Formation of Soviet Union - Communism and Nationalism, 1917-1923
Formation of Soviet Union - Communism and Nationalism, 1917-1923
THE FORMATION OF
THE SOVIET UNION
THE FORMATION OF
THE SOVIET UNION
COMMUNISM AND NATIONALISM
1917-1923
REVISED EDITION
Richard Pipes
© Copyright 1954, 1964, 1997 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College
All rights reserved
Printed in the United States ofAmerica
Sixth printing, 1997
Richard Pipes
September 1996
PREFACE TO THE REVISED EDITION
This book was originally written in 1948-1953, when the cult of
Stalin was most intense, and information on Stalin's role in the shaping
of the Soviet Union was hard to come by. I had been forced, therefore,
to construct my narrative of the whole critical period 1921-1923 - the
years when the principles of the Union were being formulated and car
ried into practice - from fragmentary and often unreliable evidence.
Two years after the book had been published, the Communist Party of
the Soviet Union held its Twentieth Congress, at which it condemned
the "cult of personality." Shortly afterwards, historical institutes in Russia
proper and in the republics began to publish quantities of monographs
and collections of documents bearing on the history of the Revolution,
Civil War, and establishment of the Union. The purpose of these pub
lications was essentially political and propagandistic: to denigrate Stalin
an,d depict Lenin as the infallible and virtually singlehanded architect
of the Soviet multinational state. In so doing, however, they revealed a
great deal of information about two vital episodes: the subjugation of
Georgia and the formulation of the constitutional principles, because
these were issues over which Lenin quarreled and virtually broke off
relations with Stalin.
The appearance of this material necessitated a thorough revision of
the latter part of my book. I have rewritten for the present edition the
section dealing with the conquest of Azerbaijan and Georgia and all of
Chapter VI. Nothing p{iblished either inside or outside of the Soviet Union
on the preceding period ( 1917-1921) seems to have affected significantly
that part of my narrative. The official Soviet interpretation of this period
has remained substantially the same as it had been in Stalin's days, and the
most important documents bearing on it are still locked up in archives.
Hence, I have left Chapters I-IV and most of Chapter V unchanged.
The corresponding sections of the bibliography - the latter part of
Chapter V ( Azerbaijan and Georgia) and Chapter VI - have been
brought up to date to include the most important works used in pre
paring this edition.
Richard Pipes
January 1964
PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION
This book deals with the history of the disintegration of the old
Russian Empire, and the establishment, on its ruins, of a multinational
Communist state: the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. Its main em
phasis is on the national movements in the borderlands, and on the rela
tions between them and the Communist movement. It has as its main
objective an analysis of the role which the entire national question played
in the Russian Revolution.
The relatively limited span of time which this history covers -from
1917 to 1923 ( if one excludes the general introductory chapter concerned
with pre-1917 events) -would make it possible to present a coherent
chronological account, were it not for the fact that the Revolution ran a
somewhat different course in every borderland region, so that a general
survey requires numerous digressions in the narrative and shifts from
area to area. The author hopes that the reader will tolerate the complexity
of the history as a feature of the topic itself.
Insofar as this study is concerned largely with the political aspect of
the national question, as distinct from its cultural or economic aspects,
peoples without a geographically defined territory of their own, such as
the Jews, or those which did not play an important part in the political
development of the Soviet state, are not treated, except in passing. Nor
does the book discuss those national groups which succeeded in sepa
rating themselves from Russia in the course of the Revolution: the Finns,
the Baltic peoples, the Poles.
In dealing with foreign words the following general principles are
used. Proper names of Russians, Ukrainians, and Belorussians are given
in transliteration, except in the case of figures internationally known,
where the prevailing English spelling is substituted; thus Trotsky, not
Trotskii. Names of persons of Turkic or Caucasian stock are shown in
the form which they themselves employed at the time of the Revolution,
that is in almost all instances in their Russified form; but, wherever
possible, the native one is also given: for example, M. Chokaev ( Chokai
ogly). The same rule applies to political parties and institutions: they
are given in their Russified form, with the Osmanli Turkish or Arabic
equivalents in parentheses. Geographic terms appear in the form current
during the period 1917-1923, and where those differ from the terms used
in 1952, the latter are also supplied.
PREFACE T O T H E F I R S T ED I T I O N Xlll
T H E N AT I O N A L P RO B L E M I N R U S S I A
The Russian Empire o n the Eve of the 1917 Revolution 1
National Movements in Russia 7
The Ukrainiana and Belorussians. The Turkic Peoples, The Peoples of the Caucasus.
Socialism and the National Problem in Western and Central Europe 21
Russian Political Parties and the National Problem 29
Lenin and the National Question before 1913 34
Lenin's Theory of Self-Determination 41
1 1 1 9 1 7 A N D T H E D I S I N T E G RAT I O N O F T H E R U S S I A N
EMPI RE
The General Causes 50
The Ukraine and Belorussia 53
The Rise of the Ukrainian Central Rada (February-June 1 9 1 7 ) . From July to
the October Revolution in the Ukraine. Belorussia in 1 9 1 7.
The Moslem Borderlands 75
The All-Rwsian Moslem Movement. The Crimea in 1 9 1 7, Bashkiriia and the
Kazakh-Kirghh; Steppe, Turkestan and the Autonomous Government of Kokand.
The Caucasus 93
The Terek Region and Daghestan, Transcaucasia.
The Bo'lsheviks in Power 107
Ill S O V I E T C O N Q U E S T O F T H E U K RA I N E A N D
B ELORUSSIA
The Fall of the Ukrainian Central Rada 1 14
The Communist Party of the Ukraine: Its Formation and Early Activity
( 1918 ) 126
The Struggle of the Communists for Power in the Ukraine in 1919 1 37
Belorussia from 1918 to 1920 150
I V S O V I ET CO N Q U EST O F T H E M O S L E M B O R D E R LA N D S
The Moslem Communist Movement in Soviet Russia ( 19 1 8 ) 155
The Bashklr and Tatar Republics 161
The Kirghiz Republic 172
Turkestan 174
The Crimea 184
V S O V I ET C O N Q U E S T O F T H E CA U CAS U S
The Transcaucasian Federation 1 93
Soviet Rule in the North Caucasus and Eastern Transcaucasia ( 1918 ) 1 95
The Terek Region. Baku.
The Independent Republics ( 1918-19 ) 204
.Azerbaifan. Armenia. Georgia.
xvi C O NTENTS
The Prelude to the Conquest 214
The Conquest 221
The Fall of Azerbaijan, The Fall of Armenia. The Fall of Georgia,
V I T H E E S TA B L I S H M E N T O F T H E U N I O N O F S O V I E T
S O C I A L I S T R E P U B L I CS
The Consolidation of the Party and State Apparatus 242
The RSFSR. Relations between the RSFSR and the other Soviet Republics. The
People's Republics.
The Opposition to Centralization 255
Nationalist Opposition: Enver Pasha and the Basmachis. Nationalist-Communist
Opposition: Sultan-Galiev. Communist Opposition: the Ukraine. Communist Oppo-
sition: Georgia,
Formulation of Constitutional Principles of the Union 269
Lenin's Change of Mind 276
The Last Discussion of the Nationality Question 28 9
CO N CL U S I O N 29 4
Chronology of Principal Events 298
Ethnic Distribution of Population, 1 897 and 1926 300
IM lstorik marksist
KA Krasnyi arkhio
LR Letopis' ( and Litopis) revoUutsii
LS Leninskii sbomik
NZ Die N eue Zeit
NV Novyi vostok
PR Proletarskaia revoliutsiia
RN Revoliutsiia i natsionafnosti
SP Sovetskoe pravo
SR Sotsialist-Revoliutsioner
VE Vestnik Evropy
VI Voprosy istorii
vs Vlast' sovetov
ZhN Zhizn' natsional'nostei
consisting of two principal groups: the people known before the Revolution as
Sarts, and composed of the descendants of the original Iranian inhabitants of Central
Asia, largely urbanized and Turkicized; and the Uzbeks proper, a Turkic people
formed in the fourteenth century, who had split away from the main body of the
nomadic Turks and who in the course of the sixteenth century had conquered most
of Turkestan.
14 T HE FORMATION O F THE SOVIET UNION
Question ( New York, 1942 ) , 12, renders the words "stable community arising on
the foundation of a common language," as "stable community of language," which,
of course, is quite a different concept.
THE NATIONAL PROB LEM IN RUSSIA 39
category, with the tribe, which is an ethnic one," 84 whereas Bauer clearly
and repeatedly defined the nation as a historical concept.85 Stalin's asser
tion that Bauer had divorced "national character" from the economic and
other conditions which had produced it, was equally unfound,e d: Bauer
had made it very explicit that he objected to all "fetishism" of the concept
of national character, since it was not an independent factor, but one
conditioned by economic and other historic forces.86 Similar faults can
be found with other statements of Stalin concerning the ideas of Bauer
and Renner. His page references to their works concern pages suspi
ciously close together, which suggests that he may well have read their
books only in part. In some instances, he does not refer to those sections
where answers to his charges could be found. The definition of the nation
which Stalin employed without any attempt to justify it or to compare it
with other existing definitions, was very curious. Odd, from the Marxist
point of view, was the word "stable" in reference to the nation; odd also
was the statement that a nation was an economic and psychological com
munity. Lenin was before long vehemently to attack such views, because
he realized that they constituted the heart of the Renner-Bauer thesis.
Stalin's exposition of the practical aspects of the Austrian program
was equally incorrect. He wrongly says that the Austrian Social Demo
cratic Party at its Bruenn Congress had accepted the project of extra
te�itorial autonomy. 87 Furthermore, his argument that the Austrian
scheme was impracticable in Russia because the tsarist government could
easily destroy "such feeble institutions as 'cultural' Diets," 88 was com
pletely invalid for two reasons. In the first place, no advocate of the
program of extraterritorial cultural · autonomy had suggested its intro
duction into an absolutist state; the entire project was devised for a
democracy. In the second place, Renner, desiring to prevent such an
eventuality even in a democratic state had actually drawn up an
elaborate scheme for the transformation of national institutions into the
state's regional administrative apparatus.
The entire attack on the Bund and the Caucasian Mensheviks also
rested on a logical fallacy. Stalin's main case against extraterritorial na
tional-cultural autonomy was that it inevitably led to a split of the Social
Democratic Party along national lines. As proof, he cited the Austrian
experience, where indeed the emergence of the idea of national-cultural
autonomy had been followed by a division of the Austrian Social Demo
cratic Party into its national components. Yet the ,r�Jation between the
two events was hardly a causal one. The pressure for the adoption of
extraterritorial autonomy and the party reorganization were both effects
of one and the same cause : the national aspirations of the Austrian
minorities.
Finally, the practical program advanced by Stalin as a solution of
40 THE FORMATION OF THE SOVIET UNION
"Marxism and the National Question" had been composed, Stalin said that the right
to national self-determination was a general one, and included the right to autonomy
and federation ( Stalin, II, 286 ) . Lenin subsequently ridiculed this idea, not only
because he was in principle opposed to federation, but also because he felt that
there could not be any "right" to autonomy and federation from the purely logical
point of view; cf. Lenin, XVII, 427ff.
THE NATIONAL PROBLEM IN RU S S IA 41
whole, represent Lenin's opinions, 0 The character of the work and the
ideas expressed in it indicate that in the main it was a work of Stalin's.
This essay represented no advance over discussion held by Russian Social
Democrats previous to 1913, but rather a not too intelligent restatement
of old arguments, replete with errors in fact and in reasoning. It pro
vided no new program for the solution of the minority question. Viewed
as a polemical piece, the essay had some passing importance, because it
contained an early attack by the Bolsheviks on the Austrian theories, but
before long Lenin was to formulate his own views, and neither he nor
anybody else bothered to refer to Stalin's article, which would long ago
have been relegated to total oblivion, were it not for its author's subse
quent career. f
0 The point has often been made that Stalin, being ignorant of German, needed
help to do his research. This argument is not entirely valid because the principal
sources for the essay, such as Bauer, Renner, and the protocois of the Bruenn Con
gress, had been translated into Russian by Jewish socialists and the footnotes seem
to show that Stalin used the Russian translations. Only two of the sources to which
reference is made were written in German, and it is possible that Stalin learned of
their contents from Lenin's notes or possibly from Bukharin; on the latter see Wolle,
Three, 582.
f The Marx-Engels-Lenin Institute in Moscow possesses two letters of Lenin in
which reference is made to Stalin's article. Their character can be surmised from
the fact that they have never been published in their entirety, and only one sentence
from each, taken out of context, has been permitted by Soviet censorship to appear
in print. Cf. Stalin, II, 402-03.
42 THE FORMATION OF THE SOVIET UNION
essentially a phenomenon proper to the capitalist era and destined to
vanish with the demise of capitalism itself. Like Marx and Engels, he
viewed it as a transitory occurrence whose disappearance the socialists
should help speed. He never shared Renner's and Bauer's faith in the
intrinsic values of nationality, or in the desirability of preserving the
cultural heterogeneity of the world. From the point of view of funda
mental assumptions and long-range expectations he belonged in the
ieftist" camp of Rosa Luxemburg. But at the same time, Lenin, unlike
Rosa Luxemburg, was keenly aware that the force of nationalism was far
from spent, particularly in those areas where capitalism was still in its
early stages of development. He desired to utilize the national move
ments emerging in various parts of the Russian Empire and for that rea
son he refused to adopt the negative attitudes of the leftists. In his
awareness of the political implications of the national strivings of the
minorities, he came much closer to the position of the "rightists."
According to Lenin, the world, viewed from the aspect of the national
problem, could be divided into three principal areas : the West, where
the problem had been solved because each nationality had its own state;
Eastern Europe, where the process of capitalist development and its
inevitable companion, the national state, were only in their formative
stage; and the backward, colonial, and semi-colonial areas where capital
ism and nationalism have not yet penetrated at all. 94 As far as socialism
was concerned, the national problem was therefore one affecting pri
marily Eastern Europe and the backward areas of the world. Capitalism
spreading from Western Europe to the East had to accommodate itself in
national states. The large, multinational empires had to transform them
selves into national states, and the minor nationalities, incapable of
attaining statehood, had to be swept out of their long isolation by the
force of industrial development, and had to lose their identity through
assimilation in the cities and factories with the industrially more ad
vanced nationalities. Thus, by the time economic development in Eastern
Europe should have attained the level existent in the West, Eastern
Europe would have lost its multinational character. What economic
forces had begun, democracy would complete. By creating equal oppor
tunities for all national groups, and by removing the main causes of
national hostility, oppression and persecution, democracy would pave
the road for a supra-national world system of government and an inter
national culture of the socialist era.
It is obvious that neither the Renner-Bauer nor the Luxemburg
scheme could satisfy tpese assumptions. The Austrian plan of extra
territorial cultural autonomy was based on what Lenin considered a
faulty concept of "national culture," and strove artificially to preserve
all those ethnic differences which capitalism was already sweeping away.
Culture to Lenin could have only a class character. "Only the clericals
THE NATIONAL PROBLEM IN RUSSIA 43
and the bourgeoisie can talk of national culture. The toilers can talk
only of an international culture of the universal worker movement." 95
What is usually referred to as "national culture" is in reality the culture
of the ruling bourgeoisie, and is squarely opposed to the democratic,
socialistic culture of the oppressed classes. 96 ''. • • the entire economic,
political, and spiritual existence of humanity becomes already ever more
internationalized under capitalism. Socialism will internationalize it com
pletely." 97 Like Kautsky before him, Lenin argued that extraterritorial
autonomy ran contrary to the processes of history. On the one hand, it
hindered the process of assimilation; on the other, it ignored the natural
tendency of capitalism to form national states and to break up multi
national empires.
Since Lenin also remained adamant in his opposition to the federalist
project adopted by the Socialist Revolutionaries and their affiliates,98 he
had to find a third solution. But what formula was capable of satisfying
the capitalist tendency towards the creation of national states without
hindering the process of internationalization of cultures or breaking up
the unity of the proletarian movement? Lenin believed that he had found
such a formula in the slogan of national self-determination, as defined
and limited by him in the summer of 1913.
As had been indicated previously, point g in the Russian Social
Democratic Labor Party's platfonn ( "the right of all nations in the state
to self-determination") had been adopted as a general democratic dec
laration. It meant, broadly speaking, that Social Democracy was in prin
ciple opposed to any form of national oppression and favored the freedom
for subjugated peoples. As a statement of principle, it was open to
divergent interpretations. It could mean national territorial autonomy,
cultural autonomy of a territorial or extraterritorial kind, or the establish
ment of federal relations. Probably the only interpretation not held by
those who had voted this statement into the party's program was that it
implied the right to secession and the formation of independent states.
With the possible exceptions of Poland and Finland, none of the border
peoples of the Empire were considered either willing or ready to separate
themselves from Russia.
Casting about for a way out of the dilemma in which his beliefs had
placed him, Lenin seized upon Point g in the Party's program and rein
terpreted it in a way best suited to his purposes. In the summer of 1913,
he thus defined what he understood by the right to self-determination:
"The paragraph of our program [ dealing with national self-determina
tion] cannot be interpreted in any other way, but in the sense of political
self-determination, that is, as the right to separation and creation of an
independent government." 99 Every nation living in the state had, as a
nation, one right and one right only: to separate from Russia and to
create an independent state. A people who did not desire to take ad-
44 THE FORMATION OF THE SOVIET UNION
vantage of this right could not ask from the state for any preferential
treatment, such as the establishment of federal relations, or the granting
of extraterritorial cultural autonomy. It had to be satisfied with the gen
eral freedoms of the state, including a certain amount of regional au
tonomy inherent in "democratic centralism." 0
The right of national self-determination, interpreted in this manner,
seemed to Lenin to fulfill all the requirements of a good socialist solu
tion of the national problem: it made possible a direct appeal to the
nationalist sentiments among Russian minorities for the purpose of win
ning their support against the autocracy; it was democratic, and as such
conducive to the ultimate victory of socialism; it was in harmony with
the tendency of capitalism to form national states; and it speeded the
assimilation of the minorities.
As Lenin's Bolshevik followers and other socialists were quick in
pointing out, however, there was one serious difficulty with this ap
proach. Interpreted in this manner, the right of self-determination seemed
to place socialists in a position of giving blanket endorsement to every
nationalist and separatist movement in Eastern Europe. Carried to its
logical conclusion, such a slogan could lead to the break-up of Eastern
Europe into a conglomeration of petty national states. How could this
be reconciled with the international character of Marxism, with its
striving for the merger of states and the disappearance of national
borders? Did it not surpass even the Austrian program in separating the
workers of various countries from each other?
Lenin, however, did not believe in the likelihood of Eastern Europe
disintegrating into its national components, and felt certain that if his
slogan would affect the future political structure of that area at all, it
would be in the opposite direction. He had two principal arguments to
support this contention. In the first place, he argued, the economic forces
- the ultimate determinant in history - worked against the breakup
of great states. The centrifugal forces evident in Eastern Europe were
mainly psychological in their origin. As long as national oppression was
permitted, the victim-nation would remain receptive to nationalist agita
tion; once this oppression was done away with, the psychological basis
for nationalism and separatism would vanish too. And what better way
was there of striking at the very root of national antagonism than to
guarantee every nation the right to complete political freedom? Lenin
was convinced that once the minorities were assured of a right to sep
arate and to form independent states, they would cast off the suspicions
which he considered the primary cause of national movements. Then
0
"The principle of democratic centralism and autonomy of local institutions
means namely full and universal freedom of criticism, as long as it does not violate
the unity of a specific action - and the inadmissibility of any criticism which un
dermines or hinders the unity of an action decided upon by the party" ( Lenin, IX,
:z.75 ) .
THE N A T I O N A L P R O B L E M I N R U S S I A 45
and only then could economic factors have a free field to accomplish their
centralizing, unifying task, unopposed by nationalism. The minorities
would find it advantageous to remain within the larger political unit, and
thus a lasting foundation for the emergence of large states and an even
tual united states of the world would be created.
Lenin's second argument against the charges that his slogan threat
ened a breakup of Russia, was his qualification of the right to self
determination. To advance the right to separation did not mean, Lenin
asserted, to condone actual separation. Certainly he had no intention of
favoring an "unconditional" right to self-determination, since "uncondi
tional" to him were only the rights of the proletariat. Whether this or
that minority should, at a given moment, secede from Russia depended
upon any number of unforeseeable factors. Whenever the interests of
nationality and the proletariat conflicted, the former had to yield to the
latter, and the right to separation had to go overboard. Furthermore,
Lenin said, he sponsored the right to self-determination as a general
democratic right, much as he favored the right to divorce without actu
ally advocating divorce. The duty of the socialists of the oppressed ethnic
groups was to agitate for a union with the democratic elements of the
oppressing nation, whereas the socialist� of the oppressor nation must
guarantee the minorities the right to self-determination. 100
It is clear, therefore, that Lenin neither desired nor expected the
right of national self-determination, in the sense in which he had defined
it, to be exercised:
The freedom of separation is the best and only political means
against the idiotic system of petty states ( Kleinstaaterei ) and
national isolation, which, fortunately for humanity, are inevitably
destroyed through the entire development of capitalism. 101
We demand the freedom of self-determination, i.e., independence,
i. e., the freedom of separation of oppressed nations, not because we
dream of economic particularization, or of the ideal of small states,
but on the contrary, because we desire major states, and a rapproche
ment, even a merging, of nations, but on a truly democratic, truly
international basis, which is unthinkable without the freedom of
secession. 102
Separation is altogether not our scheme. We do not predict sep
aration at all.1° 3
Lenin assumed a si�ilar attitude towards the question of an official
state language. Like most Marxists, he desired the eventual transforma
tion of the Russian Empire into a national state, in which the minorities
would assimilate and adopt the Russian tongue. But, he warned, this goal
could be brought al:>0ut only voluntarily; it could be made possible only
by granting the mi:r;i.orities the right to employ freely their own native
46 THE FORMATION O F THE S OVIET UNION
tongues. In time, the greatness of Russian culture and the material ad
vantages accruing to those who had mastered its language would bring
about cultural and linguistic assimilation. 104
It was rather difficult to win over other Marxists to these views, and
Lenin spent a considerable part of the prewar years writing and speaking
publicly in support of his theses. In 1913 and 1914, he delivered a series
of lectures on this subject in Switzerland, Paris, Brussels, and Cracow,
debating against the proponents of the Renner-Bauer and Rosa Luxem
burg views alike. 105
The outbreak of the war involved Lenin in further theoretical diffi
culties and forced him to broaden the definition of self-determination.
The war caused a well-known cleavage within the ranks of European
Social Democracy. Socialists of all the major European powers supported
the military efforts of their governments, thus violating repeated pledges
of mutual cooperation against future international conflicts. Socialists of
the Entente powers argued that the Allied side deserved support as pro
tecting the world from Prussian militarism; those of the Central powers,
on the other hand, argued that they were defending the world from the
yoke of Russian absolutism and reaction. vVhatever the point of their
argument, both sides referred to the founders of modem socialism to
prove that socialism was not opposed to war as such, but rather im
posed upon its adherents the obligation to support the side which was
the more progressive. Their disagreements centered around the questions
which side represented progress and which would Marx have supported
were he alive in 1914.
Lenin, like the whole Zimmerwald left, of which the Bolsheviks were
part, disagreed fundamentally with this approach. He argued that the
war of 1914 was entirely different from those which had been fought in
the nineteenth century. It was not one in which socialists could take
sides. This was a new kind of war, an Imperialist war. The capitalist
period had entered its final phase, that of finance capitalism, in which,
having outgrown national limitations, it struggled for economic control
of the entire world. The principal aim of capitalism now was the con
quest of new markets, especially in the colonies, and the era of national
wars was over. The Allies and the Central powers were equally guilty,
equally reactionary, so that the attitudes of Marx, correct for the middle
of the nineteenth century, were no longer applicable. The task of the
socialists, Lenin and his followers argued, was to bring about a trans
formation of the international conflict into a civil war and to prepare
for an imminent socialist revolution in the belligerent states.
If this was true, however, then one of the main arguments which had
induced Lenin to apply to Eastern Europe the right to national self
determination or separation, and to reject the thesis of Luxemburg -
namely, the theory that capitalism spreading in the East would accom-
THE NATIONAL PROBLEM IN RUSSIA 47
modate itself in the national state - was invalidated. Nationalism and the
national state had become things of the past. Arguing against Lenin,
Martov stated the view prevalent among the Social Democrats:
The farms in which this or that national party might wish to
realize the right of its people to self-determination may run contrary
to the forces of social development and the interests of the proletariat.
Let us take, for instance, the Armenian people. The recognition of
its right to solve- its political destiny does not oblige us to support
the slogan of any nation which might wish to realize its right to self
determination through the formation of a separate state with its army,
with its tariff wall, etc. If we should find that such a new state would
have no economic basis for its development, then, from the point of
view of the interests of the proletariat we shall, while asserting the
right of free self-determination, demand that the Armenian nation
realize this self-determination in another form. 106
This other form of "free" self-determination which they were going
to "demand" was for the majority of Mensheviks national-cultural au
tonomy. To most Bolsheviks on the other hand, the acceptance of the
theory of Imperialism meant the abolition of all borders and the creation
of a supra-national state. This was the position taken by Grigorii Piata
kov, Nikolai Bukharin, and the overwhelming majority of Bolshevik
writers. To them, Lenin's stand appeared entirely inconsistent. If the
whole national idea in the era of Imperialism became an empty phantom,
devoid of content, how could Marxists support national movements? Early
in 1915, using this argument, Piatakov and Bukharin came out openly
with a demand for the removal of Point 9 from the party program. When
Lenin refused and cited Marx's views of the 186o's to support his views,
Bukharin inquired of him, perplexed:
What? The sixties of the last century are "instructive" for the
twentieth century? But this is precisely the root of our (logical) dis
agreements with Kautsky, that they [sic] "instruct" us with examples
from the pre-Imperialist epoch. Thus you advocate a dualistic con
ception: in regard to the defense of the fatherland you stand on the
basis of the present day, while in regard to the slogan of self-deter
mination, you stand on the position of the "past century." 107
Bukharin's sentiments were shared by Karl Radek, who also argued
that Lenin's slogan attempted to "tum back the wheel of history" and
to revive the anachronistic idea of the national state. 10 8 Late in 1915
Lenin engaged in a bitter argument with the editors of the Bolshevik
periodical Kommunist over the printing of Radek's attack on the right
to self-determination, and when they refused to yield to Lenin's demands
that this article be retracted, Lenin caused the journal to be suspended. 109
During 1915 and 1916 most of the outstanding Marxist intellectuals of
48 THE F O R M A T I O N O F THE S O V I E T U N I O N
Bolshevik leanings, organized around the society Vp ered (Forward) -
among them the historian Mikhail Pokrovskii and the future Soviet
Commissar of Education Anatolii Lunacharskii - quarreled with Lenin
on this issue. 11 ° Feliks Dzerzhinskii, the future head of the secret police;
Shaumian, who in 1918 was to serve as Extraordinary Soviet Commissar
for the Caucasus; Aleksandra Kollontai; and many other followers of
Lenin's found themselves unable to accept his stand. Indeed, it is safe
to say that throughout the years of the First World War, Lenin stood
entirely alone in his insistence on the continued validity of the slogan
of national self-determination, against the opposition of all the Zimmer
wald groups.
Opposition, however, did not cause Lenin to yield. On the contrary,
after 1914, Lenin reasserted his convictions with increasing vehemence,
although with a significant shift of emphasis.
While gathering materials for his essay on Imperialism, he realized
that the colonial dependencies of the great European powers contained
over a half billion people who were, according to his views, victims not
only of capitalist exploitation but also, in a sense, of national oppression.
He immediately perceived an intimate connection between the problem
of Imperialism and the nationality question. In the African and Asiatic
colonies, which served as the economic foundations of the entire Im
perialistic system, there existed a vast reservoir of potential allies of
socialism in its struggle against Imperialism. This struggle could be
effectively undertaken only on a world-wide scale and socialism had to
take full advantage of the forces of popular dissatisfaction by allying
itself with the liberation movements in the colonies. Inasmuch as those
areas had not yet undergone the phase of national development which
Western Europe had already left behind, the struggle in the backward
areas of the world could be expected to assume at first national forms.
Imperialism, therefore, Lenin argued, did not eliminate the national
question or the need for a party statement on self-determination. If
anything, it reemphasized its importance. Imperialism was basically
national oppression on a new basis. 1 1 1 It merely transferred the center
of national movements from Europe to the colonial and semi-colonial
areas of the world. The slogan of self-determination thus became of
greatest importance as a weapon of socialist action and agitation. 1 1 2 More
over, Lenin was careful to point out, this slogan did not lose its validity
in Europe either. Although, by and large, the epoch of national move
ments was a matter of the past as far as"Europe was concerned, national
ism was not entirely out of the question in an Imperialist age even there.
"If the Euro pean proletariat should find itself powerless for a period
of twenty years; if the present war were to end in victories like those
achieved by Napoleon and in the enslavement of a number of viable
THE NATIONAL PROBLEM IN RUS SIA 49
national states . . . then there would be possible a great national war
in Europe." 11 3
For this eventuality, the socialists had to be prepared.
The connection between Imperialism and national movements in the
colonial areas was not an original discovery of Lenin's, He had adopted
it freely from the works of several Western socialists such as Rudolf
Hilferding and Hermann Gorter. 11 4 Lenin was, however, the most persist
ent champion of this idea among Russian socialists, and the first to
correlate it with the slogan of national self-determination.
This reasoning explains why, instead of abandoning self-determina
tion during the war, Lenin espoused it ever more vigorously. At the end
of the war, he asserted that in the era of Imperialism the slogan of self
determination was assuming the same role which it had played in
Eqrope during the period of the French Revolution, and was acquiring
exceptional importance in the Social Democratic platform. Those who
persisted in ignoring national movements were waiting for a "pure
revolution" instead of a "social revolution," in which the support of non
proletarian groups was essential. 11 5 At the end of 1916 Lenin started
work on a major study of the national question; he was unable to com
plete it owing to the outbreak of the February Revolution. The existing
drafts indicate that, had it been finished, this study would have repre
sented the most exhaustive treatment of the question in all the R�ssian
socialist literature and would have reemphasized the importance which
Lenin by that time attached, to national movements. 11 6
Lenin's theory of national self-determination, viewed as a solution
of the national problem in Russia, was entirely inadequate. By offering
the minorities virtually no choice between assimilation and complete
independence, it ignored the fact that they desired neither. Under
estimating the power of nationalism and convinced without reservation
of the inevitable triumph of class loyalties over national loyalties, Lenin
looked upon national problems as something to exploit, and not as some
thing to solve. But as a psychological weapon in the struggle for power,
first in Russia and then abroad, the slogan of self-determination in
Lenin's interpretation was to prove enormously successful. The outbreak
of the Russian Revolution allowed the Bolsheviks to put it to consider
able demagogic use as a means of winning· the support of the national
movements which the revolutionary period developed in all their magni
tude.
II
1917 AND THE DISINTEGRATION OF THE
RUSSIAN EMPIRE
a mere survey of the political balance of power in the Rada would indi
cate. The USR formulae for the solution of the agricultural problem,
headed by demands for the nationalization of land and the establishment
of a Ukrainian Land Fund, were very popular in the village, and assured
the party the sympathy of the peasants.
The USD and the USR, as well as most other, minor, Ukrainian parties
of the period, agreed on the need for extensive Ukrainian territorial
autonomy. At first they were disposed to wait for the All-Russian Con
stituent Assembly to formulate and ratify officially the right of the
Ukrainians to self-rule, but before long their demands became more
urgent. This development was largely due to the pressure of the Ukrain
ian soldiers and peasants.
As soon as the news of the February Revolution had reached the
Western Front, Ukrainian soldiers who previously had had no inde
pendent units but had fought side by side with the Russians, began to
use the Ukrainian language and to form organizations based on the
principle of territorial origin ( zemliachestva). When the troops learned,
a short time later, of the establishment of a Rada in Kiev, many Ukrain
ian officers and soldiers began to look to it for leadership and in some
instances to consider themselves directly bound by orders issued by the
Rada. All throughout the second half of March and the first half of
April, Ukrainian soldiers stationed in Kiev held impromptu meetings
demanding the formation of separate Ukrainian military units and the
creation of a Ukrainian national army. 6 In the first half of April an all
volunteer regiment named after Bohdan Khmelnitskii, the Cossack leader
of the seventeenth century, was formed in Kiev and sent to the front.
The Ukrainian soldiers were strongly influenced by the example of
Polish units which began to form at that time on the Southwestern front
with the sanction of the Provisional Government, and were permeated
with enthusiasm for Cossack ideals.
How violent was the nationalism which had taken hold of the soldiers
became evident in the course of the First Ukrainian Military. Congress
which opened on May 5. During the debates, the speakers attacked the
Provisional Government for its failure to treat the Ukraine on equal
terms with Poland and Finland, to both of which it had promised inde
pendence, and for ignoring demands of the Ukrainians to form military
units on their own soil. Some voices were raised in favor of Ukrainian
independence and separate representation at the future peace confer
ences. The general tone of the sessions was so extremely nationalistic that
Vinnichenko, the delegate of the Rada and a leading member of the USD,
felt forced to plead with the delegates to remain loyal to the Russian
democracy which had given the Ukraine its present freedom. Vinni
chenko's suggestion that the Congress elect Petliura as its chaiqnan was
turned down on the grounds that the Rada, for which he spoke, had
_,
THE DISINTEGRATION OF THE RUSSIAN EM PIRE 57
taken no part in convoking the Military Congress and consequently had
no right to impose candidates on it. The Congress closed on May 8, with
the resolution to send a delegation to the Petrograd Soviet to discuss the
formation of Ukrainian regiments, and to establish a permanent Ukrain
ian General Military Committee ( UGVK ) . The delegates recognized
the Rada as the organ representing Ukrainian, public opinion.7 Several
days after the Congress closed, the Ukrainian delegates to the Kiev
Soviet of Soldiers' Deputies separated themselves into a distinct faction.
When the Ukrainian soldiers at the front learned of the decisions of
the Military Congress, they too began to form national units, despite the
remonstrations of Russian officers' and soldiers' committees. Among them,
as among the Kievans, there was hope that the Rada would take care
of their interests by terminating the fighting and helping the Ukrainians
get their share of the land.8 The behavior of the soldiers left no doubt
about their impatience with the status quo. Anxious to win and retain
the support of the Ukrainian troops, the Rada included in its platform
their demand for the creation of national military units.
The Ukrainian peasantry also displayed nationalist sentiments. The
soil in the Ukrainian provinces was better but less plentiful than in
the central regions of Russia. The peasantry of these provinces had every
thing to gain if empowered to dispose of the local land according to its
own wishes, and much to lose if compelled to abide by any likely future
all-Russian solution of the land question. The Ukrainian village feared
most of all having to share the property, which it looked forward to
acquiring from the state, church, and large private owners, with the
landless peasantry of the north. This desire to apportion the rich
Ukrainian black earth independently of Russia, for the sole benefit of
the local population, became a powerful factor in the development of
nationalist sentiments among the Ukrainian rural masses. Under the
influence of the USR they favored a land program providing for the
nationalization of all land and the establishment of a Ukrainian Land
Fund, with exclusive control over the land and the right to apportion it
in accordance with the directives of a Ukrainian Diet ( Seim ) . This
formula presupposed a fairly wide degree of autonomy. At the Regional
Congress of Soviets of Workers', Soldiers' and Peasants' Deputies (Kiev,
April 22 ) the peasant section voted for the introduction of autonomy
with provisions for land distribution which would benefit the local in
habitants.9 At the First All-Ukrainian Peasant Congress (Kiev, May 28-
June 2 ) similar resolutions were adopted, and pressure was applied
upon the Rada to undertake more energetic steps toward Ukrainian
self-rule. 10
As the result of the intimate connection between peasant economic
aspirations and the slogan of autonomy, the rural restlessness and impa
tience which in one way or another affected the villages throughout the
58 THE FORMATION OF THE SOVIET UNION
entire Empire, assum�d in the Ukraine nationalistic forms. The more
eagerly the peasants demanded land, the more ardently they espoused
the slogan of "autonomy now."
Early in June the Rada sent the Provisional Government a note con
taining a list of demands, calling for the recognition of the principle of
Ukrainian autonomy, the separation of the twelve provinces with a
predominantly Ukrainian p opulation into a special administrative area,
the appointment of a commissar for Ukrainian affairs, and, finally, the
formation of a Ukrainian army. 1 1
These demands placed the Provisional Government in a difficult
position. In principle, most of the cabinet members were not opposed
to autonomy for the non-Russian regions of the state. Alexander Keren
sky, who had strong influence in the government, was actually identified
with pro-Ukrainian sympathies, owing to his defense of Ukrainian rights
in the prerevolutionary Dumas. 12 Upon the outbreak of the February
Revolution the TUP had singled him out for special favor by sending
him an individual message of congratulations, in recognition of his
championship of the Ukrainian cause. 1 3 But the government was loath
to make the kind of commitment the Rada had requested because of
its general political philosophy, which forbade constitutional changes
prior to the convocation of a Constituent Assembly. It also had specific
objections. The government considered the Rada neither truly representa
tive of the Ukraine, nor authorized to speak in its name. Furthermore,
it feared also that the introduction of the national principle into the
army would disorganize and weaken the country's armed forces at
the very time when they were being readied for an all-out offensive
against the enemy. Moved by such considerations, the Provisional Gov
ernment turned down the requests of the Rada, suggesting that the
questions which it had raised wait for the convocation of the All-Russian
Constituent Assembly. Only the demand concerning the army met with
a partly favorable reply. Petrograd agreed that something could be done
for those Ukrainians who desired to serve under national banners, but
on condition that the military authorities of the Kiev district give their
approval to any scheme affecting the organization of the army. 1 4
This action of the cabinet was favorably received by Russian and
Jewish elements in the Ukraine, which were becoming very concerned,
if not alarmed, by the behavior of the Ukrainians. The principal non
Ukrainian parties of that region, from the most conservative to the most
radical, roundly condemned the actions of the Rada. The IKSOOO and
the Kiev Soviet alike expressed approval of the Provisional Government's
reply. 1 5
On Ukrainian political circles, however, the effect of the cabinet deci
sion was quite different. Infuriated by what they considered an insolent
refusal of their modest demands, and convinced that it foreshadowed
THE DISINTEGRATION OF THE RUSSIAN EMPIRE 59
the attitude of Russian ruling circles toward the whole question of
Ukrainian self-rule, they decided to challenge the authority of Petrograd.
The government reply had reached Kiev shortly before the Ukrainian
Peasant Congress was to close. At the last session Hrushevskii read to the
agitated audience the message from the capital and concluded with
these menacing words : "We have finished celebrating the holiday of the
Revolution, and now we have entered into its most dangerous period,
one which threatens with major destruction and disorder. We must pre
pare to resist effectively any hostile attack . . . I greet you, brothers,
and repeat that, come what may, there will be a free autonomous
Ukraine." 1 6 The peasant delegates voted on the spot to disregard the
government order and to take steps for the immediate introduction of
autonomy.
At the same time as Petrograd turned down the Rada's petition, it
refused to grant the UGVK permission to convene a Second Ukrainian
Military Congress. Enraged Ukrainian soldiers held protest meetings
and urged the Rada to act on its own, without reference to the govern
ment. Acting in defiance of Petrograd, the UGVK resolved to proceed
with its plans, and set June 5 as the date for the opening of the con
gress.
On June 10 the Rada issued an official manifesto, the so-called First
Universal,° in which, addressing itself to the entire Ukrainian people, it
announced that the Ukraine would henceforth decide its own fate and,
without separating itself from Russia, take all the necessary measures
to maintain order and to distribute the land lying within its borders.
The Rada reasserted its claim to the exclusive representation of the
Ukrainian national will and imposed upon the Ukrainian society a
special tax, the proceeds from which were to be used to pay for
the Rada's administrative functions. From the juridical point of view the
First Universal was a highly questionable document, but this was a
period when juridical considerations were far from uppermost in people's
minds, and in Kiev it was received by the Ukrainian population with
great emotion, bordenng on religious reverence.17
During the second half of June the Rada underwent a series of
internal structural transformations from which it emerged equipped
with the apparatus of a full-fledged government. Its membership was
broadened to include not only Ukrainian organizations, such as the
Congress of Ukrainian Workers, but also to leave room for the_/ rion
Ukrainian population of the region over which it claimed jurisdiction. In
this manner, the Rada evolved from a national into a territorial institu
tion. Next a Small Rada, consisting of forty-five members representing
the various elements united in the Rada, was formed. The Small Rada
0
"Universals" were originally decrees issued by Polish monarchs; in the seven
teenth century this term was adopted by the Hetmans of the Cossack Host.
60 THE FORMATION OF THE SOVIET UNION
tral Rada will take all measures to prevent the sending of troops
from the Ukraine for the suppression of the uprising [in Petro
grad] .46
The Bolsheviks, Zatonskii concluded, had joined the Rada only on this
basis, No one challenged his memory, but a resolution condemning the
Petrograd uprising was adopted, and as a consequence the Bolsheviks left
the Small Rada.
The Bolsheviks decided now to proceed on their own with a seizure
of power in Kiev. On the twenty-seventh they prevailed on the Soviet of
Workers' Deputies ( where they enjoyed a majority as they did not in the
general Kievan Soviet ) , to form a separate Revolutionary Committee. But
the actual military forces at their disposal were still very small, and it
was unlikely that they could win without aid from the Ukrainians. For
this reason the Bolsheviks did not completely break with the Rada, but
left the door open for further cooperation based on the agreement of
two days before, hoping that at a critical moment the Rada would change
its mind and come to their assistance.47
On October 28, while the rebels were readying for action, pro-govern
ment troops surrounded their headquarters, and arrested the entire Bol
shevik Revolutionary Committee. Immediately other pro-Bolshevik units,
located on the outskirts of the city, began to shoot and attack.
At this critical moment the Rada finally decided to throw its forces
into the struggle on the side of the Bolsheviks. On October 29, it issued
an ultimatum to the headquarters of the armies of the Provisional Gov
ernment in Kiev, demanding the immediate release of the arrested Bol
shevik leaders from the Revolutionary Committee and the withdrawal
from Kiev of all reinforcements which the government had brought into
the city during the previous weeks to suppress the anticipated Bolshevik
coup.48 At the same time, Ukrainian patrols occupied strategic points in
the city, and prevented pro-government units from liquidating the centers
of rebel resistance.
Faced with the hostility of the Ukrainians, the Kievan Staff had no
choice but to capitulate. Two days later, representatives of the Staff met
with emissaries of the Rada, and accepted their terms. 49 The arrested
Bolsheviks were released, and the Staff left the city with its troops. The
rule of the Provisional Government in the center of the Ukraine thus
came to an end through the joint efforts of the Ukrainian Central Rada
and the Bolsheviks.
While the fighting for the city was still in progress, the General Secre
tariat took steps to enlarge the scope of its authority. Several secretariats,
previously vetoed by the Provisional Government, were added, and an
announcement was made to the effect that the jurisdiction of the Rada
extended over additional provinces. 50
THE DISINTEGRATION OF THE RU SSIAN EMPIRE 73
In other cities of the Ukraine the Rada and its Secretariat did not
play the same critical role as in Kiev, because their provincial organiza
tions were insignificant. This was the case in the smaller towns of the Kiev
province; 5 1 in the Kherson province, including the city of Odessa; 52 in
the Ekaterinoslav province; 53 and in the Chernigov province.154 Effective
rule over these areas was assumed, soon after the outbreak of the October
Revolution, by the local soviets without significant intervention of the
Ukrainian groups. In other areas where they were politically more influ
ential, the Ukrainian parties - USD and USR alike - followed the ex
ample set by the Kievans and aided the Bolsheviks. In Kharkov, the
USD's and USR's entered the Bolshevik-controlled Revolutionary Com
mittee and helped overthrow the local authorities.55 In Poltava the
USD's even suggested a merger with the Bolsheviks in the fall of 1917,
and though this idea fell through, they and the USR's sided with the
Bolsheviks during the October Revolution. 56 In the city of Ekaterinoslav
( Dnepropetrovsk ) the USD's reached an agreement with the Bolsheviks,
by virtue of which they offered to accept the rule of the local soviet in
return for Bolshevik recognition of the Central Rada's Revolutionary
Committee. 57
Belorussia in 1917
When the February Revolution took place, the Belorussian national
movement was still in its embryonic stage. There was only one Belorus
sian political party : the Hromada, which had a very small organized fol
lowing and was unknown to the masses of the population. At the time
of the first postrevolutionary Belorussian conference, held in Minsk on
March 15, 1917, the Hromada mustered only 15 followers.158 Political
life in the Belorussian lands was dominated by Russian and Jewish so
cialist parties. There is no evidence that in 1917 the peasantry, which
composed the mass of the Belorussian people, possessed any conscious
ness of ethnic separateness.
An important element in the history of this movement in 1917 was the
fact that Belorussia was a battleground, with its western half occupied
by German and Polish armies, and its eastern half occupied by Russian
troops. The political fortunes of the Belorussians were almost entirely
dependent on the attitude of the combatants.
In March, at the Belorussian conference, a Belorussian National Com
mittee composed of representatives of all the ethnic groups and all the
social classes of the territory, was organized. This committee prepared
a statement which was submitted to the Provisional Government for con
sideration. In its essential points the statement followed the program
of the SR's, who had assumed the leadership of the Belorussian cause
and exercised within it a dominant ideological influence. The committee
74 THE FORMATION OF THE SOVIET UNION
demanded _the establishment of federal relations in Russia, and the
granting of an autonomous status to Belorussia, 59
In the summer the Hromada gained the upper hand in the National
Committee and steered it toward a more radical course. The committee
held a second Belorussian sonference in July, at which, \_ under the im
pression of events taking place in the Ukraine, a Belorussian Rada was
established. 60 The main goal of the Rada was to realize an agrarian
policy modeled after that of the Russian Socialist Revolutionary Party. It
specifically excluded landowners from the right to participate in its
activities. The Rada took charge of the Belorussian soldier organizations
which were being formed at the western front, and early in October,
after merging with the Belorussian Military Council, renamed itself the
Great Belorussian Rada.
The Bolshevik party on Belorussian territory was inconspicuous in
the first half of the year. It was officially organized in Minsk at the end
of May6 1 by Bolsheviks of prewar standing who had been drafted and
served at the time of the Revolution in the ranks of the Western Army.62
The Bolsheviks concentrated their agitation and propaganda efforts on
the Russian soldiers at the western front, and as the soldiers grew more
and more war-weary, Bolshevik influence increased. The Leninist slogans
of peace had great success among the troops, especially after the failure
of the summer offensive undertaken by the Provisional Government in
the West. In the fall of 1917, the Bolshevik party in Minsk grew at a
meteoric rate: 2,530 members at the end of August; 9,1go in the middle
of September; 28,508 members and 27,856 candidates at the beginning of
October.es The Minsk Committee then reorganized itself as the North
western Committee of the Russian Social Democratic Labor Party ( Bol
shevik ) , with authority over the party cells located on the territories co
inciding with today's Lithuania and Belorussia. The party membership
was almost exclusively Russian and military in composition, with some
following among the Jewish urban population. It had virtually no contact
with the Belorussian inhabitants. 64
The destruction of the Provisional Government by the Bolsheviks,
and the disintegration of the anti-Bolshevik socialist parties which fol
lowed it, left the political field in Belorussia to two parties: the Bolshe
viks, who controlled large parts of the Russian Army, and the Belorussian
Rada, which had some influence among the native soldiers and the
intelligentsia.
In early November, the Bolshevik leaders in Petrograd issued direc
tives to the Northwestern Committee to form a Soviet government and
to assume power over their territory. Carrying out this order, the local
Bolsheviks organized an Executive Committee and a Council of Com
missars of the Western Region ( Obliskomzap ) , and demanded that all
organizations situated in tlie provinces adjoining Minsk subordinate
THE DISINTEGRATION O F THE RUSSIAN EMPIRE 75
themselves to those organs. 65 The question of relations with the Rada
was left, for the time being, open.
The elections to the Constituent Assembly on Belorussian territory
gave the Bolsheviks a considerable victory, owing mainly to the soldier
vote. The Belorussian national party failed to elect a single candidate.
At the (western ) front the Bolsheviks obtained 66.g per cent, and the
SR's 18.5 per cent of the votes. In the Minsk district the Bolsheviks ob
tained 63.1 per cent, the SR's 19.8 per cent, the Mensheviks and Bundists
1.7 per cent, and the Hromada a mere 0.3 per cent of all the votes. 66
In the city of Minsk the Hromada polled 161 votes out of 35,651 votes
cast.67
On December 14 the Hromada convened in Minsk a Belorussian Na
tional Congress to discuss the problems created by the Bolshevik coup.
In attendance were nearly 1,900 deputies, among them a large propor
tion of anti-Communist Russians. The Congress debated the political
future largely from the point of view of the effect which the establish
ment of the new authority in Petrograd was likely to have on the whole
country. Finally, on the night of December 17-18, under circumstances
that are completely unclear, the Congress proclaimed the independence
of Belorussia.
It may be questioned to what extent this Congress, or that part of
it which passed the resolution establishing the republic, represented the
wishes of the people over who� it claimed authority. One month earlier
the Hromada, participating in the elections to the Constituent Assembly
on a platform of autonomy, had polled a mere 29,000 votes in an area
populated by several million; how much would it have obtained had its
program been nationally more radical? At any rate, the separation of
Belorussia in 1917 was an ephemeral act, devoid for the time being of
political significance. Unlike the nationalists in the Ukraine and in some
other regions of the Russian Empire, the Belorussian nationalists lacked
a popular following. Only in the period of the Civil War and the ensu
ing period of Soviet rule did their movement mature and the act of
separation acquire political and psychological importance.
The Caucasus
The Terek Region and Daghestan
The Revolution in the Northern Caucasus had a very complex course.
The mountain ranges created barriers between adjoining regions, so that
their historical development proceeded at times independently of each
other. Daghestan, in the eastern sector of the Caucasian chain, and Terek,
in its center, though geographically adjacent, followed different courses.
Furthermore, in each region different national groups faced different
problems and took advantage of the Revolution to realize their own
94 THE F O R M A T I O N O F T H E S O V I E T U N I O N
The Russian population was divided into two distinct groups : the
Terek Cossacks and the so-called inogorodnye. The former had inhabited
the northeastern foothills of the Caucasian Mountains since the middle
of the sixteenth century, when they had been settled as a military guard
to protect the domain of the tsars from the incursions of the nomads and
the mountain peoples. In the cour1ie of the eighteenth century they had
lost most of the privileges of self-rule which they had originally pos
sessed, but in a number of respects they still remained a privileged so
cial order. The most important advantage which they enjoyed over the
remaining groups of the population, Russian and non-Russian alike, was
an abundance of land. Owing to government generosity, the Terek Cos
sacks possessed more than twice as much land per capita as the native
inhabitants of the mountains ( 13.57 desiatinas to the latter's 6. 0 5 ) . 138
They formed, in other words, something of a landed middle class - a
status which in the course of the Revolution was to influence profoundly
their relations with the other groups of the region. In 191 2 the Terek
Cos�acks numbered 268,000. They lived in settlements, or stanitsy, along
the Terek River or the valleys radiating from the river into the mountains .
The inogorodnye ( "people from other towns" ) were, as their name
indicates, migrants : newcomers who had arrived in the Northern Cau
casus in recent times. They were largely Russians, but among them were
also Georgians and Armenians . The first wave of inogorodnye consisted
of peasants, who had moved into the rich lands of the North Caucasian
steppes from Russia following the liberation of the serfs ( 1861 ) . Most of
these migrants had settled in the western section of the Northern Cau
casus, in the Kuban and Don districts, where they rented land from the
Cossacks. In the Terek Region there was less land, and consequently the
THE DIS INTEGRATION O F THE R U S S IAN E M P IRE 95
peasant newcomers were less numerous. The second wave of inogorodnye
had arrived toward the end of the nineteenth century, in connection with
the development of the oil industry ( Maikop, Groznyi ) and the con
struction of railroad repair shops; they filled the towns of the Terek
Region as laborers, merchants, officials. The term inogoroclnye had no
official sanction, but it was in common use in the Northern Caucasus and
it did have certain social significance. In an area where the majority of
the population had consisted for several centuries entirely of native
tribes and Cossack military settlers, the influx of an urban element and a
landless peasantry created a new and distinct class of inhabitants. The
inogorodnye and the Cossacks did not get along well. The former dis
liked the Cossack privileges, wealth, and readiness to help the government
to suppress popular resistance against absolutism; the Cossacks resented
the fact that the newcomers threatened their privileged position.
The third element in the Terek Region were the natives, or gortsy.
These people, however, constituted no unit either in the ethnic, cultural,
or socio-economic sense.
The Kabardians were a Cherkess people. At the end of the sixteenth
century they had gained complete control over the· entire North Cau
casian plain, and established dominion over most of the other native peo
ples. They had acquired possession of much land, and long after the
Russians had conquered the Northern Caucasus, the Kabardians re
mained the richest group in that area. Their per capita ownership of
land was 17.5 desiatinas, which was even higher than that of the Terek
Cossacks. 139 Owing to this wealth the Kabardians were viewed by some
of the poorer mountain peoples with as much hostility as the Cossacks
themselves. The Ossetins, who inhabited the central sector of the Terek
Region, along the Georgian Military Highway connecting Vladikavkaz
with Tillis, belonged to the Iranian race. Among the indigenous peoples
of the Northern Caucasus they were culturally the most advanced. Hav
ing in their majority accepted Christianity in the fourth century they
had come under the influence of neighboring Georgia, and, after Russian
conquest, had adapted themselves far more easily to Western civilization
than their Moslem neighbors. At the beginning of the twentieth century
the Ossetins had a sizable intelligentsia, educated in Russian schools,
and an urban population. The Kabardians and Ossetins both were pri
marily agricultural peoples.
The Chechens and Ingush presented a special problem. Inhabiting
the nearly inaccessible mountain ranges bordering on Daghestan, they
were always, from the Russian point of view, a troublesome element.
Unassimilable and warlike, they created so much difficulty for the Rus
sian forces trying to subdue the Northern Caucasus that, after conquer
ing the area, the government felt compelled to employ Cossack units to
expel them from the valleys and lowlands into the bare mountain regions.
96 THE FORMATION OF THE SOVIET UNION
There, faced by Cossack settlements on the one side, and wild peaks on
the other, they lived in abject poverty tending sheep and waiting for the
day when they could wreak revenge on the newcomers and regain their
lost lands. The Ingush and Chechens, with average land allotments of
5.8 and 3.0 desiatinas, were the poorest people in the area. Their hatred
was concentrated on the Cossacks. 140
It is not difficult to perceive that the socio-economic and cultural situa
tion in the Terek Region was conducive to a three-cornered struggle
among the Cossacks, the inogorodnye, and the land-hungry mountain
peoples. In the course of the Revolution the Cossacks found their prin
cipal support among the White Guards; the inogorodnye cooperated with
the Bolsheviks; and the natives shifted for themselves, seeking escape
from spreading anarchy in independent national activity or in alliances
with the Turks, Azerbaijanis, and Bolsheviks.
The population of Daghestan - a region occupying the northeastern
end of the Caucasian range - was one of the most primitive in the Em
pire. Here was the center of extreme religious fanaticism where Sufism
and divinely inspired sheikhs still held undisputed sway. The Revolution
in Daghestan therefore assumed the character of a religious war of the
natives against the Christians and westernized Moslems.
The national movement among the inhabitants of the mountains was
led, in 1917, by the intelligentsia, the nobility, and the moneyed elements,
who strove for the attainment of autonomy within a Russian federation
and an improvement of the economic conditions of the native population.
The religious tendency, on the other ha�d, represented an expression of
Muridism, a form of Sufism. It stressed the role of God-appointed imams,
or spiritual leaders, who exercised complete power over their followers.
Muridism had enjoyed its greatest popularity in the North Caucasus in
the middle of the nineteenth century, at the height of native resistance
to Russia. Its hero was Shami!, the leader of the Caucasian wars of the
183o's and 184o's; its ideal, the establishment of a theocratic Moham
medan state; its leaders were the mullahs, the clergy. If the nationalistic
movement enjoyed greater popularity among the peoples who were
culturally and economically more advanced, the religious movement
dominated the backward regions, especially Chechnia and Daghestan.
Although both these tendencies asserted the principle of unity of the
natives and employed Pan-Islamic slogans, they were too divergent in
their ultimate goals to merge.
In May 1917, the nationalists convened a congress of gortsy in
Vladikavkaz. Advancing no political demands, they asked for free educa
tion for all citizens, the continuation of the war, and popular support of
the Provisional Govemment. 141 The Second Congress was to have taken
place in the village of Andi, high in the mountains of Daghestan where
Shamil had once been active, but the nationalist deputies were scattered
'tH� DISINTE GRATION OF THE RUS SIAN E M P IRE 97
by the religious extremists who appeared there in large numbers on the
eve of the Congress, and threatened them with violence. Instead, the
nationalists met in September in Vladikavkaz, and there formed -a Union
of Mountain Peoples ( Soiuz Gorskikh Narodov ) . The Congress pro
claimed the Union an integral part of the Russian Empire, and drew up a
constitution regulating the internal relations of its member nations. 142
The intention of the nationalists was to include all the Moslem groups
inhabiting the northern as well as southern slopes of the Caucasian
range in one autonomous state.
The clergy in the meantime elected as their imam a sixty-year-old
Arabic scholar and wealthy sheep-owner from Daghestan, Nazhmudin
Gotsinskii. The son of a right-hand man of Shamil's, Gotsinskii knew well
how to combine the prophetic appeal, popular among the native popula
tion, with political expediency. He succeeded in establishing himself as
the de facto ruler of the high mountain districts of East Caucasus for a
major part of the revolutionary period, and in obtaining complete con
trol over the minds and bodies of his fanatical followers. Gotsinskii's
assistant, and later chief rival, was Uzun Khadzi, who was even more
extreme in his religious views. "I am spinning a rope with which to hang
all engineers, students, and in general all those who write from left to
right," he once said of his aims. 14 3
The Terek Cossacks, who already in March 1917 had elected their
own Ataman and formed a Military Government, tried in the autumn to
enter into a union with the Cossacks of the Don and Kuban, for the
purpose of forming a Southeastern Union ( Iugo-vostochnyi soiuz ) . Faced
with growing hostility from the urban population; from the inogorodnye,
who dominated the soviets; and from the non-Cossack rural population,
who refused after the outbreak of the February Revolution to pay rent
to the Cossack landowners and demanded that all land be nationalized;
the Terek Cossacks offered an alliance to the native nationalists. On
October 20, 1917, the Union of the Mountain Peoples and the Terek
Military Government united in a Terek-Daghestan Government ( Tersko
Dagestanskoe Pravitefstvo ) , which was to enter the Southeastern
Union. 144
These plans, however, were brought to nought by the outbreak of a
full-scale war between the Cossacks and the Chechens and Ingush.
Having waited with growing restlessness for nearly a year to regain the
lands which they had lost to the Russians in the previous century,
the Chechens and Ingush finally lost their patience. In December 1917
they swooped down from the mountains and attacked the cities and
Cossack settlements. Vladikavkaz, Groznyi, and the entire Cossack line
along the Sunzha River suffered from the blows of the attackers, who
looted and pillaged. The Terek-Daghestan Government, whose authority
had never extended beyond the confines of Vladikavkaz and which had
98 THE FORMATION OF THE SOVIET UNION
proved unable even to defend that city from the invaders, dissolved itself
in January 1918. The war of the Chechens and Ingush with the popula
tion of the plains ended for the time being all possibility of cooperation
between the Cossacks and the natives. The Russians - Cossack and
inogorodnye alike - now forgot their disagreements and united to
defend themselves against the common danger. In the early part of 1918
a bitter national struggle between Moslems and Russians broke out in
the Terek Region. The immediate advantage of this struggle accrued to
the Bolsheviks, who, supported by a sizable proportion of the inogorodnye
and Russian soldiers returning home from the Turkish front, organized
the resistance of the Russians against the natives.
Transcaucasia
Transcaucasia was in 1916 and 1917 under the authority of the Grand
Duke Nikolas Nikolaevich, who led Russian troops in successful cam
paigns against the Turks. When the news of the abdication of Tsar
Nicholas II reached the Headquarters of the Caucasian Army he resigned
his post. His military functions were assumed by General Yudenich, and
his civil powers were taken over by the Special Transcaucasian Commit
tee ( Osobyi Zakavkazskii Komitet, or Ozakom for short ). The Ozakom
exercised little authority and limited itself during its existence to the
introduction of organs of local self-rule ( zemstva ) into Transcaucasia. 1 45
Real power in Transc�ucasia in 1917 was wielded by the soviets,
especially those located in the two principal towns, Tillis and Baku. Until
the end of the year both soviets were dominated by the Mensheviks
and the SR's, the former enjoying greater popularity among the industrial
workers, the latter among the soldiers. The Tiflis Soviet was a Menshevik
stronghold. The Baku Soviet was at first divided equally among SR's,
Mensheviks, Mussavatists, and Dashnaks, but by the beginning of 1918,
as the result of the influx of deserting soldiers from the front, it inclined
more and more to the left, until for a brief time it came entirely under
Bolshevik control. The Transcaucasian Soviets were united for the pur
pose of coordinating their work in a Regional Center ( Kraevoi tsentr
sovetov ) located in TiHis, which passed resolutions on all political and
economic measures of general interest for the Caucasus and enforced
them through a network of subordinate provincial soviets. The Ozakom
did little more than rubber-stamp its decisions. In a sense, therefore,
in the spring of 1917 Transcaucasia represented the realization of the
Menshevik ideal of a «bourgeois" government ( i.e., the Provisional Gov
ernment and the Ozakom ) controlled and directed by "proletarian"
organs of self-rule ( i.e., soviets ) .
Largely because of this arrangement and the discipline maintained
by the army fighting the Turks, the first year of the Revolution passed
in Transcaucasia with relative calm. Neither the anarchy, caused by
Volodimir Vinnichenko, 1 921 Mikhail Hrushevskii
the people were Shiite ) , but in all other respects it was identical with the
Mussavat. The Moslem Union spoke for the conservative clergy and
the landowning classes. 1 49
In April 1917 the Caucasian Moslems held a conference in Baku. The
conference was dominated by the Mussavat, under whose influence it
passed resolutions favoring the establishment of a democratic Russian re
public, the introduction of federalism, the creation of an all-Moslem or
ganization in Russia, with competence in religious and cultural matters,
the conclusion of a peace without annexations or contributions, and the
maintenance of friendly relations with the other national minorities. 15 0 The
same program was advanced by the Azerbaijani delegation at the May
All-Russian Moslem Congress in Moscow, where it championed the
federalist cause against the idea of cultural autonomy sponsored by
the Volga Tatars. The Baku Congress also appointed an All-Caucasian
Moslem Bureau, with permanent residence in Tiflis, to function as a
center for Moslem affairs.
At the end of June the Mussavat merged with the Turkish Federalist
Party, newly founded in the heart of the Moslem landowning district in
Transcaucasia, Elisavetpol ( Gandzha� today Kirovabad ) . The Federal
ists, headed by Ussubekov ( Nasib bey Yusufbeyli ) , represented the in
fluential Azerbaijani landed aristocracy. By merging with it, the pre
dominantly urban, middle-class Mussavat gained greatly in strength. At
the same time, however, it lost something of its earlier radical social
character. The Federalists, while agreeing with the Mussavat on most
programmatic issues, strongly opposed the idea of land expropriation as
desired by the Mussavatists, and favored government purchase of private
estates for distribution to landless peasants. For some time this important
question caused disagreements between the Azerbaijani political leaders,
but £nally in October 1917 the Mussavat gave in and agreed to the
Federalist formula. 151 The name of the new party was officially changed
to the Turkish Federalist Party Mussavat, though the term Mussavat
( or Musavat ) continued in general use.
There can be no doubt that the new Mussavat enjoyed mass following
among all elements of the Moslem population in Transcaucasia. In the
elections to the Baku Soviet it consistently polled the largest number of
votes in the industrial regions of the town, and in October 1917 it re
ceived the over-all greatest vote cast in the reelections to the Baku
Soviet, more than twice the number won by the Bolsheviks. 1 52 In the
elections to the Constituent Assembly, the Transcaucasian Turks voted
along national lines, giving the Mussavat 405,917 votes, and the other
Moslem parties ( mainly of a conservative, religious orientation ) 228,-
889. 15 3 The total vote of 634,206 thus won by the Moslem parties repre
sented, in round figures, 30 per cent of all the votes cast in the elections
throughout Transcaucasia ( 1,996,263 ) and corresponded to the proportion
THE DISINTEGRATION OF THE RUSSIAN EMPIRE 10 1
control. The double standard which the new formula provided was in
the future to prove extremely convenient.
The right to national self-determination, as Lenin had interpreted it
before 1917, however, was gone, and with it died the heart of the
Bolshevik national program. It was necessary to provide something in
its place.
Before November 1917 the Bolsheviks, like the Mensheviks, had
opposed tlie federal idea, but now that the state had fallen apart, the
prerevolutionary arguments against this concept were no longer valid.
Federalism, which had been a centrifugal factor as long as Russia was
one, now became a centripetal force, an instrument for welding together
the scattered parts of a disintegrated empire.
For this reason, within a month or two after they had seized power,
the Bolsheviks reversed their old stand and took over the Socialist
Revolutionary program of a federated Russia.
The first official statement to this effect was drawn up by Lenin in
January 1918, in connection with the Bolshevik attack on the Ukraine:
"The Central Executive Committee of the Soviets of the Ukraine . . . is
proclaimed the supreme authority in the Ukraine. There is accepted a
federal union with Russia, and complete unity in matters of internal and
external policy . . ," 1 9 1 Simultaneously, Lenin prepared a general state
ment which served as a model for a resolution adopted by the Third
Congress of Soviets held at the end of January 1918. "The Soviet Russian
Republic," he wrote, "is established on the basis of a free union of free
nations, as a federation of Soviet national republics." 1 92
At the beginning of April 1918 a Constitutional Commission was
appointed to prepare a draft of the fundamental law of the Russian Soviet
republic. Headed by · Iakov Sverdlov, the commission had, as one of its
chief assignments, to determine the nature of the federal system which
was to be instituted in the new state. The question was whether the
basic units of the federation were to be economic, geographic, ethnic,
or historic regions. Each viewpoint had its sympathizers. To reach a
decision, the commission appointed two of its members, Mikhail Reisner
( of the Commissariat of Justice ) , and Stalin, to prepare projects for a
federal constitution. 193
Reisner, who presented his draft at the next meeting of the Com
mission, argued for a federation based on the economic principle. In a
socialist republic, he held, the national factor was secondary, and should
be limited to cultural matters. It was unwise to create national-territorial
units, or to pursue "hidden centralism under the cover of a federal
structure." Instead, he proposed that the Russian federation be based
on voluntary associations of trade unions, cooperatives, communes, and
other local institutions. Reisner's project thus called for a federation of
1 12 THE FORMATION OF THE SOVIET UNION
socio-economic groups rather than nationalities, organized extraterri
torially rather than territorially, and offering the minorities cultural, in
place of political, self-determination.
This project was rejected because the members of the commission
felt that it ignored both the centrifugal tendencies in evidence since
early 1917, and the fact that the republics which were already in exist
ence on the territory of the defunct Russian Empire were national in
character.
Stalin, who was not present when Reisner had read his paper, re
appeared at the third session, but without the promised project. He
brought with him only a brief statement, which demanded flatly that
the . federation be based on the principle of national-territorial autonomy,
and neither explained nor justified this request. It seems likely that
Stalin merely conveyed the wishes of Lenin, who several months earlier
had indicated that he desired the Soviet federation to be established
along national-territorial lines. Stalin made no other contribution to the
work of the commission because a few days later he left for the front.
The idea of national-territorial autonomy was accepted by the commis
sion and embodied in the Soviet Russian Constitution of 1918. Soviet
Russia thus became the first modern state to place the national principle
at the base of its federal structure.
To have an organ capable of dealing with the national question
Lenin created in November 1917 a special Commissariat of Nationality
Affairs (Narodnyi komissariat po delam natsional'nostei, otherwise known
as Narkomnats ) . The chairmanship of this commissariat was turned over
to Stalin. Its original functions consisted of mediation in conflicts arising
among the various national groups in the country and of advising other
agencies of the government on problems connected with the minorities. 1 94
But in time, especially after 1920, it assumed broader responsibilities
and became one of the several vehicles which Stalin used to obtain con
trol over the party and state apparatus of the entire country.
The activities of the Narkomnats may be divided into two periods:
from its foundation until 1920; and from 1920 until its dissolution in
1924. Until the end of the Civil War the borderland areas were separated
from Moscow, and the Narkomnats' field of operations was restricted
largely to the minority populations residing in Russia proper. It issued
general appeals to the non-Russians, urging them to support the Soviet
regime; it conducted propaganda among the· prisoners of war; it closed
minority organizations of a military or philanthropic nature established
during the war in various cities of Russia. 0
0
The Narkomnats suppressed the following organizations : the Caucasian Bureau;
all Moslem organizations formed by the All-Russian Moslem Central Council; the
Georgian Commissariat of Military-National Affairs; the Higher Lithuanian Council in
Russia; the All-Russian Moslem Council; the Armenian National councils; the Union
THE DISINTEGRATION OF THE RUSSIAN EMPIRE 1 13
LI nlike the pattern in other parts of the old Russian Empire where,
following the overthrow of the Provisional Government, authority was,
in most cases, vested in the Soviets of Workers', Soldiers' and Peasants'
Deputies, the situation in the Ukraine did not permit such a direct trans
fer of political power. The existence of the Ukrainian Central Rada,
which claimed to be the national soviet for the territory, complicated
matters. It resulted in an uneasy condominium in which sovereignty was
shared between the Rada with its General Secretariat exercising control
over the city of Kiev and, to some extent, over the right-bank ( i.e., west
of the Dnieper) rural districts, and the city soviets, most of which were
Bolshevik-dominated, ruling the remaining towns.1 For a brief time, at
the end of October and the beginning of November 1917, it seem,ed pos
sible for the two governing agencies to cooperate and even to merge,
much as they had done during the crucial days of the October Revolu
tion. But with the disappearance of the Provisional Government the
fundamental divergence of interests between them came to the fore and
led to an armed struggle which finally resulted in the Bolshevik conquest
of the Ukraine.
During the first day or two following the liquidation of the Kievan
pro-government Staff there was utter confusion in the city. No one knew
who was in command: the City Soviet, the Rada, or the newly formed
Council of Peoples' Commissars in Petrograd. The Bolshevik Committee
in Kiev, especially its right wing, which had favored cooperation with
the Ukrainian nationalists and had brought about the establishment of the
Rada's Revolutionary Committee, anticipated that the defeat of the pro
Kerensky troops would be followed by the convocation of an All-Ukrain
ian Congress of Soviets. Its members expected that this congress would
THE UKRAINE AND BELORUSSIA 115
The Ukraine,
Belorussia and the Crimea
(1922}
Ad'mini$frative Divisions before 1917
Infernal Border Dec. 1922
lntetnolional Bound-ory 1922
Orel•
Kursk•
Romania
100 Mi!es
executed as a Trotskyist twenty years later, while Artem, who headed the right,
has been given a prominent place in the Stalinist Pantheon.
1 32 THE FORMATION OF THE SOVIET UNION
arisen since 1917 ( Odessa and the Crimea) in a single Ukrainian Soviet
Republic. There is some evidence
' that the influence of Lenin was instru-
mental in terminating the shortlived but potentially explosive dual re-
gime. 53 At this Congress the Ukraine was also proclaimed an independent
Soviet republic. According to early Communist sources this step was
taken for purely tactical reasons. The left faction, which dominated tlie
Congress, was opposed to the Brest Litovsk Treaty, and hoped that b,y
proclaiming Ukrainian independence from Soviet Russia it could 9ori
tinue to fight against the German invaders, without involving Russia in
a war with the Central Powers. 54
The left continued to dominate the party apparatus at the Taganrog
Conference of Ukrainian Bolsheviks ( or Communists, as they formally
called themselves henceforth) which met in April 1918. A Communist
Party of the Ukraine - KP ( b)U - was formed by merging the two sepa
rate organizations heretofore operating on Ukrainian territory. This party,
in accordance with the resolutions of the Conference, was to be inde
pendent of the Russian Communist Party and was to join the Third In
ternational.55 Plans were made to call together an All-Ukrainian Party
Congress and to undertake extensive underground work, but before any
of those projects could be carried out the Germans had extended their
occupation to the left-bank regions of the Ukraine, including Kharkov
and Ekaterinoslav. The Ukrainian Communists were compelled to flee to
Moscow.
Both factions utilized the period between the Taganrog Conference
in April and the First Congress of the Communist Party of the Ukraine,
which took place in Moscow at the beginning of June, to win support
from the leading members of the Communist hierarchy. The opinion of
Lenin was especially important. It is nearly impossible to ascertain now
what Lenin's views on this subject really were; for after his death, both
sides claimed that they had had his backing. 56 The Kremlin had some
reasons to throw its support behind the leftists, because they understood
much better the importance of an alliance with the Ukrainian peasantry
and stood closer to Lenin on the issue of the minority policy than did the
rights. On the other hand, however, the leftists came dangerously near
the views of the Russian Left SR's on the question of the Brest Litovsk
Treaty and the continuation of the war against Germany. Their policy of
active underground movement against the occupants 0f the Ukraine
threatened to lead to the resumption of hostilities with the Central Pow
ers, a danger Lenin wanted at all costs to avoid. In view of the impor
tance of this issue, Lenin perhaps tended on the whole to agree with the
rightists. M. Maiorov, one of the leaders of the left, is probably correct in
stating that Lenin trusted neither one nor the other faction, considering
the rightists to be opportunists, and the leftists hot-heads. 57 Trotsky, ac
cording to Maiorov, supported the rights and refused to issue arms and
THE UKRAINE AND BELORUSSIA 1 33
ammunition to the partisans who had been recruited for resistance by
th� left. 58 Stalin, on the other hand, as far as one can judge on the basis
of an article written in March 1918 and some of his actions later in the
year, supported the left and urged a "patriotic war" against the invading
Germans in the Ukraine. 59
Whatever his own predilections, Lenin finally settled on a compro
mise. He approved the demand of the left for the creation of a Central
Revolutionary Committee to command the consolidated underground
forces operating in the Ukraine, but fully applied the weight of his great
prestige in convincing the leftists to act cautiously and to avoid provok
ing Germany into a resumption of hostilities. 60 He also urged the two
factions to come together, and to create a Ukrainian Communist Central
Committee composed of representatives of both. 61
The leftists owed their temporary supremacy not only to the assistance
of Lenin on certain crucial issues between them and their rivals, but also
to their alliance with some radical, non-Bolshevik parties operating in the
Ukraine. This alliance was a direct result of the short-sighted, incon
siderate policy applied by the German occupation forces toward the
Ukrainian peasantry.
The main motive which had induced the German High Command to
occupy the Ukraine was the prospect of securing large food supplies £or
their blockaded and hungry homeland. Even before they had signed the
treaty with the Ukrainians, they bluntly insisted that the Rada should
promise to provide, within a space of several months, one million tons
of cereals. 62 The Ukrainian politicians, well aware of the mood of the
Ukrainian peasantry, recoiled at the thought of such promises, which
were certain to be highly unpopular, but they were in no position to
bargain and had to give in. 63 As soon as they had entered the Ukraine,
the Germans began to collect large qua_ntities of foodstuffs to dispatch
westward. The peasants in many areas resisted them passively and in
some areas actively. German units were attacked by angry peasants and
disarmed, whereupon the GerIJ1an Command turned to the Rada, de
manding that it maintain order and keep the population under control.
The Rada was scarcely in a position to do either. Violent quarrels be
tween the more radical elements of the USD and USR, on the one hand,
and the nationalist wjng, inclined to collaborate with the occupant, on
the other, paralyzed the Rada completely. 64 Finally the Germans, disap
pointed at the impotence and socialist leanings of the Rada, on whose
active cooperation they had previously counted, decided to get rid of
the useless ally. One day, at the end of April 1918, German soldiers
entered the hall where the Central Rada was holding its session, and
ordered all those present to disperse. 65 Thus the Ukrainian Central Rada,
after one year of stormy history, came to an inglorious end.
The occupying power replaced the disbanded Rada with a puppet
1 34 THE FORMATION OF THE SOVIET UNION
government headed by Hetman Pavlo Skoropadski, an ex-officer of the
Tsarist Army and a commandant of Free Cossack detachments loyal to
the Ukrainian movement. Food-collecting now proceeded more rapidly,
unhampered by dissident voices of Ukrainian politicians. But resistance
among the peasantry continued, and the Germans took to repressive
measures. Collective fines and the shooting of hostages, at times at the
rate of ten Ukrainians for one German, became common practice. Field
courts were introduced to deal summarily with the local population,
when it tried to prevent the troops from carrying out their orders. 66
German civil authorities in the Ukraine protested to Berlin against the
brutality of the military command and urged that the interests and
moods of the population be taken into account, but with little effect.67
From the middle of 1918 the entire Ukraine became the scene of a
growing peasant rebellion, which was to hold the country in its bloody
grip for nearly two years.
The German behavior in the occupied regions provided an excellent
opportunity for the Bolsheviks to win a foothold in the Ukraine. In June
1918 there was a further break within the USD and USR parties; the
left-wing elements of both passed over to the Bolsheviks and participated
in the Second All-Ukrainian Congress of Soviets. The Left USR's even
formed a separate party under the name Ukrainian Socialist Revolution
ary Fighters ( USR Borotbisty, or simply Borotbisty, as they were hence
forth called). In Ekaterinoslav, at the Congress of Soviets which had
proclaimed the establishment of the Ukrainian Soviet Republic, there
were more Ukrainian and Russian Left SR's in attendance than there
were Bolsheviks. 68
By virtue of their views on the role of the Ukrainian peasantry and
the need for active resistance to the German occupation, the leftists in
the Ukrainian Communist movement had greater affinities to the radical
defectors from the defunct Rada than their rivals. This explains the
superiority which the left could attain over the right, dependent as the
latter was for its strength on the industrial centers of the occupied terri
tories.
The First Congress of the newly formed KP ( b)U met in Moscow at
the beginning of June 1918. The debates between the rights and lefts
flared up once more, and the leftists again won, though with slender
majorities, on the issue of revolutionary activity in the Ukraine. A Cen
tral Committee, composed almost exclusively of leftists, was created, and
subordinate to it, a Revolutionary Committee to direct the conspiratorial
and partisan work.69 On one very important issue, however, the leftists
lost. In April, at the Taganrog Conference they had succeeded in pass
ing a resolution stating that the KP ( b )U was an independent Communist
party, separate from the RKP ( b ) , and able to join the Third Interna-
THE UKRAINE A N D B E L ORUS S I A 135
tional on a par with foreign Communist parties. Such independence in
party matters Lenin would not tolerate. Homogeneity of the Communist
movement and strict unity of its command had been cardinal tenets of
his long before he had come to power, and perhaps the only principles
to which he had remained loyal throughout his life. The summer of
1918 was a period when Moscow undertook to bring into line th�
numerous provincial Communist party organizations which had grown
up in the course of the Revolution and early Civil War, and which had
taken advantage of the lack of contact between the center and the
borderlands to attain local autonomy.
The long debates over the status of the Ukrainian party took place
behind closed doors. When the delegates finally emerged from their
meeting, it was announced that the KP ( b ) U was henceforth to function
as a constituent part of the Russian Communist Party, and to carry out
all orders emanating from the RKP's Central Committee. The KP ( b ) U
would, as a consequence, have no separate representation at the Third ,
International. 70 This was an unmistakable victory for the rightists.
Unmindful of their defeat on the organizational question, the leftists
proceeded at once to prepare for the uprising in the Ukraine. Members
of the Revolutionary Committee were dispatched there to get in touch
with the peasant partisan leaders. 7 1 Arms were purchased from German
soldiers. Contact was established with the Bolshevik cells that had man
aged to survive German repression. Everything seemed to proceed
smoothly, insuring the success of a mass rebellion, capable of overthrow
ing the Skoropadski regime and forcing the Germans to evacuate the
Ukraine. The Bolshevik underground considered the time ripe :
The general political conditions at that time were most favorable
[sic!] . German rule, violence, and the indemnities which the con
querors widely imposed, tortures, mass executions, punitive expedi
tions, the burning of villages, the destruction of all peasant and
worker organizations, the nullification of all the achievements of the
Revolution, starvation wages, ruined enterprises, the high price of
all necessities, and, finally, the complete return to the landowners
and factory proprietors of all their previous privileges - all this pro
vided splendid soil for the widespread growth of the revolutionary
movement and for the development of an active will to fight among
the masses. 72
On August 5, 1918, the Revolutionary Committee of the KP ( b )U issued
its Order Number 1, calling for a general uprising in the Ukraine. 73
Despite its favorable prospects the August 1918 Ukrainian rebellion
was an utter fiasco. The Bolshevik defeat was even more disastrous than
the most determined opponents of the left faction had reason to antici
pate. The sporadic, half-hearted uprisings which occurred throughout the
136 THE FORMATION OF THE SOVIE T UNION
and state apparatus. Its resolution asked that the Soviet Ukraine, upon
its liberation from the Whites, be granted the status ·of a sovereign re
public and be federateo with all the other Soviet republics { including
those which would presumably arise outside the confines of the old
Russian Empire ) in matters of defense and economy only. Further it
demanded that the government apparatus of the whole Soviet federation
be separated from that of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Re
public { RSFSR ) , with which until then it had been almost completely
merged. This so-called Federalist group represented a new nationalist
communist tendency in Ukrainian Communism. Opposed to it was a
group led by Manuilskii, who was also chairman of the Gomel confer
ence. This faction desired the closest possible merger of the Soviet
Ukraine and Soviet Russia, and criticized the Federalist proposals as un
Communist in spirit. 104
The two factions clashed bitterly over the question of whether or
not to admit into the future Ukrainian Soviet government representatives
of the Borotbisty. The Borotbisty, it will be recalled, were left-wingers of
the Ukrainian Socialist Revolutionary Party, who in 1918 had split
from the right-wingers and adopted a distinct party name. In March
1919 they once more changed their name, assuming the cumbersome title
of the Ukrainian Party of Socialist-Revolutionaries Communists Borot
bists ( in Russian, Ukrainskaia Partiia Sotsialistov-Revoliutsionerov Kom
munistov Borotbistov ), and .five months later, most of them having
merged with the dissident radical elements of the Ukrainian Social Demo
cratic Party, formed the Ukrainian Communist Party ( Borotbists ) :
Ukrainskaia Kommunisticheskaia Partiia ( Borotbistov ), or, for short,
UKP. 0 Despite these mergers, the members of these groups continued
to be popularly known as Borotbisty. The UKP had a foreign bureau
located in Vienna under the direction of Vinnichenko, the onetime chair
man of the General Secretariat of the Ukrainian Central Rada ( 1917 )
and a leader of the USD. Following repeated disagreements over social
policies with the USD's right wing, headed by Petliura, Vinnichenko had
broken with the USD's, and allied himself with the Ukrainian crypto
Communists.10 5 The UKP was willing to cooperate with the Russian
Communist Party on condition that the Ukrainian Red Armies retain
their separate status, and that the UKP be permitted to join the Comin
tern as the principal representative of Ukrainian Communism. 106 Organi
zationally, the UKP was quite ineffective, but its leaders did enjoy a
certain following in the Ukrainian village, a following which the KP ( b ) U
desperately needed.
The swing of such rarties as the left USR and left USD to a pro
Soviet position offered the KP ( b ) U an excellent opportunity to improve
0
Not to be confused with the Communist Party of the Ukraine, KP ( b ) U, the
official branch of the Russian Communist Party.
THE UKRAINE AND BELORUSSIA 1 47
its situation, but most of the leaders of the KP ( b)U were hostile to the
idea of cooperation with them, partly because they disliked the national
istic flavor of such groups, and partly because they were apprehensive
', lest an alliance with them water down the Communist spirit of their own
party. On April 6, 1919, the Central Committee of the KP ( b)U had de
clared itself opposed to the inclusion of Borotbisty representatives in the
Ukrainian Soviet government. 107 The Communist authorities in Moscow,
however, especially Lenin, had taken a different view of the matter and
immediately issued a directive ( signed by Stalin) ordering the KP ( b)U
"to arrive at an agreement with the USR's in the sense of [allowing] the
entrance of representatives of the Ukrainian SR's into the Ukrainian
Soviet government." 108 Obedient to orders from above, the KP ( b)U had
issued appropriate instructions to all its local organizations, 109 but there
is no evidence that they had been carried out before the autumn of 19 19,
when the Communist regime had been expelled from the Ukraine by the
White forces.
The Federalists, striving for a broad alliance with non-Communist
radical groups, desired the formation of a new Communist Party of the
Ukraine, composed of remnants of the KP ( b)U; the KPU, and those
Borotbist groups which had retained their independent status. The new
party was to posses a Bolshevik nucleus, but remain formally separate
from the ineffective and virtually defunct KP ( b)U. 110 This idea they
fostered at Gamel, but with little success. Manuilskii, speaking for the
majority, which he headed, stated that the admission of the Borotbisty
would not be possible until the latter had changed some of their attitudes,
and particularly until they had given up the demand for separate Ukrain
ian armies. 1 1 1 The Federalists were also defeated on their resolutions
concerning Russo-Ukrainian relations.
Undaunted by this defeat, the Federalists took their case directly to
the Central Committee of the RKP. Sometime in November 1919 they
presented it with a memorandum in which they called for a reevahiation
of the party's national policy in the Ukraine. Arguing that the Commu
nists in the Ukraine lacked contact with the village and in the past had
depended too much on Moscow, they asserted: "In the struggle for the
reestablishment of Soviet power [in the Ukraine] the leading role must
unconditionally belong not to the Moscow center, but to the Ukrainian
center." In this connection they also asked for a reconsideration of the
party's decision concerning the Ukrainian Central Committee. 112
· The Central Committee of the RKP did not favor this request with
a reply, since it obviously ran conb"ary to all the principles underlying
Communist strategy in the borderlands. But this memorandum undoubt
edly played a part in inducing Lenin to raise the Ukrainian question at
the Eighth Party Conference, held in Moscow December 3-5, 1919.
Having been taken to task for his concessions to minority nationalists by
1 48 THE F O R M A T I O N O F THE S O V I E T U N I O N
Rakovskii, Manuilskii, Bubnov, and several others present at the Confer
ence, Lenin delivered a scathing attack on Great Russian chauvinism in
Communist ranks. 0 He was especially critical 9f the policies pursued by
his opponents in the Ukraine, and of their tp).wi�� h�ndling of the Borot
bisty, whose assistance, he believed, was vital for the party's effective
operation there.11 3
Lenin's speech produced immediate results. Soon after the Eighth
Conference closed, a new party center for the Ukraine was formed in
Moscow. It consisted of Rakovskii, Zatonskii, Kossior, Petrovskii, and
Manuilskii. At the same time a skeleton Soviet Ukrainian government was
created under Rakovskii, Manuilskii, Zatonskii, one Borotbist, and one
member of the KPU. 114 The presence of Rakovskii and Manuilskii in both
these bodies indicated that they would continue the old centralist, anti
nationalist policy, while the inclusion of Borotbists in the government
signified an effort to attract the non-Communist radicals into active
participation in the Soviet administration.
The alliance with the Borotbisty, brought about under Lenin's pres
sure did not last long in the face of the undiminished hostility of the
majority of Communists. The new Soviet organs entered Kharkov late
in December 1919, in the wake of the victorious Red Armies. In March
1920, on instructions from Zinoviev, the Chairman of the Comintern,
the Borotbisty dissolved their separate organizations and merged with the
KP ( b)U. 115 The Foreign Bureau of the UKP also disintegrated at this
time. Vinnichenko, who had migrated to the Soviet Ukraine in the winter
of 1919-20, quickly became disappointed with Communist rule and
once more emigrated. 1 1 6 The new Soviet regime in the Ukraine thus
remained firmly in the hands of centralists who owed all their allegiance
to Moscow, and who lacked even those native roots which the leaders
of the Communist movement in the Ukraine had possessed in the earlier
stages of the revolution.
The history of the Ukraine from 1917, when the old regime had
collapsed, until early 1920, when Soviet rule was finally established,
reflects a state of rapidly spreading anarchy, which, both in its extent and
its duration, is perhaps unique in the history of modern Europe. Over
these three years, no fewer than nine different governments attempted
to assert their authority over the land. None succeeded. The democracy
of the Provisional Government, the moderate socialism of the Rada and
its General Secretariat, left- and right-wing Communism, the Cossack
Hetmanate and the German occupation armies, the proto-fascist Direc-
0 The stenographic records of this conference are missing. It is possible, as one
of the participants to the Twelfth Party Congress ( 1.923 ) suggested, that they had
been destroyed by the persons whose reputation was likely to suffer from them; see
Dvenadtsatyi s"ezd RKP - Stenograficheskii otchet ( Moscow, 1.923 ) , 546.
THE UKRAINE AND BELORUSSIA 1 49
tory, peasant anarchism, and the military rule of the White Armies - all
failed alike. With each year the country disintegrated further, until by
1919 it no longer represented one country, but an infinite number of
isolated communities.
The main protagonists in this struggle for power were the Ukrainian
nationalists and the Russian Communists.
The Ukrainian movement which emerged in the course of the Russian
Revolution was, despite its ultimate failure, a political expression of
genuine interests and loyalities. Its roots were manifold: a specific
Ukrainian culture, resting on peculiarities of language and folklore; a
historic tradition dating from the seventeenth-century Cossack commu
nities; an identity of interests among the members of the large and
powerful group of well-to-do peasants of the Dnieper region; and a
numerically small but active group of nationally conscious intellectuals,
with a century-old heritage of cultural nationalism behind them. All the
evidence points to the fact that nationalist emotions during the period
of the Revolution received a strong stimulus by having an opportunity
to act in the open and to influence directly the masses of the population.
The weakest feature of the Ukrainian national movement was its
dependence on the politically disorganized, ineffective, and unreliable
village. Despite their numerical preponderance, the peasants provided
a most unsatisfactory basis for the development of political action be
cause of their political immaturity, which made them easily swayed by
propaganda, and because of their strong inclinations toward anarchism. The
fate of the Ukraine, as of the remainder of the Empire, was decided in
the towns, where the population was almost entirely Russian in its
culture, and hostile to Ukrainian nationalism. The Ukrainian cause was
further weakened by the inexperience of its leaders and the shortage of
adequate administrative personnel. The political figures came mainly
from the ranks of the free professions, with a background of journalism,
the law, or university life, but 'without any knowledge of the actual
workings of government. Of course, the same weakness affected the
Bolshevik regime in Soviet Russia, but the Communists had the ad
vantage of inheriting from the previous regime large cadres of officials
whom they could utilize until proper replacements were available. The
Ukrainians harl no such reserves because, until 1917, their country had
been ruled mainly by Russian bureaucrats, and the natives who had
entered the tsarist service were or became Russified. This shortage of
personnel with which to administer the country was one of the greatest
weaknesses of Ukrainian governments, and forced them eventually into
a complete dependence on Galician Ukrainians. And, finally, much of the
blame rests directly on the shoulders of the Ukrainian leaders themselves.
So overwhelmed were they with the rapid growth of Ukrainian national
sentiments among the masses, and so impressed with the ease with which
150 THE F O R M A T I O N O F THE S O VIET U N I O N
they had triumphed over the Provisional Government, that they greatly
overestimated their own strength. Instead of concentrating on the task
of establishing good relations with Russian democratic forces and on
winning the support of the non-Ukrainian groups of the population, the
nationalist leaders preferred to engage in the fruitless pursuit of "high
politics," in ridiculous squabbles over the mere appearances of sover
eignty, in grandiose acts which bore no relation to political reality. In
the long run this cost them the sympathy of many influential elements on
Ukrainian territory. One cannot fail to notice a certain emotional in
stability and unrealism on the part of the leaders of the Ukrainian move
ment. These faults played an important part in their ultimate downfall.
The position of the Communists was in almost every respect opposite
to that of the nationalists. Their strength centered in the towns, - not in
the villages; they had a well-organized party apparatus, supplied with per
sonnel and financial resources from Russia; they had a keen sense of
political reality, and a ruthless strategy. Yet they too failed, and after
two years of ups and downs, were completely swept off the political
stage. Their main weakness lay in the fact that they were essentially
foreigners on Ukrainian soil, strangers to its peasant culture, its interests,
and its ambitions.
The Ukrainian national movement did not perish with the termination
of the Revolution and the reestablishment of Moscow's dominion at the
end of 1919. Rather, it now penetrated into the Communist Party and
state apparatus, with the result that the early 192o's saw a reappearance
of nationalist tendencies, this time within the very Bolshevik ranks.
Belorussia from 1918 to 1920
As has been pointed out earlier, Lenin had stressed prior to 1917
the great importance of the Orient in the struggle for power. He per
sistently supported the slogan of national self-determination largely be
cause he believed that national movements among the colonial peoples
would play a crucial role in a world-wide revolution. This faith-
strengthened rather than weakened after Lenin's advent to power-ex
plains the great lengths to which he and his regime were willing to go
to win the sympathies of the Eastern peoples residing in the Russian
Empire. Pan-Islamism, Pan-Turanianism, religious orthodoxy - all these
sensitive areas of Moslem consciousness were played upon by the Soviet
government during the Revolution in order to gain a foothold in the
Moslem borderlands and to penetrate the Asiatic possessions of the West.
Early in December 1917 the Soviet government issued, over the
signatures of Lenin and Stalin, an appeal to Russian and foreign Moslems
in which it made extremely generous promises in return for Moslem
support:
Moslems of Russia, Tatars of the Volga and the Crimea, Kirghiz
and Sarts of Siberia and of Turkestan, Turks and Tatars of Transcau
casia, Chechens and Mountain Peoples of the Caucasus, and all you
whose mosques and prayer houses have been destroyed, whose be
liefs and customs have been trampled upon by the Tsars and oppres
sors of Russia: Your beliefs and usages, your national and cultural
institutions are forever free and inviolate. Organize your national life
in complete freedom. This is your right. Know that your rights, like
those of all the peoples of Russia, are under the mighty protection
of the Revolution and its organs, the Soviets of Workers, Soldiers,
and Peasants. 1
156 THE FORMATION OF THE SOVIET UNION
The Communist appeal further pledged the annulment of all inter
national agreements concerning the dismemberment of Turkey, including
the treaties which had called for the cession of Constantinople to Russia
and for the detachment of Turkish Armenia. The entire tone of the
proclamation left no doubt that the Soviet regime, by failing to make its
customary distinction between "toilers" and "exploiters," was bidding
indiscriminately for the support of all Moslem groups.
Among Moslems in Russia, Marxist influence was very limited, and
where it did exist (Vladikavkaz, Baku, Kazan), it was Menshevik in
character. In general, Moslems had been far more affected by liberal
and Socialist Revolutionary thinking than by Marxism. In November
1917 the Soviet government had, for all practical purposes, no basis for
political action in the Moslem borderlands. To offset this weakness, the
Bolsheviks made an attempt to win over the All-Russian Moslem move
ment, despite the fact that the ideology of this movement was entirely
different from their own, and that in the past its leaders had on more
than one occasion displayed hostility to Lenin and his tactics. 2
By December 1917 there existed, as organs of the All-Russian
Moslem movement, a Constituent Assembly, or Medzhilis, sitting in
Kazan; three ministries (religion, education, and finance); and an
Executive Council, or Shura, in session in Petrograd. The Shura had at
its disposal several thousand Moslem troops, composed largely of Volga
Tatar veterans of the tsarist armies. In the provinces inhabited by
Moslems and in all the major Russian cities, the Shura had established
branch offices which endeavored to enlist support for its cause and
campaigned for the elections to the Constituent Assembly. The Chairman
of the Shura and of all its provincial organizations was the Ossetin Men
shevik, Akhmed Tsalikov.
Sometime in December 1917 Stalin got in touch with Tsalikov and
offered him an opportunity to join the Soviet government on seemingly
very advantageous terms. "In order to cooperate with the [Soviet] re
gime," Stalin assured him, "the Executive Committee of the Moslems
must not at all assume this or that party label; it is sufficient to have a
straightforward and loyal relationship, so that their united efforts on
behalf of the Moslem toiling masses may proceed at full speed." 0 If
Tsalikov were willing to cooperate on those conditions, Stalin stated, he
could have the chairmanship of the Commissariat of Moslem Affairs
which the Soviet government intended to establish in the near future. 3
Tsalikov, however, backed by a majority of the Medzhilis, refused the
offer and in the Constituent Assembly, where he headed the Moslem
0 Pravda (Petrograd), No. 26, 2/15 December 1917. Pravda implies the initiative
was taken by Tsalikov, but other sources indicate that it came from Stalin; cf. A
Saadi, "Galimdzhan Ibragimov i ego literaturnoe tvorchestvo," Vestnik nauchnogo
obshchestva tatarovedeniia (Kazan), no. 8 ( 1928), 29-30,
THE MOSLEM BORDERLANDS 157
faction, attacked the Bolsheviks in strong language for their treahnent
of the minorities.4
Balked in his attempt to secure the support of the Moslem Executive
Council and with it of the whole apparatus of the All-Russian Moslem
movement, Stalin next approached the other Moslem political figures who
began to gather in Petrograd for the opening of the All-Russian Constit
uent Assembly. Early in January he persuaded three deputies to collabo
rate with him. Among them the most influential figure was Mulla Nur
Vakhitov, a twenty-seven-year-old Volga Tatar engineer from Kazan,
.
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SINKIANG
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to whom Stalin now offered the chairmanship which Tsalikov had re
fused. In the spring of 1917 Vakhitov with several friends had formed a
Moslem Socialist Committee of definite Marxist leanings. Its member
ship �as small, about a dozen persons, but this did not prevent Vakhitov
a Pan-Islamist, from entertaining the hope that it would "spread the idea
of socialism throughout the entire Moslem world." 5 In 1917 his com
mittee had been pro-Menshevik, disapproving of Lenin's July coup and
158 THE FORMATION OF ,THE SOVIET UNION
participating in the elections to the Constituent Assembly on joint tickets
with the other Moslem socialist parties, rather than with the Bolsheviks.
When, however, he was presented by Stalin with an opportunity to
assume the highest post open to a Moslem in the new government - the
chairmanship of the Moslem Commissariat - he abandoned his previous
associates and went over to the Bolsheviks. The other two deputies
whose cooperation Stalin secured were Galimdzhan Ibragimov, a Volga
Tatar writer, and Sherif Manatov, a one-time employee of the tsarist
secret police and a deputy from the Bashkir regions. 6
Although the name of the newly created Soviet Moslem center im
plied the status of a regular ministry, represented in the Council of
People's Commissars, it was, in fact, only a subsection of the Commissar
iat of Nationalities, and as such, responsible directly to Stalin. Its mission
was to organize party cells, spread Communist propaganda, and help
the Soviet regime destroy independent parties and organizations among
Russian Moslems.
Vakhitov tackled his duties with much energy. He dispatched emis
saries to the provinces with orders to open local branches of the Com
missariat, the so-called Moslem Bureaus or Musbiuro. In March and April
1918 he called Moslem conferences in the provinces under Soviet control
and opened provincial Moslem Commissariats ( Gubmuskomy) in Ufa,
Orenburg, Kazan, and Astrakhan. Within a few months the Moslem
regions and large cities of Soviet Russia were covered with a network of
Musbiuro and Gubmuskomy, which agitated among the indigenous
Turkic population against the All-Russian Moslem movement and urged
the natives to join the ranks of the Red Army. The propaganda efforts
of the Commissariat were especia11y strong among the Turkish prisoners
of war captured by the tsarist armies. 7
The establishment of the Soviet regime and the outbreak of the Civil
War had induced the leaders of the All-Russian Moslem movement to
accelerate their efforts toward autonomy. The difficulty was that the
Medzhilis, which sat in session from November 20, 1917, until the middle
of January 1918, could not agree which kind of autonomy was most suit
able for the Tatars. One group, called Toprak<;;ilar Fraksyonu ( i.e., Terri
torialist faction) wanted an autonomous Volga-Ural state; another, the so
called Turkculer Fraksyonu ( Turki faction) wanted a system which would
unite all the Turks of Russia. In addition, there was a small leftist group
which favored a compromise with the Soviet authorities. 8 Unable to reach
an agreement, the Medzhilis appointed a committee to settle this prob
lem, and then dissolved. This committee, functioning in Kazan, decided
at the end of February 1918 in favor of a Volga-Ural autonomous state,
and issued directives for the convocation of a Constituent Assembly of
the region.9
The Bolsheviks, however, did not permit the realization of these
THE MOSLEM BORDERLANDS 159
plans. On February 13/26, having learned of the Committee's resolution,
the Soviet authorities in Kazan organized a Revolutionary Staff and
arrested several Tatars connected with the local Shura, after which they
issued an ultimatum to all the Moslem organizations in the city to
subordinate themselves at once to the Kazan Moslem Commissariat. The
Tatars rejected this demand, and took cover in the native quarter of
Kazan. A brief struggle ensued. Within the native quarter the Bolsheviks
had armed a group of Moslem religious mystics, led by one Vaisov, whose
"legions" they planned to use against the Shura troops.10 Vaisov, how
ever, was killed by an angry Tatar mob and his followers were disarmed.
The native quarter, therefore, had to be taken from the outside, and this
was accomplished a few days later with the help of a detachment of Red
sailors newly arrived from Moscow.11 The Kazan Shura was closed, and
all its military detachments dispersed. On April 10/23, 1918, the com
mittee for autonomy was arrested and two days later in Ufa the remain
ing institutions of the All-Russian Moslem movement were suppressed.
By an official order of the Commissariat of Nationalities all the functions
and properties claimed by the Medzhilis and its subordinate organiza
tions were transferred to the Moslem Commissariat. 12 Vakhitov and his
agency thus served as an instrument with which the Bolsheviks seized
control of the All-Russian Moslem movement after its leaders had re
fused to cooperate.
At the beginning of May 1918 Vakhitov convened a conference of
Communists and sympathizers from the Kazan area to discuss the pos
sibility of founding a Tatar-Bashkir state. His intention was to re-cr�ate
under Soviet auspices the Volga-Ural state which the commission of the
defunct Medzhilis had proposed. The conference was pervaded with a
strongly nationalistic spirit. Moslem speakers vied with each other in
depicting the future glories of Islam and in stressing the importance of a
socialistic Tatar republic for all Asia. Despite protests from the Russian
delegates, the conference voted to establish an Autonomous Tatar-Bash
kir Republic and to include in it not only the areas inhabited by these
two peoples, but also those populated by other minority groups, such as
the Chuvashes ( who were Orthodox Christians but had asked to be ad
mitted to the new Moslem state) and the Marii ( also Orthodox Chris
tians). Vakhitov spoke of the resolution as a great step forward in the
realization of radical Pan-Islamism. Thanking Stalin and Lenin- in that
a
order - for their support, he concluded the conference on triumphant
note: 'We conceive the Tatar-Bashkir Republic as the revolutionary
hearth whence the rebellious sparks of the socialist revolution shall
penetrate the heart of the East!" 13
By the end of May, Vakhitov had at his disposal a respectable
political machine: a high position in the Commissariat of Nationalities,
with the backing of Stalin, its chairman; a network of provincial organi-
160 THE FORMATION OF THE SOVIET UNION
From the beginning of their association with the Bolsheviks the lead
ers of the Bashkir national movement suffered a series of mishaps, owing
partly to the unbridgeable mental gap which separated the two sides,
and partly to a fundamental difference of interests between the Russian
and Bashkir inhabitants of the area. The Bashkirs, having established
contact with the Bolsheviks rather late in the Civil War, had had no
experience with Communist methods, and did not realize that the con
cessions they had been granted were a tactical move to induce their
defection from the Whites. They interpreted the March 1919 agreement
as granting them political and economic carte blanche and drew up a
series of measures calling for the compulsory expropriation and resettle
ment of all non-Moslems who had come to the Bashkir areas during the
Stolypin period, and their replacement by Bashkirs residing outside the
limits of the republic. At the same time, they began to plan the creation
of an autonomous Bashkir Communist Party and the exchange of diplo
matic representatives with the other Soviet republics. 22 In the fall of 19 19,
when the Red Army occupied the Ural area, the Bashrevkom returned to
Bashkiriia and announced in a special decree that it was assuming full
power and that all the inhabitants of the republic were henceforth to
obey its orders. 23
These aspirations were in basic conflict with the interests and atti
tudes of the local Bolshevik party and state institutions with which the
Bashrevkom had to work. Most Soviet organs in the Ural region, as in the
other Moslem regions, were predominantly Great Russian in their ethnic
make-up : their personnel consisted largely of workers, soldiers of the
military garrisons, and peasant-colonists - all social groups which did
not exist among the Bashkirs. It is not surprising, therefore, that the
various soviets which emerged throughout the revolutionary period "on
Bashkir territories were ethnically Russian and fought for the interests
of the Russian population. The soviets took the side of the Russian colo
nists in their struggle for land with the Bashkirs. Bashkirs were, in many
instances, excluded from membership in the soviets, 24 and most of the
land which the Bolshevik institutions had confiscated in that area from
the state, church, or private landowners, was distributed to Russian colo
nists. 25 "Despite our intentions," wrote the delegate of the central Soviet
authorities to Bashkiriia some time later, "we [the Bolsheviks] simply
spearheaded the kulak onslaught of our Russian peasantry on Bashkir
land." 26 The urban and agricultural Tatar elements in the Bashkir terri
tories also tended to side with the Russians against the natives.
To the Bolshevik party and state institutions functioning on Bashkir
territories the very prospect of Bashkir self-rule was distasteful. Time
after time, congresses of soviets and provincial or regional revolutionary
committees of the Volga-Ural area passed strongly worded resolutions
condemning the establishment of an autonomous Bashkir republic. 27 The
164 THE FORMATION OF THE SOVIET UNION
arguments which. they presented to Moscow stated that this region was
too important economically to be separated from the Ural industrial
centers, that the native population was too weak both physically and
morally to uphold Soviet power, that the Bashkirs in general and the
leaders of the Bashrevkom in particular had fought on the White side
and hence could not be trusted, and finally, that the creation of national
republics ran altogether contrary to the international principles of Com
munism. It may be said without fear of exaggeration that, except for a
few influential friends in the center, among them Lenin, the idea of a
Bashkir republic found no sympathy whatsoever in Bolshevik circles. 0
For that reason, as one of the leaders of the Bashrevkom stated later,
the main task faced by the Bashrevkom throughout its existence was the
fight for the very survival of the young republic.28
The difficulties began soon after the Bashrevkom had returned to its
homeland in September 1919. It found that during the interval between
the reoccupation of the area by Red troops and its own arrival virtually
the entire territory of the Bashkir republic had fallen under the control
of the Executive Committee of the Ufa province. Even in the capital city
of Sterlitamak all the office buildings were taken over by officials from
Ufa, who completely ignored the existence of the republic. The thinly
scattered but influential Bolshevik Party cells on Bashkir territory were
composed mainly of Russian factory workers, who refused to subordinate
themselves to the Bashkirs and preferred to obey Red institutions in
Orenburg or Ufa. 29 It required a considerable effort, often accompanied
by physical force, for the Bashrevkom to assert its authority on its own
territory against the hostility of Soviet institutions in the neighboring
provinces and Bolshevik organizations within Bashkiriia.
The Bashrevkom was only partly successful, for before long it was
faced with another, even more formidable challenge to its authority: the
Communist Party. Until the end of 1919 responsibility for party activities
in Bashkiriia rested theoretically on the shoulders of the Bashrevkom,
which made no attempt either to organize it more effectively or to intro
duce its personnel and ideology into Bashkir political institutions. For
this negligence, which stemmed from the antipathy of the Bashkir leaders
toward the elements who filled the local party cells and from their lack
of understanding of the place of the party in a Communist society, they
were severely criticized by envoys sent from Moscow.30 In November
1919, under pressure of the same envoys, the first Bashkir regional Com
munist Party conference was convened. As might have been expected,
the conference was heavily dominated by Russians, who succeeded in
° Characteristic was the reply given to a Bashkir delegation in 1920 by Lutovinov,
the secretary of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee in Moscow: "That
whole autonomous republic, which you take so seriously, is only a game to keep
you people busy" ( Dimanshtein, "Bashkiriia," 143).
THE MOSLEM BORDERLANDS
electing a Regional Committee of the Communist Party ( Obkom ) in
which their own people held all the key positions. In time this Obkom
became a weapon with which local Russians and Tatars, supported by
influential persons delegated from the center, destroyed the national
autonomy of the Bashkirs.
The first task confronting the Obkom was to strengthen the local
Communist Party cells and to centralize the chaotic party organization.
This was difficult to do, because there was little contact with the already
existing cells, and above all, because the broad masses of the Bashkir
population sympathized with the Bashrevkom and displayed undisguised
hostility toward Russian Communist officials. ,,The Obkom used a novel
and very effective method to overcome those obstacles. It so happened
that, at about the same time, the Soviet government in Moscow had
created a Society for Aid to Bashkiriia ( Bashkirop omoshch ) in order to
alleviate somewhat the starvation and disease which had begun to deci
mate the peoples of the area. When the chairman of this society - the
leader of the right-wing of the Communist Party of the Ukraine, Artem
- arrived in Sterlitamak, the Obkom at once perceived the opportunity
which had fallen into its hands and made common cause with him. The
Obkom and the local agents of the Bashkiropomoshch took advantage of
the desperate plight of the native masses, and of their dependence on
the material assistance which the Communists alone could provide, to
organize among the Bashkirs a powerful network of subordinate Bolshe
vik cells. A large portion of the 150,000 Bashkirs who received help were
formed into so-called Committees of the Poor, and both the personnel
and financial resources of the allegedly philanthropic society were used
to establish an efficient, centralized party apparatus. 81 Within five months
the party membership in Bashkiriia increased fivefold, and Communist
organizations, all subordinated to the Bashkir Obkom, were set up in
go per cent of the counties. 82
Feeling in a much stronger position, the Russian and Tatar leaders
of the Obkom then directly challenged the authority of the Bashrevkom.
In January 1920, on the basis of rumors that the Obkom planned to do
away with Bashkir autonomy, the . leader of the Bashkirs, Kh. lumagulov
( Validov was at the time in Moscow ) ordered the arrest of several Tatar
members of the Obkom. This provided the Obkom with the opportunity
to strike. Urgent appeals for military assistance were sent out by the
Obkom to the neighboring provinces of Ufa and Orenburg and to the
Turkestan Red Army headed by Frunze, and soon several fortified points
under the command of an officer whom the Bashkirs dubbed "Governor
General" were established throughout the country. Since most of the
Bashkir troops had some time before been dispatched to fight the White
Army on the western front, the Bashrevkom had no armed might at its
disposal. A meeting of the Obkom which followed this occurrence con-
166 THE F O R M A T I O N O F THE S O VIET UNION
the Bashkirs were left with nothing but minor administrative powers. It
was a clear violation of the understanding reached the previous year, and
the final blow to Bashkir hopes.
Following the publication of the new decree, the Bashrevkom held a
secret meeting, where bitter anger was expressed at this breach of faith,
which had made a comedy of Bashkir autonomy. After more than a year
of cooperation with the Bolsheviks, none of the plans or hopes of the
Bashkir people had been realized: they had neither the land nor the self
rule of which they had expected so much. A strongly worded resolution
was adopted:
In view of the imperialistic tendencies of the Russians, which
hinder in every manner the development of the national minorities;
in view of the lack of faith of the center toward Bashkir Commu
nists, Bashkir officials are abandoning Bashkiriia and departing for
Turkestan, for the purpose of creating there an independent East
ern Communist Party, of which the Bashkir Regional Committee
( Obkom ) will be a part. The Eastern Communist Party must be
admitted into membership of the Comintern. The aim of this exodus
is by no means to rouse the national masses against the Soviet gov
ernment, but rather, through resignations, to protest against Russian
chauvinism. 37
Another complaint, written by Validov, objected to the new autonomy as
giving the minorities less self-rule than they had enjoyed under Nicholas
II and Stolypin, and accused the Communist Party, especially Stalin, of
ignoring their demands and embarking upon a course of out-and-out
G�eat Russian chauvinism. 38 Some time later, in the middle of June, vir
tually all the Bashkir government officials left their posts and vanished
into the Ural mountains.
The departure of the Bashrevkom and the other Bashkir officials soon
threw all of Bashkiriia into a civil war which permitted the Russian ele
ments to obtain further advantages. The Obkom immediately requested
additional armed help from the neighboring provinces and from the
Turkestan Red Army, so that by the end of July 1920 the entire republic
was under occupation. The Russian peasants and workers, mobilized to
deal with the rebels, eagerly flocked into punitive detachments to revenge
themselves on the Bashkirs and to seize the land and cattle which they
had long coveted. Under the pretext that they were suppressing a coun
terrevolutionary uprising, the Russians began a veritable reign of terror,
accompanied by the indiscriminate looting and murder of the Bashkir
population. 39 The Bashkirs flocked in increasing numbers into the moun
tains to join the rebels. Thus, in a sense, the Bashkir uprising of 1920
may be viewed as the result of a merger of two separate opposition move
ments : the initial political opposition of Bashkir officials and intellectuals
was strengthened by the outbreak of a popular rebellion of the Bashkirs.
168 THE FORMATION OF THE SOVIET UNION
The strength of the mass movement was demonstrated by the fact that it
continued for some time after most of the Bashrevkom officials had been
either apprehended or for�ed to Hee abroad.
While the rebellio.n _._was raging, the Obkom completed its conquest
of the political institutions of Bashkiriia. During the summer of 1920,
the Bashkirs, who were now considered to have demonstrated their
unreliability conclusively, were entirely eliminated from the party and
state apparatus. Neither the new Obkom nor the new Bashrevkom, which
was appointed to replace the old one, included even a token number of
Bashkirs.40 Moreover, the First Congress of Soviets of Bashkiriia, assem
bled in the fall of 1920 for the purpose of electing a new government,
did not include ( at first, at any rate) natives, because all the Bashkir
delegates had been arrested as "nationalists." 41 It is not surprising that
the government elected by this congress consisted of representatives of
all ethnic groups except the Bashkirs.42 Thus the Bashkir Republic, fo r
mally organized in late 1920, had no natives in its government. The party,
in close alliance with Tatars' and Russian colonists, who now filled the
key positions, and in intimate contact with envoys from the center, had
emerged victorious.
The suppression of the rebellion was only a question of time. It suc
cumbed to the superior Red forces, to an unusually severe winter, and
to hunger. The Bolsheviks granted amnesty to the rebels. Most of the
leaders of the old Bashre.vkom were captured and returned to minor
posts in the republic, while the remainder either fell while fighting in
the ranks of the Moslem partisans in Central Asia or else, like Validov,
eventually made their way abroad.
All this time, while the Bashkir Republic was experiencing its trials
and tribulations, the question of creating a Volga Tatar state had been
held in abeyance. The Tatars had played a considerably more important
role in the Communist movement than the Bashkirs, and their ambitions
were proportionately greater. The iµea of an autonomous state, which
satisfied the Bashkir nationalists, did not gratify Tatar intellectuals edu
cated in the reformed schools, who- had been associated in 1917 with the
All-Russian Moslem movement and were steeped in the atmosphere of
Moslem radical proselytism. The Tatar Communists w�re none too eager
to speed the cause of a separate Tatar autonomous state. They preferred
to wait for the termination of the Civil War, when, they hoped, it would
be possible to establish a single Volga-Ural republic, and to resume their
activities on an all-Russian scale. Their leader and ideologist at this time
was a remarkable Volga Tatar Communist, Mirza Sultan-Galiev.
Sultan-Galiev was born in the Ufa province sometime in the 188o's.
He attended the Russo-Tatar Teacher's College in Kazan, and then served
as a Russian-language instructor in the reformed Moslem schools in the
Caucasus. Before the outbreak of the war he contributed frequently to
THE MOS LEM BORDERLANDS 169
the Turkic papers in Baku and in St. Petersburg, writing articles about
Moslem life in Russia and translating from Russian publications. In the
spring of 19 17, he was engaged by the Executive Council of the Moscow
All-Russian Moslem Congress as a secretary, in which capacity he used
his knowledge of languages. Sultan-Galiev had belonged to the left wing
of the All-Russian Moslem movement and may have joined the Moslem
Socialist Committee founded by Vakhitov. In the elections to the Con
stituent Assembly, he ran unsuccessfully in Kazan on the same ticket with
Vakhitov and Tsalikov. Sometime toward the end of 1917 he went over
to the Communists. After the Bolshevik seizure of Kazan, he was ap
pointed Commissar of Education and of Nationalities in the local Soviet
government, and in February 1918 he worked with the Revolutionary
Staff which suppressed the Kazan Shura. He escaped from Kazan shortly
after the Czechs seized the city, and arrived in Moscow at the opportune
moment when the Moslem Communist movement had been deprived of
its leadership through the death of Vakhitov.
Stalin at once took Sultan-Galiev into his Commissariat of Nationali
ties and gave him all the support previously lavished on Vakhitov. As
Stalin's protege, Sultan-Galiev rose rapidly. In December 191� he became
Chairman of the Central Moslem Military College, which the Commis
sariat of Nationalities had recently taken over from Trotsky's Commis
sariat of War, and in which was vested authority over the Moslem troops
fighting on the Red side. Throughout 1919 he traveled extensively on
various missions for Stalin and made contacts with Moslem Communists
in the borderland areas. In 1920, finally, he was promoted by Stalin to
membership in the three-man Small Collegium of the Commissariat of
Nationalities, and was made co-editor of the Commissariat's official pub
lication, Zhizn' natsional'nostei ( The Life of Nationalities ) . He had
become the most important Moslem in the entire Soviet hierarchy and
had acquired a unique position from which to influence the Eastern
policies of the Communist regime. 43
Sultan-Galiev and his followers - the so-called right wing of the
Tatar Communist Party - had a distinct political ideology. In a series of
articles published in the Zhizn' natsional'nostei in the autumn of 1919,
Sultan-Galiev expressed the belief that the Communist leaders had com
mitted a grave strategic blunder by placing the main emphasis in their
revolutionary activity on Western Europe. The weakest link in the cap
italist chain was not the West but the East, and the failure of Com
munist revolutions abroad was directly attributable to the inadequacy
of Soviet efforts in the Eastern borderlands. The spread of the revolu
tionary movement in the Orient, however, required a distinct approach.
The Eastern peoples lacked an industrial proletariat, they were much
more religious than the Europeans, and hence they_ should not be sub
jected to the same revolutionary methods used in the West. Only a very
1 70 THE FORMATION OF THE SOVIET UNION
tactful approach, combined with the extensive use of native Moslem
Communists, would permit the spread of Communism in the East. 44 The
right wing thus placed emphasis on the Eastern instead of the Western
revolution, and on the need for conciliatory policies toward the Moslem
religion and traditions.
This ideology did not run contrary to Bolshevik strategy of 1919 and
1920, and hence Sultan-Galiev for a time enjoyed the backing of Moscow.
If anything, the thinly disguised Pan-Islamic tendencies of the rightists
were in harmony with the Kremlin's bid for Moslem support. Owing to
the support of Moscow, the rightists dominated the weaker and less
numerous left wing. Prominent among the leftists were assimilated Tatars,
who had staked their political careers on an alliance with the Russian
interests in the Kazan area and who fought against the concessions which
the Bolshevik leaders were making to Moslem nationalists of Sultan
Galiev's persuasion. The head of this left faction was also a Tatar, Said
Galiev, but the real power behind it consisted of Russ,ian and other Euro
pean leaders from Kazan: Karl Grazis, the organizer of the 1917 Bolshe
vik coup in Kazan, and I. I. Khodorovskii, the chairman of the Kazan
Soviet government ( Gubispolkom ) . 45 The leftists lacked a positive ideol
ogy, but they were definitely opposed to national self-rule and were
desirous of preserving the privileged position which the Russians and
other Europeans enjoyed in the Kazan province. As early as June 1918,
when the idea of a Tatar-Bashkir state had first been approved by Mos
cow, Grazis had attacked the "Eastern orientation" of the government. 46
As long as the Tatar right did not press for a republic, there was no
public con:8ict between the two factions. But at the end of 1919, the
Volga-Ural region had been freed from the White Armies, and Sultan
Galiev with his followers reopened the issue of the Tatar-Bashkir state
whose establishment the Czech revolt in August 1918 had prevented.
This question was placed on the agenda of the Second Conference of
Eastern Communists, held in November 1919. The rightists originally had
wanted a republic embracing all the territories in the Volga-Ural region
inhabited by non-Russian peoples, but they had had to give up this
notion because of Moscow's insistence on the retention of the already
existing Bashkir Republic. The rightists therefore came out in favor of a
separate Volga Tatar republic. The leftists did not oppose this project
directly; they merely expressed the opinion that instead of wasting time
and effort on such secondary matters, it would be better to concentrate
on the military mobilization of the Moslem population. Moscow, how
ever, backed the right, and resolutions were adopted proclaiming the
principle of a Tatar republic. 47 .Encouraged by their success, the rightists
next tried to persuade Moscow to exclude the city of Kazan from the
prospective state. The bad experiences of the Bashrevkom with Soviet
authorities in Ufa and Orenburg made it seem desirable to draw the
THE M O S LE M B O RDERLANDS 171
new state's borders in such a way as to eliminate towns and rural areas
in which the Russians were in a majority. To this, however, Lenin said
no, and the matter was dropped.48
The leftists did not give up their opposition to the idea of a Tatar
republic. In April 1920 a group of Communist leaders from Kazan and
its vicinity, attending the Ninth Congress of the Russian Communist
Party in Moscow, visited Lenin and attempted to make him change his
mind. Khodorovskii told Lenin that, in the opinion of the Communists
from Kazan, there were among the Tatar party members no leaders who
could be entrusted with authority, and the creation of a republic would
affect adversely the economy of Soviet Russia. "The Tatar comrades,"
Khodorovskii argued, "will not have either sufficient strength or sufficient
courage to collect grain in their republic in the manner in which we have
been doing it in the Kazan province." 49 Considering the fact that the
Kazan Communists had squeezed from the semi-starved peasantry in the
area ten million puds ( 176,000 short tons) of grain in the preceding year,
this was a potent argument. 50 But Lenin was unimpressed. To him, he
said, it did not seem wise to alienate millions of non-Russian peasants for
the sake of a few million puds of bread; on the contrary, it was necessary
to make special concessions to the Tatar peasants in the matter of grain
collection. Stalin, who was also present at the interview, added that until
better Communist cadres among the Tatars were created, one had to
utilize those that were available. 5 1 Their mission a failure, the leftists
returned home, and reported on Moscow's decision. The bad news caused
widespread grumbling in local party circles.
The leftists still had one trump c.ard to play. Possessing control of
the state and party apparatus in Kazan, they were in a position to see
to it that if they could not prevent the Tatar Republic from coming into
being, they could at least make certain that its government would fall
into their own hands. In the spring of 1920 they ordered the mobilization
of the Tatar Communists for the Turkestan front, and in this way got rid
of the main body of the opposition. 52 On June 25, 1920, the Kazan
Gubispolkom formally ceded its authority to a Tatar Revkom, especially
created for this purpose; the Revkom in turn convened a Tatar Congress
of Soviets, which met on September 25, 1920, whereupon the Revkom
dissolved itself, and the functions of government over the new Autonom
ous Tatar Socialist Soviet Republic were assumed by a Tatar Council of
People's Commissars, under the chairmanship of the leader of the left,
Said Galiev. 53
Once the principle of ethnic division of the Volga-Ural region had
been established, the formation of the other autonomous states in the area
proceeded almost automatically. The Chuvash, who in 1918 had ex
pressed a desire for a union with the Tatars, were directed to organize
a separate state, and the Chuvash Autonomous Region came into being
1 72 THE FORMATION OF THE SOVIET UNION
on June 24, 1920. 54 The Mari and Votiak Autonomous Regions were de
creed in November 1920 and January 1921, and were established shortly
afterwards.
Thus, by the end of 1920, Moscow had the situation in the Volga
Ural region well in hand. The five autonomous republics and regions
created there in the course of 1919 and 1920 were now administered by
elements obedient to the directives of Moscow, and, in addition, there
was a strong Communist Party in the chief towns of the region to super
vise and control the local governments.
The Kirghiz Republic 0
The Alash-Orda continued, as had been pointed out earlier, to co
operate with the Whites even after , Kolchak had assumed dictatorial
powers and had done away with the few vestiges of self-rule which the
nationalist organizations had enjoyed under the Committee of the Con
stituent Assembly. In 1919, however, the affairs of Dutov and Kolchak
went from bad to worse, and before the year was over the Red armies
had occupied considerable areas inhabited by the Kazakh-Kirghiz tribes.
The Soviet government at once took energetic steps to attract the Alash
Orda to its side, hoping to utilize its prestige and personnel to secure the
support of the native population, as it had done in neighboring Bash
kiriia.
As early as Janu,�ry 1919, when Orenburg had fallen and the regular
Red Army had gained a foothold in the Central Asiatic steppes, Mikhail
Frunze, the commander of the Fourth Army of the Eastern Front, called
upon all the Kazakh-Kirghiz fighting for the White cause to change their
allegiance and to side with the Communists, pledging them full amnesty
and complete forgiveness for their past activities. 55 The Soviet govern
ment in Moscow reaffirmed this promise by offering safe-conduct to all
the Kazakh-Kirghiz, including those connected with the Alash-Orda, who
wished to attend a Soviet-sponsored Kirghiz Congress in Orenburg. 56 To
administer temporarily the Kazakh-Kirghiz areas, the All-Russian Council
of People's Commissars appointed on July 10, 1919, a Kirghiz Revolu
tionary Committee or Kirrevkom. The Kirrevkom was to rule over the
provinces of Uralsk, ,Turgai, Akmolinsk, Semipalatinsk, and part of the
Astrakhan province. In the decree establishing the Kirrevkom the govern
ment also ordered all the Kirghiz to be subject to military duty in the
Red Army, and all lands owned by Russians on Kazakh-Kirghiz terri
tories to remain in the possession of their present owners. 57 The Kir-
0 The Kirghiz republic, established by Soviet Russia in 1920, included areas in
habited by the Kazakh-Kirghiz tribes, and coincided largely with the pre-1917
Steppe General Gubernia and the Uralsk and Turgai provinces. In the mid-1g2o's
this republic was divided into separate Kirghiz and Kazakh republics. At the time
of the events here described the term "Kirghiz" was in general used by the Soviet
authorities for the tribes for which the term Kazakh-Kirghiz is used by this author.
THE M O S LE M B OR D E R L A N DS 1 73
revkom was composed of seven persons, under the chairmanship of the
Pole S. Pestkovskii of the Commissariat of Nationalities. 58
The Kirrevkom, unlike its Bashkir counterpart, was not in the hands
of local nationalists, but of officials selected by Moscow from among
trusted Communists, largely non-Moslems, and for this reason it could
not serve as an instrument of native opposition as the Bashrevkom had
done in Bashkiriia. In the Kazakh-Kirghiz steppe all the organs of polit
ical power were, from the beginning of the Soviet occupation in 19 19,
firmly in the hands of Moscow. The local nationalists were powerless to
oppose them even after they had been granted autonomy.
In the summer of 1919 many members of the Alash-Orda, lured by
Communist promises and discouraged by the White defeats in the Urals,
went over to the Reds. Among them was Akhmed Baitursunov, an old
Kazakh-Kirghiz nationalist leader and one of the founders of the Alash
Orda. As soon as he joined the Communists, Baitursunov went to Moscow
for a private audience with Lenin. 59 The nature of the interview is not
known; but it is not unreasonable to suppose that Lenin made promises
to Baitursunov similar to those which he was in the habit of making at
the time to other non-Russian nationalists, and that among them were
pledges of Kazakh-Kirghiz autonomy and of assistance in the ameliora
tion of the desperate economic situation of the nomads.
At the beginning of January 1920 the Soviet authorities in Aktiubinsk
convened a Kirghiz conference, at which a new Kirrevkom was elected
to admit members of the Alash-Orda, including Baitursunov. There also
approval was given to a resolution calling for the speedy establishment
of an autonomous Kirghiz state. 60
The circumstances surrounding the establishment of the Kirghiz re
public so much resembled those which attended the creation of other
Moslem states in Soviet Russia, such as the Bashkir and the Tatar re
publics, that to describe them",at length would be redundant. Here too
Russian (J provincial institutions located in the urban centers ( Orenburg,
Semipalatinsk ) opposed with all means at their disposal and for much
the same reasons native autonomy; here too, once an autonomous repub
lic had been created at the insistence of Moscow, the Russians refused
j
to accept its authority and prevented it from- functioning properly; here
too the split between Russians and natives was clear-cut and led to per
petual friction in party and state organs. 6 1 In the spring of 1920 the rela
tions between Russians and natives working in local Soviet institutions
approached a break. There were constant quarrels over political and
economic issues connected with the distribution of food and with the
<i In the steppe regions of Central Asia under "Russians" must also be under
stood the considerable Ukrainian population; unfortunately, the documents do not,
as a rule, distinguish between the two groups, and to the native Moslem any
Orthodox Slav was a "Russian." For this reason it is necessary here to treat Great
Russians and Ukrainians as one.
1 74 THE F O R M A T I O N O F THE S O VIET U N I O N
preparations for the forthcoming Congress of Soviets of Kirghiziia.
Finally, the native nationalists headed by Baitursunov decided, out of
sheer desperation, to make a direct appeal to the highest authority in
Russia, to Lenin himself. In two lengthy telegrams which were sent to
Moscow without the knowledge of the local Communists, and which
seem to have remained unanswered, Baitursunov and his followers de
manded that the leaders of the party help establish genuine self-rule for
the natives by restraining what they called "local, provincial, and re
gional imperialists"; ending the "Bonapartist" tendencies of Communist
officials; putting a stop to the stealing and requisitions of native proper
ties; and equalizing the distribution of food. 62 But the Kazakh-Kirghiz
nationalists were in no position to do much more than send telegrams.
They had no army, no political organizations ( the Alash-Orda was never
recognized by the Communists, even though its members, as individuals,
were welcome) , no contacts in Moscow - nothing, in short, with which
to transform their dissatisfaction into organized resistance.
In October 1920 the Communist Party's Reg�onal Committee in Oren
burg convened the First Kirghiz Congress of Soviets. The congress estab
lished an Autonomous Kirghiz Republic with a government consisting of
the commissariats of Interior, Justice, Education, Health, Social Security,
and Agriculture. On the all-important land question the congress voted
to retain the status quo : to stop further colonization of the steppe, but
to allow the Russian colonists already settled there to keep their lands,
including those which they had seized from the natives in 1916 and
1917,63
In 1921 and 1922 the Kazakh-Kirghiz steppe was stricken by famine
which made itself felt most heavily among the natives, who had lost
their cattle in the course of the 1916 rebellion, and who were slighted in
the distribution of food supplies sent in by the government and put at
the disposal of local Communist organs. 6 1 Whole areas were depleted
by the lack of nourishment, and instances of cannibalism were not infre
quent. In the course of 1921, one million persons perished from hunger
in the Kirghiz Republic. Under those circumstances the establishment of
the Kazakh-Kirghiz autonomous state, formally decreed in October 1920,
was not possible until two years later, when the food situation was nor
malized. The famine also explains the relative lack during the early
192o's of native popular resistance to the Soviet regime, such as occurred
in neighboring Bashkiriia and Turkestan.
Turkestan
At the end of December 1917 authority over Turkestan was claimed
by two rival governments : a Soviet one in Tashkent, backed by Russian
railroad workers, soldiers, colonists, and the Communist government in
Russia; and a Moslem one in Kokand, supported by the politically con-
THE MOSLEM BORDERLANDS 1 75
scions elements of the native population, and by some anti-Communist
Russian parties.
The news that the natives in Kokand had proclaimed an autonomous
state aroused the ire of pro-Soviet groups in Tashkent. The local soldiers,
who already in November had arrested and executed General Korovni
chenko, the Provisional Government's representative there, now began
to round up all the inhabitants whom they suspected of sympathy with
the Kokand regime. 65 At the Fourth Regional Congress of Soviets ( Janu
ary 1918 ) the Communist faction sharply condemned native endeavors
to institute self-rule in Central Asia :
We subordinate entirely the principle of national self-determina
tion to socialism, recognizing the fact that only in the struggle with
the counterrevolution is the revolution being shaped - the revolu
tion which will sweep out of its way all obstacles such as the au-
tonomous government of Kokand. 66
Confronted with such menaces from Tashkent, the Kokand govern
ment tried desperately to secure outside assistance with which to aug
ment its weak military forces, but without success. Negotiations with
the Cossack Ataman Dutov of Orenburg broke down in the middle of
December over the issue of Moslem self-rule; the Alash-Orda was cool
to Kokand's offers of cooperation, and in any case it had no important
armed forces at its disposal; and the Emir of Bukhara, hostile to the
liberals who predominated in Kokand and anxious to preserve neutrality
in the Russian Civil War, refused even to receive the emissaries who had
been sent to him with requests for help. 67 In January 1918 several small
urban centers in the Ferghana valley recognized the sovereignty of
Kokand,68 but the remainder of Turkestan did not follow suit. The
Kokand government was unable to back up its assertions of authority
even in the city which it had chosen for its residence, because the Rus
sian Soviet in Kokand would not subordinate itself to the autonomous
institutions.
In late January 1918, when the crisis in Moslem-Russian relations led
to an open conflict, the Kokand government could rely only on a few
hundred ill-equipped and inexperienced volunteers against thousands of
Russian veterans and mercenaries in the service of the Tashkent Soviet.
Its downfall was swift and calamitous.
The struggle which led to the destruction of the autonomous govern
ment took place in the city of Kokand. 69 At the end of January the local
soviet, persisting in its independent course, took refuge in the fortress,
manned by forty-five Russian soldiers. On the night of January 29/Febru
ary 1 1, some Moslems penetrated and trie� to take over the fortress, but
they were expelled. The Russians sent for help to the garrisons of the
adjacent towns and to Tashkent. On the following day a small Russian
176 THE F O RMATION O F THE S O VIET U N I O N
detachment, armed with some heavy weapons, arrived from Skobelev
( Fergana) , to bolster the soviet's defenses. While the guns were being
mounted and the Russian and Armenian inhabitants, fearful of an im
pending massacre, were moving into the walled enclosure, the Kokand
Soviet issued an ultimatum to the Moslem authorities. It called for the
surrender of all arms and the punishment of those guilty of the night
raid. The Kokand government refused, whereupon the fortress op�ned
fire on the native quarter. The panic-stricken Moslem population began
to flee the city and to hide in the mountains.
Through the intercession of Russian civilians, negotiations for a cease�
fire were opened. Despite the uncompromising attitude of the Russian
soldiers, who insisted on exorbitant contributions from the Moslems, there
was good reason to believe that eventually an armistice would have been
reached. The Kokand government was too weak militarily to dislodge the
Russians, while the fortress had ammunition for no more than one week
of fighting. On February 5/18, however, a strong detachment of Russian
soldiers, augmented by German and Austrian prisoners of war whom the
Tashkent Soviet had hired for this purpose, arrived from Tashkent. Per
filev, the commander of the detachment and at the same time Military
Commissar of the Soviet Turkestan government, insisted that negotiations
with the Moslems be broken off at once. Early the following day he
ordered his troops to assume the offensive by storming the Old City. The
outnumbered Moslem defenders were easily dispersed. After gaining con
trol over the entire town, Perfilev allowed his men full freedom. The
soldiers, assisted by some Armenians, began to loot the native quarter and
to murder the Moslems who had not escaped when the fighting began.
After three days of stealing and slaughter, when there was nothing of
value left, the soldiers poured gasoline on the houses in the Old City and
set them on fire. The Moslem quarter was almost entirely destroyed. 4
"Kokand is now a city of the dead," wrote a Russian observer a few days
after the troops, loaded with loot, had departed; "it resembles a mortu
ary, from which emanate odors of mold and carrion." 70
The fall of the city spelled the doom of the Kokand government and
of native hopes for self-rule. Some of the leaders of the ill-fated regime
were arrested by the conquerors and · brought to Tashkent. The head of
the government, Mustafa Chokaev, escaped in time to avoid capture. On
February 9/22, 1918, the Moslem population of Kokand was compelled
to recognize formally the authority of the Tashkent Council of People's
Commissars.71
Emboldened by their success, the Tashkent Bolsheviks decided to
deal next with the Emirate of Bukhara, one of the two independent pow-
0 Kokand never recuperated from the events of February 1918. Its prerevolution
ary population of 120,000 dropped to 69,300 in 1926 and further to 60,000 in 1936.
THE MOSLEM BORDERLANDS 1 77
ers remaining in Turkestan ( the other being the Khanate of Khiva ) . The
situation there seemed quite favorable for quick and decisive action. Emir
Said Alim Khan of Bukhara was a reactionary and autocratic ruler, who,
by resisting all pressures to introduce Western institutions into his do
main and by suppressing groups spreading reformist principles, had
alienated the liberal jadidist element, which in all other parts of the
Russian Empire had supplied the backbone of the Moslem nationalist
movement. Sometime at the end of 1917 the Bukharan jadidists, known
as the Young Bukharans, established contact with the Soviet authorities
in Tashkent. In fighting the Emir, therefore, the Communists enjoyed the
advantage of having on their side the local Moslem intelligentsia.
Operations against Bukhara began in the second half of February
1918 under the direction of Kolesov, the chairman of the Turkestan Soviet
government. Kolesov moved with his troops to the gates of the capital
city and on February 28/March 13, after a conference with the Young
Bukharans, presented the Emir with an ultimatum demanding the lifting
of all restrictions on freedom of speech, the abolition of the death penalty
and corporal punishment, the dissolution of the Emir's advisory body
and its replacement by one composed of Young Bukharans, the right of
the Young Bukharans to veto all future governmental appointments,
and finally the reduction of certain taxes.72 The Emir for a time was
apparently considering the acceptance of these humiliating conditions;
but finally, under unknown circumstances, he turned them down. On
March 1/14 Kolesov ordered an attack on the walled city. The battle
ended in a Russian defeat. The local population, imbued with religious
passion, rallied behind the Emir and prevented enemy troops from
penetrating Bukhara, and meanwhile massacred several hundred Russian
residents of the city. After four days of fighting, Kolesov raised the siege
and retreated to Tashkent. With him fled about two hundred Young
Bukharans whose lives were endangered by their conspiracy with the
Soviets. 73 Shortly after Kolesov's retreat, the Turkestan government for
mally recognized the independence of Bukhara.74
The defeat at Bukhara did not alter the fact that in the spring of
1918 Tashkent's authority extended over the major part of Turkestan.
Under its control were the cities and settlements of the Syr-Daria, Fer
ghana, and Samarkand provinces, as well as the railroad lines and tele
graph stations throughout these regions. Only .the countryside - the
desert areas with their oases and the mountains encircling Turkestan
from the south and east - were beyond Tashkent's reach, largely because
the maltreatment of the native population by the Turkestan Soviet gov
ernment and the elements supporting it had alienated the indigenous
inhabitants. All through 1918 and most of 1919 the persecutions, expul
sions from the land, and looting of the Moslems by the Soviets continued
1 78 THE FORMATION OF THE S OVIET UNION
unabated, creating a regime which a contemporary Soviet observer de
scribed as "feudal exploitation of the broad masses of the native popula
tion by the Russian Red Army man, colonist, and official." 75
The dissatisfaction of the native population with Soviet rule found
expression in partisan warfare, which had its origin in the Ferghana
valley, spread to the neighboring provinces, and finally embraced nearly
all of Turkestan, including the pfincipalities of Khiva and Bukhara. This
popular resistance movement, perhaps the most persistent and successful
in the entire history of Soviet Russia, became known as Basmachestvo,
and its participants as .Basmachis. 0
The Basmachis were originally ordinary bandits who had preyed on
the countryside even before the outbreak of the Revolution. The tsarist
regime had never been quite successful in suppressing them. In 1917
their ranks grew rapidly, owing to the amnesty proclaimed by the
Provisional Government which released many criminals, and to the cur
tailment of the cotton industry, which had caused widespread unemploy
ment among the native peasants and had deprived them of their liveli
hood. The Basmachis were particularly active in the Ferghana valley,
the center of the cotton plantations. They were universally feared by the
population of this area, Russian and Moslem alike; but since there was
no force capable of putting them down, they gradually became stronger
and bolder. 76 At the beginning of 1918 the Kokand government made an
agreement with one of the most powerful of the local robber leaders,
Irgach, appointing pim captain of its troops. 77 When Kokand fell, many
Moslems connected with the autonomous government and some of the
inhabitants of the Ferghana valley who had -been maltreated by Soviet
troops fled to the mountains and joined the Basmachis, endowing Bas
machestvo with the character of a popular resistance movement. The
natives of the valley, who previously had dreaded them, now, after the
Soviet conquest, often treated the Basmachis as protectors and liberators .
The principal weakness of the Basmachi movement was its lack of
unity. The various detachments operated independently of each other
under the leadership of ambitious and jealous chieftains, who refused
to coordinate their activities and at times engaged in internecine wars.
Not infrequently, in critical situations, Basmachi units went over to the
Reds. Basmachestvo represented essentially a number of unconnected
tribal revolts and exhibited all the shortcomings of such fo1ms of resist
ance. It never attained its ultimate purpose - the overthrow of Russian
rule in Turkestan - because the Russians were infinitely better organ-
0 The origin of the term is obscure. Zeki Velicli Togan ( quoted in Hayit, Die
Nationalen Regierungen ) traces it from the word "basmak" meaning "to oppress";
the Basmachis would then be "the oppressed." According to sqme Soviet sources, on
the other hand ( ZhN, 2 June 1920 ), it stems from the native term for "robber."
Other sources indicate the root of the term to mean in native Turki "to tread under
foot," Chacun a son gout.
THE M O S L E M B O RDERLANDS 1 79
ized, controlled the cities and the lines of communication, and had at
their disposal a more numerous and more experienced armed force. But
from 1918 to 1924, and especially in the period 1920-1922 when Bas
machestvo was at its height, the revolt drove the Communist rulers of
Central Asia to desperation. "The fight against the Basmachis," wrote one
Soviet eyewitness, "was a fight with an entirely new, distinct, and unique
opponent. The Basmachis were made up of partisan detachments, almost
exclusively on horseback. They were elusive and often dissolved in the
neighboring villages literally before the eyes of our troops, who would
immediately undertake a general search of the villages but without any
results." 78 To protect their territories from the rebels, the Soviet au
thorities had to expend much effort, money, and manpower; late in 1918
a large expeditionary force was dispatched to the mountains to ferret
them out. 79 Operating in the mountains and deserts, the Basmachis suc
cessfully evaded the regular Soviet forces, and during the Civil War they
almost completely controlled the Ferghana valley and the mountains
surrounding it.
In the spring of 1918 the Soviet government in Moscow, having re
ceived disquieting reports from Turkestan on the general unpopularity
of the Bolshevik regime there and on its inability to deal with the Bas
machis, decided to intervene. Paramount, in Moscow's eyes, was the ques
tion of autonomy. Moscow saw in the persistent refusal of the Tashkent
Bolsheviks to grant the natives self-rule the principal reason for the dis
mal situation. In April 1918 a special emissary was dispatched from Mos
cow to Tashkent with instructions to proclaim Turkestan an autonomous
republic. Shortly afterwards, Stalin, in a confidential report to the Tash
kent Communists, confirmed these instructions. Obedient to orders, the
Tashkent regime convened at the end of April the Fifth Congress of
Soviets - the first at which Moslems and Russians sat together - and
reversed the resolutions of the preceding congresses by decreeing the
establishment of an Autonomous Republic of Turkestan. To maintain the
impression that this resolution was spontaneous and voluntary, the Tash
kent government sent a formal note to the Council of People's Commis
sars in Moscow informing it of the decision. Moscow replied several days
later with an acknowledgment and a pledge of full support. 80
The resolutions of this 1918 Tashkent Congress of Soviets, however,
having been imposed from above against the real wishes of the local
Communists, remained a dead letter. It was not until two years later that
the natives were given the right to participate in the government of
Turkestan, or treated on equal footing with the Europeans. 8 1
In January 1 9 1 9 the prestige of the Tashkent government was further
weakened by an attempt of its Commissar of War, Osipov, to overthrow
Soviet authority in Turkestan. Osipov captured most of the members of
the government, whom he speedily shot. He tried to establish contact
180 THE FORMATION OF THE SOVIET UNION
with the Basmachis and the British, but the Communist officials who had
eluded arrest rallied the pro-Soviet forces in Tashkent and suppressed tne
rebellion before he could carry out these intentions. In reprisal for the
plot, the Cheka reportedly executed several thousand persons suspected
of hostility to the Communist regime in Turkestan.82
At this point a few words may be said about British intervention in
Turkestan and the Caucasus. The British expended during World War I
considerable effort fighting German and Turkish attempts to penetrate·
their Middle Eastern possessions and to sever the routes to India. While
Russia had been actively engaged in fighting the Central Powers, that is,
until the end of 1917, the northwestern approaches to India, leading
through the Caucasus and the Transcaspian provinces of Russian Central
Asia, were protected by Russian armies. The sudden collapse of the
Russian front, however, changed the situation radically to the disadvan
tage of England, for it opened to the Turks and Germans the roads to
the Caspian region and Persia, and thence to Central Asia and Afghani
stan. To fill the gap the British were compelled to organize special mili
tary missions.
There were two main and several smaller expeditions of this sort.
General Dunsterville was sent from India into northwestern Persia, with
orders to reach Baku and to prevent the Central Powers from obtaining
the Caucasian oil deposits. General Malleson, operating from northeastern
Persia, was to keep the Transcaspian province from falling into enemy
hands. Colonel Bailey was to make his way to Tashkent. The forces at
the disposal of these British officers were quite inadequate for the tasks
assigned them. Dunsterville had goo men, Malleson 2, 100 ( largely natives
recruited for the purpose ) , while Bailey commanded a mere handful of
Indian guards. sa The British effort was also handicapped by a poor under
standing on the part of the commanders of the situation in the territories
where they operated. They were in general unclear about the nature of
the Civil War in Russia; they tended to treat the Bolsheviks as young
hotheads and the non-Russian groups as passive colonial peoples, con
sistently underestimating the political acumen of the former and the
nationalist fervor of the latter.
Considering that the intervention in Russia took place in the border
land areas where most of the population was non-Russian, the British
might have been expected to appeal to the national sentiments of the
minorities and to collaborate with the national governments which had
formed themselves in those areas following the disintegration of the old
Empire. This, however, they did not do. For all their importance to India
and Britain•s Middle Eastern position, the Caucasus and Turkestan were
secondary fronts; the World War was being decided in Europe. Britain
was not prepared to alienate the Russian Allies - represented during
1918 and 1919 by the Whites - whose assistance in fighting the Central
THE . M O S LEM B ORDERLANDS
Powers and in reestablishing a balance of power in Eastern Europe was
important, by supporting minority nationalism and separatism. For better
or worse, Great Britain backed the White movement and shared its nega
tive attitude toward the national aspirations of the minorities. Only in
1920, after the White cause had suffered irreparable damage and finally
collapsed, did they change their stand and throw their :mpport behind
the minorities, but not for long. In 1921 England reconciled itself to
the fact that Soviet Russia had established a viable political organism,
and began to make approaches to Moscow, abandoning the borderland
peoples to their fate.
General Malleson's troops moved into Transcaspia in August 1918
at the request of the Socialist Revolutionary Transcaspian Provisional
Government established in Ashkhabad. In August and September they
fought, in alliance with Russian White troops and Turkmen detachments,
under the leadership of a native nationalist leader, Oraz Serdar, against
Red troops trying to penetrate from Tashkent. Malleson had connections
with some of the Basmachi chieftains, but, according to Soviet sources,
there is no evidence that he supplied them either with money or with
arms.84 In February 1919 British troops received orders from London to
evacuate the Transcaspian region, and by early April they were entirely
out. In July the Red troops approached Ashkhabad, which was defended
by Oraz S�rdar and his Turkmen units. After the city had been taken,
Oraz Serdar fled to the desert and joined the Bas_machi units in the Khiva
district. 85 British intervention in Turkestan was thus of brief duration and
had no important effect on the course of the Civil War there; at best it
delayed somewhat the extension of Soviet rule to the southeastern shore
of the Caspian Sea.
In January 1919 Soviet armies captured Orenburg. In the expectation
that they would march at once on Tashkent, the Soviet government ap
pointed a special commission for Turkestan ( Kommissia V1)IK po delam
Turkestana) composed of five Communists : Sh. Z. Eliava (chairman),
M. V. Frunze { commander of the Fourth Army), V. V. Kuibyshev (po
litical commissar in the Fourth Army), F. I. Goloshchekin, and Ia. E.
Rudzutak. It was to replace the Tashkent Communist government and to
assume political authority in Turkestan as soon as that area was reunited
with Soviet Russia. The five-man commission arrived in Samara in early
spring, but because the military authorities considered it more urgent to
deal with Kolchak and Dutov than to march on Tashkent, its departure
for Turkestan was delayed for more than six months.86 Finally in the fall
the White armies were defeated, and in November 1919 the Turkestan
Commission left for Tashkent, to assume there the powers delegated to
it by the central authorities.
The first task of the commission after its arrival in Tashkent was to
prepare a detailed report on the general situation in that area for the
182 THE FORM ATION OF THE SOVIET UNION
benefit of the central Soviet authorities. Their report painted a most dis
couraging picture. On the basis of this report, the Central Committee
of the Russian Communist Party drew up a «Circular Letter to All
Organizations of the Communist Party of Turkestan," a part of which
read as follows :
ment as an indication that the Moslems intended to take over the Crimea
and to impose their rule on the Russian inhabitants. The Bolshevik Exe
cutive Committee in the port town exploited the anti-Tatar sentiments
of the sailors by spreading propaganda that the peninsula was threatened
with "Tatar dictatorship." 96 In the early days of January 1918 small de
tachments of sailors directed by the Sebastopol Revkom occupied most
of the northern half of the Crimea by means of sea-borne landings.
Among the Tatars, the threat of a clash with the Bolsheviks led to
a split between the left-wing nationalists, headed by Chelibiev, who
wanted a rapprochement with the Communists, and the right-wing na
tionalists, hea9ed by Seidamet, who opposed it. On January 9/22, 1918,
the Kurultai held a special meeting at which both viewpoints were dis
cussed. Finally, the decision was taken to approach the Sebastopol Com
munists with an offer of participation in the All-Crimean government.
The Bolsheviks agreed to the proposition, but on the condition that the
Kurultai recognize the Soviet government in Petrograd. By a vote of
forty-three to twelve the Kurultai turned down this condition, thus elimi
nating the possibility of a peaceful solution of the conflict. Chelibiev,
dissatisfied with the decision, resigned from the Executive Committee,
and Seidamet took over his functions.97
The direct cause of the armed conflict between Sebastopol and Sim
feropol which broke out in January 1918 was an agreement between the
Tatar nationalists and the Ukrainian Central Rada made in late 1917,
which had stipulated that the Tatars would not allow military units
hostile to the Rada to move across their territory. 98 When, at the be
ginning of January, the Bolsheviks in Sebastopol dispatched troops to
aid Antonov-Ovseenko in his march on Kiev and the Don, the Tatars
tried to disarm them. ;Sebastopol retaliated by sending a force of 3,000
sailors in the direction of Simferopol with orders to put an end to the
"Tatar counterrevolution." On January 13/26 Tatar and Soviet units en
gaged in battle near the railroad station of Siuren. The Red troops easily
dispersed the defenders and entered Simferopol the following day. The
Kurultai and other nationalist organizations were at once dissolved.
Seidamet, who had commanded the native troops in the ill-fated battle,
fled and eventually reached Turkey. Most of the other members of the
Milli Firka went into hiding in the Tatar villages. Chelibiev, although
he had reason to count on Red sympathy, was arrested and placed in a
Sebastopol prison. There, in February 1918, Soviet sailors - very likely
without the knowledge of their superiors - shot him and threw his body
into the sea. 99
The first Communist regime in the Crimea lasted for three months,
from the end of January until the end of April 1918. It was ineffective,
disorganized, and, like the first Soviet government in the neighboring
Ukraine, vanished without a trace as soon as German troops had set foot
186 THE FORMATION OF THE SOVIET UNION
on its territory. The sailors, whom the Sebastopol Bolsheviks had suc
ceeded in winning over by appeals to their war-weariness and national
ism, quickly grew tired of the new order. Before long, they got out of
hand and began to loot and attack the local population. At the end of
February 1918 they killed 250 citizens in Sebastopol and 170 in Simfero
pol. 100 Many of the sailors were of Ukrainian origin and refused to fight
in the Bolshevik ranks after learning of the Soviet attack on the Ukraine.
By March 1918 the fleet - the ba ckbone of Soviet power in the Crimea
- was entirely demoralized. Some sailors were deserting for home, others
were going over to the White forces. Thus ended the short-lived coopera
tion between the Sebastopol fleet and the Communists.
At the beginning of March the Communists convened in Simferopol
the First Regional Congress of Soviets in order to form a Soviet govern
ment for the Crimea. Attending, among others, were ninety-one Tatar
deputies, mostly members of the left wing of the disbanded Kurultai.
The Tatars demanded that they be given seats in the Executive Com
mittee, which was to be the government of the peninsula, but the chair
man of the congress informed them that before they had a right to ask
for places in the Executive Committee it was incumbent upon them to
join the Communist Party. When the Tatars moved to open a discussion
on the entire national question they again lost, because the non-Moslem
majority voted to refrain from injecting this question into the debates. 101
The government formed by _the congress consisted of twelve Bolsheviks
apd eight Left SR's. As a concession to the Tatars a Commissariat of
Crimean Moslem Affairs was created: in this way a lone Tatar received
a post in the Soviet government. 102
The government had scarcely assumed its duties when the German
armies began to advance ip.to the Ukraine and the Crimea. In an effort
to save the Black Sea fleet from falling into German hands, Moscow
ordered the Crimean Communists to proclaim the independence of the
peninsula, hoping that the Germans might respect the sovereignty of
such a state. 103 In accordance with these directives the Crimean govern
ment proclaimed in late March 1918 the Republic of Taurida. ( Taurida
is the name of the province of which the Crimean peninsula was a
part. ) 104
This measure, however, failed to preserve the tottering Soviet au
thority. Not only was it menaced from the outside, but internally it had
also lost all strength. In the elections to the Sebastopol Soviet, held in
the middle of April, the Bolsheviks were heavily outvoted by the SR's
and Mensheviks; in other towns they failed completely. 105 Soon the
Tatars began to raise their heads again. Virtually excluded from the
Soviet government and subjected to the excesses of the sailors, they
awaited with much impatience the arrival of German troop;;. In the
middle of April some Tatar villages revolted and threw out Communist
THE MOSLEM BORDERLANDS
officjals; here and there Tatar detachments began to reappear. Soon the
Sovnarkom left Simferopol secretly, hoping to escape from the Crimea
before the arrival of German troops, but it was intercepted by Russian
and Tatar units. Four days after the· attempted escape, all members of
the Soviet government of the Crimea were executed in the vicinity of
Yalta. 106 In early May German troops entered Sebastopol unopposed.
The German occupation did not prove itself as beneficial as the
Tatars had hoped. As in the Ukraine and Belorussia the Germans vacil
lated between the desire to support native nationalism in the struggle
against the Russians and the will to impose their discipline upon the
occupied territories. In May the members of the Kurultai who had
emerged from hiding formed a Provisional Crimean Government, with
Seidamet as Prime Minister, 107 but the Germans refused to recognize it
and instead placed the civil administration in the hands of General
Sulkevich, a Lithuanian Moslem who had once served in the Russian
armies and during the war had commanded a special Moslem Corps
which the Germans had formed in Rumania. Sulkevich's regime, like
Skoropadski's in the Ukraine, was a puppet government, serving the
interests of the German occupation armies, and out of touch with the
Tatar and Russian population. The fact that it assisted the occupants to
ship food from the Crimea to Germany, and that it passed legislation
returning to the previous owners the land confiscated in the course of
1917 and early 1918, did not increase its popular following. All the efforts
of Tatar political figures to use their Turkish connections as a means of
exercising pressure on the Germans, proved unsuccessful. The Germans
refused to surrender any authority in the Crimea to the Tatars. As soon
as the German armies evacuated the peninsula in November 1918,
Sulkevich resigned.
After the resignation of Sulkevich, authority over the Crimea was
assumed by a Russian government, headed by Solomon S. K rym, a mem
ber of the Jewish Karaite sect of the Crimea and a Kadet Deputy in the
First Duma. His government drew its principal support from the Russian
official and landowning groups, which were strong in the Crimea. Its
political and economic orientation was that of the Kadet Party.
In the fall of 1918 three distinct political tendencies emerged among
the Tatars. The extreme right wing, composed largely of the clergy and
wealthy Moslem landowners, which in 1917 had already had conHicts
with the Tatar nationalists over the questions of land and religious ad
ministration, supported the Krym government. The Tatar nationalists of
the Milli Firka would not cooperate with the Russian liberals. The major
ity of the Milli Firka preferred to pursue an independent course, hoping
sooner or later to secure recognition from both sides engaged in the Civil
War, and to regain the authority which the party had enjoyed before
being suppressed by the Sebastopol :Heet. 10 8 A minority in the party con-
188 THE F ORMATION O F THE S O VIET UNION
sidered such a course impracticable, and sought conciliation with the
Communists. This was the left wing of the Milli Firka, headed by Veli
Ibragimov ( Ibrahim ) , which in the winter of 1918-19 established con
tact with the Communist underground operating in the major cities of
the peninsula, and began to work hand in hand with the Communist
cells. 109
When Soviet troops reoccupied the Crimea in April 1919, overthrow
ing the Krym government, the relations between the Tatar nationalists
and the Communists were considerably better than they had been a year
earlier, in the days of the Republic of Taurida. With the Soviet armies
there arrived numerous Moslem Communists, including the chairman
of the Central Bureau of the Communist Organizations of the Peoples of
the East, Mustafa Subkhi. Immediately propaganda was started among
the Moslem masses, a Crimean Moslem Bureau was opene� to handle
Moslem affairs, and a considerable effort was made to attract Tatar in
tellectuals to the Soviet side. In May 1919 the Communists' established
a Crimean regime, and appointed a government in which several im
portant posts, including the chairmanship of the Commissariat of Foreign
Affairs, were given to members of the left wing of the Milli Firka. 110
The Central Committee of the Milli Firka, which had not collaborated
actively with the Communist underground, dispatched to the Soviet au
thorities, shortly after the formation of the republic, a conciliatory note
in which it offered to adopt the Communist platform and to support
the Soviet regime in return for a share in the administration and the
right to function legally on Crimean territory, but this proposition was
apparently rejected. 1 11
Active collaboration of the Central Committee of the Milli Firka with
the Communists dates only from the autumn of 1919. In June 1919 barely
one month after it was formed, the government of the Soviet Crimean
Republic had to flee before the White armies of General Denikin which
had occupied the peninsula. The regime which Denikin had established
in the second half of 1919 was perhaps the most reactionary of all to
which the Crimea had been subjected since the outbreak of the Revolu
tion; it was also the most hostile to the Tatar nationalist movement.
Denikin not only made clear his opposition to Tatar nationalism by dis
solving Tatar political organizations which had managed to lead an open,
if tenuous, existence from the time of the German occupation, but also
alienated the Tatar intellectuals by undoing some of the most important
reforms introduced in the Crimea in the spring of 1917. Specifically, he
restored the old Vakuf Commission and returned to his post the tsar
appointed Mufti of the Crimea, removed by the March 1911 Crimean
conference. Driven underground, the Milli Firka had no choice but to
cooperate with the only powerful, well-organized anti-Denikin force
the Communists. The Milli Firka endeavored to reach an agreement with
THE MO SLEM B ORDERLANDS 189
the illegal Communist organizations in the Crimea, but since these or
ganizations were constantly suppressed by the White authorities, its
efforts produced no results. 112 Only in the autumn of 1919, when the
center of Communist activity was transferred from the Crimean peninsula
to Odessa, was it possible for the Milli Firka and the Communist Party
to establish regular relations. The two sides agreed at that time to
coordinate their anti-White activity in the Crimea,11 3
Baron Wrangel, who succeeded Denikin as leader of the White forces
after Denikin resigned in early 1920, attempted to correct the mistakes of
his predecessors by making generous promises to the Tatars, including
the pledge of autonomy and religious self-rule, 114 but this evidence of
good will came too late to bring practical results. In the fall of 1920 the
Communists organized a Crimean Revolutionary Committee ( Krymrev
kom) in Melitopol ( Ukraine) ; in October, they penetrated the White
defenses of the Crimea and occupied the peninsula for the third time.
As soon as Soviet rule had been established, the Milli Firka tried to
place its relations with the Communists on a more permanent basis. In
a formal declaration submitted to the Regional Committee of the Russian
Communist Party in the Crimea, the chairman of the Central Committee
of the Milli Firka called attention to the fundamental similarities be
tween Communist and Moslem ideals. The Milli Firka, he stated, differed
from the Communist party "not in principle, but only in the timing, place,
and means of realization [of socialism]"; the Milli Firka believed that,
before the socialism for which both parties were striving could be at
tained, certain reactionary factors, rooted deeply in Moslem life, had to
be destroyed. It was ready to cooperate wit� the Soviet authorities in
their fight against international imperialism, religious conservatism, and
economic exploitation, provided it was granted the status of a legal party
with a right to publish a newspaper and to administer Crimean Moslem
religious and educational institutions, including the vakuf properties. 11 5
The Crimean Communists turned down this offer, and branded the Milli
Firka an illegal, counterrevolutionary organization. 116
If the refusal of. the Soviet authorities in the Crimea to accept the
cooperation offered by the Milli Firka signified their rejection of a large
proportion of the- Tatar intelligentsia, certainly their agricultural policies
incurred the enmity of the Crimean Tatar peasantry. Owing to the fact
that Catherine II had distributed very large areas of land in the Crimea
to her favorites and other noblemen, the ownership of land there was
concentrated in a comparatively few hands. In the second half of the
nineteenth century ( 1877) 1,000 noblemen owned over one-half of all
the land in the Crimea. 11 7 And though this concentration lessened ap
preciably during the last decades of the ancien regime, as small peasant
holdings increased, the properties which came within the categories con
sidered subject to confiscation by the Soviet authorities ( large estates,
190 THE F O R MATION O F THE S OVIET U N I O N
church and government lands) still amounted to no less than 50 per cent
of all the acreage of the Crimea. 1 1 8 Instead of distributing this confiscated
property to the peasantry and the landless agricultural laborers, the au
thorities transferred most of it to gigantic state farms, or sovkhozy, which
mushroomed throughout the peninsula in 1920 and 1921. In the spring of
1921, there were in the Crimea 987 sovkhozy, owning 25 per cent of all
the arable land, and 45 per cent of all the orchards and vineyards.1 19
In the setting up of the state farms many irregularities were committed.
In fact, the heaviest losers in the new system were the Tatars, because
they formed the bulk of the landless peasantry in the Crimea.
Early in 1921 Sultan-Galiev was dispatched by Moscow to the Crimea
to report on conditions there, and if necessary, to prepare recommenda
tions for their improvement. Sultan-Galiev's report, published in May
1921 was very critical of Soviet rule in the Crimea. Communist Party
work there, he reported, was entirely disorganized and out of touch with
the Moslem population; the state farms, run by ex-tsarist and colonial
officials directly subordinate to Moscow, ignored the needs of the local
population; Tatar education was neglected. He suggested that a Crimean
Soviet Socialist Republic be created, that Tatars be admitted in large
numbers in Communist organizations, and that the sovkhozy be dras
tically curtailed. 120 Despite objections from local Communists, and the
acceptance of a resolution by the Crimean Regional Communist Party
Congress against the creation of a republic, 121 the Bolshevik authorities
in Moscow carried out Sultan-Galiev's recommendation and established
in November 1921 the Autonomous Crimean Socialist Soviet Republic.
The chairmanship of the new government was given to Iurii Gaven, a
Bolshevik whose views on the nature of autonomy left no doubt that he
would follow closely · the directives of Moscow. 122
Kalmyk A.R.
The Caucasus
(1922)
Black Sea
Iran
tJ
against the invaders from the mountains. At this congress all the Russian
political parties of the Terek Region- Mensheviks, SR's, Bolsheviks, as
well as some radical Ossetin parties - formed a ..socialist bloc'' and
joined the Cossacks in a new administration: the Terek People's Soviet
(Terskii Na-rodnyi Sovet) . 12
The Terek People's Soviet moved in March to Vladikavkaz, where it
founded the Terek People's Soviet Socialist Republic (Terskaia Narod
naia Sovetskaia Sotsialisticheskaia Respublika). The government of the
new republic included representatives of Russian, Cossack, and some na-
THE CAUCASUS 197
tive parties ( but without the Chechen and Ingush) and was headed by
the Georgian Bolshevik, Noi Buachidze. In April the Republic adopted a
constitution, which acknowledged the sovereignty of the Russian Soviet
Republic and granted Moscow very extensive rights over the Terek
Region in matters of finance, foreign affairs, the entry of Russian troops,
posts and telegraphs. At the same time, the Terek Region retained broad
autonomy in other internal matters, including full legislative, administra
tive, and judiciary power, on the condition that it did not enact legisla
tion violating the constitution of the RSFSR. 13
The Terek state represented perhaps the first instance of a "People's
Republic," a type of government the Communists were in time to use
in other conquered territories where their position was weak. In those
areas they satisfied themselves with control of the central organs of
political power and with the application of general democratic and social
ist measures, postponing the realization of their full Communist program
until a more opportune moment. Another characteristic feature of this
type of rule was Communist cooperation with socialist and liberal groups.
In May 1918 some deputies of the dissolved Terek-Daghestan ad
ministration, who in January had fled Vladikavkaz and had sought refuge
in Transcaucasia, proclaimed in Batum the independence of the Northern
Caucasus. This step was without practical significance, since the North
ern Caucasus was then firmly under the control of the Bolshevik-domi
nated Terek Republic, but it did open the way for possible Turkish
intervention on behalf of the North Caucasian Moslems. The German
delegation at the Batum Conference considered the self-styled republic
a fiction and refused to grant it recognition. 14
The Communist-sponsored Terek Republic exercised effective political
authority for a brief time only. In the summer of 1918, the traditional
animosity between the Cossacks and the inogorodnye led again to an
open conflict. Despite specific directives from Lenin to retain an alliance
with other socialist parties and to refrain from copying Communist poH"
cies in Russia proper, the Terek Bolsheviks, pressed by the land-starved
inogorodnye, began to socialize land. 15 The Cossacks would not acqui
esce, and quit the government. Moreover, before long the war between
the Ingush and the Cossacks, halted in the spring, Hared up once more,
and the entire region was thrown into complete anarchy. In June violent
anti-Soviet demonstrations of Russians dissatisfied with Soviet rule took
place in Vladikavkaz, in the course of which Buachidze, the Bolshevik
chairman of the republic's government, was killed. 16
The Georgian Bolsheviks, who had fled to Vladikavkaz at the end of
May 1918, after Georgia had proclaimed its independence, found the
North Caucasus completely disorganized. "Soviet rule existed only in
name, having among the population neither weight nor authority. Either
198 THE FORMATION OF THE SOVIET UNION
there were no organs of government whatsoever, or else they had no idea
what to do." 11
Early in August the Cossacks attacked and seized Vladikavkaz. The
Bolshevik leaders, including Ordzhonikidze, who had been dispatched
there in July by the Soviet government from Tsaritsyn ( Stalingrad), hid
in the mountains, among the Chechen and Ingush. Assuming leadership
over the Terek Bolsheviks, Ordzhonikidze made an alliance with the
mountain natives and promised them the assistance of the Soviet govern
ment in regaining the lands which they had lost to the Cossacks under
the tsars. On August 17, Ingush warriors, incited by the Bolshevik exiles,
attacked and seized Vladikavkaz. A few days later, the Bolsheviks fol
lowed their new allies into the city and reorganized the Terek govern
ment. Soviet power now was less popular than it had been at the be
ginning of the year, when it had enjoyed the support of the Cossacks and
non-Communist Russians. Ordzhonikidze admitted that in the fall of
1918 Bolshevik authority in the Terek Region rested exclusively on the
assistance of the mountain Moslem groups, especially the Ingush: "I re
call the moment before the end of the Fourth Congress [ of the Terek
Region, held in August 1918] when our fate hung on a hair; this was a
moment . . . when we had no following . . . when we were looked
upon with timidity . . . when only the Ingush people followed us with
out hesitation." 18
The time for the "People's Republic" type of government was past,
and Ordzhonikidze, possibly under directives from Stalin ( then in Tsarit
syn) , with whom he was associated, undertook instead a policy of terror
and repression. He organized a secret police, or Cheka, and proceeded to
arrest or execute Mensheviks, SR's, and other elements who had ex
pressed dissatisfaction with Communism. "Only then did the population
learn the meaning of the Cheka," writes a Communist historian. 19 For
the £rst time the North Caucasus experienced the full horrors of Soviet
rule.
The Chechen and Ingush, on the other hand, were handsomely re
warded at the expense of the Cossacks for having saved Soviet rule in
the Terek Region. Whole Cossack settlements were expelled, and their
land, livestock and household belongings turned over to the Chechen
and Ingush. 20 The persecution of the Terek Cossacks and the alliance
with the Chechen and Ingush became the cornerstone of Bolshevik policy
in the North Caucasus for many years to come. It accounted for the
loyalty shown by the Chechen and Ingush toward the Communists
during the Civil War. The new regime which the Bolsheviks had estab
lished upon their return to Vladikavkaz in August was entirely in their
hands and subordinated directly to Moscow. The constitution of April
1918 was altered to eliminate all divergencies from the constitution of
THE CAUCASUS 199
Soviet Russia, and the internal autonomy which the Terek People's Re
public had been promised was abolished. 21
Baku
Until the middle of March 1918 life in Baku proceeded much as
before, despite Communist determination to seize power. Bolshevik in
activity was due primarily to the weakness of the party and its following.
The soldiers on whom the Communists had depended at the end of 1917�
and who accounted for at least one-third of their following in the city,
had dispersed and were gone. The workers, especially the laborers in
the oil industry, voted for the SR's if they were Russian, and for their
respective national parties if they were not. In such circumstances it was
impossible to accomplish an armed seizure of power. The Baku Bolshe
viks were compelled to give up their plans for a coup and to concentrate
instead or�)he penetration of the labor unions and other organizations by
means of strikes, propaganda, and agitation.22
If, despite their numerical weakness, the Communists succeeded in
retaining control over the executive organ of the Baku Soviet, the reason
must be sought in their effective exploitation of the national animosities
which played an important part in local politics. The Baku Soviet re
flected in miniature the ethnic and political structure of Transcaucasia:
it was composed of Russian, Armenian, and Azerbaijani parties and was
torn by the same dissensions which eventually destroyed the Transcau
casian Federation. Throughout 1917 the Bolsheviks and the Mussavatists
in the Baku Soviet maintained friendly relations, which aided consider
ably the weak Bolshevik faction.
In January 1918 Communist-Mussavat relations underwent a change.
The city began to suffer from a food shortage, caused by the severance
of the railroad connecting Baku with the North Caucasus and by the
refusal of the Moslem peasants in Eastern Transcaucasia to deliver prod
uce to the city. The outbreaks of Moslem violence in various parts of
Transcaucasia, such as in Shamkhor, which were directed against Russian
soldiers and the Russian inhabitants in general, and perhaps above all
the threat of a Turkish invasion of the Caucasus, caused the Bolsheviks
to turn against the Mussavat, and like their comrades in the Terek
Region, to assume the championship of the Russian national cause. 23
The incident which led to the Bolshevik coup in Baku came unex
pectedly, before the Communists were quite prepared to assume power.24
On March 17/30, 1918 - on the day when the North Caucasian Com
munists were proclaiming the Terek People's Soviet Socialist Republic in
Vladikavkaz- the Executive Committee ( Ispolkom) of the Baku Soviet,
controlled by the Communists, received reports that a ship of repatriated
troops of the so-called Savage Division ( Dikaia Diviziia), composed of
ZOO T H E F O RMATION O F T H E S O VIET UNION
Moslem volunteers in the tsarist service, had entered the Baku harbor.
The Russians and Armenians in the soviet, fearing the disembarkation of
armed Moslem units would precipitate a national conflict, ordered the
troops of the Savage Division to disarm before entering Baku. The troops
complied, and were allowed to leave the boat. The action of the Ispolkom
soon became known in the Moslem quarter of the city, where it aroused
great discontent. Meetings were held and protests voiced against the
high-handed methods used by the Russians and Armenians. The Moslem
population was enraged that the Russians and Armenians, who had their
own armed detachments, had prevented the Azerbaijanis from also ac
quiring a military force. The next afternoon ( March 18/31) , a delegation
of Baku Moslems appeared at the soviet to demand the return of the
confiscated arms; simultaneously shooting broke out in the Moslem
quarter. In several sections of the city Russian soldiers were accosted and
disarmed by Moslem mobs.
The soviet was convinced that it faced a Moslem "counterrevolution."
In any struggle in which the Turkish population was involved, the Ar
menians were certain to be on the other side of the battle line, and thus
on March 18/31 or the following day a coalition was formed between
the Communists, Russian SR's, and Armenian Dashnaks. The alliance
with the Dashnaks became very embarrassing for the Bolsheviks, partly
because of the bad reputation of the Dashnaks among both the Rus
sian socialists and the .,Moslems, and partly because it was certain to
transform any struggle for control of the city into a Moslem-Armenian
slaughter.
On March 20/April z, Dashnak units, directed by the Ispolkom,
attacked and disarmed Moslem mobs responsible for the outbreak of
violence two days earlier. They met with resistance, but on the morning
of the following day the Baku Soviet was in full command of the city.
The defenseless Moslem population was now at the mercy of the
Dashnaks and the pro-Communist Russian deserters. For three full days
- from March zo to 23 - the Dashnaks and the deserters massacred
Moslems in the city and its industrial suburbs, and then moved into the
neighboring countryside to continue the attack on the rural inhabitants.
All in all, some three thousand persons, mostly Moslems, lost their lives
in the March fighting. 26
"The March [1918] struggle," wrote a Soviet historian of the Trans
caucasian revolution, "consisted without any doubt of the exploitation
of two national tendencies against a third national tendency." 26 "The
counterrevolution expressed itself through the Turkish national group,
whereas the Armenian and Russian national groups actively supported
the side of the revolution." 27 The fact that they had come into power in
the wake of a purely national clash and with the assistance of the Dash
naks was not easy f or the Bolsheviks to justify. Shaumian wrote to Lenin
THE CAUCASUS 20 1
explaining that without the aid of Armenian nationalists Baku with its
priceless oil would have been lost;28 Bolshevik speakers tried to defend
the action to the Baku Soviet on the same grounds; 29 and Communist
historians ever since have either minimized the role of the Dashnaks in
the March events or else ignored it altogether.
In mid-April, the Bolsheviks formed a Soviet government in Baku,
composed entirely of Bolsheviks and left-wing Mensheviks ( International
ist ), notwithstanding the fact that in the election to the Baku Soviet
( April 1918 ) these parties and their sympathizers had obtained only
sixty-seven of a total of 308 seats.30 The SR's and Dashnaks, who had
played a prominent role in the March events and between them had more
deputies than the Communists, were excluded from the administration.81
The new government appointed Shaumian as its chairman and declared
as its goal "to be most intimately connected with the All-Russian cen
tral government and to execute, in accordance with local conditions,
all decrees and directives of the Worker and Peasant Government of
Russia." 32
One of the first measures of the new authority was the suppression
of all the Moslem and Menshevik newspapers and societies. An order was
also issued to the Dashnaks to disband their separate military detach
ments and their National Soviet, but the Armenians disregarded it. 88
During their rule in Baku, the Communists devoted most of their
attention to the oil problem. They began at once to dispatch shipments
of oil to Russia via the Caspian Sea and Astrakhan, and thence along the
Volga northward. During the four months of Soviet control in Baku
( March-June 1918 ) eighty million puds ( 1,440,000 short tons ) of oil
were shipped to Russia. 3 4 Having run into difficulties with the oil firms
about prices and deliveries, Shaumian decided to seek Moscow's permis
sion to nationalize the industry. His communications with the capital
passed through Tsaritsyn, where Stalin acted as intermediary: Soon a
reply arrived from Stalin saying that the Council of People's Commissars
approved of the request. A few days later, however, a countermanding
communication from Lenin and the Commissariat of Fuels informed
Shaumian that Stalin's report was not correct, that the decision of the
Council was not to nationalize.3 5 The Commissariat of Fuels ordered
Shaumian to leave the oil industry in private hands in order not to dis
rupt production; but it was too late to retract the previous directive, and
in June the oil industry was nationalized.
The nationalization of the oil industry was one of the prime reasons
for the loss of Bolshevik strength in Baku. As the Commissariat of Fuels
had anticipated, the production of oil declined considerably after nation
alization·, and it also resulted in a lowering of workers' wages.86
Soviet historians agree that sometime in May the laboring population,
traditionally SR and Menshevik in its leanings, had already begun to
202 T H E FORMATION O F THE S OVIET U N I O N
turn against the Soviet regime, which it had supported for a brief time
out of fear of the Turks.:n Shaumian and his colleagues, so deeply under
the spell of the Paris revolution of 1870 that they had called their gov
ernment the "Baku Commune" and had continually lectured the workers
about its Parisian counterpart, tried to stem the unfavorable tide by ex
horting the laborers to make ever greater sacrifices and to restrain the
appetites for more money which the Communists themselves, while
striving for power, had whetted :
In the struggle with the bourgeoisie the working class had worked
out special methods of fighting; it had become used to demanding.
This method was once very useful and revolutionary. Now the situa
tion is different. In power is not the bourgeoisie but an organ created
by the workers, and for that reason the attitude towards the govern
ment should be different. Unfortunately the old psychology has be
come ingrained, and the workers defend their private interests.
Against whom? against the common mass.38
In June 1918 the position of the Baku Commune became precarious.
The Transcaucasian republics had proclaimed their independence, and
the Azerbaijanis were preparing to march with the Turks on Baku, to
reclaim the city, and to extort revenge for the massacres of March. From
Moscow and Tsaritsyn where Shaumian had sent for help, however, the
directives were calm. Stalin relayed the following message on June 25/
July 8 :
Armenia
The Armenian Republic was an anomalous political organism : two
thirds of its territory was under enemy occupation and nearly one-half
of its population consisted of war refugees. It lacked money and food;
its administration consisted of people who had devoted the major part
of their life to revolutionary or terrorist activity, and were entirely devoid
of experience in affairs of government. No territory of the old Russian
Empire had suffered greater losses from the First World War, and none
was placed in a more desperate situation by the empire's disintegration.
The collapse of the Transcaucasian Federation caused Armenia to
be diplomatically isolated. The Azerbaijanis had the Turks; the Geor
gians, the Germans; the Armenians alone had no one to whom to turn
for assistance. All Armenian military resources had been committed to
the defense of the central Armenian territories· located along the Araks
River, and only the fact that the Turks were more interested in seizing
THE CAUCASUS 209
Baku and advancing o n th e North Caucasus than in turning against the
Armenians had saved Erivan from certain capture. In the summer of 1918
the Armenians had dispatched a delegation to Germany, hoping to obtain
there help similar to that which had been promised to Georgia, but Berlin
was not interested. Armenia had nothing to offer either strategically or
economically, and a protectorate over that war-ravaged country was
likely to represent a considerable financial liability.62
The internal situation of independent Armenia was almost hopeless.
Before 1917 the region which became Armenia had imported about one
third of its food requirements from Russia. Not only was supply from this
source unavailable, but the population of the republic was, as a result
of the refugee influx, twice as large as it was before the war. Armenia
was constantly on the brink of famine, which was avoided only because
of the assistance extended to that country by the American Relief Mission
in 1919 and 1920. 63 The Armenian treasury was empty, and the local
currency suffered a catastrophic inflationary decline : from March 1 920
to November 1920, alone, the ruble circulating in Armenia declined from
56o to 28,000 for one United States dollar. 64 There was no regular taxa
tion system to pay for the costs of running the government, and the state
provided for its needs either by occasional requisitions or by contribu
tions from Armenian colonies abroad. The total expenditures of the state
between September 1918 and January 1920 exceeded its income ten
times. 6 5
At the end of 1919 an American delegation, headed by General James
G. Harbord, arrived in Armenia. It was dispatched by the United States
government to report on the advisability of establishing an American
mandate over Armenia - an idea which was sponsored by the Armenians
themselves and which had aroused the sympathy of President Wilson.
The Harbord Mission painted in its account a very discouraging picture
of internal conditions prevailing in the republic and stated that the ma
jority of the inhabitants desired the reestablishment of ties with Russia
as the only way of attaining economic stability and external security. 66
The legislative authority in the Armenian Democratic Republic was
technically vested in an eighty-man Parliament, but in fact it was firmly
in the hands of one party, the Dashnaktsutiun, which controlled the
armed forces and__ possessed the only effective political apparatus on
Armenian territory. There is no record of any extensive legislative activity
on the part of the government. It limited itself to the founding of Arme
nian schools and other cultural institutions. 67 The land reform initiated
by the Transcaucasian Seim in 1917 was not enforced.
After the German and Turkish evacuation from the Caucasus, Arme
nia established contact with the staff of General Denikin and until the
end of the Civil War collaborated closely with the White forces. In re
turn for Armenian support and certain concessions ( such as the Arme-
210 THE F ORMATION O F THE S O VIET UNION
nian pledge to receive evacuating White armies, given formally in March
1920) , Denikin transmitted to Armenia arms and ammunition, and helped
the republic :6.nancially. 68 In consequence of their pro-Denikin orienta
tion, the Armenians did not participate in the Georgian-Azerbaijani mili
tary agreement of June 1919, which was primarily designed to prevent
White intervention in Transcaucasia.
The relations between Armenia and the other two Transcaucasian
republics were hostile, not only because of Armenia's pro-White policy
but also because of its territorial aspirations. As soon as the Turks had
left Transcaucasia, Armenia and Georgia engaged in an armed struggle
over the Borchalo region ( December 1918). The Armenian claim to this
territory rested on the fact that the majority of its population was Arme
nian; the Georgians, on the other hand, asserted that Borchalo was theirs
as a part of the pre-1917 TiHis gubernia, which they claimed in its en
tirety. The clash was stopped by the intervention of the British occupa
tion authorities in the Caucasus. Both sides agreed to settle the question
by plebiscite. 69 In 1919 and 1920 Armenia also fought with Azerbaijan
over the Karabakh and Zangezur regions.
Perhaps the worst political mistake of the Armenian republic was
to engage in a conflict with a reinvigorated Turkey. Disregarding political
realities, and motivated by a desire for revenge, the Armenians undertook
to detach from Turkey the provinces which had been populated by their
people before the 1915 massacres. In the winter of 1918-19, with British
approval, they occupied parts of Eastern Anatolia, and before long Ar
menian refugees began to trickle back to their ravaged homeland. In
May 1919 the Armenian Republic officially proclaimed the annexation
of Turkish Armenia. 70 Unfortunately for the Armenians, they overesti
mated the extent to which Turkish power had been destroyed in World
War I and occupied Eastern Anatolia just as a new republican Turkish
movement under Kemal Pasha was forming itself in adjacent territories.
In July 1919 the followers of Kemal held a conference in Erzerum ( on
territory claimed by Armenia ) and there signed a National Pact, one of
the provisions of which called for the return to Turkey of all its old
eastern regions, including those annexed by Armenia.7 1 Unless one of the
sides was willing to give way a clash was inevitable. It finally broke out
in 1920 with dire results to the Armenian republic.
Georgia
Of all the republics which had been separated from Russia and then
reconquered by the Communists, Georgia came closest to attaining politi
cal stability. Like the other two Transcaucasian republics, it enjoyed cer
tain geographic advantages: the Caucasian mountains permitted it to
isolate itself from the Russian Civil War and to weather the first phase
of independence, during which many of the other republics formed on
THE CAUCASUS 211
the territory of the Russian Empire had been destroyed. But in addition,
Georgia also h,ad at its disposal a relatively numerous native intelligentsia
with experience in governmental _service and grass-roots party_ work.
Georgia's economic situation, although far from sound, was also better
than that prevailing in Azerbaijan and Armenia, partly because its com
munication problems were less serious ( Georgia had contact with the
outside world through the Black Sea ports, and control of the pivot of
the Transcaucasian railroad system in Tiflis ) , and partly because its inter
nal policies were better planned and more energetically enforced.
Shortly after the independence of Georgia had been proclaimed, Ger
man units landed in Batum (June 1918 ) , occupying strategic points along
Georgia's border and some towns in the interior of the country. The
Germans asked the Georgians not to surrender to the Turks control over
the railroad lines, as they were bound to do by the terms of a Georgian
Turkish treaty, signed in Batum at the beginning of June. 72 Instead, the
Germans themselves took over the Georgian railroad network. During
their stay on Georgian territory the Germans behaved quite correctly,
in contrast to their behavior in the Ukraine, Belorussia, and the Crimea.
They interfered little with the internal affairs of the republic, respected
the authority of the government, and abstained from the brutal methods
of food-collecting which they were applying in other parts of old Russia.
The Germans undertook to secure Soviet Russia's recognition of Georgian
independence, ·and some progress in that direction was made; but the
Communists delayed taking an official stand as long as possible and were
still uncommitted in November 1918, when the war was over and the
Germans had to evacuate the Caucasus. Certainly, if only by comparing
their life under the Germans with the lot of the Azerbaijanis under the
Turks, the Georgians had no reason to regret their decision.
Following German and Turkish evacuation, Batum and other points
within Georgia were occupied by British troops. The presence of the
British, embarrassing as it was to the Georgian government from the
point of view of its national prestige, was not unwelcome as protection
against the encroachments of neighboring powers, especially the White
armies and the Communists. As in Azerbaijan, the British command left
the local government some self-rule in internal matters. The original atti
tude of the British toward the Georgian Social Democrats was as hostile
as it was toward the Azerbaijanis; the Georgian Republic, after all, had
actively collaborated with the Germans, and, in a sense, had come into
being on German initiative. But before long Georgian relations with the
British changed for the better. In 19i9 London sent as its envoy to
Tiflis, Oliver Wardrop, a specialist in Georgian literature and a warm
friend of the Georgian cause, who established amicable relations with
the local political l_eaders, and pleaded for a pro-Georgian policy with
his superiors in the Foreign Office.73
212 THE FORMATION OF THE SOVIET UNION
Georgia was governed by a group of Social Democrats who for nearly
a quarter of a century had been connected with the Russian and Western
European socialist movements. For two and a half years at the helm of
the Georgian state they endeavored to realize democratic and socialist
ideals. Their efforts, if not always successful, provided a remarkable
demonstration of the receptivity of Georgia to Western ideas.
The first Georgian government, headed by Chkhenkeli, and identified
with a pro-German policy, relinquished its authority in the fall of 1918.
A new cabinet was formed under Gegechkori. In February 1919 elections
were held for the Georgian National Assembly, and after the elections a
new cabinet was appointed. The elections gave the Social Democrats 105
of a total of 130 seats, · the remainder being distributed among the Geor
gian Socialists-Federalists ( nine seats) , Georgian National Democrats
( eight sea�s) , Socialists Revolutionaries ( five seats) , and Dashnaks ( three
seats) . 7 4 Noi Zhordaniia, one of the founders of Georgian Social Democ
racy, and the chairman of the Tiflis Soviet during the preceding two
years, was elected by the National Assembly the President of the Re
public. As in Switzerland, whose political system was imitated, the
cabinet served directly under the President, and both were responsible
to the Assembly. The Georgian government could maintain more than
nominal authority over the republic because it had at its disposal a net
work of provincial party organizations, on whom it could depend to
provide administrative personnel and to execute its directives. The Geor
gian leaders also intended to introduce into Georgia certain other features
of the Swiss political system, such as cantonal self-rule. 75 The Georgian
constitution, drawn up in 1920 but not ratified until the Soviet armies
were approaching the gates of Tiflis a year later, was modeled after
Western European democratic constitutions. 76
The rapid growth of nationalist emotions in Georgia during the period
of independence was demonstrated both by repeated border incidents
with Armenia and Azerbaijan, and by the manner in which the govern
ment met the minority problem within its domain. The Georgian Re
public covered a territory corresponding to the two prerevolutionary
Russian provinces of Kutais and Tiflis, inhabited by several minority
groups: in the north, the Ossetins ( an Iranian people) ; in the west, the
Abkhazians ( a group of Cherkess origin) and Adzhars ( Moslems of Geor
gian stock) ; in the south, Armenians. In its endeavor to create a homoge
neous national state, the Tillis government showed little sympathy for the
attempts of those minority groups to secure political and cultural auton
omy. In early 1919 the Georgian government forcibly closed an Abkhaz
National Council which had been convened for the purpose of discussing
local grievances and appointing organs of self-rule. 7 7 The growth of
nationalism in Georgia had its parallels in other borderland areas, but
its emergence in Georgia was the more remarkable because before the
THE CAUCASUS 213
Revolution Georgia had been among the regions least inclined in that
direction.
Of all three Transcaucasian republics Georgia alone tackled the land
problem. Because of the mountainous character of the country, only
13.2 per cent of its total surface of approximately ££teen million acres
was arable; the peasantry, which formed three-fourths of the republic's
entire population owned only a small part ( 6.2 per cent ) of that land,
in most cases not enough for sustenance. 78 To alleviate the shortage of
land, the government confiscated all the private holdings in excess of
forty acres. The confiscated assets were transferred to a special state au
thority, which at first leased the land to the peasants, and after January
1919 sold it to them for a nominal sum. This reform, which was com
pleted in 1920, gave the state control of nearly one and a half million
acres. In addition, the state owned the properties of the tsarist family,
of the treasury of the defunct Russian government, and of the church
- all of which had been confiscated in December 1917 by the Trans
caucasian Seim. The total land at the disposal of the state thus amounted
to nine and a half million acres, comprising all the forests, nearly all
the pastures and meadows, and one-fourth of all the arable land in
Georgia. 79 This reform encountered serious difficulties, such as commonly
occur when large agricultural units are divided into small holdings, but
it did produce a greater equalization of land distribution. By creating a
more numerous class of peasant proprietors who owed their land to the
state, the reform strengthened the republic's popular support.
In addition to land, the Georgian government also nationalized the
principal industries and the means of communication. In 1920, about go
per cent of all workers in Geotgia were employed in state or cooperative
enterprises, and only 10 per cent in privately owned establishments.80
The financial situation of the Georgian Republic was precarious. It
lacked money in its treasury, a firm currency, and a regular taxation sys
tem. At the beginning of 1919 its expenses exceeded its income three and
a half fold.81 One of the main considerations which had induced the gov
ernment to sell the confiscated land to the peasantry, instead of leasing
or distributing it, as would have be(:ln more consistent with its socialist
doctrine, was the sorry condition of the treasury. It was hoped that with
the two hundred million rubles which the sale of the land was expected
to bring the state deficit could be liquidated. 82 In the long run, Georgia
hoped to improve its economic situation by exploiting the considerable
natural wealth of the country ( manganese, lumber, coal) and by attract
ing foreign capital. It planned to exchange its raw materials for food and
manufactured goods, and to provide for the needs of the government out
of income from the nationalized land and industries, as well as from
prospective foreign concessions.
About one-third of Georgia's expenditures was devoted to the upkeep
214 THE FORMATION OF THE SOVIET UNION
of the republic's armed force. Its nucleus was the Red Guard, which had
been formed in Tiflis in November 1917 to suppress the pro-Bolshevik
Tillis Arsenal. The · Red Guard, afterwards renamed the Popular Guard,
was an all-volunteer reserve unit, run on a democratic basis by elected
officers and soldier congresses, and directly subordinated to the President
of the Republic. It was an elite militia, composed largely of industrial
workers and other urban elements, strongly imbued with the spirit of
socialism and nationalism. 83 In addition to the Guard, Georgia also had
a regular army, which consisted of draftees and was subordinate to the
Minister of War. In the event of mobilization, Georgia could put into
the field about fifty thousand men, organized into twenty-three battalions
of the Popular Guard, thirty-six battalions of the Regular Army, and
some cavalry and artillery units. This army was not large in comparison
with those taking part in the Russian Civil War, nor was it well equipped,
but as future events were to show, its spirit was good, and by Transcau
casian standards, its combat efficiency high.
The Prelude to the Conquest
The Soviet republic which the Communists had established in the
Terek Region in August 1918 rested primarily on the military support
provided by the Eleventh and Twelfth Red Armies, operating in the
so-called Caspian-Caucasian Sector of the Southern Front, under the
command of A. G. Shliapnikov. Shliapnikov's main assignment was to
complete the occupation of the North Caucasus and to spread Soviet
power to Azerbaijan by expelling from there the Azerbaijani nationalist
authorities and the British military units.st At the height of its strength,
in December 1918 the Eleventh Army numbered 150,000 men. Political
power in the Terek Region during the autumn and winter of 1918-19
was for all practical purposes in the hands of the Revolutionary Com
mittee of this army, in which Ordzhonikidze played a prominent part.
The formal government, with its headquarters in Piatigorsk, had little
authority. 85
When in the early months of 1919 the Eleventh and Twelfth Armies
melted away, partly as a result of typhus epidemics and partly from mass
desertions, Soviet rule in the Terek Region also collapsed. In May and
June of that year the White regiments of General Denikin began to move
into the North Caucasian regions, occupying first Daghestan and then
the Terek. Ordzhonikidze and other local Soviet leaders sought refuge
once more in the mountains of Chechnia and Ingushetiia.
Upon his entry into North Caucasian territory, Denikin was for the
first time confronted with the national problem, for his armies now oper
ated in a region which was heavily populated by non-Russian groups
and which touched directly upon the borders of independent Azerbaijan
and Georgia. His handling of this question was likely to determine to a
THE CAUCASU S 215
large extent this area's support for the White cause. By his unwillingness
to recognize the growth of nationalist sentiments in the borderlands since
the outbreak of the Revolution, and by his high-handed treatment of the
national republics, Denikin not only failed to win the local sympathies,
but actually drove most minority groups into the arms of the Communists.
He and his entourage were fundamentally opposed to the existence of
independent republics on the territory of what had been the Russian
Empire. Whatever other disagreements divided the leaders of the Volun
teer Army, Denikin recalled in his Memoirs, the idea of " 'Great Russia,
One and Indivisible' sounded clear and distinct to the mind and heart
of one and all." 86 Shortly after his troops had reached the borders of the
Transcaucasian republics Denikin declared that he would not recognize
their independence; and after a number of border incidents with Azer
baijan and Georgia had taken place, he proclaimed, in November 1919,
an economic blockade of the two republics: "I cannot permit," he said,
"those self-made entities, Georgia and Azerbaijan, which are openly
hostile to Russian statehood and have arisen contrary to Russian state
interests, to receive food at the cost of Russian territories liberated from
the Bolsheviks." 87 General Lukomskii, a high officer connected with the
Volunteer Army, stated bluntly that the Whites were tolerating the sep
aration of Transcaucasia only because they were fully occupied fighting
the Communists. 88
In view of Denikin's attitude it is not surprising that the victories of
the Volunteer Army in the fall of 1919 created consternation among
Georgian and Azerbaijani national leaders. It was obvious to them that
regardless of the outcome of the Civil War in Russia, the Transcaucasian
republics would be put to a severe test to defend their independence
against their northern neighbor once the fighting had ceased.
Denikin placed the administration of the Northern Caucasus in the
hands of officers of native origin who were serving in his army, and at
first made no effort to interfere with local life or even to extend his
dominion into the mountainous backcountry. In August 1919, however,
while making the supreme effort to capture Moscow, he issued an order
mobilizing the native population of the Northern Caucasus for military
service. The natives, traditionally exempt from such duty, refused to
obey the order, and in some areas fled to the mountains. Denikin dis
patched punitive detachments to deal with these recalcitrants. The na
tives then organized partisan units which attacked White troops ven
turing close to their hideouts. By October-November 1919 the White
forces were engaged in a full-scale war with the natives of the Northern
Caucasus, which, occurring at a decisive moment of the Civil War when
the fate of Moscow itself hung in the balance, was without doubt a
factor contributing to their ultimate defeat. 89
The center of anti·Denikin resistance was located in the most inac-
216 THE F O R M ATION O F THE S OVIET UNION
After the signature of the treaty, the Armenian army was renamed the
Red Army of Armenia, but it was left under the command of Dro, its
previous chief and a leading member of the Dashnaktsutiun.
The Revolutionary Committee arrived in Erivan on December 6, 1920,
one week after its departure from Azerbaijan. Upon assuming authority,
it entirely disregarded the treaty which Legran had signed with the de
posed regime. On December 2 1 , 1920, it decreed all laws of the Soviet
234 THE F OR M A T I O N O F THE S O VIET U N I O N
Russian government to be in force in Soviet Armenia; 149 no attempt was
made to regain for Armenia the territories occupied by the Turks since
October 1920, and in March 1921 they were formally ceded to Turkey
in the Treaty of Kars; contrary to Articles 5 and 6 of the agreement, the
Dashnaks were arrested and before long ejected from the government.1 5 0
The RSFSR
The first Constitution of Soviet Russia ( 1918), while accepting the
general principle of federalism, had made no provisions for the settle
ment of relations between the federal government and the individual
states. Indeed, as one historian points out, the very word "federation" was
not even mentioned in the body of the Constitution. 5 During 1918, it was
not clear what, if any, difference' in status there was between the
autonomous regions, the autonomous republics, and the Soviet republics,
and all those terms were used interchangeably. Wherever the Communists
came into power they simply proclaimed the laws issued by the govern
ment of the RSFSR valid on their territory and announced the establish
ment of a "uni9n" with the Russian Soviet republic.
The first attempt to put into practice the principles enunciated in the
Constitution was made in the spring of 1918, when the government of
the RSFSR ( or, more precisely, its All-Russian Central Executive Com
mittee) ordered the formation of the Tatar-Bashkir and Turkestan re
publics. As we have seen, these attempts were not successful. The Tatar
Bashkir state never came into being because the Russians evacuated the
Volga-Ural region in the summer of 1918; while Turkestan, cut off from
Moscow by the enemy, had, until the end of the Civil War, no adminis
trative connection with the RSFSR.
It was only in February 1919, with the signing of the Soviet-Bashkir
agreement, that the decentralization of the administrative appar�tus along
national lines began in earnest. Between 1920 and 1923, the government
of the RSFSR established on its territory seventeen autonomous regions
and republics. 0 The autonomous regions ( sometimes called "Toilers'
Communes") had no distinguishing juridical features even in terms of
l(j, They were ( in addition to the Bashkir and Turkestan republics) : the Auton
omous Tatar Socialist Soviet Republic ( May 27, 1920); the Autonomous Chuvash
Region (June 24, 1920); the Karelian Toilers' Commune ( August 6, 1920); the
Autonomous Kirghiz Socialist Soviet Republic (August 26, 1920); the Autonomous
Region of the Mari People ( November 25, 1920); the Autonomous Region of the
Kalmyk People (November 25, 1920); the. Autonomous Region of the Votiak People
(January 5, 1921); the Autonomous Daghestan Socialist Soviet Republic (January
20, 1921); the Autonomous Gorskaia Socialist Soviet Republic (January 20, 1921);
the Autonomous Region of Komi (Zyrians) {August 22, 1921); the Autonomous
Crimean Socialist Soviet Republic ( October 18, 1921); the Autonomous Mongol
Buriat Region (January 9, 1922); the United Karachaev-Cherkess Autonomous Region
(January 12, 1922); the United Kabardino-Balkar Autonomous Region (January 16,
1922); the Autonomous Iakut Socialist Soviet Republic (April 20, 1922); the Auton
omous Region of the Oirat People (June 1, 1922); the Cherkess (Adyghei) Auton
omous Region (July 27, 1922). For this, see D. A. Magerovskii, Soiuz Sovetskikh
Sotsialisticheskikh Respublik [Moscow, 1923], 16n.
24 8 THE FORMATION OF THE SOVIET UNION
Soviet law and were described by one Soviet authority as "national
guberni,i." 6 The autonomous republics, on the other hand, were re
garded as endowed with a certain degree of political competence, al
though what the limits of this competence were posed a question that
troubled the best legal minds of the time. 7
The common feature of . these autonomous units - regions and re
publics alike- was the fact that they came into being by decree of the
All-Russian Central Executive Committee acting alone or in conjunction
with the Council of People's Commissars of the RSFSR. The only excep
tion to this rule was the Bashkir Republic founded, as we saw, in
February 1919, by agreement between the government of the RSFSR
and a group of Bashkir nationalists; but since the 1919 agreement was
unilaterally abrogated fifteen months later with the introduction of the
new Bashkir constitution on the orders of the Russian Soviet government,
this exception cannot be said to have affected the general practice.
The origin of the autonomous states provided additional assurance
that they would not infringe in any manner upon the centralized struc
ture of Soviet political authority. "Autonomy means not separation,"
Stalin told the North Caucasians in 1920, "but a union of the self-ruling
mountain peoples with the peoples of Russia." 8 Indeed, the main stress
in the Communist interpretation of autonomy was on closer ties between
the borderlands and Russia and on the enhancement of the authority
and prestige of the Soviet regime in areas where nationalistic tendencies
were deeply rooted. As Stalin's statement emphasized, autonomy was
considered as an instrument of consolidation, not of decentralization.
As indicated in the sections dealing with the history of the border
lands during the Revolution and Civil War, the government of the
RSFSR retained in the reconquered territories full control over the mili
tary, economic, financial, and foreign affairs of its autonomous states.
These were granted competence only in such spheres of government ac
tivity as education, justice, public health, and social security; and even
in these realms they were subject to the surveillance of the appropriate
commissariats of the RSFSR as well as the local bureaus of the Russian
Communist Party. The governments of the autonomous regions and re
publics, as one Soviet jurist correctly remarked, had more in common,
from the point of view of authority and function, with the prerevolution
ary Russian organs of self-rule, the so-called Provincial zemstva, than
with the governments of genuine federal states.9 There can be little
doubt that the tradition of those institutions, introduced during the Great
Reforms of the 186o's, had much to do with the evolution of Soviet con
cepts of autonomy.
The first attempt to consolidate the state apparatus of all the auton
omous regions and republics was made in the early 192o's by the Com
missariat of Nationality Affairs (Narkomnats or NKN). This commis-
THE ESTABLISHMENT OF THE US SR 24 9
sariat, originally established to serve as an intermediary between the
central Soviet organs and the minorities and to assist the government
in dealing with problems of a purely "national" nature ( which could not
be too numerous, in view of the Communist attitude toward the entire
problem of nationality and nationalism ) , had displayed little activity in
1919 and the first half of 1920. Stalin, its chairman, was absent; its vice
chairmen and higher functionaries·were called in by the Soviet authori
ties to fill various posts in the reconquered borderlands; and the remain
ing borderland areas were largely in the zone of combat or under enemy
occupation. As a result, the commissariat led only a nominal existence,
publishing a weekly newspaper and occasionally engaging in propaganda
activity.
In the spring of 1920 Stalin resumed the active chairmanship of the
Commissariat of Nationality Affairs and began to transform it into a
miniature federal government of the RSFSR. A decree issued on May 10,
1920, instructed all the national minority groups on the territory of the
RSFSR to elect deputies to the Narkomnats. 1 0 This was intended to give
the Commissariat a representative character and, in a sense, was the first
step in the abandonment of the purely executive aspect of the Commis
sariat. On November 6, 1920, the Narkomnats decreed that it would
assume jurisdiction over the agencies of the autonomous regions and re
publics which had been attached to the Central Executive Committee of
the All-Russian Congress of Soviets. 1 1 In December 1920 the government
of the RSFSR decreed that the Narkomnats was to open provincial
branches and attach them to the Central Executive Committees of the
autonomous regions and republics of the RSFSR. 1 2
In April 1921 the executive officers of the N arkomnats, and the chair
men of the delegations from the autonomous regions and republics, were
constituted into a new body, called the Council of Nationalities ( Sovet
NatsionaI'nostei ) .13
While undergoing all those important structural changes, the Com
missariat of Nationality Affairs claimed for itself ever broader and greater
powers. The November 1920 decree stated that no economic and political
measures of the Soviet government applicable to the borderlands could
become law unless approved by the Narkomnats, and that all the political
organizations of the minorities were to deal with the central Soviet gov
ernment only through their agencies at Narkomnats. 14 When, a month
later, the Commissariat established its branch offices in the autonomous
states, it gave them authority to participate in the activities of the Central
Executive Committees of the autonomous regions and republics.1 5 In the
summer of 1922, the Narkomnats claimed that it had the right to super
vise the other commissariats of the Soviet Russian government insofar as
their activities affected the national minorities, that it represented the
autonomous republics in all budgetary matters, and that it alone directed
250 THE F O R M A T I O N O F THE S OVIET U N I O N
the education of the non-Russian party and state cadres. 16 In 1923, the
forthcoming dissolution of the Narkomnats was justified by the fact that
"it had completed its fundamental task of preparing the formation of
the national republics and regions, and uniting them into a union of re
publics." 17
Through such measures the Narkomnats was transformed from one
of the minor ministries of the RSFSR into a federal government of the
autonomous regions and republics of the RSFSR. 1 8 At least, so it was in
theory. In reality, the role of the Narkomnats in the integration of the
Soviet state was considerably smaller than its claims implied. The auton
omous regions and republics had so little self-rule left that their formal
merger in a federal institution had virtually no practical consequences.
It was a measure of primarily bureaucratic significance. In 1924 the
Commissariat was dissolved and its Council of Nationalities became,
through the addition of representatives of the full-fledged Soviet repub
lics, the second chamber of the legislative branch of the government of
the USSR.
tween the RSFSR and the Independent Republics," first revealed in 1956,
has not yet been published in its entirety, but its main points can be
readily reconstructed. The key clause was the first one, calling for the
entrance of the five border republics into the RSFSR on the basis of
autonomy.BB If carried out, this clause would have transformed the
Ukraine, Belorussia, Georgia, Azerbaijan, and Armenia into autonomous
republics of the RSFSR, on a par with the Iakut or the Crimean republics,
and would have swept aside the whole elaborate system of relations es
tablished by the treaties. The second article provided for the organs of
the RSFSR - its Central Executive Committee, Council of People's Com
missars, and Council of Labor and Defence - to assume the functions of
the federal government for all the six republics. The remaining three
articles specified which commissariats were to be taken over by the Rus
sian government, which were to be left to the republics but to function
under the control of the corresponding agencies of the RSFSR, and
which were to be entrusted entirely to the autonomous republics. 89
Stalin completed his project at the end of August and dispatched it to
the Central Committees of the republics for discussion and approval. It is
important to note, however, that even before the republics had reacted,
Stalin, on August 29, 1922, sent a wire to Mdivani announcing the ex
tension of the authority of the Russian government: the Sovnarkom,
VTsIK, and STO ( Sovet Truda i Oborony, or Council of Labor and De
fence ) , over the governments of all the republics.90 The Georgians were
so enraged by this unilateral abrogation of the 192 1 treaty that they dis
patched to Moscow a three-man delegation, which was later joined by
Mdivani. 91
As may be expected, Stalin's draft had no difficulty securing the ap
proval of the Azerbaijani Communist Party, which was under Ordzhoni
kidze's firm control. 92 But no other republican Central Committee ( with
the possible exception of the Armenian ) followed suit. 0 The first vocal
opposition came from the Georgians. On September 15, 1922, the Georgian
Central Committee flatly turned down Stalin's theses, voting unanimously,
with one dissent ( Eliava ) "to consider premature the unification of the
independent republics on the basis of autonomization, proposed by
Comrade Stalin's theses. We regard the unification of economic endeavor
and of general policy indispensable, but with the retention of all the
attributes of independence." 93 Ordzhonikidze, who with Kirov attended
these proceedings, then decided to overrule the Georgians. On the fol
lowing day he convened the Presidium of the Zakraikom, which he
headed, and had it pass a resolution approving Stalin's project. The
Presidium also ordered the Georgian Central Committee, on its personal
0
It cannot be established definitely whether the Armenian Central Committee
approved of Stalin's project. Iakubovskaia ( Stroitel'stvo, 145 and 149 ) says that it
did, but S. Gililov in his Lenin passes over the subject in silence.
272 THE FORMATION OF THE SOVIET UNION
responsibility, not to inform the rank and file of its negative decision and
to carry out faithfully Stalin's instructions. 94
The Belorussians responded ( on September 16) evasively. First, they
asked for territory to be added to their republic; then they stated that as
far as relations with the RSFSR were concerned, they would be satisfied
with the same arrangement as that made by the Ukraine.95 The Ukrai
nians, having procrastinated until October 3, finally passed a resolution
which categorically demanded the preservation of Ukrainian independ
ence and the establishment of relations with the RSFSR on the basis of
principles formulated by Frunze's commission the previous May. 9 6
Stalin's commission reconvened on September 23. It had little to show
by way of republican approval, but the lack of enthusiasm in the border
lands apparently did not much trouble either Stalin or his colleagues.
There was more discussion of the draft, during which some clauses were
criticized and possibly even changed. No one, however, challenged the
fundamental premise of "autonomization." 97 Having secured the approval
of the commission, Stalin forwarded to Lenin the minutes of its meetings,
as well as the favorable resolutions of the Azerbaijani Communist Party
and the Zakraikom. 98
Lenin apparently had not been kept well informed of the commis
sion's work, for the data which Stalin supplied dismayed and angered him.
From Lenin's point of view, the project undid the pseudofederal edifice
which he had so carefully constructed over the past five years. Worst of
all, it threatened to upset the whole fiction of national equality which
Lenin counted on to mollify and neutralize the nationalist sentiments
of the minorities. He saw no practical advantages to be derived from
incorporation of the five independent republics into the RSFSR. Its only
consequence would have been to reveal, with brutal frankness, the de
pendence of all the Communist republics on Russia and to make it very
difficult in the future to win nationalist movements for Bolshevism in
the so-called colonial and semi-colonial areas.
As soon as he had become acquainted with the commission's materials,
Lenin summoned Stalin. He severely criticized his project and exerted
on him strong pressure to modify all those points which formalized the
hegemony of the RSFSR over the other republics. He wished for an
arrangement whereby all the republics, the RSFSR included, constituted a
new federation, with a separate government, called the Union of Soviet
Socialist Republics of Europe and Asia. Stalin yielded to Lenin on this
and agreed to abandon the idea of "autonomization" advocated in the
first article of his project in favor of a federal union of equal states. But
he refused to concede on the second article. Lenin's demand for the
creation of new federal central organs- an All-Union Central Executive
Committee, Sovnarkom, and Council of Labor and Defence- to super
sede those of the RSFSR seemed to him administratively cumbersome
THE ESTABLISHMENT OF THE USSR 2 73
and superfluous. Stalin thought that Lenin's purpose could be achieved as
well by the simpler device of renaming the organs of the RSFSR as all
Union ones. But Lenin disagreed and criticized Stalin for being im
patient and excessively addicted to administrative procedures. On the
conclusion of their interview, both men put down their views in a mem
orandum which they forwarded to Lev Kamenev, then acting chairman of
the Sovnarkom. 99 Stalin's note was surprisingly insolent in tone.
In the end, Stalin had to yield all along the line and, on the basis of
Lenin's criticism, to revise his entire project. The project was discussed
at a meeting of the Plenum on October 6, 1922. Lenin, suffering from a
severe toothache, had to absent himself from this session, but he made
his views unmistakably clear in a note which he sent to his colleagues on
that day: "I declare war on Great Russian chauvinism; a wa! not for
life but for death. As soon as I get rid of that accursed tooth of mine, I
shall devour it with all my healthy ones." 100 He also repeated his in
sistence that Stalin modify article two of his project. The Plenum ac
cepted Lenin's suggestions, and voted in favor of a new draft calling for
the establishment of a Union of Soviet Socialist Republics governed by
a newly created Union Central Executive Committee of representatives
of the republican Central Executive Committees. The Plenum also ap
pointed a commission of eleven members to translate these principles into
a constitutional project. 1 01 0 It may be noted that Mdivani participated as
a guest in these deliberations and, however reluctantly, gave his approval
in the name of the Georgian party, but only after having insisted that the
Georgian republic enter the Union directly, as a full-fledged member. 102
After its approval by the Plenum, the new draft of constitutional prin
ciples was sent to the Central Committees of the non-Russian republics.
In Transcaucasia, the Azerbaijani and Armenian parties gave their ap
proval promptly, but the Georgians once more made difficulties. From
one point of view, the new statement was preferable to the previous one,
which they had so unceremoniously rejected on September 15: the feder
ating republics now entered the Union as formally independent states,
equal to the RSFSR. But the new project also had one very serious draw
back. Whereas Stalin's old project envisaged the three Transcaucasian
republics as entering the RSFSR directly, the new one provided for their
joining the Union through the intermediacy of the Transcaucasian Fed
eration. To the Georgian Communists this provision seemed ludicrous
and insulting. Why, for instance, should Belorussia have the right to
become a full-Hedged member of the Union, and not Georgia? And
what was the point of creating a federation if the proposed Union would'
absorb most of the republican commissariats anyway? A double political
0
The commission consisted of Stalin, Lev Kamenev, Piatakov, A. I. Rykov,
Chicherin, M. I. Kalinin, and rep resentatives of the five non-Russian republics { Bor'ba
za uprochenie, 118).
2 74 THE FORMATION OF THE SOVIET UNION
union- once with the Transcaucasian Federation, and then, through
the Federation, with the Union - simply made no sense to them. The
Georgians, therefore, protested to Moscow, demanding the abandon
ment of the projected federation. 103 To this request Stalin replied on
October 16 in the name of the Central Committee, stating that it was
unanimously rejected. 1 04
Tempers in Georgia now reached the point of explosion. Dissident
Communist leaders held secret meetings at which they complained of the
violation of their rights and criticized the policies of Moscow. 105 They
secured at this time the support of the most distinguished Georgian
Communist, Makharadze, who on October 19 made a speech in Tillis
pleading for Georgia's direct entrance into the Union. 106 Makharadze
was not only the oldest Georgian Bolshevik ( like Zhordania he had be
come a Marxist while attending the university in Warsaw in 1891-92),
but he had a well-earned reputation of being an irreconcilable enemy of
nationalism. Before the Revolution he had opposed Lenin's slogan of
national self-determination from a position which Lenin called "nihilistic";
during the Revolution ( at the . April 1917 Bolshevik Congress) he had
led the faction which demanded the removal of that slogan from the
party's program; and in 1921-222, despite some misgivings, he had col
laborated with Ordzhonikidze's centralistic measures. That a Communist
of such background should have joined the opposition provides evidence
of the near unanimity which existed in Georgia at this time.
On October 20, the three members of the Georgian delegation returned
from the mission to Moscow on which they had been dispatched at the
end of Augu�t and reported to the Central Committee. Having heard
them, the Committee voted ( twelve to three) to appeal to Moscow once
more for reconsideration. Accepting now as binding the dycision to
establish a Transcaucasian federation, it nevertheless requested the aboli
tion of the Union Council and Georgia's direct entrance into the Union,
on the same terms as the Ukraine. 107 Simultaneously, Makharadze and
Tsintsadze sent strong personal letters to Kamenev and Bukharin com
plaining about Ordzhonikidze. 1 0 8
Lenin by this time had had his fill of the Georgians. He interpreted
their actions as a breach of party discipline as well as a failure to adhere
to a decision taken with the concurrence of their representative. On
October 21 he dispatched to Tiflis a sharply worded wire in which he
rejected their request and stated that he was turning the whole matter
over to the Secretariat, that is, to Stalin. 109 Kamenev and Bukharin sent
separate wires to Makharadze and Mdivani accusing them of nationalism
and insisting that they coaperate in the establishment of the federation. 11 0
Upon receipt of these dispatches the Central Committee of the Georgian
Communist Party on October 22 took the unprecedented step of tender
ing the Central Committee of the Russian Communist Party its resigna-
THE ESTABLISHMENT OF THE USSR 275
tion. 1 1 1 The resignation was accepted, and a new Georgian Central Com
mittee was promptly appointed by the Zakraikom. It consisted mostly of
young converts to Communism who lacked both experience and reputa
tion, and whom Mdivani contemptuously dismissed as "Komsomoltsy." 1 1 2
With their support, Ordzhonikidze had no difficulty · securing full co
ope!ation and approval of the new constitutional project. 1 1 3
The Georgian affair delayed by several weeks the drafting of the
Union agreement. The constitutional committee reassembled again only
on November 21, without having accomplished anything in the interval.
It now appointed a subcommittee, chaired by the Commissar of Foreign
Affairs, G. V. Chicherin, to prepare the draft of a constitution. 1 1 4 Chi
cherin had his draft ready within a week's time. 1 1 5 It was at once ap
proved by the. constitutional committee and by the Central Committee
(Lenin included) and, in the course of December, by the Congresses of
Soviets of the four federating republics ( Transcaucasia being treated
now as a single federal republic). 11 6 On December 29, 1922, representa
tives of the republics attended a conference in the Kremlin at which
Stalin read the articles of the Union. After some protests, most likely from
some Georgians, the majority of those present voted in favor of the act. 1 1 7
Next day a joint session of the Tenth Congress of Soviets of the RSFSR
and the deputies of the congresses of soviets of the Ukraine, Belorussia,
and Transcaucasia took place in Moscow's Bolshoi Theatre. This joint
session called itself the First Congress of Soviets of the Union of Soviet
Socialist Republics. 1 1 8 Its main order of business was to ratify the agree
ment establishing the Soviet Union- a task which it was con�dently ex
pected to fulfill, since 95 per cent of all the deputies were members of
the Communist Party and as such were required by party discipline to
vote for resolutions passed by the Central Committee. 119 The Congress did
not disappoint those expectations.
The agreement stipulated that the supreme legislative organ of the
new state was the Congress of Soviets of the USSR and that during in
tervals between its sessions, the role passed to _the Central Executive
Committee of the Congress of Soviets. The sessions of the Congress of
Soviets were to be held by rotation in the capitals of each of the four
republics. The highest executive organ of the Union was to be the Coun
cil of People's Commissars of the USSR ( Sovnarkom Soiuza), elected
by the Central Executive Committee and composed of the following
officials: a chairman, a deputy chairman; the Commissars of Foreign Af
fairs, War and Navy, Foreign Trade, Means ,of Communications, Post and
Telegraphs, Workers' and Peasants' Inspection, Labor, Supply, Finance;
the Chairman of the Higher Council of National Economy; and in an
advisory capacity, the head of the Secret Police ( OGPU ) . The Union
republics were to have their own councils of people's commissars com
posed of the Commissars for Agriculture, Supply, Finance, Labor, In-
276 THE FORMATION OF THE SOVIET UNION
terior, Justice, Workers' and Peasants' Inspection, Education, Health,
Social Security; the Chairman of the Higher Council of National Econ
omy; and as consultants, representatives of the federal commissariats.
The Commissariats of Supply, Finance, Labor, Workers' and Peasants'
Inspection, and the· Higher Council of National Economy of each of the
republican governments were to be directly subordinated to the cor
responding agencies of the federal government. The agreement thus dis
tinguished three types of commissariats : federal, republican, and joint.
Strictly within the competence of the republican governments were only
the Commissariats of Agriculture, Interior, Justice, Education, Health,
and Social Security. The final article of the agreement guaranteed every
republic the right of secession from the Union, despite the fact that,
according to the preceding article, only the federal government could
effect changes in the Union Agreement- such as, presumably, matters
of entering and leaving the Union. 120
The Presidium of the Central Executive Committee, appointed by the
First Congress of Soviets of the USSR, formed on January 10, 1923,
six separate commissions to prepare the draft of a constitution based on
the articles of the Union Agreement. 1 2 1
Lenin's Change of Mind
The Georgian opposition, whose history since early 1921 we have
traced, was of importance not only for its role in shaping the constitution,
but also for its impact on Lenin's attitude toward the nationality question.
It provided overwhelming evidence against the basic premise of Lenin's
nationality policy : that nationalism was a transitional, historical phe
nomenon associated with the era of capitalism and bound to dissolve in
the heat of intense class struggle. Lenin observed with obvious dismay a
new kind of nationalism emerging in the Russian as well as in the
minority Communist apparatus- that very apparatus on which he de
pended to eradicate national animosities. As this evidence accumulated
in the winter of 1922-23, Lenin went through a reappraisal of Soviet
nationality policy which bore all the marks of a true intellectual crisis. It
is likely that had he not suffered a nearly fatal stroke in March 1923 the
final structure of the Soviet Union would have been quite different from
that which Stalin ultimately gave it.
To understand Lenin's change of mind one must bear in mind the
effect which both internal and external events since 1917 had had on his
nationality policy. Self-determination interpreted as the right to secession
was in fact a dead letter. So was federalism, since the military and
economic exigencies of the Soviet state, requiring the merger of the
conquered borderlands with the RSFSR, had vitiated the very essence
of the federal system which Lenin had been forced to adopt as a sub
stitute for self-determination. The minorities were thus left without any
THE ESTABLISHMENT OF T HE USSR 277
effective guarantees against the encroachments of the central authorities;,
and yet they needed these more than ever in view of the unlimited
authority enjoyed by the Communist party over the citizenry. In the
end, Lenin's national program reduced itself to a matter of personal be
havior: it depended for the solution of the complex problems of a multina
tional empire upon the tact and good will of Communist officials. To
Lenin such a solution seemed perfectly feasible, in part because he him
self was a stranger to national prejudices, and in part because he be
lieved that the establishment of Communism destroyed the soil in which
nationalism could flourish.
In fact, however, Lenin's expectations were quite unfounded. Like
every staunch realist, he mistook that segment of reality of which he
happ ened to be aware for reality as a whole, and in the end displayed no
little na1vete. Nationalism may well have been rooted in psychology, in
the memory of wrongs done or in sensitivity to slights; but surely it was
more than that. It reflected also specific interests and striving that could
not be satisfied merely by tact but required real political and other con
cessions. Nor could the groups on which Lenin counted to carry out what
was left of his nationality program display that reasonableness this pro
gram demanded. Before as well as after 1917 even the closest of his fol
lowers had rejected his concessions to the nationalities as impractical and
incompatible with the Bolshevik ideology. If the Soviet Constitution of
1918 and the Communist program of 1919 had included his formulae call
ing for a federation based on the national principle and the retention of
the slogan of national self-determination ( although in a highly qualified
form), it was only because of Lenin's tremendous prestige with the Party.
The majority of the Bolshevik leaders remained unconvinced, and the
numerous new rank and file who had joined the Communists since the
Revolution ( in 1922 they constituted 97.3 per cent of the active party
membership) 122 were even less prepared to assimilate the subtle reason
ing which lay behind his national program. To the overwhelming majority
of Communists and Communist sympathizers, the goals of the movement
- the "dictatorship of the proletariat," the "unity of the anticapitalist
front," or the "destruction of counterrevolutionary forces" - were syn
onymous with the establishment of Great Russian hegemony. The Soviet
Russian republic alone'-had the industrial and military might necessary
to accomplish these ends. After the failure of the Communist revolutions
in Central Europe, it became the arsenal and fortress of world Com
munism. The Communist movements in the Russian borderlands had
proved themselves weak and incapable of survival without the military
assistance of Soviet Russia. The bulk of the membership of the Com
munist Party came from the urban and industrial centers of the country
and hence was predominantly Russian ethnically and culturally. In 1922,
72 per cent of all the members of the Communist Party ( including its
278 THE F O R M A T I O N O F THE S O VIET U N I O N
N AT I O N A L O R I G I N O F COM M U N 1 S T PA RTY M E M B E R S, 1 9 2 2
Per 1000 of popu
lation of given
nationality within
Absolute Per cent the borders of the
Nationality number of RKP Soviet state
Statistics, based on the 1922 Party Census, from I. P. Trainin, SSSR i natsional'naia
problema ( Moscow, 1924 ), 26.
Lenin's analysis of the Geo:i;gian incident suffered from all the limita
tions imposed upon him by the Communist dogma. He was unable to
perceive that the failures of the Soviet national policy were due to a
fundamental misinterpretation of the entire national problem and fol
lowed naturally fr.om the dictatorial system of government which he had
established. His mind operated only in terms of class-enemies. Seeking
scapegoats, he ):>lamed all national friction on the "bourgeois" elements
in the state apparatus, disregarding the fact that in the Georgian crisis
the guilty ones, by his own admission, were top members of the Com
muni.st Party. His remedies consisted only of reversion to party control
of th'e political apparatus, linguistic measures, and the introduction of
"codes ·of behavior" for Communist officials working in the borderlands -
methods which had proved themselves unequal to the task in the previous
years of Soviet rule. Nothing illustrated better the confusion which by
now pervaded his thoughts on the subject than his contradictory recom
mendation that the union of republics be both "retained and strength
ened" and in effect weakened by restoring to the republics full inde
pend�nce in all but military and diplomatic affairs. 142
Lenin, hoping to recover from his illness, kept the memorandum to
himself, with the intention of b,asing on it a major policy statement at
the forthcoming Twelfth Party Congress. In the meantime he busily
gathered evidence against Stalin and Ordzhonikidze. He probably did
;not realize, however, how quicklY, power was slipping from his hands.
When on January 27, 1923, Dzerzhinskii had returned from his second
Caucasian mission and Lenin, through his secretary, demanded to see the
materials he had brought back, Dzerzhinskii replied that he had turned
all materials over to Stalin. A search for Stalin revealed that he was out
of town and unreachable. Upon his return two days later, Stalin flatly
refused to surrender the materials and did so only when Lenin threatened
to put up a fight for them. 1 43 There can be little doubt that, although
Stalin pretended to be concerned with Lenin's health, in fact he was
personally interested in keeping Lenin as much as possible out of the
Georgian feud.
Lenin by now could rely only on a few devoted women from his
private secretariat. He turned over to them all the materials brought back
by Dzerzhinskii and prepared a questionnaire which they were to use
in analyzing them. The questionnaire contained the following seven
questions: What was the deviation with which the Georgian Central
Committee was charged? In what respect did it violate party discipline?
288 THE F O R M A T I O N O F THE S O VIE T UNIO N
In what ways was it oppressed by the Zakraikom? What instances were
there of physical violence used against the Georgians? What was the
policy of the Central Committee of the RKP when Lenin was present
compared to that when he was absent? Did Dzerzhinskii on his second
trip also investigate the charges against Ordzhonikidze? What was the
present situation in Georgia? 144 While the secretaries were busy at work
preparing the report, Lenin constantly inquired ab9ut their progress.
According to the diary of his personal secretary, in "February 1923 the
Georgian question was then uppermost in his mind. 1 4 5
In the meantime, the formation of the Soviet Union was forging ahead.
In February 1923 the Plenum of the Central Committee (from which
Lenin was also absent) decided to add a second chamber to the Union
legislature to represent the national groups. Originally, the Communists
had been hostile to the idea of a bicameral legislature, considering it a
feature of a "class society" and unnecessary in the "proletarian" state. In
November 1922 Stalin had stated that, although some Communists were
advocating the creation of a second, upper chamber to provide represen
tation for the nationalities as such, he felt that this view "will undoubt
edly find no sympathy in the national republics, if only because the
two-chamber system, with the existence of an upper chamber, is not com
patible with the Soviet government, at any rate, at the present stage of
its development." 1 4 6 By February, however, Stalin changed his mind in
favor of a bicameral legislature, largely, in all likelihood, because it
enabled him to increase his personal control over the Soviet legislature.
The Council of Nationalities ( Sovet natsional'nostei ) , which was approved
by the party and incorporated into the Constitution, was the same Coun
cil of Nationalities that Stalin had formed as part of the Commissariat
of Nationality Affairs in April 1921, with the addition of deputies from
the three Union republics. The second chamber was, therefore, staffed
with people who had Stalin's personal approval. 147 0
Lenin finally received the report on March 3. It must have infuriated
him, because he now switched his support completely to the side of the
Georgian opposition. His first impulse was to form a new and impartial
investigating commission; 148 the second, to entrust the handling of the
whole Georgian affair to Trotsky. On March 5, he addressed to Trotsky
the following letter: 1 4 9
Respected Comrade Trotsky! I would very much like to ask you
to take upon yourself the defence of the Georgian case in the Central
Committee of the Party. The matter is now being "prosecuted" by
Stalin and Dzerzhinskii, on whose objectivity I cannot rely. Quite on
<11 It must be noted, however, that the idea of a bicameral legislature was at this
time also much advocated by Rakovskii as a means of reducing the preponderance
in the government of Great Russians. See his Soiuz Sotsialisticheskikh Sovetskikh
Respublik - Novyi etap v Sovetskom soiuznom stroitel'stve (Kharkov, 1923 ) , 4-6.
THE ESTABLISHMENT OF THE USSR 289
the contrary. If you agree to assume responsibility for the defence,
I shall be at ease. If for some reason you do not agree to do so, please
return the materials to me. I shall consider this a sign of your refusal.
With best comradely greetings,
Lenin ft
With this letter, Lenin forwarded to Trotsky his memorandum on the
nationality question. 15 0
The following day Lenin sent a brief but significant message to the
leaders of the Georgian opposition : 1 5 1
To Comrades Mdivani, Makharadze, and others : copies to Com
rades Trotsky and Kamenev. Respected Comrades! I follow your case
with all my heart. I am appalled by the coarseness of Ordzhonikidze,
and the connivances of Stalin and Dzerzhinskii. I am preparing for
you notes and a speech.
Respectfully,
Lenin
Simultaneously, Lenin dispatched to Georgia a new investigating com
mission, consisting of Kamenev and Kuibyshev.
Decidedly, events were taking a dangerous course for Stalin and
Ordzhonikidze. They were saved from a public chastisement by Lenin
by sheer good fortune. On the day when he had dictated his letter to
Mdivani and Makharadze, Lenin suffered his third stroke, which para
lyzed him completely and removed him for good from all political
activity. f
is in the first place and above all in the central, industrial regions,
and not in the borderlands, which represent peasant countries. If we
should lean too far in the direction of the peasant borderlands at the
expense of the proletarian region, then a crack may develop in the
system of proletarian dictatorship . This, comrades, is dangerous. In
politics it is not good to stretch too far, just as it is not good to stretch
too little. 15 6
Next, Stalin proceeded to quote from Lenin's previously published works
to the effect that the class principle had priority over the national one,
and that the Communists from the minority areas were obliged to strive
for a close union with the Communists of the nation which had oppressed
them. It did not take great subtlety to realize that "the proletarian region,"
whose hegemony Stalin advocated, meant Russia, and that his references
to Lenin's works were inspired by a desire to offset the damage which
Lenin's memorandum had done to Stalin's prestige, by indicating the in
consistencies inherent in Lenin's national theory. To Lenin's statement
that "it is better to stretch too far in the direction of complaisance and
softness toward the national minorities, than too little," Stalin replied that
it was not advisable to stretch too far, either. (1'
The case for the opposition was hopeless. Not only was the Congress
packed with Stalinists, 157 but the opposition was also severely handi
capped in its choice of arguments. The basic Communist assumptions
worked to the advantage of Stalin. The unity, centralization, and om
nipotence of the Communist Party, the hegemony of the industrial
proletariat over the peasantry, the subordination of the national principle
to the class principle - all those Communist doctrines which were in
fact responsible for the plight of the minorities - were axiomatic and
beyond dispute. By challenging them, the opposition would have placed
itself outside the party. The opposition, therefore, had to limit itself to
criticism of the practical execution of the Communist national program.
One speaker after another of the opposition pointed out the injustices
and failures of the Communist regime in the borderlands : the discrimina
tion against non-Russians in the Red Army ( "The army still remains a
weapon of Russification of the Ukrainian population and of all the minor
ity peoples," Skrypnik stated ) , 158 in schools, and in the treatment of the
natives by officials. But such charges, damning as they were, did not
affect the fundamental premises of Stalin's case and were easily brushed
aside as exaggerations or minor infractions.
1/
The only attempt to analyze the deeper causes of the crisis in the
national policy was made by Rakovskii, who rested his argument on
Lenin's thesis of the defective apparatus :
0
Both Lenin and Stalin used in the juxtaposed phrases the Russian colloquialisms
"peresolit' " and "nedosolit'," here translated as "stretch too far" and "too little." The
allusion thus is obvious.
292 THE FORMATION OF THE SOVIET UNION
Comrades, this [national question] is one of those questions which
is pregnant with very serious complications for Soviet Russia and the
Party. This is one of those questions which - this must be said openly
and honestly at a Party Congress - threaten civil war, if we fail to
show the necessary sensitivity, the necessary understanding with re
gard to it. It is the question of the bond of the revolutionary Russian
proletariat with the sixty million non-Russian peasants, who under
the national banner raise their demands for a share in the economic
and political life of the Soviet Union. 1 59
Stalin, Rakovskii continued, was oversimplifying the danger of Great
Russian nationalism in the party and state apparatus when he called it,
in the course of his report, a mere by-product of the New Economic
Policy. The real cause of the crisis lay deeper: " [It is ] the fundamental
divergence which occurs from day to day and becomes ever greater and
greater: [ the divergence] between our Party, our program on the one
hand, and our political apparatus on the other." The state apparatus was,
as Lenin said in his memorandum, an aristocratic and bourgeois remnant,
"anointed with the Communist chrism." Rakovskii cited a number of
instances of the organs of the RSFSR having issued decrees and laws
for the other three Soviet republics even before the Union had been
formally ratified and the authority of the federal government constitu
tionally ascertained, and he charged that since December 1922 the
Union commissariats had actually governed the entire country, leaving
the republics no self-rule whatsoever. To implement Stalin's suggestions
on the means for combating the mounting wave of Russian nationalism,
Rakovskii concluded, it was necessary to strip the government of the
Union of Soviet Socialist Republics of nine tenths of its commissariats. 160
How weak the opposition really was became painfully evident when
Rakovskii placed before the Congress formal resolutions to reduce the
preponderance of the Russian republic in the Union government. He had
occupied himself much during the previous several months with con
stitutional questions and even had drafted a constitutional project which
vested much more authority in the republics than did the one formulated
in Moscow. 1 61 That Rakovskii should hav.e become a defender of states'
rights seemed rather strange in view of his whole record as a "nihilist"
on the nationality question. But he was a close and loyal friend of
Trotsky and, armed with Lenin's memorandum, he must have felt on
solid ground. He now pointed out that, under the existing system, the
RSFSR had three times as many representatives in the Soviet of Nation
alities as the remaining three republics put together, and suggested a
constitutional arrangement which would prevent any one republic from
having more than two fifths of the total representation. Stalin, however,
brushed aside this motion as "administrative fetishism." It was subse
quently voted down. 1 62 The inability of the opposition to secure ac-
'fHE E S T A B L I S H M E N T O F THE U.SSR 293
ceptance of even such a watered down version of Rakovskii's project ( his
original idea of granting the republics nine tenths of the commissariats
which the articles of Union had given the federal government was
whittled down in committee during the discussion of the constitutional
question) indicated the extent to which Stalin and the central party ap
paratus had gained mastery of the situation.
The Twelfth Congress thus rejected all the suggestions which Lenin
had made in his article in the hope of healing the breach in the party
caused by the national question : it refused to diminish the centralization
of the state apparatus of the USSR by granting the republics more organs
of self-rule; it vindicated Stalin and Ordzhonikidze; and most important of
all, it turned down, through Stalin, the fundamental principle of Lenin's
approach, namely the necessity of having the Russians place themselves
in a morally defensive position in regard to the minorities. The Twelfth
Congress, the last at which the national question was discussed in an
atmosphere of relatively free expression, ended in the complete triumph
of Stalin. The issue of self-rule versus centralism on the administrative
level was decided in favor of the latter. Henceforth nothing could prevent
the process of amalgamation of the state apparatus from being brought
to its conclusion- the more so, since Lenin, the only person capable
of altering its course, was entirely eliminated from active participation in
politics.
On July 6, 1923, the Central Executive Committee of the USSR
formally approved the Constitution of the USSR, and on January 31, 1924
- ten days after Lenin's death- the Second All-Union Congress of
. • Soviets ratified it. °' The process of formation of the Soviet Union was
thus brought to an end.
0
Genkina, Obrazovanie SSSR, 122-62, and Iakubovskaia, Stroitel'stvo, 217-24,
233-71, describe in detail the steps leading to the ratification of the 1923 Constitu
tion, and analyze the differences between the Constitution and the 1922 agreement
establishing the Union.
CONCLUSION
1917
March 12-15: Russian Revolution; estabHshment of Provisional Government;
abolition of all legal disabilities of national minorities. 17: Formatioa of
the Ukrainian Central Rada in Kiev.
April Various Moslem congresses held throughout the Empire.
May 14: Opening of the First All-Russian Moslem Congress in Moscow.
June 23: The Ukrainian Central Rada issues its First Universal.
August 17: The Instruction of the Provisional Government to the Ukrainian
Central Rada.
November 7: Bolshevik coup in Petrograd. 8-12: Bolshevik-Rada coup in Kiev.
7-14: Bolshevik-Left SR coup in Tashkent. 24: Establishment of the
Transcaucasian Commissariat.
December 6: Finland proclaims its independence. 11: Lithuania proclaims its
independence; opening of the Regional Moslem Congress in Kokand,
17: Communist ultimatum to the Ukrainian Central Rada. 19:· Opening
of the First All-Ukrainian Congress of Soviets in Kiev. 27: Opening of
the Belorussian National Congress in Minsk. 30: First Soviet Govern
ment of the Ukraine formed in Kharkov.
1918
January 12: Latvia proclaims its independence. 18: Beginning of the Red
Anny offensive against Kiev. 22: Fourth Universal of the Ukrainian
Central Rada proclaiming Ukrainian independence.
February 8: Red Army takes Kiev. 11: Beginning of Moslem-Communist conflict
in Kokand. 24: Estonia proclaims its independence.
March 3: German armies march into Kiev.
April 1: Bolshevik-Dashnak coup in Baku. 22: The Transcaucasian Federative
Republic proclaims its independence. 29: Germans disband the Ukrain
ian Central Rada.
May 26: Georgia proclaims its independence. 28: Azerbaijan and Armenia
proclaim their independence.
July 10: Ratification of the first Constitution of the RSFSR by the Fifth
All-Russian Congress of Soviets.
August 5: Beginning of the abortive Communist uprising in the Ukraine.
September 15: Turkish armies capture Baku.
November 11: End of World War I. 30: Establishment in Moscow of the Council
of Workers' and Peasants' Defense.
December 14: Troops of the Directory march into Kiev.
1919
January Armed conflict between Red Army and Directory.
February 6: Red Army captures Kiev.
March 18-23: Eighth Congress of RKP(b) and adoption of new party program.
CHRONOLOGY 2 99
October 2: Dissolution of the Central Committee of the KP(b)U. 14: Denikin
occupies Orel; high point of his advance on Moscow. 20: Red Army
retakes Orel.
1920
February 20: Red Army captures Khiva.
April 8: Creation of Caucasian Bureau of RKP ( b) ( Kavbiuro). 25: Outbreak
of Soviet-Polish war. 27: Communists invade Azerbaijan and seize Baku.
May 6: Polish armies enter Kiev. 7: Signing of Soviet-Georgian Treaty. 22:
New edict on Bashkir autonomy and outbreak of Bashkir rebellion. 25:
Outbreak of Azerbaijani rebellion in Gandzha.
August Outbreak of rebellion in Daghestan.
September 2: Red Anny captures Bukhara. 30: Treaty with Soviet Azerbaijan.
November 29: Communist ultimatum to Armenia, followed by Turkish-Soviet parti
tion of that country.
1921
February 11: Beginning of Red Anny operations against the Georgian Republic.
16: Outbreak of rebellion in Soviet Armenia. 25: Red Anny captures
Tiflis.
November Enver Pasha deserts Communists and joins Basmachis.
1922
March 12: Formation of first Soviet Transcaucasian federation (FSSSRZ).
August 4: Death of Enver Pasha. 10: Central Committee appoints committee to
formulate principles of union; Stalin's "autonomization" project.
September 27: Lenin intervenes and forces Stalin to abandon "autonomization."
October 6: Plenum of Central Committee approves revised draft of principles
establishing the Union. 22: Resignation of the Central Committee of the
Communist Party of Georgia.
November 21: G. V. Chicherin heads subcommittee drafting Union constitution.
December 30: First Congress of Soviets of the USSR meets in the Kremlin. 30-31:
Lenin writes memorandum on the national question.
1923
January 21: Death of Lenin. 31: Ratification of the Constitution of the USSR
by the Second All-Union Congress of Soviets.
ETHNIC DISTRIBUTION OF THE POPULATION OF THE RUSSIAN EMPIRE
AND THE SOVIET UNION ACCORDING TO THE CENSUSES OF 1897 AND
1926 ( in round figures)
1897 1926
Total within
1897 borders Total within
of Russian 1926 borders
Empire of USSR
Nationality or language (by (by By By
group language) language) nationality language
(continued)
ETHNIC DISTRIBUTION OF POPULATION 301
1897 1926
Total within
1897 borders Total within
of Russian 1926 borders
Empire of USSR
Nationality or language ( l:iy ( by By By
group language) language) nationality language
r r g r r h r r h
r r g r r g
,n; p; d .zi: p; d ,n; p; d
E e e E e e E e e
6 e ie
E e e E 0 io
m m zh m at zh Jit m zh
3 8 z 3 8 z 3 8 z
H II i H II y
I i i I i i I i i
I i i
n ii i rr ii. i n ii i
It It k K It k It K k
JI JI I .1I ,'I I .JI JI I
M 11[ m l\1 AI m 1\1 M m
II n n II II n II Il n
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
II n p II II p II n p
p p r p p r p p r
C C s C C s C C s
T T t T T t T T t
y y u y y u y y u
y y u
<I> qi f q> (p f qi Ip f
X X kh X X kh X X kh
u n; ts u n; ts u n; ts
q 'l ch q 'l ch q 'l ch
III III sh III III sh III III sh
THE SYSTEM OF TRANSLITERATION 3o3
m lit sheh m lit sheh
'I, ... "
LI H y LI :LI y
L :r. , L :r. I, :r.
ii i e
a 8 e a 8 e
IO IO iu IO IO iu IO IO iu
8. .a: ia 8. .a: ia 8. a ia
BIBLIOGRAPHY
For the abbreviations used in the Bibliography see the list facing
the first page of Chapter 1. To enhance the usefulness of the
Bibliography, the institution where each item can be located is
indicated in abbreviated form. The absence of a symbol following
the place and date of publication signifies that the source can be
found in the Harvard College Library. A book listed as located
in a given library, may, of course, in many instances be found in
other libraries as well. Periodical publications may be located
through the Union List of Serials.
THE NATIONAL PROBLEM IN RUSSIA
I, GENERAL INFORMATION
IV, SOCIALISM AND THE NATIONAL PROBLEM IN WESTERN AND CENTRAL EUROPE
a. General
S. F. Bloom, The World of Nations-A Study of the National Implications of the
Work of Karl Man (New York. 1941),
BIBLIOGRAPHY
H. Cunow, ..Marx und das Selbstbestimmungsrecht der Nationen," NZ, XXXVI, pt.
1 (1917-18), 577-84; 607-17.
--- Die Marxsche Geschichts- Gesellschafts- und Staatstheorie, II (Berlin, 19z3).
'.f. G. Masaryk, Die philosophischen_ und soziologischen Grundlagen des Marxismus
(Vienna, 1899);-chapferviii, "Nationalitaet und lntemationalitaet."
b. The Second International and Some of Its Leaders
Some idea about the national theories of the leaders of the Second International
may be gained from the results of a questionnaire sent out by La Vie Socialiste and
published in nos. 15-19 (5 June-zo August 1905), which contain replies from
seventeen leading European and American socialists. The stenographic reports of
the Stuttgart Congress, Internationaler Sozialisten-Kongress (Stuttgart, 1907), are
also informative. See also:
M. Anim, "Das Nationalitaetsprinzip in der sozialistischen Internationale," Sozial
istische Monatshefte (Berlin), II (1910), 885-90.
J. Lenz, Die II Internationale und 1hr Erbe, 1889-1929 (Hamburg, n.d.).
K. Kautsky, one of the chief theoreticians of the Second International wrote much
and influenced socialist thinking in Austria and Russia. See:
K. Kautsky, "Die moderne Nationalitaet," NZ, V ( 1887), 392-405; 442-51.
--- Das Erfurter Programm (Stuttgart, 1892).
--- "Finis Poloniae?" NZ, XIV, pt. 2 ( 1895-96), 484-91.
--- "Der Kampf der Nationalitaeten und das Staatsrecht in Oesterreich," NZ,
XVI, pt. 1 (1897-98), 516-24; 557-64; 723-26.
--- "Die Krisis in Oesterreich," NZ, XXII, pt. 1 ( 1903-04), 39-46; 72-79.
--- Patriotismus und Sozialdemokratie (Leipzig, 1907).
--- "Nationalitaet und Internationalitaet," NZ, Ergaenzungsheft No. 1 (Stuttgart,
1908). Kautsky's main work on the subject.
--- Nationalstaat, Imperialistischer Staat und Staatenbund (Nuernberg, 1915).
--- "Zwei Schriften zum umlernen," NZ, XXXIII, pt. 2 ( 1915), 71-81.
--- "Nochmals unsere Illusionen," NZ, XXXIII, pt. 2 (1915), 230-41.
--- "Noch einige Bemerkungen ueber nationale Triebkraefte," NZ, XXXIV, pt. z
(1916), 705-13.
Bernstein's ideas can be found scattered through the following works:
E. Bernstein, Die Voraussetzungen des Sozialismus und die Aufgaben der Sozialdemo
kratie (Stuttgart, 1899).
--- Zur Gesc}iichte und Theorie des Sozialismus (Berlin-Bern, 1901).
--- "Vom geschichtlichen Recht der Kleinen," NZ, XXXIII, pt. 2 ( 1915), 753-
59.
--- Sozialdemokratische Voelkerpolitik (Leipzig, 1917).
Of interest also are the following essays:
H. Cunow, "Illusionen-Kultus," NZ, XXXIII, pt. 2 (1915), 172-81,
L. H. Hartmann, "Die Nationalitaetenfrage und die Sozialdemokratie," Die Neue
Gesellschaft ( 1907), 263-72.
H. Heller, Sozialismus und Nation (Berlin, 19z5).
L. Martin, "Die Nationalisierung der Deutschen Sozialdemokratie," Gegenwart, II,
no. 37 ( 1907).
M. Schippel, "Nationalitaets- und sonstiger Revisionismus," Sozialistische Monatshefte,
II (1907), 712-19.
J. Strasser, Der Arbeiter und die Nation (Reichenberg, 1912; DLC). Strasser influ
enced Lenin.
For the "Austrian theory" the most important works are: Otto Bauer, Die
Nationalitaetenfrage und die Sozialdemokratle, in Marx-Studien, II (Vienna, 1907);
THE NATIONAL PROBLEM IN R U S S I A 309
Karl Renner, D as Selbstbestimmungsrecht der Nationen; Erster Teil: Nation und
Staat (Leipzig-Vienna, 1918). Bauer's work is particularly to be recommended.
F. Austerlitz, "Die Nationalen Triebkraefte," NZ, XXXIV, pt. 1 ( 1915-16), 641-48.
0. Bauer, "Bemerkungen zur Nationalitaetenfrage," NZ, XXVI, pt. 1 (1908), 800-
802.
--- "Die Bedingungen der nationalen Assimilation," Der Kampf, V, no. 6 (March
1912), 246-63. A brief restatement of his views.
A. Kogan, "Socialism in the Multi-National State" (Ph.D. dissertation, Harvard
University, 1946).
Verhandlungen des Gesamtparteitages der Sozialdemokratie in Oesterreich (Bruenn )
(Vienna, 1899),
V. RUSSIAN. POLITICAL PARTIBS AND THE NATIONAL QUESTION
The material concerning the national programs and theories of Russian political
parties is mainly of a primary nature.
a. The Right-Wing Parties
G. lurskii, Pravye v Tret'ei Gosudarstvennoi Dume (Kharkov, 1912).
Natsionalisty v Tret'ei Gosudarstvennoi Dume (St. Petersburg, 1912).
b. The Kadets
P. D. Dolgorukov, Natsional'naia politika i Partiia Narodnoi Svobody (Rostov on
Don, 1919; CSt-H).
F. F. Kokoshkin, Avtonomiia i federatsiia (Petrograd, 1917; NN).
NN).
Partiia 'Narodnoi Svobody,' Progrnmma (Moscow, n.d.; NN).
Programma Partii Narodnoi Svobody (K-D) priniataia na s"ezde v Petrograde 28
Marta 1917 goda (Odessa, 1917; NN).
Zakonodatel'nyia proekty i predpolozheniia Partii Narodnoi Svobody, 1905-1907 gg.
( St. Petersburg, 1907; NN).
c. The Socialist Revolutionary Party
M. Borisov, "Sotsializm i problema natsional'noi avtonomii," SR, No. 2 ( 1910), 227-
64.
N. V. Briullova-Shaskol'skaia, Partiia Sotsialistov-Revoliutsionerov i natsional'nyi
vopros (Petrograd, 1917; CSt-H).
V. Chernov, "Edinoobrazie ili shablon?" SR, no. 3 ( 1911 ), 147-60.
Le Parti Socialiste-Revolutionaire et le probleme des nationalites en Russie ( [Paris,
1919]; CSt-H).
Protokoly pervago s"ezda Partii Sotsialistov-Revoliutsionerov (n.p., 1906; NN).
Protokoly tret'iego s"ezda Partii Sotsialistov-Revoliutsionerov (Petrograd, 1917; NN).
Protokoly konferentsii rossiiskikh natsional'no-sotsialisticheskikh partii ( St. Peters-
burg, 1908; NN).
A. Savin, "Natsional'nyi vopros i partiia S-R," SR, no. 3 ( 1911 ), 95-146.
Stat'i po natsional'nomu voprosu (Warsaw, 1921; NNC) - B. Savinkov and others.
a. Lenin
Lenin's works on the national question are too numerous to be mentioned indi
vidually. The principal essays can be found assembled in V. I. Lenin, Sobranie
sochinenii ( 1st ed.; Moscow, 1922-27), XIX, and V. I. Lenin, Izbrannye stat'i po
natsional'nomu voprosu (Moscow-Leningrad, 1925). Some key sentences from Lenin's
writings are selected in P. I. Stuchka, Leninizm i natsional'nyi vopros (Moscow,
1926). The most complete and best annotated edition of Lenin's works is the
third. V. I. Lenin, Sochineniia (30 vols.; Moscow, 1935), which is arranged chrono
logically, rather than topically. The last volume contains a subject index. Very
useful too are Lenin's notes and drafts (many of them not included in the third
edition of the Sochineniia ) found in Leninskii sbornik, especially vol. III ( 1925),
455-87; XVII (1931), 207-318; and XXX (1937).
Among secondary works on Lenin's national theory, many of which are listed
in the numbers of Leniniana ( Moscow, 1926£E.) are :
D. Baevskii, "Bol'sheviki v bor'be za III Internatsional," IM, XI ( 1929), 12-48.
THE D I S I N T E G R A T I O N O F THE RUS S I A N E M P IR E 311
II
T H E D I S I N T E G RAT I O N O F T H E R U S S I A N EM P I R E
I. GENERAL
The most important sourcebook for the history of the national problem in 1917
is S. M. Dimanshtein, ed., Revoliutsiia i natsional'nyi vopros, III (Moscow, 1930;
NN); it contains virtually all the pertinent documents arranged by parties and
nationalities, Unfortunately, the other volumes in this series were never published.
Other works pertaining to the national problem in 1917 can be found in the
bibliographies for Chapter I and those chapters dealing with the respective regions.
Ill
T H E . U K RAI N E A N D B E LO R U S S I A
I. GENERAL lllSTORIES OF THE REVOLUTION IN THE UKBAINE
e. Nikolaeo
I.Kagan, "Partorganizatsiia i oktiabr'skii perevorot v g. Nikolaeve," LR, no. 1 ( 1922 ) ,
104-06.
Ia. Riappo, "Boroa sil v oktiabr'skuiu revoliutsiiu v Nikolaeve," LR, no. 1 ( 1922 ) ,
8 1-103.
f. Odessa
Khristev [Kb. A. Rakovskii], "Rumcherod v podgotovke Oktiabr'skoi revoliutsii,"
LR, no. 1 ( 1922 ) , 171-83.
g. Poltava
S. Mazlakh, "Oktiabr'skaia revoliutsiia na Poltavshchine," LR, no. 1 ( 1922 ) , 126-42.
Smetanich, "Poltava pered 'Oktiabrem,' " LR, no. 3/8 ( 1924 ) , 62-70,
h. Volhynla
M. Gendler, "O revoliutsionnykh sobytiiakh v Volynskoi gub. ( m . Berezna ) 1917-
19 gg.," LR, no. 1 ( 1922 ) , 202-0 5.
VII, BELORUSSIA
Among the historical accounts of the history of the Revolution in Belorussia the
following deserve particular mention: V. G. Knorin, 1917 god o Belorussil i na
Zapadnom fronte ( Minsk, 1925; NN ) , and V. K. Shcharbakou, Kastrychnitskala
revoliutsyia na Belarus£ i belaporskaia okupatsyia ( Minsk, 1930; in Belorussian; NN ) .
A collective volume published by the Tsentral'ny Vykanauchy Komitet, BSSR,
Belarus" ( Minsk, 1924; in Belorussian; NN ) , contains important essays written by
Communist participants. Other works are :
S. Agurskii, Ocherkl po istorii revoliutsionnogo dvizheniia o Belorussii ( .1863-1917)
{ Minsk, 1928; NN ) . Historical background.
A. Charviakou, Za savetskuiu Belarus' ( Minsk, 1927; NN ) .
Ia. Dyla, "Sotsyialistychny rukh na Belarusi," in Ts. V. K., BSSR, Belarus', 124-40.
U. Ihnatouski, "Vialiki Kastrychnik na Belarusi," Belarus', 195-214.
BIBLIO GRAPHY
--- "Komunistychnaia partyia Belarusi i belaruskae pytan'ne," Belarus', 229-42.
--- [V. M. Ignatovskii], Belorussiia (Minsk, 1925; NN ) .
le. Kancher, Belorusskl vopros (Petrograd, 1919; DLC ).
A. Kirzhnits, "Sto dnei sovetskoi vlasti v Belorussii," PR, no. 3/74 (1928 ), 61-131,
V. G. Knorin, Zametki k istorii diktatury proletariata v Belorussii (Minsk, 1934;
NN ).
--- [V. Knoryn], "Komunistychnaia partyia na Belarusi," Belarus', 215-.21.
V. Mitskevich-Kapsukas, "Bor'ba za sovetskuiu vlast' v Litve i Zap[adnoi] Belo
russii," PR, no. 1h08 ( 1931) , 65-107.
V. F. Sharangovich, 15 let KP (b ) B i BSSR (Minsk, 1934; NN ) .
Z. Zhylunovich, "Liuty-Kastrychnik u belaruskim natsyianal'nym rukhu," Belarus',
182--94.
IV
T H E M O S L E M B O R D E R LAN D S
I, GENERAL
As yet, there is no authoritative study of all of Russian Islam. For the Moslem
problem in tsarist Russia the best sources are L. Klimovich, Islam v tsarskoi Rossli
( Moscow, 1936 ) , which is tendentious but has interesting data and a good bibli
ography, and the scholarly journal Mir Islama (Petrograd, 1912-13 ).
II, SOVIET POLICY TOWARD THE MOSLEM MINORITIES ( GENERAL )
The only work which attempts to deal with the national movements of all
Moslem peoples is G. von Mende, Der nationale Kampf der Russlandtuerken (Berlin,
1936 ); it is biased and disorganized but in parts very useful. J. Castagne, "Le
Bolchevisme et l'Islam," Revue du Monde Musulman (Paris ), LI ( 19zz ) , consists
mainly of documents. F. de Romainville, L'Islam et l'U.R.S.S. (Paris, 1947; CSt-H ) ,
is a popular account, base� on Western sources, dealing mainly with post-1940
developments. B. P. L. Bedi, Muslims in the U.S.S.R. (Lahore, [1947] ) , follows
Communist propaganda. A. Arsharuni and Kh. Gabidullin, Ocherki panlslamlzma i
pantiurkizma v Rossii ([Moscow], 1931 ), is an invaluable source for the study of
Pan-Islamic and Pan-Turanian tendencies among Russian Moslems.
III. RUSSIA, TURKEY, AND THE PAN-TURANIAN MOVEMENT
G. Aleksinsky, "Bolshevism and the Turks," Quarterly Review (London ) , vol. 239
(1923 ) , 183-97.
H. Jansky, "Die 'Tuerkische Revolution' und der russische Islam," Der Islam
(Berlin and Leipzig), XVIII ( 1929), 158-67.
G. Jaeschke, "Der Turanismus der Jungtuerken," Die Welt des Islams, XX.III (1941) ,
no. 1-2, pp. 1-54 (NN ).
--- "Der Weg zur russisch-tuerkischen Freundschaft," Die Welt des Islams,
XVI (1934), 23-38.
J. Lewin, "Die panturanische !dee," Preusslsche ]ahrbuecher (Berlin ) , vol 231
( 1933 ) , 58-69.
"Panislamizm i pantiurkizm," Mir Islama, II ( 1913), 556-71; 596-619, Deals with
the influence of both these ideas on Russian Moslems.
THE M O S L E M B O RDERLAND S 3 17
"Pantiurkizm v Rossii," Mir Islama, II ( 1913 ) , 13-30.
"W," "Les Relations russo-turques depuis l'avenement du bolchevisme," Revue du
Monde Musulman, LII ( 1922 ) , 181--211.
Zarevant, Turtsiia i Panturanizm (Paris, 1930; NN ) .
V. THE CRIMEA
E. Kirimal, Der Nationale Kampf der Krimtuerken, mit besonderer Berueck
sichtigung der Jahre 1917-1918 ( Emsdetten, 1952 ), and M. F. Bunegin, Revo
liutsiia i grazhdanskala volna v Krymu ( [Simferopol] , 1927; CSt-H ) , are the best
works from the viewpoints of the Crimean Turkish nationalists and the contempo
rary Communists respectively. A good source is the historical journal, Revoliutsiia v
Krymu ( Simferopol, 1924; CSt-H., no. 3 only ) . See also:
M. L. Atlas, Bor'ba za sovety ( Simferopol, 1933, CSt-H ) .
N . Babakhan, "Iz istorii krymskogo podpol'ia," Revoliutsiia v Krymu, no. 3 ( 1924 ),
3-37.
A. K. Bochagov, Milli Firka { Simferopol, 1930; CSt-H ) .
T. Boiadzhev, Krymsko-tatarskaia molodezh v revoliutsii ( Simferopol, 1930; CSt-H ) .
A. Buiskii, Bor'ba za Krym i razgrom Vrangelia ( Moscow, 1928; NN ) .
V. Elagin, "Natsionalisticheskie illiuzii krymskikh Tatar v revoliutsionnye gody,"
NV, no. 5 ( 1924 ), 190-2 16; no. 6 ( 1924 )., 205--2 5.
Iu. Gaven, "Krymskie Tatary i revoliutsiia," ZhN, no. 48/56, 21 December 1919,
and no, 49/ 57, 28 December 1919.
Grigor'ev [Genker], "Tatarskii vopros v Krymu," Antanta i Vrangel', Sbomik statei
( Moscow, 1923; CSt-H ), 232-38.
A. Gukovskii, "Krym v 1918-19 gg," KA, XXVIII ( 1928 ) , 142-81; XXIX ( 1928 ),
55-85.
S. Ingulov, "Krymskoe podpol'e," in Antanta i Vrangel', 138--71.
S. Liadov, "Zhizn' i usloviia raboty RKP v Krymu vo vremia vladychestva Vrangelia,"
PR, no. 4 ( 1922 ), 143-47.
D. S. Pasmanik, Revoliutsionnye gody v Krymu (Paris, 1926 ) .
S. Se£, "Partiinye organizatsii Kryma v bor'be s Denikinym i Vrangelem," PR, no.
10/57 ( 1926 ) , 1 14-55.
D. Seidamet, La Crimee ( Lausanne, 1921 ) .
--- [J. Seyidamet], Krym -przeszlos6, terazniejszos6 i dqzenia niepodleglosciowe
Tatarow krymskich ( Warsaw, 1930; in Polish; private ) .
V. Sovetov, Sotsial-Demokratiia v Krymu ( 1898-19o8 ) ( Simferopol, 1933; CSt-H ) .
V. Sovetov and M. Atlas, Rasstrel sovetskogo pravitel'stva Krymskoi Respubliki
Tavridy ( Simferopol, 1933; CSt-H ) .
S . A . Usov, lstoriko-ekonomicheskie ocherki Kryma ( Simferopol, 1925; CSt-H ) .
V. Utz, Die Besitzverhaeltnisse der Tatarenbauem i m Kreise Simferopol (Tuebingen,
1911; NNC ) .
A . Vasil'ev, "Pervaia sovetskaia vlast' v Krymu i e e padenie," PR, no. 7 ( 1922 ) , 3-58.
I. Verner, "Nasha politika v Krymu," ZhN, 10 October 1921,
Ves' Krym, 1920-1925 ( Simferopol, 1926; CSt-H ) .
BIBLIOGRAPHY
VI. THE VOLGA TATARS
V
T H E CA U CAS U S
I, GENERAL
Among studies dealing with the Revolution on the territory of Transcaucasia, the
most recent and most complete is F. Kazemzadeh, The Struggle for Transcaucasia
(1917-1921) (New York, 1951). S. T. Arkomed, Materialy po istorii otpadeniia
Zakavkaz'ia ot Rossil (Tillis, 1923; CSt-H); A. P. Stavrovskii, Zakavkaz'e posle
Oktiabria (Moscow-Leningrad, 1925; CSt-H), and S. E. Sef, Revoliutsiia 1917
goda v Zakavkaz'i ( [Tillis], 1927; DLC), contain documents and other primary
materials. Two French secondary works are useful: J. Loris-Melikov, La Revolution
russe et les nouvelles republiques transcaucasiennes (Paris, 1920), and E. Hippeau,
Les Republiques du Caucase (Paris, 1920; Brit. Mus.). The journal Promethee and
La Revue de Promethee (Paris; CSt-H and NN) deal largely with the national
problem in Soviet Caucasus. See also the following sources:
R. Arskii, Kavkaz i ego znachenie dlia Sovetskoi Rossii (Peterburg, 1921; DLC).
0, Baldwin, Six Prisons and Two Revolutions ( Garden City, 1925 ) .
L. Beria, On the History of the Bolshevik Organizations in Transcaucasia (London,
1939).
J. Buchan, ed., The Baltic and Caucasian States (London, 1923).
P. G. La Chesnais, Les Peuples de la Transcaucasie pendant la guerre et devant la
paix (Paris, 19.21; DLC).
322 BIBLI O GRAPHY
a. For the Northern Caucasus the most important works, both containing nu
merous documents, are : I. Borisenko, Sovetskie respubliki na Severnom Kavkaze v
1918 godu (2 vols.; Rostov on Don, 1930; DLC ) , and N. L. Ianchevskii, Grazhdan
skaia bor'ba na Severnom Kavkaze, I ( Rostov on Don, 1927; NN ) . Other works are :
A. Avtorkhanov, K osnovnym voprosam istorii Chechni ( [Groznyi], 1930; CSt-H ) .
--- Revoliutsiia i kontrrevoliutsiia v Chechne ( Croznyi, 1933; Doc. Int. ) .
H . Bammate, The Caucasus Problem ( Berne, 1919; CSt-H ) .
N. F. Iakovlev, Ingushi ( Moscow, 1925; CSt-H ) .
V. P. Pozhidaev, Gortsy Severnogo Kavkaza ( Moscow-Leningrad, 1926; NN ) .
M . Svechnikov, Bor'ba krasnoi armii n a Severnom Kavkaze - Sentiabr' 1918-Apref
1919 ( Moscow-Leningrad, 1926; Doc. Int. ) .
b . For Daghestan an essential work is A. A. Takho-Godi, Revoliutsiia i kontr
revoliutsiia v Dagestane ( Makhach-Kala, 1927; DLC ) . N. Emirov, Ustanovlenie
sovetskoi vlasti v Dagestane i bor'ba s germano-turetskimi interventami, 1917-19 gg.
( Moscow, 1949; DLC ) , is a recent official history. See also :
N. Samurskii [Efendiev], Dagestan ( Moscow, 1925 ) .
--- "Grazhdanskaia voina v Dagestane," NV, III ( 1923 ) , 230-40.
--- Itogo i perspektivy sovetskol vlasti v Dagestane ( Makhach-Kala, 1927;
DLC ) .
"Krasnyi Dagestan," in V. Stavskii, ed., Dagestan ( Moscow, 1936; NN ) ,
5-32.
--- ..Oktiabr'skaia revoliutsiia i dal'neishie etapy ee razvitiia v Dagestane," PR,
no. 10/33 ( 1924 ) , 83-104.
TsIK, Dagestanskaia ASSR, Desiat' let avtonomii DASSR ( Makhach-Kala� 1931;
NN ) .
A. Todorskii, Krasnaia armiia v gorakh ( Moscow, 1924; Doc. Int. ) .
m. AZERBAIJAN
a. Official
Claims of the Peace Delegation of the Republic of Caucasian Azerbatd;an Pre
sented to the Peace Conference in Paris ( Paris, 1919; NNC ) and [The] Economic
and Financial Situation of Caucasian Azerbaid;an ( Paris, 1919; NNC ) are of value.
THE CAUCA SUS 323
The journal of the Historical Section of the Azerbaijan Communist Party, Istpart
AzKP ( b ) , Iz proshlogo ( Baku; Doc. Int., incomplete ) , contains many pertinent
articles and memoirs.
b. Bibliographies
A. V. Bagrii, Materialy dlia Bibliografii Azerbaidzhana ( Baku, 1.924-26; NN ) .
c. Secondary Sources
The literature on Azerbaijan during the 1.91.7-1.923 period is voluminous. S.
Belen'kii and A. Manvelov, Revoliutsiia 1917 g. v Azerbaidzhane - ( khronika
sobytii) ( Baku, 1.927; NN ) , is a detailed chronicle. Ia. A. Ratgauzer, Revoliutsiia i
grazhdanskaia voina v Baku, I ( Baku, 1.927; CSt-H ) , is the most complete history
of the subject from the Bolshevik point of view. M. E. Resul-Zade, Azerbajdzan w
walce o niepodleglos6 ( Warsaw, 1938; in Polish; private ) , and M. Z. Mirza-Bala,
Milli Azerbaycan Hareketi ( [Berlin], 1938; in Turkish; private ) , represent the anti
Soviet viewpoint. The latter is a valuable history of the Mussavat Party. Other
works are:
M. D. Bagirov, Iz istorii bol'shevistskoi organizatsii Baku i Azerbaidzhana ( Moscow,
' 1946 ).
A. Dubner, "Bakinskii proletariat v bor'be za vlast' ( 1918-20 gg. ) ," PR, no. 9
( 1930) , 1.9-45.
--- Bakinskii proletariat v gody revoliutsii ( 191 7-1920 ) ( Baku, 1931; CSt-H ) .
L. C . Dunsterville, The Adventures of Dunsterforce ( London, 1.920 ) .
G. Gasanov and N . Sarkisov, "Sovetskaia vlast' v Baku v 1.918 godu," IM, no. 5/69
( l. 938 ) , 32-70.
M.-D. Guseinov Tiurkskaia demokraticheskaia partiia federalistov 'Musavat' v
proshlom i nastoiashchem, pt. 1 ( [Tillis], 1927; CSt-H ) .
T. Guseinov Oktiabr' v Azerbaidzhane ( Baku 1927; NN } .
M . S . Iskenderov, Iz istorii bor'by Kommunisticheskoi partii Azerbaidzhana za pobedu
sovetskoi vlasti ( Moscow, 1958 ) .
B. Iskhanian Kontr-revoliutsiia v Zakavkaz'e ( Baku 1919; CSt-H ) .
--- Velikie uzhasy v gorode Baku ( Tillis 1920; CSt-H ) .
G. Jaeschke, "Die Republik Aserbeidschan," Die Welt des Islams, XXIII, no. 1-2
( 1941 ) , 55-69 ( NN ) .
A. G. Karaev, Iz nedavnego proshlogo ( [Baku, 1926] ; NN ).
A. Karinian, Shaumian i natsionalisticheskie techeniia na Kavkaze ( Baku, 1928;
CSt-H ) .
V. N. Khudadov, "Sovremennyi Azerbaidzhan," NV, no. 3 ( 1923 ) , 167-89.
M. Kuliev, Vragi Oktiabria v Azerbaidzhane ( Baku, 1927; NN ) .
H. Munschi, Die Republik Aserbeidschan ( Berlin, 1930; NN ) .
N. Narimanov, Stat'i i pis'ma ( [Moscow, 1925] ; NN ) .
N. Pchelin, Krest'ianskii vopros pri Musavate ( 1918-1920 ) ( Baku, 1931; Doc. Int. ) .
A. L. Popov, "Revoliutsiia v Baku," Byloe, XXII ( 1923 ) , 278-312.
"Iz istorii revoliutsii v Vostochnom Zakavkaz'e ( 1917-18 gg. )," PR,
no. 5/28 ( 1924 ) , pp. 13-35; no 7/30 ( 1924 ), pp. 110-43; no. 8-9/31-32
( 1924 ) , pp. 99-116; no. 11 /34 ( 1924 ), pp. 137-61.
A. Raevskii, Partiia M usavat i ee kontr-revoliutsionnaia rabota ( Baku, 1929; NN ) .
--- Angliiskie 'druz'ia' i musavatskie 'patrioty' ( Baku, 1.927; NN ) .
--- Bol'shevizm i men'shevizm v Baku v 1 904-05 gg. ( Baku, 1930; NN ) .
--- Angliiskaia interventsiia i musavatskoe pravitel'stvo ( Baku, 1927 ) , An im-
tant source.
Ia. A. Ratgauzer, Bor'ba za Sovetskii Azerbaidzhan ( Baku, 1928; NN ) .
Sarkis [N. Sarkisov], Bor'ba z a vlast' ( [Baku], 1930; Brit. Mus. ) .
BIBLIOGRAPHY
S. E. Sef, Kak bol'sheviki prishli k vlasti v 1917-18 gg. v bakinskom raione ( Baku,
1927; NN ) .
--- "Bakinskii Oktiabr'," PR, no. 11/106 (1930 ) , 67-89.
--- "Iz istorii bor'by za natsionalizatsiiu neftianoi promyshlennosti," IM, no.
18/19 ( 1930 ) , 29-62 (NN ).
J. Schafir, Die Ermordung der 26 Kommunare in Baku [sic!] und die Partei der
Sozialrevolutionaere ( Hamburg, 1922; NN ) .
M. Shakhbazov, "Gandzha do i pri sovetvlasti," Iz proshlogo ( Baku ) , no. z
(1924 ), 101-07 (Doc. Int. ) .
S[tepan] G. Shaumian, Stat'i i rechi ( [Baku], 1924; CSt-H ) .
S[uren] Shaumian, "Bakinskaia kommuna 1918 goda," PR, no. 12/59 ( 1926 ) , 70-
112.
--- Bakinskaia kommuna ( Baku, 1927; CSt-H ) .
A. Steklov, Armiia musavatskogo Azerbaidzhana (Baku, 1928; Doc. Int. ) .
--- Krasnaia armiia Azerbaidzhana ( Baku, 1928; NN ) .
E . A. Tokarzhevskii, Ocherki istorii sovetskogo Azerbaidzhana v period perekhoda na
mirnuiu rabotu po vosstanovleniiu narodnogo khoziaistva ( 1921-1925 gg.)
(Baku, 1956 ) .
IV. ARMENIA
S. Vratsian, Hayastani Hanrapetouthiun [The Republic of Armenia], (Paris,
1928; private; in Armenian ) , is the most thorough account of Armenian his
tory, 1917-1921, from the Dashnak point of view. A. N. Mandelstam, La So
ciete des Nations et les puissances devant le probleme armenien ( Paris, 1926 ) ,
deals with the foreign relations of the Armenian Republic. B. A. Bor'ian, Armeniia,
mezhdunarodnaia diplomatiia i SSSR ( 2 vols.; Moscow-Leningrad, 1928-29 ) , is a
badly written but very useful early Soviet account. J. G. Harbord, "American Military
Mission to Armenia," International Conciliation ( New York ) , no. 151 ( June 1920 ) ,
275-312, is a non-partisan view of internal conditions in the Armenian Republic
written by the head of the American mission there. See also:
A. N., "Kommunizm v Armenii," Kommunisticheskii Internatsional, II, no. 13 ( 1920 ) ,
2543-50.
Bakinskii Armianskii Natsional'nyi Sovet, Armiano-gruzinskii vooruzhennyi konflikt
( Baku, 1919; NN ).
H. Barby, La Debacle russe (Paris, [1918]; NN ) .
--- Les Extravagances bolcheviques et l'epopee armenienne ( Paris, n.d.; CSt-H ) .
E. Bremond, La Cilicie en 1919-1920 ( Paris, 1921; private ) .
Comite Central du Parti 'Daschnaktzoutioun,' L'Action du Parti S.R. Armenien dit
'Daschnaktzoutioun,' 191 4-1923 (Paris, 1923; Brit. Mus. ) .
Delegation de la Republique armenienne, L'Armenie et la question armenienne
( Paris, 1922; private ) .
A. Gukovskii, "Pobeda sovetskoi vlasti v Armenii v 1920 godu," IM, no. 1 1 ( 1940 ) ,
8-17.
A. P. Hacobian, Armenia and the War (New York, [1917] ) .
L. R. Hartill, Men Are Like That ( Indianapolis, 1928 ) .
G. Jaeschke, "Urkunden zum Frieden von Giimrii (Alexandropol ) ," Mitteilungen
des Seminars fuer orientalische Sprachen (Berlin ) , XXXVII, pt. z (1934 ) ,
133-42.
a
G. Korganoff, La Participation des Armeniens la Guerre Mondiale sur le Front
du Caucase ( 1914-1918 ) (Paris, 1927 ) .
J. G. Mandalian, Who Are the DashnagsP ( Boston, 1944; NNC ) .
A. F. Miasnikov, Armianskie politicheskie partii za rubezhom ( Tiflis, 1925; NN ) .
F. Nansen, Armenia and the Near East (London, 1928 ) .
THE CAUCA S U S 325
A. Poidebard, ed., L e Transcaucase et la republique d'Armenie ( Paris, 1924; DLC ) .
Programma armianskoi revoliutsionnoi i sotsialisticheskoi partii Dashnakstutiun
( Geneva, 1908; NNC ) .
V. Totomiantz, L'Armenie economique (Paris, 1920 ) .
M. Varandian, Le Confl,it armeno-georgien et la guerre du Caucase ( Paris, 1919 ;
DLC ) .
S. Vratzian, "How Armenia Was Sovietized," The Armenian Review, I-II, nos. 1-5
(1948-49 ) , pp. 74-84 ; 79-91; 59-75; 87-103; 118-27.
V, GEORGIA
VI
I. COLLECTIONS OF DOCUM:ENTS
Sobranie uzakonenii i rasporiazhenii Rabochego i Krest'ianskogo Pravitel'stva,
Sistematicheskii sbornik vazhneishikh dekretov, 1 9 1 7-1920 ( Moscow, 192 1 ) , con
tains texts of decrees, some of which bear upon the subject of the consolidation of
the state aparatus. RSFSR, Narodnyi komissariat po inostrannym delam, Sbornik
deistvuiushchikh dogovorov, soglashenii i konventsii, zakliuchennykh RSFSR s inos
trannymi stranami ( 2nd ed.; 3 vols.; Moscow-Peterburg 1921-22 ) , and lu. V.
Kliuchnikov and A. Sabanin, Mezhdunarodnaia politika noveishego vremeni v
dogovorakh, notakh i deklaratsiiakh ( 3 vols.; Moscow, 1925-29 ) cite texts of the
agreements between the RSFSR and the republics.
The most important publications to have appeared since 1957 bear on the role of
Lenin in the formation of the Soviet Union, and his disagreements with Stalin over this
matter. The key documents have been published in the fourth edition of Lenin's
Works, V. I. Lenin, Sochineniia, XXXVI ( Moscow, 1957 ) and Leninskii Sbornik,
XXXVI ( 1959 ) . Some of these have appeared earlier outside Soviet Russia.
II. STENOGRAPHIC REPORTS OF PARTY AND SOVIET CONGRESSES AND RESOLUTIONS
VKP ( b ) , Desiatyi s"ezd RKP ( b ) ( Moscow, 1933 ) .
IML, Odinadtsatyi s "ezd RKP ( b ) - stenograficheskii otchet ( Moscow, 196 1 ) .
RKP ( b ) , Dvenadtsatyi s"ezd - stenograficheskii otchet ( Moscow, 1923; NN ) .
TsK, RKP ( b ) , Rossiiskaia Kommunisticheskaia Partiia ( bol'shevikov ) v rezoliutsiiakh
ee s"ezdov i konferentsii ( 1 898-1922 gg. ) ( Moscow-Petrograd, 1923 ) .
Desiatyi vserossiiskii s"ezd sovetov ( Moscow, 1923 ) .
TsIK, SSSR, I s"ezd sovetov Soiuza Sovetskikh Sotsialisticheskikh Respublik
stenograficheskii otchet ( Moscow, [ 1923] ) .
III, STUDIES OF SOVIET FEDERALISM IN THE 192o's
Of secondary works, the most important by far is S. I. Iakubovskaia's Stroitel'stvo
soiuznogo Sovetskogo sotsialisticheskogo gosudarstva, 1 922-1925 gg. ( Moscow, 1960 ) ;
based on a rich selection of archival materials, it is quite jndispensable despite its
faithful adherence to the current official interpretation of historical events. S. S. Gililov,
in V. I. Lenin - organizator Sovetskogo mnogonatsional'nogo gosudarstva ( Moscow,
1960 ) also uses archival sources. Vital information on Lenin's activities in late 1922
is recorded in the log of his secretary, "Novyi dokument o zhizni i deiatel'nosti
BIBLIOGRAPHY
V. I . Lenina," Voprosy istorii KPSS, no. 2 ( 1963 ) , 67-91 ; cf. L . A . Fotieva, "Iz
vospominanii o V. I. Lenine," Ibid. no. 4 ( 1957 ) , 147-67.
I. N. Ananov, Ocherki federal'nogo upravleniia SSSR ( Leningrad, 1925 ) .
N. N. Alekseev, "Sovetskii federalizm," Evraziiskii vremennik ( Paris ) , v ( 1927 ) ,
240-61.
K. Arkhippov, "Tipy sovetskoi avtonomii," VS, nos. 8-9 ( 1923 ) , pp. 28-44; no. 10
( 1923 ) , pp. 35-56.
S. N. Dranitsyn, Konstitutsiia SSSR i RSFSR v otvetakh na voprosy ( Leningrad,
1924 ) .
V. Durdenevskii, "Na putiakh k russkomu federal'nomu pravu," Sovetskoe pravo, no.
1/4 ( 1923 ) , 20-35.
Z. B. Genkina, Lenin - predsetadel' Sovnarkoma i STO, ( Moscow, 1960 ) .
G. S. Gurvich, "Avtonomizm i federalizm v sovetskoi sisteme," VS, no. 1 ( 1924 ) ,
24-29.
--- Istoriia sovetskoi konstitutsii ( Moscow, 1923 ) .
--- "Printsipy avtonomizma i federalizma v sovetskoi sisteme," Sovetskoe pravo,
no. 3/9 ( 1934 ) , 3-39.
--- Osnovy sovetskoi konstitutsii ( Moscow, 1926 ) .
S. N. Harper, The Government of the Soviet Union ( New York, [1938] ) .
V. I . I gnat' ev, Sovetskii stroi ( Moscow, 1928 ) .
--- Sovet Natsional'nostei TsK SSSR ( Moscow-Leningrad, 1926 ) .
S. A . Korf, "Vozmozhna-li v Rossii federatsiia?" Sovremennyia zapiski ( Paris ) , III
( 192 1 ) , 173-g o.
S. B. Krylov, "Istoricheskii protsess razvitiia sovetskogo federalizma," Sovetskoe
pravo, no. 5/ 11 ( 1924 ) , 36-66. A well-documented account.
D. A. Magerovskii, Soiuz Sovetskikh Sotsialisticheskikh Respublik - ( obzor i ma
terialy ) ( Moscow, 1923 ) . One of the most valuable studies, important for
its source materials.
V. V. Pentkovskaia, "Rol' V. I. Lenina v obrazovanii SSSR," VI, no. 3 ( 1956 ) , 13-24.
B. D. Pletnev, "Gosudarstvennaia struktura RSFSR," Pravo i zhizn', no. 1 ( 1922 ) ,
26-30.
Kh. Rakovskii, "Rossiia i Ukraina," Kommunisticheskii Internatsional, no. 12 ( 1920 ) ,
pp. 2 197-2202.
M. 0. Reikhel, ed., Sovetskii federalizm ( Moscow, 1930; NN ) .
M . Reisner, "Soiuz Sotsialisticheskikh Sovetskikh Respublik," VS, nos. 1-2 ( 1923 ) ,
9-24.
P. I. Stuchka, Uchenie o gosudarstve i o konstitutsii RSFSR ( Moscow, 1922 ) .
N. S . Timashev, "Problema natsional'nago prava v Sovetskoi Rossii," Sovremennyia
zapiski, XXIX ( 1926 ) , 379-99.
B. D. Wolfe, "The Influence of Early Military Decisions upon the National Struc
ture of the Soviet Union," The American Slavic and East European Review,
IX ( 1950 ) , 169-79.
NOTES
II
THE DISINTEGRATION OF THE RUSSIAN EMPIRE
Ill
IV
T H E C A U CAS U S
1. Georgia, Ministerstvo Vneshnikh Del, Dokumenty i materlaly po oneshnei poli
tike Zakavkaz'ia i Gruzii (Tillis, 1919, 269ff; henceforth referred to as Georgia,
Dokumenty.
2. A. P. Stavrovskii, Zakaokaz'e posle Oktlabria (Moscow-Leningrad, 1925), 15;
M. Z. Mirza-Bala, Milli Azerbaycan Hareketi ( [Berlin], 1938), 121.
3. Mirza-Bala, Milli, 121-23; I. Tseretelli, Separation de la Transcaucasie et de la
Russie et l'independance de la Georgie (Paris, 1919 ) .
4, F. Kazemzadeh, The Struggle for Transcaucasia (1917-1921) (London-New
York, 1951), 147.
5. Georgia, Dokumenty, 278.
6. The text of the Georgian declaration of independence is to be found in Delega
a
tion georgienne a la Conference de la Paix, Memoire presente la Conference
de la Paix (Paris, 1919), 21-22,
344 NOTES TO CHAPTER V
7. The text of the Azerbaijani declaration of independence is in Mirza-Bala,
Milli, 135.
8. Tseretelli, Separation.
9. Mirza-Bala, Milli, 124.
10. M. Varandian, Le Confiit armeno-georgien et la guerre du Caucase (Paris,
1919), 37-52; this source cites the text of an alleged Georgian-Turkish agree
ment of 1914.
11. N. L. Ianchevskii, Grazhdanskaia bor'ba na Severnom Kavkaze, I (Rostov on
Don, 1927 }, 134-36, 189.
12. Ibid., 197-99.
13. I. Borisenko, Sovetskie respubliki na Severnom Kavkaze v 1918 godu, II (Ros
tov on Don, 1930), 231-36, contains the text of this constitution.
14. A. A. Takho-Godi, Revoliutsiia i kontr-revoliutsiia v Dagestane (Makhach-
Kala, 1927), 61-65.
15. Ianchevskii, Grazhdanskaia bor'ba, II, 201-02.
16. Borisenko, Sovetskie respubliki, II, 69.
17. F. Makharadze, Sovety i bor'ba za sovetskuiu vlast' v Gruzii, 1917-1921
(Tiflis, 1928 ), 175.
18, Speech by Ordzhonikidze in December 1918, quoted by Borisenko, Sovetskie
respubliki, II, 72-73.
19. Takho-Godi, Revoliutsiia, 88-89.
20. Ibid., 89.
21, Borisenko, Sovetskie respubliki, II, 7g-80.
22. S. E. Se£, Bor'ba za Oktiabr' v Zakavkaz'i, ( [TiflisJ, 1932), 64; see also Suren
Shaumian, "Bakinskaia Kommuna 1918 goda," PR, no. 12/59 (1926 ) , 77-78.
23. S. E . Sef, Kak Bol'sheviki prishli k vlasti v Bakinskom raione (Baku, 1927 }, 15.
24. Ia. A. Ratgauzer, Revoliutsiia i grazhdanskaia voina v Baku, I (Baku, 1927),
144.
25. S. Se£, "Bakinskii Oktiabr'," PR, no. 11/106 (1930), 73.
26. S. Se£, Kak Bol'sheviki prishli k vlasti v Bakinskom raione (Baku, 1927), 26,
quoted in A. Dubner, Bakinskii proletariat v gody revoliutsii ( 1917-1920 )
( Baku, 1931), p. v.
27. Sef, quoted by Dubner, 25; for other accounts of the March events, see Se£,
"Bakinskii Oktiabr'," 70-78; Ratgauzer, Revoliutsiia, 147-48.
28. Sef, "Bakinskii Oktiabr'," 79.
29. Ratgauzer, Revoliutsiia, 146.
30. Ibid., 168.
31, Ibid., 165.
32. Ibid., 168.
33. Se£, "Bakinskii Oktiabr'," 82.
34. Ratgauzer, Revoliutsiia, 174.
35. Stepan Shaumian, Stat'i i rechi ( 1908-1918 ) (Baku, 1924), 188-90; Sef, Kak
Bol'sheviki, 33-34; LS, XXXV (1945), 24.
36. S. A. Vyshetravskii, Nefrlanoe khoziaistvo Rossii za poslednee desiatiletie (Mos-
cow, 1924 ) , 148-49; Dubner, Bakinskii proletariat, 93.
37. Dubner, Bakinskii proletariat, 92.
38. Shaumian, speaking on May 16, 1918, in Dubner, 67.
39. Shaumian, Stat'i, 224-25.
40. Ibid., 224.
41, Ratgauzer, Revoliutsiia, 199.
42. Ibid., 207.
43, Ibid., 212-13; the omissions are in the text.
44. Ibid., 213-15,
45. J. Schafir, Die Ermordung der 26 Kommunare in Baku und die Partei dP·
Sozialrevolutionaere ( Hamburg, 1922).
46. L. C. Dunsterville, The Adventures of Dunsterforce (London, 1920 ) , 182-86.
47. Ibid., 305ff.
48. Mirza-Bala, MaU, 13sf(.
THE CAUCASUS 345
49. Ibid., 14off.
50. N. Pchelin, Krest'ianskii vopros pri Musavate (1918-1920 ) (Baku, 1931 ), 21;
Ratgauzer, Borba, 3.
51. Mirza-Bala, Milli, 141-47; A. Stel<lov, Armiia musavatskogo Azerbaidzhana
(Balm, 1928 ), 7.
52. Maj. Gen. J. G. Harbord, "American Military Mission to Armenia," Inter
national Conciliation, no. 151 (June 1920 ), 296.
53. Ratgauzer, Bor'ba, 14-15; Dubner, Bakinskii proletariat, 101.
54. Mirza-Bala, Milli, 149; B. A. Bor'ian, Armeniia, mezhdunarodnaia diplomatiia
i SSSR (Moscow-Leningrad, 1928-29 ) , II, 73-74.
55. M. Kuliev, Vragi Oktiabria v Azerbaidzhane (Baku, 1927 ), 13.
56. A. Raevskii, Angliiskaia interventsiia i musavatskoe pravitel'stvo (Baku, 1927 ) ,
48-49.
57. Steklov, Armiia, 33.
58. Dubner, Bakinskii proletariat, 135n.
59. Raevskii, Angliiskaia interventsiia, 82.
60. Ibid., 159; R. Arskii, Kavkaz i ego znachenie dlia Sovetskoi Rossii (Peterburg,
1921 ), 45.
61. Claims of the Peace Delegation of the Republic of Caucasian Azerbaidjan
Presented to the Peace Conference in Paris (Paris, 1919 ), 28-31.
62. Bor'ian, Armeniia, II, 62, go.
63. S. Vratsian, Hayastani Hanrapetouthiun (Paris, 1928 ) , 214ff.
64. Bor'ian, Armeniia, II, 83.
65. Ibid., 83.
66. Harbord, "American Military Mission to Armenia," 275-312.
67. Vratsian, Hayastani, 320-25.
68. Ibid., 330, on agreement; Bor'ian, Armeniia, II, 83, on assistance.
69. Raevskii, Angliiskaia interventsiia, 108-09.
70. A. N. Mandelstam, La Societe des Nations et les puissances devant le prob
leme armenien ( Paris, 1926 ), 57.
71. Ibid., 55.
72. M. Varandian, Le Conflit armeno-georgien et la guerre du Caucase (Paris,
1919 ).
73. E. L. Woodward, ed., Documents o n British Foreign Policy, 1919-1939, 1st
Series, III (London, 1949 ), passim.
74. Makharadze, Sovety, 156. W. S. Woytinsky, La Democratie georgienne (Paris,
1921 ) , 194, and J. Kawtaradze, Gruzja w zarysie historycznym ( Warsaw,
1929 ), give slightly different figures.
75. E. Kuhne, La Georgie libre ( Geneva, 1920 ), 57-58.
76. Republique de Georgie, Constitution de la Republique de Georgie (Paris,
1922; private ) ,
77. [F] Makharadze, Diktatura men'shevistskoi partii v Gruzii ( [Moscow] , 1921 ),
71; S. Danilov, "Tragediia abkhazskogo naroda," Vestnik Instituta p o lzucheniiu
Istorii i Kultury SSSR (Munich ), I ( 1951 ), 124££.
78. G. Devdariani, Dni gospodstva men'shevikov v Gruzii ( Tiflis, 1931 ), 310-311.
79. M. Khomeriki, La Reforme agraire et l'economie rurale en Georgie ( Paris, 1921 ),
17; Woytinsky, La Democratie georgienne, 210-11.
80. Devdariani, Dni gospodstva, 302.
81. Makharadze, Sovety, 156-57.
82. Ibid.
83. Woytinsky, La Democratie georgienne, 89££.
84. M. Svechnikov, Borba krasnoi armii na Severnom Kavkaze ( Moscow-Leningrad,
1926 ), 45.
85. Ibid., 102-03.
86. A. Denikine, The White Army (London, 1930 ), 156.
87. Order no. 171, dated 19 November 1919, in Azerbaidzhan (Baku ) , no. 267,
quoted in Dubner, Bakinskii proletariat, 137.
88. Raevskii, Angliiskaia interventsiia, 112.
NOTES TO CHAPTER V
89. Takho-Godi, Revoliutsiia, n8-.21.
90. Ibid., 128-29.
91. A. Avtorkhanov, K osnovnym voprosam istorii Chechni ( [Groznyi], 1930),
57-75.
92. Takho-Godi, Revoliutsiia, 114, 127-28; N. Samurskii, "Krasnyi Dagestan," in
V. Stavskii, ed., Dagestan (Moscow, 1936 ), 16.
93, Quoted from documents found in the Azerbaijani Historical Archive by
Raevskii, Angliiskaia interventsiia, 53.
94. Lord Curzon to Wardrop, 4 October 1919, in Woodward, Documents, 1st
Series, Ill, 577,
95. Denikine, The White Army, 340.
96. Raevskii, Angliiskaia interventsiia, 61, on Azerbaijan; Woodward, Documents,
1st Series, III, 595, on Georgia; Harbord, "American Military Mission to
Armenia," on Armenia.
97. Raevskii, 55-58.
98. Ibid., 58.
99. Arskii, Kavkaz.
100. Makharadze, Sovety, 193.
101. Sarkis, Borba za vlast' ( [Baku], 1930 ) , 15; Ratgauzer, Borba, 45.
102. A. G. Karaev, Iz nedavnego proshlogo {Baku, 1926], 13.
103. Makharadze, Sovety, 193-96.
104. Sarkis, Bor'ba, 48.
105. Ibid., 93.
106. Ibid., 99-100.
107. Ibid., 97; Karaev, Iz nedavnego, 54-55.
108. Dubner, Bakinskii proletariat, 145-46; Ratgauzer, Bor'ba, 53, 63.
109. E. Drabkina, Gruzinskaia kontr-revoliutsiia ( Leningrad, 1928 ) , 172; Makh
aradze, Sovety, 197-206.
110. The fullest account of Turco-Soviet relations in this period is by G. Jaeschke,
"Der Weg zur russisch-tuerkischen Freundschaft," Die Welt des Islams, XVI
(1934 ), 23-38.
111. Karaev, Iz nedavnego, 59.
112. Jaeschke, "Der Weg," 27.
113. Iu. V. Kliuchnikov and A. Sabanin, Mezhdunarodnaia politika noveishego
vremeni v dogovorakh, notakh i deklaratsiiakh, II ( Moscow, 1925-29 ), 384-87.
114. Karaev, Iz nedavnego, 88, 121; see also Mirza-Bala. Milli, 188ff.
115. Takho-Godi, Revoliutsiia, 223.
l l 6. rLS, XXXIV ( 1942 ) , 279.
1 17. S. M. Kirov, Stat'i, rechi, dokumenty, I ( {Leningrad], 1936 ) , 331.
1 18. Entsiklopedicheskii slovar' . . . 'Granat', XLI, pt. 3, 160-63; Pravda Gruz.ii
( Tiflis ) , 10 March 1922.
1 19. G. K. Ordzhonikidze, Izbrannye stat'i i rechi, 19u -1937 ( [Moscow], 1939 ) .
1 13. "Ordzhonikidze, G. K.," Bol'shaia Sovetskaia Entsiklopediia, XLIII ( 1939 ) .
G . Zhvaniia, "V. I . Lenin i partiinaia organizatsiia Gruzii v period bor'by z a
sovetskuiu vlast'," Zaria Vostoka ( Tiflis ), 2 1 April 1961.
120. Raevskii, Angliiskaia interventsiia, 17g-80, on Azerbaijan; Kazemzadeh, The
Struggle, 295, on Georgia.
121. The Azerbaijani State Archive, Deposit of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs,
quoted in Raevskii, Angliiskaia interventsiia, 185.
122. Steklov, Armiia, 66-67; Izvestiia, 21 January 1937.
123. Raevskii, Angliiskaia interventsiia, 61-64, 185ff; Kazemzadeh, The Struggle,
276ff, 283.
124. Karaev, Iz nedavnego, 127; Kuliev, Vragi, 40.
125. Mirza-Bala, Milli, 188-90; Kirov, Stat'i, I, 205.
126. Sarkis, Borba, 140-41; Karaev, Iz nedavnego, 123-34.
127. Raevskji, Angliiskaia interventsiia, 190; E. A. Tokarzhevskii, Iz istorii inostrannoi
interventsii i grazhdanskoi voiny v Azerbaidzhane ( Baku, 1957 ) , 268-70.
THE CAUCA S U S 347
128. Kazemzadeh, The Struggle, 284.
129. Mirza-Bala, Milli, 192££.
130. Zhvaniia, "V. I. Lenin"; cf. LS, XXIV, 295-96.
131. · Traite conclu le 7 mai 1920 entre la Republique
democratique de Georgie et
la Republique Socialiste Federative Sovietiste Russe . • . ( Paris, 1922 ) ;
RSFSR, Narodnyi komissariat po inostrannym delam, Sbornik deistvuiushchikh
dogovorov, soglashenii i konventsii zakliuchennykh RSFSR s inostrannymi
gosudarstvami, III ( Moscow, 1922), 295.
132. Vratsian, Hayastani, 410ff.
133. M. Shakhbazov, "Gandzha do i pri sovetvlasti," Iz proshlogo ( Baku ) , no. 2
( 1924), 101-07.
134. Zarevant, Turtsiia i Panturanizm ( Paris, 1930 ) ; H. Munschi, Die Republik
Aserbeidschan ( Berlin, 1930 ) , 41-46.
135. N. Narimanov, Stat'i i pis'ma ( Moscow, 1925 ), pp. x-xiv.
136. LS, XXXV ( 1945 ) , 236. Telegram of Lenin of July 1921.
137. Takho-Godi, Revoliutsiia, 142, on Soviet activities in the North Caucasus.
138. On the rebellion, cf. Samurskii, "Krasnyi Dagestan," 18-20.
139. Kommunist ( Baku ) , 4 November 1920, quoted in IM, no. 11 ( 1940). 12.
140. Stalin, IV, 410-11.
141. Bor'ian, Armeniia, II, 96.
142. Ibid., 95.
143. A. N., "Kommunizm v Armenii," pp. 2543-50.
144. Vratsian, Hayastani, 417-41.
145. S. I. Iakubovskaia, Ob"edinitel'noe dvizhenie za obrazovanie SSSR ( 191 7-
1922 ) ( [Moscow], 1947 ) , 99.
146. Bor'ian, Armeniia, II, 122.
147. See telegram of Stalin to Ordzhonikidze in V. S. Kirillov and A. Ia. Sverdlov,
Grigorii Konstantinovich Ordzhonikidze ( Sergo ) - Biografiia ( Moscow, 1962 ) ,
140.
148. RSFSR, Narodnyi komissariat po inostrannym delam, Sbornik deistvuiushchikh
dogovorov, III, 14-15.
149. Vratsian, Hayastani.
150. Bor'ian, Armeniia, II, 126, 135-36; Vratsian, Hayastani, 435ff.
151. Makharadze, Sovety, 213.
152. Ruben, '"V tiskakh men'shevistskoi 'demokratii'," PR, no. 8 ( 1923 ) , 146.
153. Zhvaniia, "V. I. Lenin."
154. Quoted in Drabkina, Gruzinskaia kontr-revoliutsiia, 175,
155. Makharadze, Sovety, 223.
156. The text of the Gekker report can be found in Republique de Georgie, Docu
ments relatifs a la question de la Georgie devant la Societe des Nations ( Paris,
1925 ) , 67-68.
157, Zhvaniia, "V. I. Lenin."
158. Jaeschke, "Der Weg ," 29-30.
159. M. Pavlovich, V. Gurko-Kriazhin, and F. Raskol'nikov, Turtsiia v bor'be za
nezavisimost' ( Moscow, 1925 ) , 59-106.
160. Note dated 17 February 1921, Trotsky Archive, Harvard College Library, T-635.
161. Zhvaniia, "V. I. Lenin"; Kirillov and Sverdlov, Ordzhonikidze, 143.
162. Zhvaniia, ibid.
163. Lloyd George's assurance to Krasin was reported by Chicherin in a speech de
livered on 4 March 1925 and cited by I. Tseretelli in Promethee ( June, 1928 ) ,
p. 11 from Zaria Vostoka ( Tillis ) , 5 March 1925.
164. Zhvaniia, "V. I. Lenin."
165. Dispatch by Lenin dated 14 February 1921, Trotsky Archive, T-632.
166. Dispatch by Trotsky from Ekaterinburg ( Sverdlovsk ) , dated 21 February
1921, Trotsky Archive, T-637.
167. Trotsky Archive, T-635.
168. Entsiklopedicheskii slovar' . . . 'Granat', XLI, pt. 2, supplement, 20-27.
169. The account of the invasion of Georgia is derived principally from the following
N O T E S TO CHAPTER V
sources: R. Duguet, Moscou et la Georgie martyre ( Paris, 1927); Republique
de Georgie, Documents; L. Coquet, Les Heritiers de la 'toison d'or', ( Chaumont,
1.930 ) ; and from contemporary newspaper accounts in Pravda, The Times
( London), and New York Times.
170. Bor'ian, Armeniia, II, 125ff.
171. Pravda, 2 March 1921.
172, An account of the fight for Batum is given in the report of the commander of
the Batum fortress, in Ia. M. Shafir, Ocherki gruzinskoi zhirondy ( Moscow
Leningrad, 1925), 187-92.
173. Text in Devdariani, Dni gospodstva, 226-28.
174. Lenin, XXVI, 187-88.
175. Ibid. 188.
176. Ibid., 192.
VI
THE ESTABLI SHMENT OF THE U SSR
1. Quoted in E. H. Carr, The Bolshevik Revolution, 1917-1923, I ( New York,
1951), 1 17.
2. Program of the Russian Communist Party ( 1919), in TsK, RKP ( b), Rossiiskaia
Kommunisticheskaia Partiia ( bol'shevikov ) v rezoliutsiiakh ee s"ezdov i kon
ferentsii ( 1898-1922 gg.) ( Moscow-Petrograd, 1923), 255-56.
3. Ibid., 254.
4. Ibid., 253-54.
5. Carr, The Bolshevik Revolution, I, 139.
6. D. Magerovskii, "Soiuz Sovetskikh Sotsialisticheskikh Respublik," SP, no. 1/4
( 1923), g.
7, Ibid., 10; V. Durdenevskii, "Na putiakh k russkomu federal'nomu pravu," SP,
no. 1/4 ( 1923), 30-33.
B. Stalin, IV, 402.
9, B. D. Pletnev, "Gosudarstvennaia struktura RSFSR," Pravo i zhizn' ( Moscow),
no. 1 ( 1.922), 29-30. See also the opinions of D. A. Magerovskii, Soiuz Sovet
skikh Sotsialisticheskikh Respublik ( obzor i materialy ) ( Moscow, 1923), 20;
G. S. Gurvich, Osnovy sovetskoi konstitutsii ( Moscow, 1926 ), 149ff; N. N.
Alekseev, "Sovetskii federalizm," Evraziiskii vremennik ( Paris), V ( 1927), 255,
and M. Langhans, "Die staatsrechtlichc Entwicklung der auf Russischen Boden
lebenden kleineren Nationalitaeten," Archiv fuer Oeffentliches Recht, Neue
Falge, IX ( 1925), 195.
10. lzvestiia, 22 May 1920.
11. Ibid., 6 November 1920.
12. Ibid., 21 December 1920.
13. Ibid., 27 April 1921.
14. Ibid., 6 November 1920.
15. Ibid., 21 December 1920.
16. Revue du Monde Musulman, LI ( 1922), 26-33.
17. G. K. Klinger, ed., Sovetskaia politika za 1.0 let po natsional'nomu voprosu v
RSFSR ( Moscow-Leningrad, 1928 ), 24; cf. I. Trainin, "K likvidatsii Narkom
natsa," ZhN, no. 1/6 ( 1924 ), 19-30.
18. P. Miliukov, Rossiia na perelome, II ( Paris, 1927), 249.
19. KP( b)U, Institut Istorii Partii, Istoriia KP ( b ) U ( Kiev, 1933), II, 264-65.
20. Sistematicheskii sbornik vazhneishikh dekretov, 191.7-1.920 ( Moscow, 1921), 63.
21. L. Trotsky, My Life ( New York, 193 1), 4 1 1-22.
22, LS, XVIII ( 1931 ), 243; Lenin, XXVI, 619-20.
THE E S TA B L I S H M E N T O F THE U S S R 349
23. M. Ravich-Cherkasskii, Istoriia Kommunisticheskoi Partii Ukrainy ( [Kharkov],
1923 ) , 1 1 1.
24. E. G. Bosh, God bor'by ( 1917) ( Moscow, 1925 ), 92.
25. B. D. Wolfe, "The Influence of Early Military Decisions upon the National
Structure of the Soviet Union," The American Slavic and East European Review,
IX ( 1950 ), 16g-79; Ravich-Cherkasskii, Istoriia, 131.
26. Ravich-Cherkasskii, Istoriia, 131-32.
27. LS, XXXIV ( 1942 ) , 120-21.
28. Magerovskii, Soiuz, 68-69.
29. S. I. Iakubovskaia, Stroitel'stvo Soiuznogo Sovetskogo Sotsialisticheskogo gosu
darstva, 1 922-1925 gg. ( Moscow, 1960 ) , 123.
30. The background of the Russian-Azerbaijani treaty is discussed by M. S.
Iskenderov, Iz istorii bor'by Kommunisticheskoi partii Azerbaidzhana za pobedu
Sovetskoi vlasti ( Baku, 1958 ), 515-17, and E. A. Tokarzhevskii, Ocherki
istorii Sovetskogo Azerbaidzhana v period perekhoda na mirnuiu rabotu po
vosstanovleniiu narodnogo khoziaistva ( 1 92 1-1 925 gg. ) ( Baku, 1956 ) , 88-go.
31. RSFSR, Narodnyi komissariat po inostrannym delam, Sbornik deistvuiushchikh
dogovorov, soglashenii i konventsii, zakliuchennykh RSFSR s inostrannymi
stranami ( Moscow-Peterburg, 1921-22 ), I, 1-9; henceforth referred to as
NKID, Sbornik.
32. Ibid., 15-17 and 13-15; cf. above, 137-38.
33, Tokarzhevskii, Ocherki, 89.
34. NKID, Sbornik, I, 17-27.
35. Ibid. II, 7ff.
36. Iu. V. Kliuchnikov and A. Sabanin, Mezhdunarodnaia politika noveishego vre
meni v dogovorakh, notakh i deklaratsiiakh ( Moscow, 1925-29 ) , III, 167ff.
37. "Dalnevostochnaia Respublika ( DVR )," Bol'shaia Sovetskaia Entsiklopediia, 1st
ed., XX ( Moscow, 1930 ), 216-21.
38. Revue du Monde Musulman, LI, 224-25.
39. Kommunisticheskii lnternatsional i osvobozhdenie Vostoka, Pervyi s"ezd narodov
Vostoka - stenograficheskie otchety ( Petrograd, 1920 ), 108-12 ( NN ) .
40. D. Soloveichik, "Revoliutsionnaia Bukhara," NV, no. 2 ( 1922 ), 277.
41. M. Chokaev, "The Basmaji Movement in Turkestan," The Asiatic Review
( London ) , XXIV, no. 78 ( 1928 ), 284-85.
42. K. Okay, Enver Pascha, der grosse Freund Deutschlands ( Berlin, [ 1935] ) ,
387-88.
43. Soloveichik, "Revoliutsionnaia Bukhara," passim.
44. Ibid.; Revue du Monde Musulman, LI, 229.
45. Soloveichik, "Revoliutsionnaia Bukhara," 283; SaYd Alim Khan ( Emir of Buk
hara ), La Voix de la Boukharie opprimee ( Paris, 1929 ) , 37.
46. [K.] Vasilevskii, "Fazy basmacheskogo dvizheniia v Srednei Azii," NV, no. 29
( 1930 ), 134 .
47. Soloveichik, "Revoliutsionnaia Bukhara," 283.
48. Revue du Monde Musulman, LI, 229-30, cites text of the ultimatum.
49. Soloveichik, "Revoliutsionnaia Bukhara," 284, has Enver's letter to the Emir;
cf. Vasilevskii, "Fazy," 134.
50. Vasilevskii, "Fazy," 135; Chokaev, "The Basmaji Movement," 282; J. Castagne,
Les Basmatchis ( Paris, 1925 ), 34.
51. Vasilevskii, "Fazy," 135.
52. I. Kutiakov, Krasnaia konnitsa i vozdushynyi fiat v pustyniakh - 1 924 god
( Moscow-Leningrad, 1930 ) .
53. VKP ( b ) , Tatarskii Oblastnoi Komitet, Stenograficheskii otchet IX oblastnoi kon
ferentsii tatarskoi organizatsii R.K.P. ( b) ( Kazan, 1924 ) , 130.
54. Sultan-Galiev, quoted in A. Arsharuni and Kh. Gabidullin, Ocherki panislamizma
i pantiurkizma v Rossii ( [Moscow], 1931 ) , 78-79; see also A. Arsharuni, "Ideo
logiia Sultangalievshchiny," Antireligioznik ( Moscow ) , no. 5 ( 1930 ), 22-29,
and M. Kobetskii, "Sultan-Galievshchina kak apologiia Islama," Antireligioznik,
no. 1 ( 1930 ), 12-16, ( NN ) .
35 0 N O T E S T O CHAPTER VI
55, L. Rubinshtein, V bor'be za leninskuiu natsional'nuiu politiku ( Kazan, 1930 ) ,
75ff.
56. Arsharuni and Gabidullin, Ocherki, 78-86; G. von Mende, Der nationale Kampf
der Russlandtuerken ( Berlin, 1936 ), 158.
57, L. Trotsky, Stalin ( New York, [ 1941] ) , 4 17.
58. Stalin, V, 305.
59. NKID, Sbornik, I, 15-16.
60. Magerovskii, Soiuz, 24.
61. Iakubovskaia, Stroitel'stvo, 130.
62. V. M. Kuritsyn, Gosudarstvennoe sotrudnichestvo mezhdu Ukrainskoi SSR i
RSFSR v 1917-1922 gg. ( Moscow, 1957 ) , 141, 144.
63. S. Gililov, V. I. Lenin - Organizator Sovetskogo mnogonatsional'nogo gosu.
darstva ( Moscow, 1960 ) , 145-46.
64. V. V. Pentkovskaia, "Rol' V. I. Lenina v obrazovanii SSSR," VI, no. 3 ( 1956 ) ,
14-15; Iakubovskaia, Stroitel'stvo, 139-40.
65. Iakubovskaia, Stroitel'stvo, 140-4 1; Pentkovskaia, "Rol' V. I. Lenina," 15; V.
Chirko, Ob"iednavchyi rukh na Ukraini za stvorennia Soiuzu RSR ( Kiev, 1954 ) ,
120,
66. Iakubovskaia, Stroitel'stvo, 130, 14 1-42.
67. See his autobiographical sketch in Entsiklopedicheskii slovar' . . . 'Granat',
XLI, pt. 3, supplement, 47-59.
68. Institut Marksizma-Leninizma pri TsK KPSS, Odinadtsatyi s"ezd RKP ( b } -
stenograficheskii otchet ( Moscow, 1961 ) , 72-75.
69. R. S. Sullivant, Soviet Politics and the Ukraine, 1917-1957 ( New York, 1962 ) ,
passim.
70. NKID, Sbornik, III, 18- 19.
71. Lenin, XXVI, 191; LS, XX ( 1932 ) , 178.
72. NKID, Sbornik, III, g-13; Akademiia Nauk Gruzinskoi SSR, Bor'ba za upro
chenie S ovetskoi vlasti v Gruzii ( Tillis, 1959 ) , 34 7-48; Gililov, V. I. Lenin,
157-58; RKP ( b ) , Dvenadtsatyi s"ezd - stenograficheskii otchet ( Moscow,
1923 ), 152.
73. Bor'ba za uprochenie, 5g-61; Gililov, V. I. Lenin, 151; Iakubovskaia, Stroi
tel'stvo, 131; Dvenadtsatyi s"ezd, 558; Stalin, V, 48.
74. Gililov, V. I. Lenin, 159; V. S. Kirillov and A. Ia. Sverdlov, Grigorii Kon
stantinovich Ordzhonikidze ( Sergo ) - Biografiia ( Moscow, 1962 ) , 158-59;
henceforth referred to as Ordzhonikidze.
75. Bor'ba za uprochenie, 65; Gililov, V. I. Lenin, 161.
76. lakubovskaia, Stroitel'stvo, 48-49; Gililov, V. I. Lenin, 160; Ordzhonikidze,
162-63.
77. Gililov, V. I. Lenin, 160.
78. Ibid., 161.
79. Lenin, Sochineniia, 4th ed., XXXIII ( 1953 ) , 103; Gililov, V. I. Lenin, 161.
Bo. Bor'ha za uprochenie, 38.
8 1. Ibid., 89.
82. Text, ibid., 108- 10.
83. Kommunist ( Kharkov } , no. 238 ( 17 October 1923 ) in M. V, Frunze, Sobranie
sochinenii ( Moscow-Leningrad, 1926 ) , I, 476-78.
84. Speech cited in Zaria vostoka, no. 228, 21 March 1923, reported by E. B.
Genkina, Obrazovanie SSSR, 2nd ed. [Moscow], 1947 ) , 101; Gililov, V. I.
Lenin, 151.
85. Gililov, V. I. Lenin, 151-52.
86. Ordzhonikidze, 171; Bor'ba za uprochenie, 1 17.
87. Lenin, XXV, 624; this letter is not reproduced in Stalin's Collected Works.
88. Pentkovskaia, "Rol' V. I. Lenina," 17.
89. My reconstruction rests partly on Iakubovskaia, Stroitel'stvo, 144, 148, and
Pentkovskaia, "Rol' V. I. Lenina," 17, and partly on Lenin's and Stalin's letters
of 27 September 1922, referred to below ( see note 99 ) .
go. S. S . Gililov, "Razrabotka V . I . Leninym printsipov stroitel'stva mnogonatsio-
THE E S TA B L I S HM E N T O F THE U S S R 35 1
nal'nogo Sovetskogo gosudarstva," Akademiia Obshchestvennykh Nauk pri TsK
KPSS, 0 deiatel'nosti V. I. Lenina v 1 9 1 7-1922 gody - Sbornik Statei ( Mos
cow, 1958 ), 76; Gililov, V. I. Lenin, 165-66; Ordzhonikidze, 171.
91. Borba za uprochenie, 1 17.
92. lakubovskaia, Stroitel'stvo, 145.
93. First published in Sotsialisticheskii vestnik, no. 2/48 ( 17 January 1923 ) , 19;
reprinted, with a record of the vote, in Borba za uprochenie, 1 16-17.
94. Pentkovskaia, "Roi' V. I. Lenina," 17; Iakubovskaia, Stroitel'stvo, 145-46.
95. Gililov, V. I. Lenin, 167; Iakubovskaia, Stroitel'stvo, 146.
96. Iakubovskaia, Stroitel'stvo, 151-52.
97. Pentkovskaia, "Rol' V. I. Lenina," 17; Iakubovskaia, Stroitel'stvo, 148-49;
Gililov, V. I. Lenin, 169.
98. lakubovskaia, Stroitel'stvo, 149.
99. Lenin's memorandum is reproduced in LS, XXXVI ( 1959 ) , 496-g8; Stalin's has
not been published in full, but can be found in the Trotsky Archive, T-755.
Both documents are dated 27 September 1922.
100. Lenin, Sochineniia, 4th ed., XXXIII, 335.
101. The revised project, accepted by the Plenum on 6 October, is reproduced in
Bor'ba za uprochenie, 117-18.
102. Ordzhonikidze, 172; Gililov, V. I. Lenin, 175.
103. Dvenadtsatyi s"ezd, 536; Stalin, V, 433.
104. Sotsialisticheskii vestnik, 17 January 1923; cf. L. Beriia, K voprosu ob istorii
Bol'shevistskikh organizatsii v Zakavkaz'e, 7th ed. ( [Moscow], 1948 ) , 245.
105. Dvenadtsatyi s"ezd, 464.
106. Gililov, V. I. Lenin, 175-76.
107. Beriia, K voprosu, 243-44; Gililov, V. I. Lenin, 174-76; Iakubovskaia, Stroi
tel'stvo, 154; Ordzhonikidze, 172-73.
108. Sotsialisticheskii vestnik, 17 January 1923, 19; Gililov, V. I. Lenin, 176.
109. Sotsialisticheskii vestnik, 17 January 1923, 19; Beriia, K voprosu, 245-46. L.
Schapiro observes ( The Communist Party of the Soviet Union, London, 1960,
227 ) that this letter is not reprinted in Lenin's Collected Works; but it should
be noted that it is listed in the complete catalogue of Lenin's published writings,
Institut Marksizma-Leninizma, Khronologicheskii ukazatel' proizvedenii V. I.
Lenina ( Moscow, 1959-62 ) , II, no. 10,276. See also L. Trotsky, Stalin ( New
York, [ 194 1] ) , 357.
1 10. Sotsialisticheskii vestnik, 17 January 1923, 19.
1 1 1. Ibid.; Dvenadtsatyi s"ezd, 156-57; Iakubovskaia, Stroitel'stvo, 154-55; Gililov,
V. I. Lenin, 177,
1 12. Sotsialisticheskii vestnik, 17 January 1923, 19; Dvenadtsatyi s"ezd, 158; Gi1ilov,
V. I. Lenin, 178-79.
1 13. Bor'ba za uprochenie, 1 18-20.
1 14. Iakubovskaia, Stroitel'stvo, 160.
1 15. Ibid.
1 16. Carr, The Bolshevik Revolution, I, 397.
1 17. Pravda, 30 December 1922; S. I. Iakubovskaia, Ob"edinitel'noe dvizhenie za
obrazovanie SSSR ( [Moscow] , 1947 ), 194.
1 18. TsIK, SSSR, I s"ezd sovetov Soiuza Sovetskikh Sotsialisticheskikh Republik -
stenograficheskii otchet ( Moscow, 1923 ) .
1 19. Ibid., 19.
120. Ibid., 8-1 1.
121. Genkina, Obrazovanie SSSR, 123; Iakubovskaia, Stroitel'stvo, 193,
122. Based on figures supplied in RKP ( b ) , TsK, Statisticheskii otdel, RKP ( b ) v
tsifrakh ( Moscow, 1924ff ) , Vypusk I, table 6, p. 5 ( NN ) .
123. VKP ( b ) , Desiatyi s"ezd RKP( b ) ( Moscow, 1933 ), 206-07; speech of Zatonskii.
124. I. P. Trainin, "K postanovke natsional'nogo voprosa," VS, no. 5 ( 1923 ) , 29.
125. TsK, RKP ( b ) , Rossiiskaia Kommunisticheskaia Partiia ( bol'shevikov ) , 330-3 1;
Stalin, V, 40.
126. Ordzhonikidze, 174-77.
35 2 NOTE S TO CHAPTER VI
127. Dvenadtsatyi s"ezd, 157; L. A. Fotieva, "Iz vospominanii o V. I. Lenine,"
Voprosy istorii KPSS, no. 4 ( 1957 ), 159;· "Novyi dokument o zhizni i deiatel'
nosti V. I. Lenina," ibid., no. 2 ( 1963 ), 71.
128. lzvestiia, 17 November 1922; Fotieva, "Iz vospominanii," 158-59; "Novyi doku-
ment," 71.
129. "Novyi dokument," 69.
130. Ibid., 74.
131. Ibid., 76.
132. Ibid., 77; Fotieva, "Iz vospominanii," 150.
133. Ordzhonikidze, 177-78.
134. The incident is described in Ordzhonikidze, 175-76.
135. "Novyi dokument," 77.
136. Fotieva, "Iz vospominanii," 159.
137. "Novyi dokument," 69, 77.
138. Magerovskii, Soiuz, 56-57.
139. Dvenadtsatyi s"ezd, 150, 1 59; Bor'ba za uprochenie, 146.
140. G. K. Ordzhonikidze, Stat'i i rechi ( Moscow, 1956-57 ), I, 266.
141. Fotieva, "Iz vospominanii," 156, 158.
142. See this book, pp. 285-86.
143. Fotieva, "Iz vospominanii," 161-62.
144. "Novyi dokument," 90-91.
145. Ibid., 84, 91; Fotieva, "Iz vospominanii," 162-63.
146. Stalin, V, 143. Cf. Genkina, Obrazovanie SSSR, 125ff and V. I. Ignat'ev,
Sovet National'nostei TsIK SSSR ( Moscow-Leningrad, 1926 ) .
147. Cf. J. Stalin, Marxism and the National Question (New York, 1942 ) , 134, 142;
Iakubovskaia, Stroitel'stvo, 198-99.
148. "Novyi dokument," 91.
149. Sotsialisticheskii vestnik, no. 23/24 { 69/70 ) , 17 March 1923, 15. Copy in Trotsky
Archive, T-787. Trotsky's reply is in Stalin School of Falsification ( New York,
1937 ), 71.
150. Trotsky Archive, T-794.
151. Sotsialisticheskii vestnik, no. 23/24 ( 69/70 ) , 17 March 1923, 15. Trotsky
Archive, T-788.
152. See his circular to the members of .the Central Committee of 16 April 1923 in
the Trotsky Archive, T-794.
153. Dvenadtsatyi s"ezd, 150-59.
154. Ibid., 185-86.
155. Stalin, Marxism, 137-57.
156. Stalin, V, 264-65.
157. Trotsky, Stalin, 357.
158. Dvenadtsatyi s"ezd, 523; cf. ibid., 548.
159. Ibid., 529.
160. Ibid., 53 1-32.
161. See his constitutional project in V. I. Ignat'ev, Sovetskii stroi, Vyp. I ( Moscow
Leningrad, 1928 ) , 115-19, and his theoretical analysis in Soiuz Sotsialisticheskikh
Sovetskikh Respublik - Novyi etap v Sovetskom soiuznom stroitel'stve ( Kharkov,
1923 ) . The latter contains a critique of the Union constitution.
162. Dvenadtsatyi s"ezd, 532-34.
INDEX
Abkhazians,212 Austria, 2, 23, 24, 36; national question,
Adalet Party (Persian Communist), 218, 24-28
220,229 "Autonomisation," 270-271, 272, 281,
Adzhars,212 282-283
Aharonian,Avetis ( c. 1864-1948),216 Autonomous Regions and Republics, see
Akhil Bek,257 Russia,Soviet
Akhundov,R.,268 Autonomy, cultural, 24, 25, 31, 33, 34,
Akmolinsk,172 37,40,42,77,78
Akselrod, Pavel Borisovich ( 1850-1928), Avar people,16
34 Azerbaijan, 79, 194, 204-208, 210, 212,
Aktiubinsk,173 214, 216, 217, 221, 223, 224, 253,
Akushinskii,Ali Khadzi,216 254, 266, 279; establishment of Soviet
Alash-Orda Party (Kazakh-Kirghiz), .84, rule, 224, 225-229; foreign relations,
85,86,89,108,162,172,173-175 254; integration into USSR, 253, 271;
Aleksandropol,193,231,232 National Council, 204-206; national
Alexander I,4,8 movement, 20, 99, 100, 104-105, 202;
Alexander II,2,7 Parliament ( December 1918), 206;
American Relief Mission ( Armenia), 209 political parties, 15, 99-100, 106, 204-
Anatolia,12, 101,221, 231, 236; Eastern, 205
18,101,210,231 Azerbaijani people, 8, 12-13, 16, 96, 99-
Andi,96 101, 194, 195, 199, 200, 202, 203, 205
Ankara,240 Azerbaijani Soviet Socialist Republic,see
Antonov-Ovseenko, Vladimir Aleksan Azerbaijan
drovich ( 1884-purged, died in exile,
1939), 120, 124, 126, 127, 128, 130, Bai1ev, Frederick Marshman, Lieut�nant
140,184 Colonel ( 1882-1967),-180
Araks River,16,208 Baisun,258
Ardahan,106,107 Baitursunov, Akhmed ( 1872-?), 84, 173,
Armenia, 7, 8, 17, 156, 208-210, 212, 174,262
217, 223, 230, 239, 240, 271; estab Bakhchisarai,13, 79,81
lishment of Soviet rule, 227, 230-234; Baku, 14, 15, 98, 100, 101, 104, 105,
National Conference, 102; National 106, 156, 19,3, 195, lQg-204, 217, 218,
Council ( Tulis), 102; national move 225, 230, 231. 2f:7; British occupation,
ment, 18-19, 101, 202; political par 206-207; establishment of Communist
ties, 19, 101, 102, 106; Provisional Mil led Baku Commune ( 1918), 199-204;
itary Revolutionary Committee, 232, Executive Committee of Soviet ( Ispol
233 kom), 199, 200; Moslems, 200, 205;
Armenian Corps,102 oil industries, 13, 201, 202, 207-208,
Armenians, 2, 8, 16-17, 20, 47, 99, 101, 226; political parties, 199-200, 206;
107, 176, 194, 195, 199-20 0, 201, 205, Turkish occupation of, 204, 205, 206;
206,208,209,216 Communist coup ( 1920), 224, 225-
Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic, see 229
Armenia Balkariia,223
Artem, Fedor Andreevich ( 1883-1921), Barudi, Alimdzhan,77
127,136,140,144,165 Bashkiriia, 86, 108, 161-168, 170, 247-
Ashkhabad,181 248, 270, 279; Congress, First ( Oren
Astrakhan, 1, 158, 172, 201, 207-208, burg, July 1917), 86; Congress of
220 Soviets, First ( 1920), 168; national
354 INDEX
movement, 85, 163-164, 166-167; Ob Buachidze, Noi (Samuil) (1882-killed
kom, role of (Regional Committee of 1918), 197
Communist Party), 164-168; political Bubnov, Andrei Sergeevich (1883-
parties, 85, 161; Revolutionary Com purged, perished 1940), 139, 148
mittee (Bashrevkom), 162, 164, 165, Budenny, Semen Mikhailovich ( 1883-
166, 167, 168, 170; Society for Aid to, ), 238
165; uprising of 1920, 166-168 Bukeikhanov, Alikhan Nurmagometovich
Bashkir Republic, Autonomous (Soviet), (1869-?), 84
see Bashkiriia Bukhara, 4, 13, 177, 183-184, 255-260;
Bashkirs, 1, 13, 51, 77, 79, 82, 85, 86, integration into USSR, 255
164,166 Bukhara, Emir of, 175, 176-177, 184,
Basmachi Movement ( Basmachestvo), 256, 258-259
176-180, 256-260; see also Turkestan Bukharan People's Soviet Republic, see
Basmachis, 178, 180, 181, 183, 184, 262 Bukhara
Batum, 15, 106, 107, 194, 197, 207, 208, Bukharin, Nikolai lvanovich (1888-exe
211, 217, 239, 240, 257 cuted by Soviet regime 1938),47, 109,
Bauer, Otto (1881-1938 ), 25-27, 28, 36, 110, 274, 290
38-39, 40, 41, 42, 46 Bund (Jewish), 14, 27-28, 34, 37, 75,
Belaia Tserkov, 138 142,244
Belorussia, 245, 250, 251, 252, 253-254,
271, 272, 273; Belorussian national Catherine the Great,2,190
congress (December 14, 1917), 75, Catholicos (Armenian), 19
150, 151; Belorussian National Re Caucasian Bureau, see Communist Party,
public, proclamation of (March 1918), Russia (RKP(b))
151; Council of Commissars, Western Caucasian Mountain peoples (Gortsy), 2,
Region, 74; early history, 59; German 16, 94, 155, 195-196, 197; Gortsy con
occupation (1918), 151-152; Great gress,first (May 1917), 96-97
Rada, 24, 74; integration into the Caucasian Mountains,15,94,210
RSFSR, 253-254, 271, 272; Military Caucasus, 5, 7, 17, 211, 217; British in
Council, 74; National Committee, 73- tervention in, 180; Council of Defense,
74, 152; national movement, 11-12, 216; demography, 15-17, 94-96; es
73, 75, 150-154; political parties, 11- tablishment of Soviet rule, 217-241;
12, 73, 75, 150-152; provisional gov national movements, 20-21, 37, 96-98,
ernment (February 1918), 151; Rada, 214-216; Northern, 2, 15-16, 20, 51,
52, 74, 108, 151; see also Belorussians; 76, 79, 93, 95, 105-106, 108, 198, 199,
Lithuanian-Belorussian Soviet Repub 207, 208, 214, 215-216, 225, 295; oc
lic; specific political parties by name cupation by Whites, 214-216; political
Belorussians, 2, 9 parties, 34, 38, 99, 194, 216; revolu
Belorussian Socialist (or Revolutionary) tionary committee of Northern, 223;
Hromada, 11, 28, 73, 74, 75 see also Transcaucasia
Bicherakov, Grigorii, Colonel (d. 1952), The Caucasus and Its Significance for
203-204 Soviet Russia, 217
Bobruisk, 151 Central Asia, 13, 51, 79, 81, 85, 86, 87,
Bolshevik Party, see Communist Party, 91, 168, 172, 179, 180, 257, 258, 259,
Russia (RKP(b)) 260, 295; Congress of Soviets, Fourth
Bolshevism, see Communism; Lenin; So Regional, 175; see also Turkestan
cial Democratic Labor Party (Russia); Centralism, 242, 296; see also Lenin;
Stalin Russia, Soviet; Stalin
Borchalo, 210, 237, 239 Central Moslem Military College,169
Borotbisty, see Socialist Revolutionary Central Powers, 46, 106, 118, 130, 132,
Fighters Party Ukraine; Communist 142,180-181,193,205,221
Party, Ukraine ( Borotbist) Chardzhou,184
Brest-Litovsk Treaty, 106, 107, 108, 118, Chechen people, 51, 94, 95-96, 97, 98,
130, 132, 193, 194 155,195,198
Briukhanov, Nikolai Pavlovich ( 1878-?), Chechnia, 96,214,223
251 Cheka, 180,198,265,269
Broido, Grigorii Isaakovich (1885-?), 89 Chelibiev, Chelibidzhan (1885-executed
Bruenn Congress (1899), see Social by Communists 1918),79,80,81,185
Democratic Labor Party, Austria Cherkess people, 95, 212
INDEX 355
Chernigov, 64, 73, 119, 124, 136 160-161; Central Committee, 80, 81,
Chernomore, 15 106, 130, 135, 136, 140, 141, 144, 145,
Chernov, Viktor Mikhailovich ( 1873- 147,160,181,217, 224,234,244,245-
1952 ), 31 246, 252, 264, 266, 267, 269, 270, 274,
Chicherin, Grigorii Vasilevich ( 1872- 275,281,288-289,290; "Circular letter
1936), 140, 141, 225, 236, 253, 273, to All Organizations of the Communist
275 Party of Turkestan," 182; Conference,
Chkalov province,81-82 Eighth (December 1919), 147-148;
Chkheidze, Nikolai Semenovich ( 1864- Congress (April 1917), 274; Congress,
1926),99,216 Eighth (March 1919), 109, 110, 245;
Chkhenkeli, Akaki Ivanovich ( c. 1879- Congress, Ninth (April 1920), 171;
1959), 37, 106, 193, 212 Congress,Tenth (1921),279-280; Con
Chokaev, Mustafa (1890-1941), 88, 92, gress, Eleventh (March 1922), 265;
93,176 Congress, Twelfth (April 1923), 265,
Chuvash Autonomous Region,171-172 287, 290-293; Crimean Regional Com
Chuvash people,1,159,171 mittee, 189, Donets-Krivoi Rog Re
Civil War, Russian, 81-82, 89, 107, 108, gional Committee, 245; federalism in,
113, 125, 158, 163, 166, 179, 181, 183, 244, 245; Great Russian Nationalism,
187, 191, 195, 198, 207, 214, 215,217, 277-280; nationalist communism, 260-
235, 246, 247,248, 251, 259, 260, 279, 262; national origin of membership,
294,295 277-278; and the national question,33,
Communism, 51, 53,72,86, 92, 148, 164, 36-38, 41, 47, 49, 52, 108-111, 145,
246, 265; see also Lenin; Socialism; 149-150, 242, 295, 296; Northwestern
Stalin Regional Committee, 74, 152, 245;
Communist Party, Armenia, 231, 233, Party Program ( 1919), 243, 245, 277;
245,271,273 Southwestern Regional Committee,
Communist Party, Azerbaijan, 219-221, 245; Transcaucasian Regional Commit
222,227,230,245,253, 271- 272, 273; tee, 105-106, 218, 219, 220, 224, 225,
see also Baku 234, 245, 268, 271-272, 275, 288;
Communist Party, Bashkiriia, 163-164, Turkestan Committee, 245; Turkbiuro,
165, 169; regional conference, :first 259; see also Adalet Party; Communist
( November 1919), 164-165 Parties of specific states and provinces;
Communist Party, Belorussia ( KP ( b)B), Gummet Party; Moslem Socialist Com
74, 150, 151, 152 mittee; Social Democratic Labor Par
Communist Party, Caucasus, 96, 98, 216, ties
219-220, 224-225; see also Communist Communist Party, Tatar, 168, 169, 260,
Party,Armenia; Communist Party,Az 262; in Kazan, 170-172; Second Con
erbaijan; Communist Party, Georgia; ference of Eastern Communists ( No
Communist Party, Terek vember 1919), 170
Communist Party, Crimea, 80-81, 185, Communist Party, Terek, 196, 197, 198
186; Executive Committee, 185-186; Communist Party, Transcaucasia, 100,
First All-Crimean Party Conference 103-104, 105-106, 193, 278; Congress,
( November 17, 1917), 81; Regional First ( October 1917), 105
Party Congress ( 1921), 190 Communist Party, Turkestan, 88, 89, 92,
Communist Party, Georgia, 104, 197-198, 93, 184, 245, 256
211,218, 219, 228, 234, 245, 266, 273; Communist Party, Ukraine ( KP ( b)U),
Central Committee, 267-269, 271, 273, 63, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 108, 114, 115-
274-275, 281, 287, 290 116, ll7, 118, 119, 126-136, 138-139,
Communist Party, Latvia, 245 140, 143, 144-147, 148, 245, 252, 278;
Communist Party, Lithuania, 245 Central Committee, 128, 133, 134, 136,
Communist Party, Russia (RKP{b) ), 30, 141,144,147,245; Central Revolution
40, 46, go, 98, 104-105, 132, 137, 140, ary Committee, 133, 134-135, 139;
142, 144, 149, 151, 1 54, 156, 161, 163, Congress, First (June 1918), 132, 134-
166, 174, 184, 221, 242, 243-245, 247, 135, 144; Congress, Second ( October
248, 253, 260, 288-289, 294; Baku Bu 1918), 136, 139; Federalist group in,
reau of Regional Committee, 227; Cau 146, 147; Gomel Conference ( Novem
casian Bureau ( Kavbiuro), 224-225, ber 1919), 145, 147; Kharkov, 123,
226,229,232, 235, 26 6-269, 290; Cen 124,125,127,128,129,130,131; Kiev,
tral Bureau of Moslem Organizations, 69-72, 114-115, 121, 123, 127, 128,
INDEX
129, 131, 139; Taganrog Conference Denikin, Anton Ivanovich, General
(Ukrainian) (April 1918), 132, 134 ( 1872-1947), 138, 143, 144, 153, 188,
Communist Party, Ukraine ( Borotbist) 189, 206, 209, 214, 215, 216, 219, 220,
(UKP), 134, 146, 148, 152 295
Congress of Peoples of the East ( Baku, Derbent, 205,225
1920)' 229, 232, 256--257 Dilizhan,232
Congress of Soviets,All-Russian, 52, 155; Diushambe,258,259
Central Executive Committee (VTsIK), Dnieper River region,2,9,114, 129, 149,
243,247,249,250,252,253, 264,271- 153
273, 276; Third (January 1918), 111, Donets-Krivoi Rog Soviet Republic, 130,
243; Tenth ( December 1922), 275 131; Congress of Soviets,123
Congress of Soviets,Union of Soviet So Donets River region,129,130,131
cialist Republics: First ( December Don River region, 11, 15, 94, 119, 120,
1922), 275-276; Second (January 127,136,140
1924),293 Doroshenko, Dmytro I. ( 1882-?), 66--67
Congress of Ukrainian Workers, 59, 62, Dro,233
67 Duma, 14, 30, 58, 76; first, 7, 14-15, 17,
Constituent Assembly, All-Russian, 52, 84; second,14-15,84; third,17-18
56, 61, 63, 75, 78, 89, go, 100, 102, Dunsterville, Lionel Charles, Major Gen
103, 104, 109, 122, 157, 158, 169, 172 eral ( 1865-1946), 180, 2'cfa-203, 204
Constitutional Democratic Party (Kadets), Dutov, Ataman Aleksandr Ilich ( 1864-
11, 15, 29, 61, 63, 76, 77, Bo, 84, 89, 1922),86,162,172,175,181
107 Dzerzhinskii,Feliks Edmuntovich ( 1877-
Cossacks, 2, g, 20, 51, 66, 83, 86, 106, 1926),48,281, 283-284, 286,287,288
108, 143, 148; Don, 97, 118, 170; Dzhemal Pasha (1872-assassinated 1922),
Kuban, 97; Southeastern Union of, 93, 256,257
97, 108; Terek, 94, 95-96, 97, 195, Dzhulfa,193
197; see also Ukrainians Dzhunaid Khan,257
Crimea, 2, 12, 13, 79-81, 108, 132, 184-
192; Communist regime in, 185-186, Ekaterinoslav, 63, 73, 115, 116, 119,123,
188-192, 261, 271; Congress of So 129, 130, 131, 132, 134
viets, First Regional ( Simferopol, Eliava, Shalva Zurabovich ( 1855-purged,
March 1918 ), 79, 186, 187; German executed 1937), 181, 271
occupation of, 187-188; Mufti of, 188; Elisavetpol, 15, 100, 204, 205, 228
national movement, 186, 187, 188; po Engels, Friedrich ( 1820-1895), 21; see
litical parties, 80-81, 185-191; Revolu also Marx, Karl
tionary Committee ( Revkom), 185, Enver Pasha ( 1881-1922), 256--260, 263
Vakuf Commission, 188; see also Erivan, 15, 209, 231, 232, 233, 239;
Tatars, Crimean Treaty of ( 1920), 233
Crimean Soviet Socialist Republic, see Erzerum,106,210
Crimea Erzinjan,106
Crimean Tatar National Party ( Milli Estonia, 3,107-108
Firka), 79, 80, 185, 187, 188, 189;
Central Committee, 188
Curzon, George Nathaniel, Lord ( 1859- Far Eastern People's Republic,255
1925),216 Federalism, 30, 34, 65, 77, 78, 100, 105,
Cyril and Methodius Society,10 111, 242, 246, 247, 263, 276
Czech people,24,160,170 Feodosiia,81
Ferghana Valley,175,177,178,179,183,
Daghestan, 15, 16, 93, 95, 96, 205, 208, 184,257,260
214,223,225,229,230,239 Finland, 2, 3, 4, 5, 29, 43, 56, 108, 254;
Dashnaks,see Dashnaktsutiun Party Seim ( Diet, Tsarist), 3, 7; Senate
Dashnaktsutiun ( Fede_ration) Party, 1g- (Tsarist), 3
20, 28, 98, 101, 102, 200, 201, 204, Finns, 1, 2, 7; see also Chuvash people;
206, 209, 212, 230,231, 232, 233, 234, Mordva
239; regional conference (April 1917), Frumkin,M. I. (1878-purged,died 1939),
102 237
Declaration of Rights of the Toiling and Frunze, Mikhail Vasilevich ( 1885-1925),
Exploited People ( 1918),242-243 165, 172, 183, 184, 264, 268, 270, 272
INDEX 357
Galicia, 8, 10, 138, 142, 153 Hromady, 10
Galpem, Aleksandr Iakovlevich ( 1879- Hrushevskii, Mikhail Sergeevich ( 1866-
1956), 64 1934), 54, 55, 59
Gandzha, see Elisavetpol Hryhoryiv, Ataman ( killed 1919), 142,
Gasprinskii, Ismail Bey ( 1851-1914), 13, 143
79
Gegechkori, Evgenii Petrovich ( 1879- Ibragimov, Galimdzhan ( 1887-1927?),
1954)' 103, 212 158
Gekker, Anatolii Markovich, General, Ibragimov, Veli ( executed by Soviet re
224, 235, 236, 238, 239 gime 1928), 188
Georgia, 17, 95, 106, 207, 208, 210-214, Ibrahim-Bek ( executed by Soviet regime
216, 218, 219, 220, 223, 254, 270, 281- 1931), 184, 257, 258, 259, 260
282, 283-285, 287, 288-290; Commu Ingushetia, 214, 223
nist opposition, 263, 266-269, 270, 271, Ingush people, 51, 94, 95-96, 97, 98, 195,
273-274, 281-282, 287-290, 291; So 197-198
viet conquest, 224, 227, 230, 234-241, Inogorodnye, 94, 96, 97, 98
254, 257, 269; Congress of Soviets, Inorodtsy, 5; see also specific ethnic
First ( February 1922), 268; National groups and peoples
Assembly, 212; National Council, 194- Ioffe, Adolf Abramovich ( 1883-1927),
195; national movement, 17-18, 99, 252
202, 212-213; political parties, 18, 194, Irgach, 178
212; Revolutionary Committee ( Rev Irkutsk ( province), 5
kom), 238, 240-241, 245, 268, 269 Iskhakov, Gaijaz ( 1878-1954 ), 15
Georgians, 2, 16-17, 20, 34, 94, 99, 107, Istanbul ( Constantinople), 221
194, 195, 207 Ittifak Party, 15, 76, 77
Georgian Soviet Socialist Republic, see Ittihad, 88, 91
Georgia Iumagulov, Kh., 165
German Army, 73, 132, 133-134, 180, Ivan IV ( The Terrible), 1, 12
211
Gikalo ( purged, disappeared 1937), 223 Jadidist movement, 14, 77, 88, 177, 183-
Gittis, 237 184, 191, 256, 258
Goloshchekin, Filipp Isaevich ( 1876- Jewish Socialist Labor Party ( SERP), 28,
purged, disappeared in the 193o's), 31
181 Jews, 2, 5, 6, 7, 16, 29, 34, 36, 38, 58,
Gomel, 145, 147 74, 92, 143, 152; see also Bund
Gorskaia Respublika ( Mountain Repub-
lic), 223-234 Kabakhidze, A., 281
Gorter, Hermann ( 1864-1927), 49 Kabarda, 223
Gortsy, see Caucasian Mountain peoples Kabardians, 94, 95
Gotsinskii, Nazhmudin ( c. 1865-?), 97, Kadets, see Constitutional Democratic
229 Party
Grazis, Karl, 170 Kaledin, Ataman Aleksei Maksimovich
Grebenka, 125 ( 1861-suicide 1918), 118, 127
Grodno, 5 Kalinin, Mikhail Ivanovich ( 1875-1946),
Groznyi, 95, 97, 195 273
Gubemie, see· Russia, Tsarist Kalmykov, B., 223
Gummet Party ( Moslem Socialist), 218, Kalmyks, 94
220, 229 Kama River, 82
Guseinov, M. D., 253, 268 Kamenev, Lev Borisovich (1883-executed
by Soviet regime 1936), 136, 166, 262,
Hadzhinskii, M. Hasan, 226 273, 274, 282, 289
Halil Pasha ( c. 1881-?), 222, 226-227, Kamenev, Sergei Sergeevich, General
256 ( 1881-1936), 236, 238
Hamdan, 257 Kantemir, 216
Harbord, James Guthrie, Major General Karabakh, 208, 210, 228
( 1866-1947), 209 Karaites ( Crimean), 187 __
Hilferding, Rudolf ( 1877-killed by Ger Karakul Bek, 257
mans 1941), 49 Kars, 15, 106, 107, 208, 232, 233; Treaty
Hnchak ( Clarion) Party, 19 of, 234, 240
INDEX
Katkhanov, 223 ecuted by Communists 1920 ) , 161,
Kautsky, Karl ( 1854-1938 ) , 35-36, 47 162, 172, 181, 295
Kavbiuro, see Communist Party, Russia, Kolesov, 91, 177
Caucasian Bureau Kollontai, Aleksandra Mikhailovna (1872-
Kavtaradze, 282 1 952 ) , 48
Kazak, 84 Kommunist, 47
Kazakh-Kirghiz, 13, 5 1, 8 1-82, 83, 155, Kommunist ( Baku ) , 230
171-174, 182, 255, 257; conference Kommunist ( Tillis ) , 235
( Aktiubinsk, January 1920 ) , 173; Con Korkmasov, D., 223
ference, All-Kazakh ( Orenburg, April Korovnichenko, General ( executed by
1917 ) , 84, 85, 172; Congress of So Communists in 1917 or 1918 ) , go, 175
viets, First, 173-174; Kirghiz Congress Kossior ( Kosior ) , Stanislav Vikentevich
( Orenburg ) , 172; Kirghiz Revolution ( 1889-executed by Communist regime
ary Committee ( Kirrevkom ) , 172-173; 1939 ) , u8
national movements in, 85, 86, 172- Kossovskii, Vladimir ( 1870-? ) , 28
174 ; political parties, 172, 173, 174; Kotsiubinskii, lurii M., 140
revolt ( 1916 ) , 83-84, 85 Kovalevskii, Mykola, 55
Kazakh-Kirghiz Autonomous Republic, Kovno, 5
see Kazakh-Kirghiz Krasin, Leonid Borisovich ( 1870-1926 ) ,
Kazakh region ( Azerbaijan ) , 232, 233 235, 237, 25 1
Kazakh, see Kazakh-Kirghiz Krestinskii, Nikolai Nikolaevich ( 1883-
Kazan, 1, 14, 156, 158, 159, 169, 170, executed 1938 ), 253
171; Gubispolkom, 171; Moslem Com Krivoi Rog region, 129
missariat, 59; Revolutionary Staff, 159, Krylenko, Nikolai Vasilevich ( 1885-
169; Shura, 159, 169 purged, disappeared 19:18 ) , 1 19
Kazim Karabekir Pasha ( 1882-? ) , 222 Krym, Solomon S. ( 1867-? ) , 187
Kemal Pasha ( Atatiirk ) ( 188 1-1938 ) , Kuban, 15, 94, 1 19, 120
2 10, 232 Kuibyshev, Valerian Vladimirovich ( 1888-
Kerensky, Alexander Fedorovich ( 188 1- 1935 ) , 18 1, 289
) , 58, 60, 63, 65, 68 Kumyks, 94
Khan-Khoiskii, Fathali ( 1876-executed Kura River, 12, 16, 227
1 920 ) , 204, 206, 225, 226, 228 Kuropatkin, Aleksei Nikolaevich, General
Kharkov, 10, 63, 73, 1 15, 1 16, 1 19, 120, ( 1848-1921 ) , 89
122, 123, 126, 127, 129, 130, 131, 132, Kursk, 139, 140
142, 252; Revolutionary Committee Kurultai, see Tatars, Crimean
( Revkom ) , 127, 129 Kutais, 15, 212, 239
Kherson, 73, 1 1 5, 123, 129 Kvantaliani, 226
Khiva, 4, 13, 86, 177, 178, 181, 255, 257 Kviring, Emmanuil Ionovich ( 1888-
Khmelnitskii, Bohdan ( c. 1593-1657 ) , 56 purged, perished 1939 ) , 136, 144
Khodorovskii, Iosif Isaevich ( 1885-? ) ,
170, 171 Lakai, 259
Khodzhent, 257 Lapchinskii, G. F., 145-146
Khorezm People's Republic, see Khiva Latvia, 108, 251, 252, 253
Khristiuk, Pavel, 55, 67 Latvians, 2
Kiev, 4-5, 1 1, 53 -54, 56, 59, 63, 64, 66, Legran, 232, 233
1 14, 1 19, 122-123, 125, 129, 130, 137, Lemberg, 1 1
138, 139, 140, 142, 143, 227, 252; So Lenin, Vladimir Ilich ( 1870-1924 ) , 32,
viet, 57, 58, 68, 70, 72, 1 14, 1 16, 117, 51, 69, 106, 108, 1 18, 1 19, 121, 123,
1 19 127, 128, 132, 133, 1 3 5, 140, 143, 144,
Kirghiz, see Kazakh-Kirghiz 147, 148, 153, 156, 164, 166, 170, 173,
Kirghiz Republic ( Autonomous ) , see Ka 174, 183, 197, 201, 202, 224, 226, 227,
zakh-Kirghiz 229, 230, 23 2, 23 5-238, 23 9, 240-241,
Kirov, Sergei Mironovich ( 1888-assas 245, 251, 253, 264-265, 266, 267, 268-
sinated 1934 ), 223, 224, 227, 228, 234- 269, 270, 272, 274, 275, 287, 288-290,
235, 239, 271 29 1-293; on centralism, 244; on fed
Kobzar ( Taras Shevchenko ) , 10 eralism, 36, 43, 1 12, 1 13, 246, 276;
Kokand, 86, 92, 174-176; conquest by on Great Russian nationalism, 273, 283;
Soviets, 108 on Imperialism, 47, 48-49; Memoran
Kolchak, Aleksandr Vasilevich ( 1874-ex- dum on the National Question ( 1922 ) ,
INDEX 359
282-287, 289-290, 291, 292; on na Mensheviks, 30, 71, 75, 80, 81, 88, 89,
tionalism, 68, 244, 2g6; on the national 98, 99, 104, 105, 124, 156, 186, 193,
question, 34-42, 49, 109, 272-273, 196, 198, 201-202, 218, 236, 242, 244,
276-289; on self-determination, 41-49, 269; Liquidators, August 1912 Confer
108-111,155, 242, 283; on separatism, ence of, 34; national question, 33, 34,
44,45,68 36,47,111
Levandovskii, General ( purged, disap Mglinskii (county),64
peared 1937),224,239 Miasnikov,A. F. ( 1886-1925),270
Liberation of Labor, 32 Mikoyan,Anastas Ivanovich (1895- ),
Life of the Nationalities (Zhizn' Natsional' 218,230
nostei),169 Miller,Zhan,80
Lithuania, 5, 74, 107-108, 153-154, 245, Milli Firka, see Crin1ean Tatar National
251,252,253 Party
Lithuanian-Belorussian Soviet Republic Minsk,151
(Litbel),153 Mitskevich-Kapsukas, Vikenti Semeno
Lithuanians,2 vich ( 1880-1935), 153, 281
Livonia,3 Molotov,Viacheslav Mikhailovich
Lloyd George, David ( 1863-1945), 237 ( 1890- ), 270
Lossow,General van,194 Mongolians,2
Lukomskii, Aleksandr Sergeevich, Gen Mordva,1
eral ( 1868-1939), 215 Moslem Bureaus ( Musbiuro ), 158, 160;
Lunacharskii, Anatoli Vasilevich ( 1877- Crimean,188
1933),48 Moslem Congress, All-Russian, 1905-
"Luxemburgism," 23,42,46 1906, 14; First ( May 1, 1917), 76-78,
Luxemburg, Rosa ( 1870-assassinated 81, 85, 100, 162; Second ( Kazan, July
1919) ' 22, 41, 46 21, 1917), 78; Executive Council
Lvov, Prince Georgii Evgenevich ( 1861- ( Shura), 78; Religious Administration,
1925), 54 77
Moslem Democratic Party Mussavat ( or
Maiorov,M.,132 Musavat), 15, 98, 99-101, 104, 107,
Makharadze, Filipp Ieseevich ( 1868- 194,195,199,205,206,226
1941)' 105, 219, 234, 235, 238, 263, Moslem Movement, All-Russian ( 1917),
269, 274, 282, 289, 290 14-15, 20, 75-79, 155-161, 168, 169,
Makhno, Nestor Ivanovich ( 1889-1934), 192; Constituent Assembly (Medzhilis),
142, 143 78-79, 156, 158, 159, 191; and the
Maksudov,Saadri Nizaip.utdinovich Czech rebellion, 160; Executive Coun
( 1879-19 57), 14-15 cil ( Shura), 156-157; factions in Med
Malleson, Sir Wilfred, Major General zhilis, 158; and the national question,
( 1866-1946),180,181 75-76, 77, 78-79, 85, 91, 176, 191;
Manatov,Shrif,158 political parties, 76, 99-100, 158; sup
Manuilskii, Dmitrii Zakharovich ( 1883- pression by Soviets ( April 1918), 177-
1959), 138, 139, 141, 145, 146, 147, 178
148,281 Moslem peoples, 6 ,12, 14,17,20,76, 87,
Mari people,159 98, 99-100, 102, 103, 168, 184, 212,
Mari Autonomous Region,172 218, 259, 27 9-280; intelligentsia, 14,
Martov, Iulii Osipovich ( 1873-1923), 27, 177
32,34,47 Moslem Socialist Committee,158,169
Martynov,Alexander Samoilovich ( 1865- Moslem Union ( Azerbaijan), 14, 99-100,
1935),34 206,226
Marx, Karl ( 1818-1883), 46, 47; on the Mount Kodzhori,238
national question,21-23,38 Mozdok,196
Marxism,see Socialism Mudros, Annistice of ( November 1918),
Marxism and the National Question (Iosif 206
Stalin),37-40 Mufti of Orenburg, 77
Mdivani, Budu ( purged, executed 1937), Mukhtarov, Keshshav,262
224, 263, 266-267, 270, 273, 275, 282, Munnever Kari, 88
289,290 Muraviev, M. A., Lieutenant Colonel
Medem, Vladimir Davidovich ( 1879- ( killed by Communist soldiers, 1918),
1923),28 124,125,126,127,128
INDEX
Muridism,96 Peasant Congress, All-Russian ( Petro-
Mussavat, see Moslem Democratic Party grad ) ,120
Mussavat People's Republics,see Russia, Soviet
Perfilev,,176
Nakhichevan,208 Perovsk,91
Nalivkin, Vladimir Petrovich ( 1862- Persia,8,180,254
1917), 89, go Pestkovskii,S. S., 113,173
Narimanov, Nariman ( 1871-1925), 229, Peter the Great,2
258 Petliura,Simon (187g-assassinated 1926),
Nasha Niva (Our Land), 11 55, 56-57, 118-119, 1 25, 139, 1 40,
National Democratic Party, Georgia, 212 146,153
Nationalism, 8, 27, 47; see also under Petrograd,see St. Petersburg
specific states, provinces, and move Petrovskii, Grigorii Ivanovich ( 1878-
ments 1958),148,252
National Ukrainian Party ( NUP), 1 1 Piatakov, Grigorii Leonidovich ( 1890-
Neutral Democratic Group ( NDG ), 99- executed by Soviet regime 1937), 47,
100, 206 68, 110, 136, 139, 140, 141, 144, 273n
Nevskii Vladimir Ivanovich ( 1876- Piatigorsk, 214
purg;d, perished 1937), 25 1 Pilsudski, Josef, Marshal ( 1867-1935),
Nicholas II ( 1868-killed 1918), 167 153
Nikolaev, 1 16 Pishpek,91
Nikolai Nikolaevich, Grand Duke ( 1856-- Plekhanov, Georgii Valentinovich ( 1857-
1929),98 1918),32-34,36
Nogai,94 Podolia,5,64,119
Nolde, Boris E., Baron ( 1876-1948), 64 Poili,238
Nomadic peoples, 5, 51, 82, 83, 86, 191; Pokrovskii, Mikhail Nikolaevich ( 1868-
see also Inorodtsy 1932),48
Northern Caucasus,see Caucasus Poland, 2, 3, 9, 22, 23, 43, 56, 108, 235,
Novozybkovskii ( county),64 250; national movement, 10, 23, 30,
Nubar Pasha, 216 36; Sejm ( Diet), 153
Nuri Pasha,204, 205, 216, 222,226, 256 Poles,2,7,24,29
Polish Army (Pilsudski), 73, 151,153
Polish Legion, 151
Odessa, 63,73, 116, 123, 132, 1 43, 189 Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth,2
Okudzhava, M. ( executed 1937), 281 Polish Socialist Party (PPS), 11, 34
Orakhelashvili, Mamia Dmitrevich (1883- Poltava, 63, 64, 73, 116, 123, 124, 125,
executed by Soviet regime 1937), 237, 136
238,290 Populism,8,10, 11,17,20,30
Oraz Serdar,181 PPS,see Polish Socialist Party
Ordzhonikidze, Grigorii Konstantinovich Porsh,M.,55,62,69
( 1886-suicide 1937), 130, 198, 214, Pravda, 230-231, 264
223,224,225,226,227,228,229,230, Priamursk ( province),5
232,234,235,236,237,238,239, 240- Prussia,2
241, 266-269, 270,271,274,275, 281- Pugachev, Emelian lvanovich ( c. 1742-
282, 283-286, 287, 288, 289, 290, 293 executed 1775); rebellion, 82
Orenburg, 86, 158, 161, 164, 165, 170,
172, 173, 181
Osipov ( killed by Communists 1919 ) , Radek, Karl Bemardovich ( 1885-purged,
179-180 executed 1939),47
Osman Khodzha,258,259 Rakovskii, Khristian Georgievich ( 1873-
Ossetia,223 purged, died 1941 ), 138, 139, 141,
Ossetins,94,95,196,212,218 142, 1 48,252,254,263,291-293
Ottoman Empire, 8, 9, 12, 17, 18, 20, 23, Red Army,see Soviet Army
76, 80, 99, 105, 106, 107, 205, 206, "Red Cossacks," 124
221-222 Red Guard,124,125,214
Reisner, Mikhail Andreevich ( 1868-
Pale of Settlement,6,32 1928),111
Peasant Congress, All-Ukrainian: First Renner, Karl ( 1870-1950), 25-27, 28,
( Kiev 1918 ),57,59; Third, 67 38-39,40,41,42, 46
INDEX
Resul-zade, Mehmed Emin ( 1884-1955), 259, 261, 290, 292; People's Commis
15,77,204,226,228-229 sariat of the Ukraine, 128; People's
Revolutionary Ukrainian Party ( RUP), Republics,254-255; relations with Tur
10-11,55 key, 221-222, 236, 239-240; Soviet of
Revolution of 1905, 6, 7, 14, 15, 84, 103- Nationalities, 288, 292-293; Tatar
104,228 Bashkir Commissariat, 161; trade mis
Revolution of 1917, 50, 73, 82, 89, 96, sion to London ( 1921 ) , 235; Trans
98-99, 150, 155, 183, 190, 191, 207, caucasian Commissariat, 103, 105, 106,
221, 242, 248, 250, 260, 261, 294, 297; 107, 161; Turkestan Commissariat, 161;
February : 49, 51, 56, 58, 76, 97, 102; Turkestan Commission, 181-183, 184;
October: 52-53, 61, 69, go, 108, 114, Union Republics, 250-254; see also
276-277, 295 Congress of Soviets, All-Russian; So
Revue Socialiste, 33 viet Army; Russian Soviet Federative
Riga, Treaty of, 154 Socialist Republic
Rion River Valley,16 Russia, Tsarist, 4, 23, 108, 114, 191;
Rudzutak, Ian Ernestovich (1887-purged, autocratic government, 2-3, 6-7; Brit
died or executed 1938 ) , 181 ain, relations with, 221; demography,
Russia, Provisional Government of 1917, 2, 5, 8, 12-13, 82; Mongol invasion, 9;
101, 107, 128, 191; Moslems in, 78, policies on minorities, 6-7, 10, 14, 20-
84, 88-89; policy on minorities, 50-51, 21, 29, 30-31, 294; Polish-Lithuanian
56, 58, 102, 108, 148, 294; Resolution pressures (13th-14th centuries), 9; po
on the Ukrainian Question (July 3, litical parties, 8; provincial govern
1917), 60-61; "Temporary Instruction ment, structure of, 4-5, 83; territorial
to the General Secretariat of the development, 1, 17, 20, 86-87; Turkey,
Ukrainian Central Rada," 64-66, 68, relations with, 101; see also Duma;
69, 114, Turkestan Committee, 84, 89; and under specific states and provinces
Ukraine, overthrow in,72,114,115 Russian Army (Tsarist), 102, 106, 108,
Russia, Soviet: autonomous regions and 118
republics, 246-250; Bashkir autonomy, Russian Empire,see Russia, Tsarist
decree on (May 22, 1920), 166-167; Russian Party of Moslem Communists
centralization, military, 251-253; cen (Bolshevik ) , 160, 169, 245, 260, 261,
tralization of power in, 242-255; Com 262; dissolution (Moscow Congress,
missariat of Communications, 251; 1918 ) ,160-161
Commissariat of Crimean Moslem Af Russian people, 2, 16, 51, 58, 77, Bo, 82,
fairs, 186; Commissariat of Education, 83, 87, 94, 99, 101, 107, 152, 166, 168,
264; Commissariat of Foreign Affairs, 176, 199-200, 207, 271, 295
188, 217, 224, 225, 227, 264; Commis Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Re
sariat of National Economy, 162; Com public (RSFSR), 106, 241, 245, 247-
missariat of Nationality Affairs ( Nar 250, 252,253-255, 263, 264, 266,271-
komnats ) , 112-113, 116, 158,159, 169, 272, 273; relations with other Soviet re
248-250, 260, 288; Commissariat of publics, 250-255, 269-273, 292; see
Provisions, 251; Commissariat of War, also Congress of Soviets, All-Russian;
162, 169; Constitutional Commission Russia, Soviet
{ 1918 ) , 111; Constitution of 1918, Russification, 7
112, 247, 250, 252, 253; Council of Rykov, Aleksei lvanovich (1881-executed
Nationalities,249-250,288,292; Coun 1938 ) ,273,281
cil of People's Commissars (Sovnar
kom ) , 109, 114, 116, 120, 121-122, Safarov, Georgii lvanovich (1891-purged,
123, 141, 158, 172, 187, 201, 243, 246, died 1942 ) ,93
247, 264, 271-272, 273, 275; Council Said Alim Khan, see Bukhara, Emir of
of \Vorkers' and Peasants' Defense, Said Galiev, Sakhibgarei, (1894-purged,
251, 252, 253, 271-272; Extraordinary executed 1939 ) , 170, 171
Commission for the Supply of the Red St. Petersburg, 1 1 , 53, 99, 104, 156
Anny, 25 1; governmental structure, Sakartvelo (Georgia ) , see Socialist-Fed-
242-244, 247-248, 250; Moslem Com eralist Party, Georgia
missariat, 158, 160, 161; and the na Samara, 16 1, 181
tional question, 39-40, 44, 51, 52, 53, Samarkand, 88, 177,260
82, 166-167, 179, 192, 202, 294, 296; San River, 1 1
New Economic Policy { NEP ) , 235, Sarts (Turkestan ) ,155,182
INDEX
Sebastopol, 80; Communist conquest of, Social Democratic Labor Party, Russia
81,184 (RSDRP ) , 11, 17, 18, 32, 35, 37-38,
Second International, 23, 33, 34; and 39, 43, 55, 69, 77, 99, 242; First Con
World War I,46,48 gress (1898 ) , 32; Second Congress
Seidamet,Dzhafer (1889-1960 ) ,81, 185, (1903 ) , 28, 32-33, 40, 244; and the
187 national question, 34, 36, 41, 47; Pro
Semipalatinsk,172,173 gram of 1903, 32-33, 43; see also Men
Semireche,see Semirechensk province sheviks; Communist Party (RKP(b ) )
Semirechensk province,83,85, 86 Social Democratic Labor Party, Ukraine
Separatism,11,92,105,115,119 (USDRP ) , 11, 55-56, 60, 61, 63, 68,
Ser Ali Lapin,88,93 69, 73, 116, 122, 133, 134, 146-148;
Serebrovskii, Aleksandr Pavlovich (1884- nationalism,145
executed 1937 ), 226 Socialism, 8, 1 1 , 27, 41, 44, 76, 122, 156,
Serfs,liberation of, 82-83,94 242; and the national question, 17-18,
SERP,see Jewish Socialist Labor Party 20, 23, 28, 36; Revisionist, 23, see
Sevan, Lake, 232 also Communism; Communist Parties;
Sevres, Treaty of,232 Lenin; Luxemburg; Marx; Second In
Shakhtakhtinskii, Bekhbud (1881-1924 ) , ternational; Socfal Democratic I abor
253 Parties; Stalin; Third International
Shamil (c. 1798-1871) ,96 Socialist-Federalist Party, Georgia, 18,
Shamkhor, 103, 199 28,212
Shaumian, Stepan G, (1878-executed Socialist-Federalist Party, Ukraine, 53-
1918 ) ,37,48,104, 106,200-202, 203- 54, 55, 58
204,217 Socialist-Revolutionaries Communists Bo
Sheinman,A. L.,235,239 rotbists, Ukrainian Party of, see So
Shevchenko, Taras Grigorevich (1814- cialist Revolutionary Fighters Party
1861 ), 10 (Ukraine )
Shliapnikov, Aleksandr Gavrilovich Socialist Revolutionary Fighters Party,
(1883-purged, died 1937 ) , 214, 217 Ukraine (Borotbisty ) , 134, 142, 143,
Shulaveri, 238 145, 146-147; see also Communist
Siberia,2, 5,13,108 Party,Ukraine
Silyn,233 Socialist Revolutionary Party (SR ) , 15,
Simferopol, 184-185 18, 19, 43, 52, 71, 88, 89, go, 92, 111,
Siuren, 185 123,132,156, 161, 200, 204, 218; First
Skirmunt, Roman Aleksandrovich (1868- Congress (1905 ) , 30-31; and the na
? ) ,151 tional question, 30-31; in Belorussia,
Skobelev,176 75; in the Caucasus, 196, 198, 199,
Skoropadski, Hetman Pavlo Petrovich 200-202; in the Crimea, 80, 81, 186;
(1873-1945 ), 134, 135, 137, 138 in Georgia, 212; in Transcaucasia, 98,
Skrypnik, Mykola A. (1872-suicide 1933 ), 104,107,108; in the Ukraine ( UPSR ) ,
143-144,263-266,291 55-56, 57, 60, 61, 63, 67, 73, 116, 121,
Slavs, 2; see also Belorussians; Poles; 122, 123, 133, 134, 142, 146-147
Russian people; Ukrainians Soviet Army, 122, 126, 127, 140, 142,
Smena Vekh, 265 145, 148, 150, 152, 153, 158, 160, 162,
Smilga, Ivan Tenisovich (1892-purged, 163, 164, 168, 172, 178, 181, 184, 185,
perished 1938 ) , 237 214,217, 220, 224, 225, 226, 227, 228,
Smolensk, 152 231,232,235,236,237,238,239,240,
Social Democratic Labor Party, Armenia, 252, 256, 259, 260, 291; Khiva, 184;
36 Military Soviet ( Ukraine ) , 140; Revo
Social Democratic Labor Party, Austria : lutionary Military Committee of the
Bruenn Congress ( 1899 ) , 24-25, 28, Republic, 251; Tashkent, 184; Turke
39, 40; project on the national ques stan, 165, 167; Ukraine, 146, 252; see
tion, 27-28, 37-39, 41, 42, 44 also "Red Cossacks"; Red Guard
Social Democratic Labor Party, Georgia, Speranskii, Mikhail Mikhailovich (1772-
101, 211, 212, 219, 295 1839 ) , 6
Social Democratic Labor Party, Latvia, Stalin, Iosif Vissarionovich (1879-1953 ) ,
34 11, 112, 113, 116, 132, 136, 139, 140,
Social Democratic Labor Party,Lithuania, 141, 147, 155, 156-157, 158, 159, 160-
34 161, 166, 167, 169, 171, 179, 198, 201,
INDEX
202, 203, 225, 227, 228-229, 230-231, Terek River, 94
235, 237, 239, 251, 255, 262, 263, 265, Tereshchenko, Mikhail Ivanovich ( 1888-
267, 270-271, 272-274, 275, 281, 282, 1956), 60
284, 287, 288-293; and the national Terterian, 233
question, 37-40, 109-110, 270-272, Third International, 132, 134-135, 245,
280-281 257, 262
Starodubskii (county), 64 Thomson, Sir William Montgomerie,
Steppe region, 5, 86; see also Kazakh Major General ( 1877- ), 206-207
Kirghiz Tiflis,15,95,98, 102, 103,104, 105, 106,
Sterlitamak, 164, 165 193, 204, 211, 212, 217, 219, 224, 234,
Stolypin, Petr Arkadevich ( 1863-assas 238-240, 274
sinated 1911), 167; reforms, 83, 86 Toilers' Soviets, 143
Stopani, Alexandr Mitrofanovich ( 1871- Topchibashev, Ali Merdan Bey ( 1865-
1933), 224 1934), 216
Subkhi, Mustafa ( executed by Turks, Transcaspian region, 86, 181, 218
1920 or 1921), 161, 188, 236 Transcaucasia, 2, 12, 15-16, 18, 19, 98-
Sufism, 96 107, 108, 180, 197, 202, 205, 208, 217,
Sulkevich, General Suleiman ( 1865-exe 221, 222-223,224-225, 250, 253, 295;
cuted by Communists 1920), 187, 207 Congress of Soviets First ( 1922), 282;
Sultan-Galiev, Mirza ( b. 1880's-arrested, Eastern, 199, 205, 206, 207, 208, 217,
disappeared 1930), 168-170, 190,260- 218; Federation, 193-1 95, 199, 254,
263, 265 266-269, 273-275, 282, 290; Moslems
Sunzha River, 97 in, 199, 208; national movements in,
Surazhskii (county), 64 37, 50, 98, 105, 201; political parties,
Sverdlov, Iakov Mikhailovich ( 1885- 99,103,104; Regional Center, 98, 106;
1919), 111 Seim ( Diet), 103, 105, 106, 107, 194,
Syr-Daria, 117 205, 213; Special Transcaucasian Com
mittee ( Ozakom), 98; Union Council,
Tajiks, 255, 259 268-269, 274; see also Armenia; Azer
Takoev, S., 223 baijan; Caucasus; Georgia
Tang ( Dawn), 15 Transcaucasian Federative Republic, see
Tangche1ar Party, 15 Transcaucasia
Tashkent, 87, 89, go, 92, 93, 174, 175, Trebizond, 106, 107, 194
176, 184, 257; Council of People's Trifonov, 237
Commissars, 92, 176-177, 179 Trotsky ( Trotskii), Leon Davidovich
Tatar Republic ( Autonomous Soviet So ( 1877-assassinated 1940), 32, 34, 43,
cialist Republic), 168-172, 260; Coun 118, 132-133, 166, 169, 238, 251, 280,
cil of People's Commissars, 171, 262; 282, 288-289, 292
Revolutionary Committee ( Revkom), Tsalikov, Akhmed T. ( 1881-?), 78, 156,
171, 189 157-158, 169, 216
Tatars, Crimean, 12, 51, 77, 79-80, 81, Tsaritsyn, 198, 201
155, 184-186, 187-189; Volga, 1, 12, Tseretelli, Irakly Georgevich ( 1882-
14, 15, 51, 77, 79, 85, 100, 155, 165, 1960), 60, 99, 195, 216
166, 168 , 170, 261; Constituent As Tsintsadze, Kate, 267 , 274, 282
sembly ( Kuru1tai), 81, 184-185, 187, Tugan-Baranovskii, Mikhail lvanovich
191 ( 1865-1919)' 66
Taurida, 115, 129, 186, 188; see also Tukhachevskii, Mikhail Nikolaevich,
Crimea General ( 1893-executed by the Soviet
Tenichbaev, Muhammedzhan, 93 regime 1937), 223, 224
Terdzhiman (Interpreter), 13 Tuktarov, Fuad, 15
Terek-Daghestan government, 97, 195, TUP ( Society of Ukrainian Progressives),
197 see Socialist-Federalist Party, Ukraine
Terek People's Soviet Socialist Republic, Turgai, 172
see Terek region Turkestan, 2, 5, 7, 13, 14, 75, 76, 86-93,
Terek region, 15, 16, 93-95, 96, 98, 104, 155, 174-184, 247, 257, 258, 279; Brit
195-199, 218, 219, 223, 230; Military ish intervention in, 180-181; Congress
Government, 9 7, 214; political parties, of Soviets, Third Regional ( November
196-198; Soviet rule established, 195- 1917), 91; Congress of Soviets, Fifth
198, 214 ( April 1918 ), 179; conquest by So-
INDEX
viets, 90-91, 175-178; Constituent As (January 9/22, 19 18). 125; General
sembly, 93; Council of People's Com Secretariat, 60, 61, 62, 64, 65, 66, 67,
missars, 91, 92; Executive Committee, 68-69, 72-73, 114, 1 15, 116, 1 19, 120,
93; Moslems in, 87-89, 91, 92, 175- 123, 125, 148; German occupation
176, 178, 179, 188; national move (World War I), 132, 133-134, 135-
ment, 50, 85, 88-93, 174-175; Peo 136, 137, 139, 148; IKSOO, 53, 58,60;
ple's Council, 93; political parties, 88, integration into USSR, 251-253, 254,
174-175; popular resistance movement 263-264,270, 27 1,272; national move
(Basmachestvo), 176-180, 256-260; ment, 9-10,55-57,61,63,68, 70, 1 14-
Revolutionary Committee, 91; rival 115, 118-1 19, 123, 127, 138, 148-150;
governments ( 1917), 174-175; see also National Union, 137; political parties,
Central Asia 10-11, 53-56, 61-62, 63, 67, 68, 69,
Turkestani-Moslem Congress: First (April 73, 122, 132-133, 137, 138-140, 141-
1917), 88; Third (November 1917), 144, 148-150; revolt of August 19 18,
91; Fourth (December 1917), 92-93; 135-136; Revolutionary Committee of
Turkestan Moslem Central Council, Rada, 71, 73, 1 14-1 15; Seim (Diet),
88, 89-90, 91, 92 1 1, 57; Small Rada, 59-60, 63, 66, 67,
Turkey, 2, 18, 106-107, 156, 210, 221- 68-69, 70, 71, 72; Soviet of Workers'
223,224,230, 231-234,235, 236, 239- Deputies, 53, 72, 1 14; Special Com
240, 250, 254, 257; see also Ottoman mission for Defense of, 124; Third
Empire Universal, 1 15-116
Turkic peoples, 1, 12-15, 18, 20, 52, 76, Ukraine, First Military Congress ( 1918),
79, 82, 83, 87, 96, 100, 190; culture, 56-57
14; nationalism, 13-14, 85, 89, 158; Ukrainian Democratic Radical Party
political parties, 15; in Transcaucasia, (UDRP), 1 1, 53-54
155; see also Moslem peoples; names Ukrainian General Military Committee
of nationalities (UGVK), 57, 59
Turkish Federalist Party, 100 Ukrainian Land Fund, 56, 57
Turkmen people, 13, 182, 183, 255 Ukrainian National Congress, 55
Turks (Turkey), 101, 106, 180, 193, 205, Ukrainians, 2, 8, 9-10, 24, 36, 51, 80;
207,209,224; see also Turkey see also Ukraine
"Ukrainophiles," 10
Ulema Dzhemieti (Association of Clergy
Ufa, 78, 158, 159, 164, 165, 166, 170; men, Turkestan), 88, go
Executive Committee, 164 Union of Mountain Peoples (Caucasus),
Ukraine, 4-5, 50, 64, 65, 250-252, 253, 97
270, 271, 272, 274; agricultural ques "Union of Toiling Moslem�/' 88, 91
tion in, 51, 56, 57-58, 61, 69; Bol Union Republics, see Russia, Soviet
shevik Revolutionary Committee, 72, Unity Party (Azerbaijani }, 206
73; Central Executive Committee, 108, Ural region, 13, 51, 81,82, 108, 160, 161,
123, 129, 145; Central Rada (Ukrain 162, 163, 170, !71, 247, 295
ian Central Council), 52, 53-61, 62, Uralsk, 172
63, 64-65, 67, 69, 70, 71-73, 1 14-126, Ussubekov, Nasib bey, 100
128, 129, 130-131, 133, 137, 138, 148, Uzbeks, 13, 182, 255, 257
185; Civil War in, 108,252,254; Com Uzun Khadzi,97,216
munist conquest,69,71, 1 14-126, 137-
150; Communist opposition, 263-266;
Congress of Soviets, All-Ukrainian, Vaisov { killed 1918), 159
1 16, 120, 121, 122, 123, 127, 134; Vakhitov, Mulla Nur ( 1885-executed by
Congress of Soviets, All-Ukrainian, Czechs 1918 ), 157, 158, 159, 160, 161,
Second (March 1918 ) , 131-132, 134; 169
Congress of Soviets, All-Ukrainian, Validov (Ahmed) Zeki (Togan) ( 1890-
Third (March 19 19), 251-252; Coun )' 85, 93, 161, 162, 165, 167, 168,
cil of Defense, 144; Council of Peo 262
ple's Commissars, 50, 252, 263; cul Vambery, Armin (c. 1832-1913), 87
tural nationalism, 7, 10; Directory Vernyi, 85
(National Union), 137, 138, 139, 140- Viborg Manifesto, 84
142, 148, 251; First Universal of Rada Vilna (Wilno), 5, 151, 153; see also
( 19 17), 59, 65; Fourth Universal Belorussia; Lithuania
INDEX
Vinnichenko, Volodimir Kirillovich (1880- Wrangel, Petr Nikolaevich, Baron ( 1878-
1952), 55, 56, 60 , 62, 63, 64, 66, 67, 1928), 189
68, 137, 138, 140, 141, 142, 146, 148
Vitebsk, 151 Young Bukharans, see J adidist movement
Vladikavkaz, 94, 95, 96, 97, 156, 195, Young Khivans, see Jadidist movement
196, 197, 198, 199, 224, 229 Young Turks, 222
Volga River region, 1, 14, 15, 160, 161, Yudenich, Nikolai Nikolaevich, General
163, 170, 171, 201 ( 1862-1933), 98
Volhynia, 5, 64
Voroshilov, Kliment Efremovich ( 1881- Zakataly, 228
) , 140 Zangezur, 208, 210, 233
Votiak Autonomous Region, 172 Zarudnyi, A. S. ( 1864-?), 65
Vpered (Forward), 48 Zatonskii, Vladimir Petrovich ( 1888-
Vratsian, Simon (c, 1883- ), 231-232 purged, executed 1937), 70, 71, 72,
140, 148
Zelenyi, 142
Wardrop (John) Oliver, Sir (1864-1948), Zhordaniia, Noi Nikolaevich (1870-1952),
211, 216 18, 212, 240-241, 274
Warsaw, 4, 153 Zhylunovich, Z., 153
White Armies, 96, 113, 125, 136, 137, Ziazikov,I., 223
138, 143,144,145,146, 147-148,161- Zimmerwald Group, see Second Interna
162, 170, 172, 173, 180-182, 188, 209, tional
211, 214-216, 295 Zinoviev, Grigorii Evseevich (1883-exe
Wilson, Woodrow ( 1856-1924), 209, cuted by Soviet regime 1936), 120,
216, 217 148, 283
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