed to the north, where I shall move to break through to Russia as soon as possible. He distributed a formal manifesto known as Order No. 15, in which he expressed his desire to destroy communism and restore the Russian monarchy by appointing Tsar Nicholas II's brother, the Grand Duke, Michael as the new ruler of the empire.

A campaign against Siberia also made sense because Roman was vulnerable to attack in Urga, either by the Reds or the Chinese. Cucky from his victory in Urga, Roman thought that his next steps would be easy. He believed that anti-Bulshivic sentiment in Siberia remained strong and that his invasion could inspire other uprisings across. across the area. Later, he said that his impending attack on the Reds would ignite a, quote, powder keg of popular resentment in Siberia that would gather the scattered white units still operating there into a single, unstoppable force. But by 1921, the Red Army was much stronger than he had

anticipated. The whites had lost control of the trans-Siberian. railway and dispersed east. Only a few stragglers remained. Roman's monarchist ambitions and sadistic reputation did not land well with the Russians still living in Siberia. Meanwhile, after Roman took over Urga, at least 8,000 Chinese soldiers and refugees had fled to Kiyakta, meaning he had even more opponents there than just the Russians. The Khalkas, the largest Mongolian subgroup, refused to work with Roman. Even the nobles of Erga feared Roman's threats to their privileges

and were not entirely committed to his cause. Roman was aware of these obstacles. The daughter of a former Tsarist official recalled how her father tried to dissuade him from going to Kiyakta by saying, quote, here you have fodder for the horses, everything, whereas out there they will destroy you. But despite the warning, Roman went anyway. He had internalized his role in World War I, where the best soldiers went into battle, even when the odds were stacked against them.

His attack on Chiakta in May 1921 failed. His force was too small and poorly organized, and he couldn't get very far without local support. Roman spent the next three months on the road with his regiment wandering aimlessly through Siberia and Mongolia. Even worse, the Red Army was closing in on him. They partnered with an army of Mongols and took over Urga while Roman was away. The rest of Roman's men had already fled the capital by the time the Reds had arrived. With no pushback, the invaders established a pro-communist government, while keeping the Bogdakan on as a figurehead. As one Red Army writer put it, quote,

Roman wanted to move against us, but the opposite occurred. We moved against him. By August, Roman's army was still wearily marching through Siberia. Resentments had been building as Roman's plan seemed harder and harder to grasp let alone execute. Roman's brutality towards his own army, including regular beatings and executions, no longer inspired the same fear and discipline

that it had back in Urga. Finally, one night, a few of Roman's officers snuck into his camp. They fired shots and tossed grenades at what they believed was his tent, but they had picked the wrong one and killed one of his orderlies instead. Hearing the commotion, Roman managed to escape. He hopped on his horse and rode into the woods. By morning, he had run into his Mongol unit, and together they began

marching west. But it turns out the Mongols were in on the assassination plan. After they lulled him into a false sense of security, they jumped him and tied him up. One Mongol soldier, perhaps exaggerating his role in deposing Roman, said that he distracted Roman by asking him for a light as they were riding. While Roman looked for a match, the soldier says he tackled Roman off his horse. In any case, Roman's once loyal army turned on him, capturing him and turning him in, to the Reds. Roman expected that he would be executed. Rather than submit to the same kind of torture he perpetrated on his political enemies,

he tried to take his own life multiple times while in captivity. He tried to drink the poison he always kept in his uniform pocket, but it fell to the ground out of his reach before he could grab it. He later tried to hang himself with a pair of horses' reins, but they were too thick to bow. budge. The Bolsheviks did not immediately call for Roman's execution. Instead, they brought him back to the western Siberian city of Novosibrisk for a trial. There was no doubt that he would be found guilty, and he had already admitted his guilt in their initial interrogation. His death seemed

so inevitable that citing a Soviet news bulletin, the New York Times reported his execution four days before his trial. Still, the Soviet government wanted to use Roman, who represented the most extreme version of the white cause, as an example. Thousands of onlookers filled the Summer Pine Theater on September 15th, 1921, to watch his trial. He arrived on stage in an embellished yellow kafftan,

the same one he had worn when he had first invaded Mongolia. Because he had already admitted guilt, the prosecution did not spend much time grilling him about his military career. Instead, they attacked him personally. The prosecution asked if his family owned large estates in the Baltic, to which Roman responded, probably not anymore. He then asked how long Roman's family had held its noble status, and Roman replied, a thousand years. The prosecutor's closing argument extended this line of questioning. He said to the crowd, This trial of former Baron Ungern is not only a trial of the person of Baron Ungern,

but a trial of an entire class of society that is accustomed to ruling and would not give up its power, even if it were to mean the destruction of half of humanity. Baron Ungern, who sits here on the defendant's bench, is the main instrument. inspiration of countless others who are tearing to pieces not only the body of the Russian people, but of the peoples of the whole world. He ended his speech with his preferred verdict, the death penalty. Quote, this verdict must resound as a verdict of death on all noblemen who try to raise their hands against the power of the workers and peasants, said the prosecutor. in the face of such an impassioned political speech,

and given that Roman already pled guilty to the charges, the defense didn't have much to work with. They mounted a flimsy attempt to plead Roman's insanity, which Roman himself denied. Changing tactics, the defense suggested that Roman had never been a great danger to Soviet power in the first place. His attorney dismissed Roman's ambitions as, quote, chaos, the products of, quote, a sick imagination.

But even the defense was resigned to Roman's execution, saying it would be the easiest way to end his sufferings, resembling the sympathy that we would show for a sick animal. End quote. The judge gave Roman the last word before the verdict would be announced. He stated, simply, I cannot say anything more. Roman was sentenced to death by firing squad, and he was shot the next morning. Although both the prosecution and defense were ostensibly positioned against each other,

their accounts of Roman's life work well together. Historians broadly agree with the defense's portrait of Roman as, to put it mildly, a chaotic person. His poorly thought-out plan in Mongolia was doomed from the state. He was neither a particularly dangerous threat to Bolshevik Soviets nor an asset to the Tsar. He was never a great tactician, a great leader, or even a great soldier. The only quality that his officers commended him for was his willingness to dive headfirst into seemingly fruitless missions, which overall didn't bode well for a long-term military career.

In the face of his apparent mediocrity, Roman clutched onto his aristocratic lineage for meaning. In every battle he fought him, from World War I to his disastrous campaign in Mongolia, he believed that he was defending the monarchy. In his mind, hierarchy was the only thing preventing the world from devolving into utter disorder. This was certainly true for Roman himself. he had spent his entire life coasting on his elite status, refusing to do anything that seemed beneath him, even elementary school homework. Any political ideology or religion he entertained worked downstream from his fundamental belief in his own superiority. Fitting then that the

prosecution convicted him, not for his actions as an individual, but as a civil, of his class. Ironically, the very thing that animated his life, his devotion to representing and defending his noble status ultimately ended it. That's the story

of the brutal Roman Ungern von Sternberg, but stick around to hear how Roman may have used fortune tellers to guide his military decisions. You can have opinions, you can have like a strong stands and then there's your body having its own program. I'm Dr. Maya Shunker, a cognitive scientist

and hosts of the podcast, a slight change of plans, a show about who we are and who we become when life makes other plans. We share stories and scientific insights to help us all better navigate these periods of turbulence and transformation. There is one finding that is consistent, And that is that our resilience rests on our relationships. I wish that I hadn't resisted for so long the need to change. We have to be willing to live with a kind of uncertainty that none of us likes. Listen to a slight change of plans on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. If you are a founder or a freelancer or the friend who always says, hey, you know what, what if I started that?

This is for you. I'm telling you I had nothing to my name. I didn't know a single person in New York. And somehow I'm dressed by Oscar de Lorenta walking down that red carpet. This month, we sit down with entrepreneurs and creators who actually did it, who turned the scary leap into a business, a paycheck, and a life they are proud of. Direct center of our happiness or our regrets is whether or not we're taking action on the things that matter to us. They're not selfish.

They're so important. They actually lead to our greatest contributions because when we're living fulfilled, we actually show up better everywhere. We lead better. We're better friends. We're better relationships and collaborators and all those things because we have passion about the things we're doing. If you're trying to build something of your own this year, join us in these conversations that will make you braver and smarter with your money. Listen to Dos Amigos as part of the Michael Tutta Podcast Network available on the IHard Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. This is Amy Rovock alongside TJ Holmes from the Amy and TJ podcast.

And there is so much new. information, commentary coming at you all day and from all over the place. What's fact, what's fake, and sometimes what the F. So let's cut the crap, okay? Follow the Amy and T.J. podcast, a one-stop news and pop culture shop to get you caught up and on with your day. And listen to Amy and T.J. on the IHeart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts. Roman Ungern von Sternberg was by all accounts a superstitious person, a number, of memoirs from his orderlies and contemporaries tell anecdotes about drawing, playing cards,

and meeting with psychics in order to determine his next moves. He was even said to have included a number of fortune tellers and profits in his retinue during his Mongolian campaign. Polish writer Ferdinand Osendowski, who traveled with Roman throughout Mongolia, wrote that Roman left Urga for Siberia in 1921, in part because of the interference of fortune tellers. Osendowski apparently accompanied Roman to see one fortune teller in Urga. According to him, quote, the fortune teller was a little woman of middle years, who squatted down Eastern style before the brazier,

bowed low and began to stare at Baron Ungern. She drew a small bag very slowly from her girdle, and took from it some small bird bones and a handful of dry grass. She began whispering at intervals, unintelligible words, as she threw occasional handfuls of grass into the fire, which gradually filled the tent with a soft fragrance. After the fortune teller had burned all of her grass, she placed the bird bones on the charcoal

and turned them over again and again with a small, pair of bronze pincers. As the bones blackened, she began to examine them, and then suddenly her face took on an expression of fear and pain. She said in fragments, quote, I see, I see the God of war. His life runs out. And it was at that point that she fainted and was carried out by two of her assistants. A long silence followed. Apparently Roman got up. and paced around the tent, saying to himself, quote, I shall die, I shall die, but no matter, no matter, the cause has been launched and will not die. Nobody will extinguish the fire in the heart of the Mongols.

Finally, apparently Roman raised his hand above his head, shouting, My time has come, in a little while I shall leave Urga. With that, he exited the tent, slamming the yurt door, and Osendowshka wrote that he never saw Roman again. It's hard to know what to make of this story. The memoir that we're citing is a dubious source full of sensational details and exaggerations. Historian James Palmer adds further ambiguity,

floating the idea that the fortune teller in Osendowska's story may have been purposefully trying to manipulate Roman. He wrote, quote, It's possible that the Mongolians played Ungern's own suspicions against him. Eager to see the city rid of his men, it would have been relatively simple and with some precedent

to influence the oracles to push him in a certain direction. End quote. Regardless of whether the story is true or whether the fortune teller was purposefully manipulating him, The story aligns with how Roman viewed his military ambitions in extreme, almost religious terms. He believed he was fighting a holy war on behalf of the Tsar, describing himself as someone who, quote, strongly trusts in destiny. Noble Blood is a production of IHeart Radio and Grim and Mild from Aaron Manky.

Noble Blood is hosted by me, Dana Schwartz. Writers for Noble Blood are Hannah Johnston, Hannah Zwick, Paul Jaffy, Natasha Lasky, and me, Dana Schwartz. The show is edited and produced by Jesse Funk and Nome's Gripen, with supervising producer Rima Il Kali, and executive producers Aaron Manky, Trevor Young, and Matt Frederick. For more podcasts from IHeartRadio, visit the IHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. I'm Dr. Maya Shunker, a cognitive scientist and hosts of the podcast, a slight change of plans, a show about who we are and who we become when life makes other plans. I wish that I hadn't resisted for so long the need to change.

We have to be willing to live with a kind of uncertainty that none of us likes. You can have opinions. You can have like a strong stance. And then there's your body having its own progress. Listen to a slight change of plans on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Will Ferrell's Big Money Players and IHeart Podcasts presents soccer moms. So I'm Leanne. Yeah. This is my best friend, Janet.

Hey. And we have been joined at the hips since high school. Absolutely. A redacted amount of years later, we're still joined at the hip. Just a little bit bigger hips. This is a podcast. We're recording it as we tailgate our youth soccer games in the back of my Honda Odyssey. With all the snacks and drinks.

Why did you get hard seltzer instead of beer? Oh, they hit a bogo. Well, then you got them. Listen to soccer moms on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Kristen Davis, host of the podcast, Are You a Charlotte? In 1998, my life was forever changed when I took on the role of Charlotte York on a new show called Sex and the City. Now I get to sit down with some of my favorite people and relive all of the incredible moments this show brought us on and off the street. screen. Listen to Are You a Charlotte on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

This is an IHeart podcast. Guaranteed human.