Famine, civil wars, complete breakdown of authority-it only makes sense to join a guerilla movement that promises provisions and safety, right? Learn about the Basmachi, a group of warlords turned guerilla movement that became one of the Soviet’s most persistent headaches in Central Asia during the 1920s and 30s.
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References
Making Uzbekistan: Nation, Empire, and Revolution in the Early USSR by Adeeb Khalid
The “Russian Civil Wars” 1916-1926 by Jonathan Smele, Published by Oxford University Press, 2017
“The Basmachi or Freemen’s Revolt in Turkestan 1918–24” by M. B. Olcott Soviet Studies, no. 3, 1981
Russian-Soviet Unconventional Wars in the Caucasus, Central Asia, and Afghanistan by Robert F. Baumann, Combat Studies Institute, 2010.
“The Final Phase in the Liquidation of the Anti-Soviet Resistance in Tadzhikistan: Ibrahim Bek and the Basmachi, 1924-1931” by William S. Ritter, Soviet Studies, no 4, 1985
“Revolution in the Borderlands: the Case of Central Asia in a Comparative Perspective” by Marco Buttino, A Companion to the Russian Revolution, John Wiley & Sons, 2020
“The Basmachi: Factors Behind the Rise and Fall of an Islamic Insurgency in Central Asia” by Boris Kogan, Small Wars Journal 2011
Art of Asymmetrical Warfare 