October 15, 2025

The Soviet Siberia — the Kazakh Autonomy: from the Demarcation of Territories to the Demarcation of Competences (1920—1921)

Puntos clave

The separation of territories in Siberia and Kazakhstan inherently involved the demarcation of competences amid Bolshevik leadership.
The Kyrgyz Revolutionary Committee engaged in negotiations regarding food and military issues, influencing the outcome of territorial autonomy.
Despite formal changes, administrative functions remained largely under Omsk's control until late 1921, illustrating the complexities of this territorial shift.
The ambivalence in the creation of the Kazakh ASSR reflects the limitations of Bolshevik ethnic policies pursued for political reasons.

Resumen

The article analyses the history of interaction between the Bolshevik leadership of Siberia represented by the Sibburo of the Central Committee of the All-Russian Communist Party of Bolsheviks and the Siberian Revolutionary Committee with the Kyrgyz Revolutionary Committee and the leadership of the Kyrgyz (Kazakh) ASSR on the issue of the separation of Siberia and Kazakhstan in 1920—1921. The “Siberians” were in favour of the creation of an autonomy, but quite reasonably doubted the ability of its leadership to effectively solve food and military issues, as well as to guarantee the security of internal territories and external borders. As a result, the transfer of the Akmola and Semipalatinsk oblasts (provinces) to the Kyrgyz (Kazakh) ASSR was for the Siberian leadership, first of all, a question of division of competences and was allowed only when the administrative apparatuses in each of their spheres were ready. Even after the territory of the two mentioned regions formally became a part of the Kirghiz (Kazakh ASSR), the party apparatus, food apparatus, military units and power structures continued for some time to be subordinated to Omsk, which provided a systematic transfer of administrative functions by the autumn of 1921. The specific circumstances of the creation of the Kirghiz (Kazakh) ASSR give grounds to state the ambivalence of the Soviet national project, was already evident at its origins: the Bolsheviks’ “ethnophilia” was limited to political pragmatism.

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