After negotiations with the Bolsheviks stall, the Alash Orda turn to the White Movement in Siberia. What they find are endless political factions, Cossacks, numerous battles with the Red Army, and a White Army coup.
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Continue readingThe Russian Civil War knocks on the door of Siberia and the Steppe. The newly created Alash Autonomy must decide who they will ally with: the Bolsheviks or the White Army. Attracted by Bolshevik rhetoric, the Alash Orda start negotiates with the Soviets, but quickly learn that they have two, conflicting definitions of “self-determination”
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Continue readingFamed but often misunderstood guerilla fighters, the Basmachi were an Islamic resistance force that targeted both the Bolsheviks and modernizing Islamic forces of Central Asia. This article provides a basic overview of their creation, organizational hierarchy, and talks about some of their most famous leaders.
We’ve spent considerable time exploring how the Russian Revolution affected Central Asia from several different perspectives. So far, we’ve talked about the Russian Settlers, the Alash Orda, the Jadids, and the Bukharan and Khivan Emirs. You may be thinking, that’s plenty of peoples and we’re ready to move onto 1918, but we have one more perspective to add and that’s the Basmachi, a guerrilla movement that reinvented itself numerous times during the 1920s and clashed with the Soviets from 1918 to the 1930s.
Continue readingFamine, 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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Continue readingTomorrow is our one year anniversary! To celebrate we posted our first ever Bird’s Eye View episode. This format allows us to take a step back and discuss the definitions, theories, and common features of an aspect of asymmetrical warfare. Today we’ll discuss what a civil war is and isn’t. Be warned, this episode contains mild dives into political theory.
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Continue readingThis is a very special episode as we discuss the Jadids with renowned scholar, Dr. Adeeb Khalid. The Jadids were an Islamic modernizing movement within Central Asia that would later find common cause with Bolsheviks and create modern day Uzbekistan. We’ll be discussing who the Jadids were, their doctrinal development, and how they fit within our narrative of the Russian and Central Asian Civil Wars.
Dr. Khalid is Professor of Asian Studies and History as well as director of Middle Eastern Studies at Carleton College. He is an expert in his field and published numerous works on Central Asia including Making Uzbekistan: Nation, Revolution, and Empire in the Early USSR and the Politics of Muslim Cultural Reform: Jadidism in Central Asia. He has a new book coming out this May, Central Asia: a New History from the Imperial Conquests to the Present which you can preorder at your favorite bookstore.
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