The Buryats and the Far Eastern Republic: An Aspect of Revolutionary Russia 1920-22

379 Pages·1999·11.732 MB·English

by  Cathrynn Ann Brennan

THE BURIATS AND THE FAR EASTERN REPUBLIC:
AN ASPECT OF REVOLUTIONARY RUSSIA 1920-22.
A thesis presented for the degree of Ph.D. at the University of Aberdeen.
Author: Cathryn Ann Brennan, M. A. Hons (University of Aberdeen).
Presented: 1999.
UMI Number: U113361
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DECLARATION:
This thesis has been composed by the candidate (Cathryn Ann Brennan).
This thesis has not been accepted in any previous application for a degree.
The work, of which the thesis is a record, has been done by the candidate alone.
All verbatim extracts have been distinguished by quotation marks and the sources of information have
been specifically acknowledged by the candidate.
signed
Cathryn Ann Brennan.
SUMMARY
This thesis is a history of the treatment by the Far Eastern Republic of the problems involving
its Buriat population. The Far Eastern Republic existed between April 1920 and November 1922,
occupying the lands of the former Russian Empire between Lake Baikal and the Pacific Ocean. It was
a state, established and run under Russian Communist control, with the appearance of a pluralist,
property-owning democracy. It was the aim of Soviet Russia to exploit American-Japanese rivalry in
Asia and gain American help to evict Japanese interventionists who were occupying the Russian
Pacific littoral. The Buriats who came under the jurisdiction of the Far Eastern Republic were the
northern-most Mongol people, nomadic livestock-herders who followed the Buddhist faith. The thesis
in an essay in complexity, exploring the interactivity of policies and the difficulties of reconciling
conflicting aims within the revolutionary agenda.
Chapterl gives a brief outline of the changes undergone by the Transbaikal and its Buriats in the
period up to the Russian Revolution of 1917. Attention is focussed upon changes affecting Buriat
society as a whole; its fragmentation with polarisation of rich and poor and the emergence of an
intelligentsia. But special attention is given to changes within the two main institutions of Buriat
culture; its nomadic livestock rearing economy and its religious system. These changes originated in
pressures from central government policy and from modernisation.
Chapter 2 gives a history of Buriat attempts to achieve autonomous self-government during the
Russian Revolution, which culminated in its being granted by the Constitution of the Far Eastern
Republic. However, establishment of the autonomous administration was highly problematic.
Communists would not tolerate this being run by ‘bourgeois nationalists’ of doubtful loyalty, while
deep-seated inter-ethnic problems over land allocation and use prevented delineation of an
autonomous Buriat territory.
Chapter 3 addresses the major problems between Russians and Buriats concerning land holdings.
There was land hunger in the Transbaikal. The Buriats sought the return of lands taken from them by
the Tsarist government some years earlier. Meanwhile Russian peasant immigration had exacerbated
the jealousy of the Russian arable farmer for the comparatively large land holdings of the Buriat
nomads and the resentment of the Buriat herder who had lost his lands to the immigrants. These
problems hindered the establishment of a defined area over which the Buriats could practise
iv
autonomous self-rule, as well as the elaboration of effective land laws, since alienation of the huge
Russian peasant majority would rebound on communist control over the democratic processes of the
republic.
Chapter 4 gives a detailed account of the practical steps taken to solve these inter-ethnic problems over
land, and in so-doing exposes structural weaknesses and inter-ethnic tensions within population,
government and communist party.
Chapter 5 deals with the attempts made by the republic to repatriate a large population of Buriats, who
had fled abroad with their huge and valuable herds to escape the chaos of civil war. The steps taken
disclose communist fears over Buriat loyalty, Buriat fears over forced conscription into the army and a
whole wealth of problems concerning food supply and animal health.
Chapter 6 picks up the theme of Buriat religious objections to conscription, and explores the theocratic
movement which these fears helped to foster. There was massive support for the Buddhist church and
its many lamas in the Transbaikal and revolution brought the chance to attempt the establishment of a
theocratic regime, following the other Buddhist examples of Tibet and Autonomous Outer Mongolia.
The communists saw the theocratic movement as essentially counter-revolutionary, led by ‘parasitic’
lamas who did no work but lived off the poor masses. The theocratic movement directly challenged the
autonomous self-government which the republic had granted its Buriats, so all possible steps were
taken to eradicate it.
Chapter 7 presents a different view of the theocratic movement, as essentially a movement of poor
people rebelling against rule by their traditional exploiters who had donned the mask of ‘autonomy’
and found niches within the revolutionary regime. The Buriat Autonomous Administration was very
short of manpower and many Buriats who had achieved wealth and power under the old regime now
found a role in administering the new one. The Buriat poor were suffering in the throws of a major
economic crisis and could not pay the large and unfairly apportioned taxes which were levied to pay
for the autonomous administration, so they rebelled, and fell in behind the banner of the theocratic
movement. The communists, who might have seen these poor and exploited Buriats as their comrades,
instead saw them as the allies of counter-revolution. But other Buriats, who did not come under the
influence of the theocratic movement, but who voiced the very same objections to ‘autonomy’, became
lionised as revolutionary heroes.
V
For my father, A. R. Berry, who set me on this long road in the summer of 1961
and
for Lida and her people: may the future bring the Buriats all they hope for.
vi
CONTENTS
Title p. i
Declaration p. ii
Summary p. iii
Dedication p. v
Contents p. vi
Preface p. vii
Glossary p. ix
Map 1 - Russia and her Neighbours. p. xiii
Map 2 - The Far Eastern Republic in 1922. p. xiv
Introduction p. 1.
Chapter 1: The Transbaikal and its Buriats before 1917 p. 11.
Chapter 2: Autonomy p. 55.
Chapter 3: Land Problems: Theory and Law p. 108.
Chapter 4: Practical Solutions to Land Problems p. 144.
Chapter 5: Food Crisis and Amnesty p. 178.
Chapter 6: Lamas and Theocrats p. 229.
Chapter 7: The Balagady:
an Alternative View of the Theocratic Movement p. 280.
Conclusion p. 333.
Bibliography p. 354.
PREFACE
This thesis is based almost exclusively on Russian-language sources. In transliterating, the
author has used the Library of Congress system, somewhat amended so that:
Cyrillic e, e and 3 are all represented by roman ‘e’; cyrillic 'M by roman ‘zh’; cyrillic x by roman
‘kh’; cyrillic q by roman ‘ts’; cyrillic u by roman ‘ch’, cyrillic m by roman ‘sh’; cyrillic m by roman
‘shch’; cyrillic h is omitted from word ends, but represented by ” within words; cyrillic h by roman
‘y’; cyrillic l by roman ’; cyrillic 10 by roman ‘iu’ and cyrillic n by roman ‘ia’.
There are many Buriat and Mongolian as well as Russian and a few Chinese, words used in
this thesis. These are explained in a glossary which also includes abbreviations and other special
terms. The glossary offers an explanation of the difficulties encountered in rendering Buriat and
Mongolian terms into other alphabets and the variety of renderings which result. Because of the wide
ranging origins of words appearing in the thesis, the author has avoided applying the many and varied
plural versions correct for each language. Such words appear in italics, and where they are required to
express a plural, the author has anglicised this process, simply adding the letter ‘s’ to the singular
form.
Because most of the footnotes given are of a numerical form, from an archival catalogue, or
from Soviet history books with titles which are often formulaic and repetitious, the author had avoided
the use of terms such as ibid., op. cit. and loc. cit. These seem to offer endless opportunities for error
in such circumstances, so the author has preferred to give a full, and therefore accurate, reference
instead of an abbreviated one. Footnotes referring to archival documents which have a complete
numerical reference have had their titles rendered into English. Such documents often have an actual
title which has little content, for example: ‘Report’, with no indication of subject matter, and date and
author left to the end. In such cases a fuller title has been synthesised for the document, to include its
subject (for example ‘On the theocratic movement’), the date and the author. This has been done since
the numerical reference is enough to locate the document in the archive, and so that all elements
useful in describing the document are assembled in a title, rather than using a title which has little
content, leaving important details scattered thoughout the document. Documents from published
sources, such as sbomiki, have had their titles transliterated from that source rather than translated or
synthesised. Articles and books which were originally published in cyrillic have been referred to in the
westen manner: articles have their titles in roman type and within single quotation marks, while book
titles are italicised.
The thesis is based upon primary source material, from the recently-opened Russian archives
and from Russian material published during the period under discussion. The author has leant heavily
upon the perceptions of figures most closely involved in the events described. These two factors have
made it seem appropriate to allow the sources to ‘speak for themselves’, thus there are many direct
quotations. This sometimes leads to a confusion of verbal tenses, as the historian, using the past tense,
lets the source speak in the present tense. The author hopes that the stylistic price exacted by this
practice will not prove too high to pay for the immediacy it is meant to achieve.
Many friends and colleagues deserve warm thanks for the help they gave me during work on
this thesis. In Aberdeen these include my mother, Mary Berry; the staff and postgraduates of Aberdeen
University History Department; the staff of the Queen Mother Library, especially those involved with
Inter-Library Loans; Josephine Forsyth, who valiently struggled with the shortcomings of my
linguistic skills; James Forsyth, who gave insight into the history of the native peoples of Siberia, and
inspired this field as an approach to the history of the Far Eastern Republic; and my great friends
Colin Christie and Murray Frame, whose affections seem to have survived the stresses to which they
were subjected. But my deepest gratitude is to my supervisor and mentor, Professor Paul Dukes, who,
while patiently and consistently providing the best advice and guidance (and struggling with so many
of my translations), gave me the freedom to pursue my own interests in my own way. Many friends in
Russia helped and encouraged the work. Prime amongst these are the Ostapenko family, Sasha
Barsenkov, Lena Burmina, Boris Starkov, Nona Tarkhova, Artem Ulunian, Dima Fedosov and the
staffs of the RTsKhlDNI and the ‘Lenin’ Library. A special appreciation is reserved for Lena Zorina
and her family, who helped me to travel to the Transbaikal where I made more friends, especially
among Lena’s extended family and Irina Kurennaia of the Pushkin Library in Chita. My deepest
gratitude is to my good friend Lida Iril’deeva, who made Buriat life and tradition real and immediate
for me and put me in contact with a wealth of modern Buriat historical scholarship. I must also thank
my examiners, Dr. Alan Wood, of Lancaster University, and Professor James Thrower, of Aberdeen
University. Lastly, I should like to thank Brian Pearce for his inspirational example and for
galvanizing my interest in the Far Eastern Republic with a chance remark some years ago.
GLOSSARY of foreign words, abbreviations and special terms:
A note on Buriat names and special terms
The language of most Transbaikal Buriats at the time under consideration was a dialect of
Mongolian, written in Mongolian script. However, literacy rates among the Transbaikal Buriats,
although high compared to those of many peoples of the Russian Empire,1 were low enough to mean
that the vast majority only spoke rather than wrote their language. Thus, the task of rendering special
culture-specific Buriat terms or names, into Russian (and eventually into English), turns into one of
phonetic representation. It was only with the establishment of Soviet rule that effective attempts were
made to create a written form of Buriat, first using the Latin alphabet, and later Cyrillic.2 This means
that many Buriat names and terms which we shall meet in the thesis have a variety of spellings. There
are patterns discernable in such confusion, for example ‘B’ and ‘P’ are often confused, as are ‘O’ and
‘A’, ‘D’ and‘T’, and ‘O’ and ‘U’. Additionally, confusion arose in the transcription of the minutes of
meetings, either due to poor handwriting or pronunciation, and this was compounded when Buriat
terms were used in exchanges involving Russians or russified Buriats. The justification for such
confusion is evidenced by the adoption of several special symbols to augment the Cyrillic letters in
modern written Buriat.3 With this in mind the author hopes the reader will tolerate and understand the
variety of spellings encountered, as renderings originating in phonetic confusion are reproduced as
they occur in the documents and literature. This has been done so that words which are wrongly
1 R. Rupen, Mongols of the Twentieth Century, Part I (Bloomington, Indiana, 1964), p. 42: gives a
general literacy rate for the Transbaikal Buriats in 1897 of 8.4% (16.4% for men and 0.6% for
women) rising to 14% in the Aga region in 1908, this figure indicates the predominance of literacy in
Mongolian over literacy in Russian (2,863, as against 2,194 - probably lamas - whose first language
was Tibetan and only 416 whose first language was Russian). In 1897 the all-Siberian literacy rate,
which included Russians and Ukrainians was 11.5%.
2 R. Rupen, Mongols of the Twentieth Century, Part I (Bloomington, Indiana, 1964), pp. 42-3. Here
we also find discussion of earlier attempts to create a modern rendering of Buriat, such as that by
Agvan Dorzhiev, and the political implications of language reform - some modernising Buriats
thought the language should be abandoned in favour of Russian, while arch conservative Buddhist
lamas preferred Tibetan.
3 See Kratkii RussJco-Buriatskii Slovar ’, compiled by Ts. B, Tsydendambaev and M. N. Imekhenov,
(Moscow, 1962).