The Revolt of 1916 in Russian Central Asia • Chapter 2

It is generally true that economic causes figure heavily in the explanation of almost all revolts. In few revolts, however, does the economic factor play so conspicuous a role as in the Revolt of 1916. Only a consideration of the many and profound economic changes effected by the coming of the Russians enables one to understand the form of the uprising and the actions of the insurgents.

A. Russian Economic Interests in Central Asia before the Conquest

The first active Russian economic interest in Central Asia may be dated to Peter the Great's reign. Though traditionally pictured as the monarch who oriented Russia to the West, Peter, nevertheless, was greatly interested in the economic potentialities of Asia. Missions were dispatched to China which eventuated in the signing of the Treaty of Kiakhta with China in 1727 just after Peter's death. This treaty gave great advantages to Russia over the other Western powers, establishing permanent commercial relations and a regular diplomatic representation at Peking.1 The Russian religious mission in Peking presented (p12) a very favorable opportunity for scientific study of China in view of recent edicts against the Jesuits.

Peter's interest in Central Asia was equally great. Here his appetite was aroused by exaggerated visions of gold to be found here and of the supposed practicability of using the Amu Darya as a water route to India by turning the Amu Darya from the Sea of Aral to its old outlet to the Caspian Sea.2 p22 Expeditions were dispatched but they proved abortive; the mission under Prince Bekovich-Cherkassky was in fact annihilated through the treachery of the Khan of Khiva (1712). Peter's war with Persia gained him, under the treaty of St. Petersburg, 1723, Persia's Caspian provinces, but these were recovered by Persia in a few years. Thus Peter's efforts in Central Asia brought no permanent gain. If more was not accomplished it was not through lack of interest on his part but rather because of his great preoccupation with affairs in the West.

Though preoccupation with Western questions took most of the attention of succeeding Tsarist governments in foreign affairs there was nevertheless a continued interest in Central Asia. With the failure of military expeditions the government adopted other tactics. There began the gradual subjugation of the steppe nomads lying between the Central Asian khanates and Russia proper. The Kazakhs during the first quarter of the seventeenth century had been pressed to the West by the attacks of the Kalmyks or Western Mongols so that they impinged on Russian territory. The Kazakhs were divided at the time into three hordes, the Great, Middle, and Little. Utilizing the quarrels among them the Russian government succeeded in 1732 by gifts and bribery during the reign of the Empress Anne in persuading the Khan of the Little Horde to accept Russian suzerainty. Similar policies towards the Middle and Great Hordes resulted by the end of the 1740s in the annexation of the territories of Turgai, Uralsk, and part of Semipalatinsk and Akmolinsk. These territories provided a base for further penetration into Central Asia.

(p13) The first half of the nineteenth century saw the Russians strengthening their influence over the western part of the steppe. In 1822 new laws were enacted for the administration of the Kazakhs. The privileges of the Sultans or chieftains were circumscribed while a certain degree of autonomy was granted to the Kazakhs. In the view of the Russians peace in the steppe could only be secured by the breaking of the power of the leader over the clan, the traditional organization of the Kazakhs. This was effected by the creation of administrative p23 units which did not correspond with clan divisions but cut across these lines.3

Though the Kazakhs were now Russian subjects, conditions in the steppe were, if anything, more turbulent than before. The common people (black bones) still had great respect for their aristocracy (white bone — the expression equivalent to "blue blood" in a number of Inner Asian societies.) The marauding proclivities of the Kazakhs were still strong and any "batyr" or hero was certain to find a following.4 The Sultans recognized by the Russians could not keep order or did not want to while the annual military expeditions from Orenburg (now Chkalov) proved equally ineffectual. Only with the establishment of strongholds in strategic positions in the steppes by Governor-General Obruchev (1845), advances on the Syr Darya, the overthrow of the brigand Isetz Kutebarof, and the demise of the batyr, Jan Hodja, brought peace to the steppe,5 and facilitated the dispatch into the steppes of Russian caravans. The occupation of Aralskoe in 1847 on the lower Syr Darya marked the beginning of a new period —- the Russian encroachment on the Central Asian khanates and their conquest.

(p14) Russia's trade with Asia did not attain great proportions during the first half of the nineteenth century; in general only 6‑7% and not over 10% of all her exports passed over her Asiatic borders. This fact, however, obscures the real significance of her trade. While Russia's exports to Europe were predominantly raw materials and half manufactured goods her Asiatic exports included a significant proportion of manufactured goods.6

While the Persian and Transcaspian trade grew more rapidly than the trade with the Central Asian khanates in the first p24 quarter of the century, by the middle of the 1830 the situation had changed. There was a significant drop in Russia's Iranian trade as a result of the development of a new trade route to Iran via Turkey and the introduction there of English textiles. It is in this setting that the Central Asian market assumes great importance.

The articles imported were for the most part raw cotton, cotton yarn, and fabrics. The unfavorable trade balance for Russia was settled by gold while fabrics, sugar, tableware, and other goods were exported to Central Asia.7 Russian cotton textile manufacture benefited especially by this trade. In 1840, 73% of all cotton stuffs sent to Asia were taken by the Central Asian market.8 In this trade, which had been carried on through the intermediary of Khivan and Bukharan merchants, direct trade relations were entered into in 1840. The Russian manufacturers showed a great knack, starting about 1828 and 1829, in manufacturing articles that would suit the taste of the Asian market. In the matter of clothing, travellers were to have a difficult time in distinguishing between native productions and Russian imitations. As in India, the influx of cheap foreign cotton stuff was to doom native production to extinction.

According to the figures of one authority Russian trade with Central Asia was evaluated at 10.53 million roubles for the decade 1827‑ (p15) 1837 and 15.73 million roubles for 1840‑1850.9 While the export of cloth and other goods to Central Asia continued to grow increasingly, the import of cotton increased even more in volume. Thus in the decade 1857‑1867 imports to Russia rose almost 4.4 times while exports from Russia rose 2.14 times.10 The decade 1857‑1867 shows a colossal increase in trade; the turnover in this period was 946% greater than in the decade 1840‑1850.

Thus as an economic background for the conquest of Central p25 Asia we see the very rapid development of trade with Central Asia. The mills of Moscow and Lodz were relying increasingly on the coarse short-staple cotton of Turkistan while they saw in Central Asia a preserve for the sale of their cotton stuffs.

The period of the conquest (the 1860s) saw a wild bacchanalia of speculation, coal and oil scandals in which even the military were involved. The potentialities and richness of the country were much exaggerated and most of the Russian ventures that were started in these years failed in the early '70s. Though of importance to the Russian manufacturers the local cotton was wretched in quality and the great demand was not to come until the early 1880s when American Upland cotton was introduced.

B. Russian Economic Policy towards the Sarts

1. Land Policy

When the Russians came to Central Asia, landholding was nominally regulated according to the Shariat or Moslem religious law. Nominally all land was the sole possession of the State. In actuality this principle was modified through custom (adat) and local conditions, and a confused situation existed. Land was classified in three major categories: (1) amlyak — land belonging to the state. This included most of the uncultivated land, the land used by the nomads, and such land as was cultivated by private persons paying certain fees. In practice these (p16) lands might be classed as private property inasmuch as the occupier could dispose of it; (2) mulk — land in private ownership given by the state in return for service; (3) vakuf — land given to some mosque or religious school either by the State or by some private individual.11

The Russian government revived the concept of the Shariat that all land belonged to the state. Though it left the Sarts in possession of the land they already occupied, all uncultivated land was listed as belonging to the government. At the time of the coming of the Russians the system of landholding was terribly confused thanks to the venality of the officials, local p26 custom, and lack of documents. The Russian government cut this Gordian knot by subjecting all land to the same tax (except the vakuf lands) thus removing many inequalities.

In the extremely vital matter of irrigation the Russian government left the system in the hands of the natives though reserving the right of general supervision and to make all future extensions in irrigation systems. According to customary law (adat) there was no private property in water; an equal distribution was to be made among all the lands. In practice many abuses and inequalities resulted. To assure equal distribution all land had to be absolutely level, a matter which required a tremendous amount of labor. Often the control of the water was monopolized by some powerful personage who favored the rich and collected bribes from the agriculturists. Regions downstream were often left short of water; thus Bukhara, downstream on the Zarafshan river, often received less water than the Samarkand region; the canals and installations were makeshift affairs and the water often broke through the banks of the canal. By the end of the Tsarist era new installations were extremely modest in extent though Tsarist engineers had great plans for the future.

2. The Introduction of American Cotton

The growing of cotton in Turkistan goes back to antiquity, having been introduced from India via Afghanistan and Persia. It was the (p17) short-staple variety, coarse, and requiring double labor inasmuch as the pods did not open as widely as the American variety and hence had to be picked from the shrub before the cotton could be taken out.12 Russian manufactures took more and more of the native cotton through they preferred to import American cotton. Caravans of cotton went to Russia generally by the Orenburg route. A great impetus was given to this importation by the great rise in cotton prices during the American Civil War, reaching fabulous proportions in 1863. Thus if we take cotton prices in the United States in 1900 at 100 we get the following table for the years 1859‑1865.

This record price period is followed by one of an almost uninterrupted lowering of prices until 1885. The introduction of American cotton seed into Turkistan in the early 1880s by Governor-General Kaufman was a moment of tremendous significance for the future of the country. This introduction coincided with a renewed climbing of cotton prices after 1885.14

At the same time the building of the Transcaspian railway was being pushed forward, which was to connect all the important cities of Russian Central Asia. In 1884, it was brought to Merv, in 1886 to (p18) the Amu Darya and in 1888 to Samarkand (later to Tashkent and from there to Orenburg). Though conceived of as a strictly military measure by military men, its character soon changed and it became a going commercial undertaking. The railway brought a lowering of cotton transportation costs, a tying of the economy to the fluctuations of the world market and the conversion of Turkistan into a cotton colony of the Tsarist Empire. A few statistics will illustrate the great growth of cotton of the American variety.15

Tashkent was the northern limit and Andijan the eastern of the growth of this crop. The "cotton fever" especially gripped p28 the Ferghana province comprising about two‑thirds of the total cotton acreage. The working up of various cotton products took 60% of all labor in Ferghana, 80% of all mechanical power, 80% of all fuel, and 92% of the total figure of the production of the oblast.17 The other basic oblasts registered the following increase in the cotton harvest for the years 1908 to 1913.18

(p19) Cotton was also grown in the Transcaspian region around Merv, but not in Semirechie.

Great as was the obsession with cotton in these years it was dwarfed by the grandiose plans put forward in the last years of Tsarism. Senator Count Palen in the year 1906 made an intensive official examination of the state of the country and reported that the natural boundary for the extension of cotton growing (325,000 dessiatines) had already been reached. On the other hand, Krivoshein, Minister of Agriculture and Stolypin's alter ego in his land policies, thought this was but a third of the area that should be irrigated and put to cotton growing. The water system of the Amu Darya alone was declared to be almost comparable to the Nile, while "Each extra pud of Turkistan cotton is competition for American cotton" — so Krivoshein states in a memorial. Taking a leaf from the history of Egypt — the first big example of a monoculture satisfying its food requirements from the outside — Krivoshein seized upon this concentration as a desideratum for Turkistan. The region was to abandon its grain and rice culture altogether for a single devotion to the growing of cotton. It was in this connection that he conceived the idea of the Turkistan-Siberian (Turk-Sib) railway — usually thought of as a Soviet conception — as facilitating the export of Siberian grain into the region. The years of 1911‑1913 saw construction started from both ends. The work was hampered by lack of p29 capital and the increased attention given to the menacing situation in the West. Though the war brought an end to this construction, 1915 saw the completion of the stretch from Novosibirsk to Semipalatinsk.19 All the technical problems had been worked out. Only some bridges remained to be put up.20

And what of the dekhan — the native peasant — in the feverish race to make cotton King? What was his share in the immense wealth which was being paid out for cotton, and was his life richer or poorer thereby?

(p20) On the surface it would appear that the peasant must surely gain in this cotton boom. The secured sale of cotton, duties on American cotton, tax privileges for cotton lands, the predominance of cotton-growing on small native farms rather than on Russian-owned plantations, thus leaving the proceeds of the harvest in the country — all this seemed to point to a better life for all the classes of the population. In actuality the situation of the dekhan became, if anything, much worse.

Though cotton growing was very remunerative it was also subject to great fluctuation not only as to harvest but as to price. Since the United States was by far the major producer of this commodity it virtually set the price by its crop. A bad harvest in Turkistan which coincided with a good one in the United States (with the lowering of the price of cotton) meant a catastrophe for the grower in Turkistan.21 But the grower could not always turn to the raising of food crops inasmuch as the building of the Transcaspian railways brought in the foodstuffs at prices often below the cost of production in Turkistan. In reality the peasant had no choice in the matter as he was given grain only in proportion to the quantity of cotton he produced.22

The small cotton grower was placed in a position of dependence upon the metropolitan market for the sale of his crops. Agents of the cotton textile mills and the cotton ginners advanced him a small deposit towards his future crop and from p30 then on his dependence was assured and he sank more and more into debt. Until the beginning of the World War the difference between fall and spring prices for grain and other agricultural commodities reached 50%.23 The peasant was forced to sell his harvest when prices were low and to buy grain and seeds for sowing in the spring when prices had greatly advanced.24 To (p21) obtain money for the latter he had to sell even his draught animals and household utensils as well as to have recourse to the usurer.

The Russian investigator, N. Koryton, described the activities of the usurer, in 1904, in the following manner.

These "benefactors" help the native peasant in the moment of his greatest need by lending him a small sum at an enormous interest, not less than four per cent per month. The transaction takes place before a common judge, and in the debtor's note the interest is always added to the sum borrowed. That is, if the sum of a hundred roubles is borrowed for one year, the note is made out for 148 roubles. Furthermore, if the usurer doubts the debtor's paying capacity, he takes as security a mortgage on the debtor's real property, at the same rate of interest as above and at a valuation of half the property's actual worth. Foreclosures of such mortgages are the usual thing here. Russian usurers have acquired vast tracts of land at the expense of the ruined native peasants.25

Taxes were yet another factor that forced the peasant into desperate economic straits. The budget of Turkistan showed a deficit for every year of the prewar era but this only led the government to raise taxes more and more. Inasmuch as the taxes levied did not raise the productive power of the peasantry the result could only be prejudicial to the interests of the latter. Much land was forfeited due to the inability of the peasant to pay the taxes.26

Thus via loans from cotton agents, usurers, the increased population pressure on the land, the enhanced price of land due p31 to cotton bringing speculation, increased taxes, the destruction of the self-sufficient village economy through the flood of cheap Russian goods, the peasant sank more and more into indebtedness and lost his land.

Despite the increasing concentration of land in the hands of the rich the peasant usually remained on the plot of land he had lost, farming it on a sharecrop basis. The owner provided the seeds, implements, and the land while the tenant did all the work. The crop was divided between the two, the owner getting the lion's share. Though (p22) the plantation system was introduced it did not prove very successful. Turkistan was for the most part a land of small-scale agriculture, the average independent cotton grower having but from 2 to 4 dessiatines which he cultivated intensively with his crude implements, the ketman (hoe) and the omach (native plow). One authority explains the failure of the plantation system in terms of the psychological reaction of the peasant; when working for his family at home he was most industrious but when working for someone else he was disposed to see no sin in loafing or pretending to work.27

The expropriation of the peasant's land did not lead to his employment in industry as in Europe and Japan. Russia looked upon this region as a colonial area to serve as a source of raw materials and an outlet for her manufactures. Naturally she could not look with favor upon any great development of industry there.28

The situation among the bais or rich natives was quite different. Not being dependent upon loans they could prosper at cotton growing. They were enlisted as agents of the cotton firms and ginners while to this they added the function of usurer. The increasing closeness of the alliance between the native merchant and the Russians was especially remarked in Tashkent and Samarkand and in the cities of Ferghana. The establishment of the Cotton Exchange at Kokand also contributed to this. Native merchants visited with ever increasing frequency the fair at Nizhni Novgorod and especially Moscow p32 where they founded important native trading companies.29 Thus by the beginning of the World War rich natives and Russians found much in common, though social intercourse stopped at the native threshold.

3. The Russians in Turkistan

The coming of the Russians to Turkistan differed significantly from that of the British into India. The British came as governors, administrators, and merchants but did not enter into competition with (p23) the natives in other fields. Russians in Turkistan, however, were found in the entire gamut of occupations, from the ruling classes to lavatory cleaners and street sweepers. Thus they entered into competition for jobs with natives at every level.

Especially galling for the natives was the industrial situation. In the few industries that existed before the war (especially cotton-ginning processing and cottonseed extraction comprising 85% of the industrial production of Turkistan)30 the Russians monopolized the skilled positions while the natives worked at the rest. But this was not all; the tremendous disparity between the pay and working conditions of the two must also be noted. The natives worked 10 to 12 hours a day and at times 16 hours while their pay averaging 180 roubles a year contrasted very unfavorably with the 288 rouble average for Russia.31 The outlook for the Russians was quite different. Possessed usually of more mechanical skill than the natives they were a small contingent in Turkistan while further recruitment in Russia proper was beset with many difficulties. In the last years of Tsarism nowhere, perhaps, in the empire were they given such concessions and favorable treatment. The work day was cut to 8 hours in most cases, full rest on holidays, free medical assistance from the employer and pay for interruption in the work without previous notice by the employer.32 They formed 22.8% of the total industrial labor force while 70‑79% were skilled workers.33

p33 The railways were the great stronghold of this skilled élite requiring more qualified professional workers than elsewhere. The distribution here was as follows: Russians, 80.7%; Moslems, 14.6%; Poles, 2.6%; Germans, 0.8%; Armenians, 0.7%; Jews, 0.2%.34

Russian colonization in the three basic provinces of Turkistan (Syr (p24) Darya, Ferghana, Samarkand) was not great. In 1914 the Russian colonists were distributed thus:35

The Russian peasant cared little for the cultivation of cotton and rice and hence was not much attracted to the region. When there he grew his traditional crops of cereals and fodder. Russians were settled in villages apart from the natives on lands newly opened by irrigation. Their portions were huge by comparison with native standards (often 40‑50 dessiatines) but they could not work the land as intensively as the native peasant did with his ketman. Even so the difference between the two was great and the Turkistan Russian peasant prospered while the native worker became further enslaved.

C. Russian Economic Policy towards the Nomads

If the great changes effected by the Russians among the sedentary peoples of Turkistan centred upon the conversion of the country into a cotton province of the Tsarist Empire, among the nomads the story is one of the steady encroachment of the Russian settlers upon the lands of the nomads. The agrarian question then is the touchstone of the relations of the nomads to the Russians.

Province	No. of Villages	No. of Inhabitants
Syr Darya	108	45,000
Samarkand	13	3,500
Ferghana	23	20,000

In the area of present-day Kazakhstan Russians appeared as far back as the sixteenth century. They became much transformed by intermarriage and could be hardly distinguished from the steppe dweller. The first settlers were soldiers rather than peasants and so the situation was to remain for a long time. p34 They were given great tracts of land and their settlements formed a line of defense against the forays of the wild nomads. There was not yet a single peasant colony in (p25) 1868.36 The year 1875 marked a change in the settlement of the country after the Governor-General of the steppes affirmed that Cossack settlements brought little in the way of civilization to the steppes. It is this year which marks the beginning of peasant colonization of the steppe. In Semirechie, the scene of the most bitter resistance in the Revolt of 1916, the colonization was begun shortly after the conquest of the territory (1867).

In the territories of both the Kazakh and the Kirghiz, colonization at first went ahead leisurely and painlessly for the population. It was not of a mass character and officials like General Kolpakovsky, Governor of Semirechie, approached the question of the seizure of nomad land cautiously. In Semirechie the majority of settlements were formed with the willing consent of the Kirghiz communities.37

From the end of the nineteenth century to the beginning of the twentieth century there was a transitional period. Officials like General Kolpakovsky who, though often insufficiently trained, strove to do their best, were now replaced by administrators of lesser moral qualities. Along with this went a stepped-up colonization program and an increasing disregard of the rights of the nomads to land. These tendencies were pushed to their extreme in the period 1905‑1916.

In understanding the background for this peasant colonization movement into Russian Central Asia and Siberia a few remarks are pertinent concerning the agrarian situation in Russia. Russian immigration into Asiatic Russia before the Emancipation of the serfs (1861) was necessarily very limited inasmuch as the serfs were bound to the land and were the property of the landholder. The emancipation of the serfs brought an acceleration of the immigration into Asiatic Russia but even here the peasant encountered many obstacles to his free movement. Freed of the control of the lord he was now p35 subjected to the control of the obshchina or commune. The collective responsibility of the latter for the payment of taxes, furnishing of recruits for (p26) the army, and payment for the land given them by the Emancipation38 created an interest in keeping all members of the commune in place so that the obligations on the others would not be increased. The domestic serfs were set free without any land.

The end of the nineteenth century found the Russian government turning its attention more and more to the colonization of Russian Asia by peasant settlers as a means to help solve the critical agrarian problem created since the Emancipation. In the black soil region of Russia the "poverty lots" were imposed upon the peasants by the nobles because of the great value of the land there. A great class of peasantry was created which was forced to hire themselves out as their land was wholly insufficient for providing their needs. While the period registered a movement on the part of the nobles to sell their land to the peasantry this brought little relief inasmuch as the population had grown greatly in the meantime.39 Between 1860 and 1897 the peasant population of European Russia had grown by more than half. The peasant could only escape redemption payment and communal control by accepting a "poverty lot" of one-fourth of the amount of land he tilled before the Emancipation in which case the peasant had too little land to make a living on. The great peasant disturbances in 1902 followed by the Revolution of 1905 brought great pressure upon the government to seek some sort of solution of the land problem. The government was aided in its colonization program by the inauguration of the Transsiberian railway (1891) which played a great part from the very first in bringing the settler to Asiatic Russia. This is the background to the third period of colonization of the Steppe beginning in 1905.

The formation of the Resettlement Administration in 1905 brought in its train not only the rapid colonization of what is now Kazakhstan and Kirghizia but the complete ignoring of the interest of the natives and the ruin of the herding economy.

(p27) p36 Since the conquest the natives were looked upon as not possessing the land; adopting the rules of the Shariat the government declared all land belonged to it and the nomads were to utilize the land only by the sufferance of the government. It set aside portions for the use of the nomads and declared the rest "surplus," to be taken over by the government as a reserve for future Russian colonization. This was done under the terms of the Steppe polozhenie or code, article 120 of which declared that all land which may be termed surplus comes under the jurisdiction of the department of Agriculture. Article 126 stated that the term "surplus lands" meant only those lands which were not necessary to the Kirghiz economy.

The actions of the Resettlement Administration were in violation both of the spirit and the letter of the law. The meaning of the term "surplus land" was given a wider and wider interpretation.40

From 1896 to 1902 there was dispatched the first special expedition into the present Kazakhstan area under F. Shcherbin with the goal of finding out the presence and quantity of "surplus lands" and the establishing of "normalized measures" for the partition of land among the local population. The expedition in the years 1896‑1902 examined twelve uezds (districts) of three oblasts (provinces) of Kazakhstan and found in only eight uezds 22,512,000 dessiatines of "surplus lands."41

The Shcherbin expedition was to provide the Resettlement Administration with experience in establishing new norms. The norms established by the Shcherbin expedition were declared too high and new expeditions were dispatched after 1907. The result of all this was an even further lowering of the norm of land declared necessary for the nomads.

In addition the local officials were instructed by St. Petersburg to earmark new lands as "surplus" to be included in the reserve for future colonization. An active competition was begun among the officials (p28) in this matter while the director of resettlement affairs, Beletsky, instructed them as to the number p37 of dessiatines of surplus land they must register in order to move ahead in the service. One over-zealous official, Mazurenko, went so far as to include a portion of China in the tracts he earmarked for seizure as surplus lands!42 Many higher officials who fulfilled the instructions of St. Petersburg with insufficient vigor were removed. This fate befell Leontev, the vice-governor of the Turgai province in 1906 after he warned the authorities about the danger of creating a mass movement among the Kazakhs and acted against the expropriation of their lands, pointing out that "the police forces do not in any way correspond to the needs and intensity of the same resettlement movement." Later the same fate befell Tomachevsky, the Governor of Turgai province.43

Not content with seizing all nomad land outside the established norms the Resettlement Administration in some places sought to place all the best lands in the category of "surplus" while leaving the deserts, hill tops, and scrublands for the nomads. Land was seized even of those Kirghiz and Kazakhs who had adopted a sedentary life and were making a living as agriculturists.44

Another dire threat to the nomads was the outright seizure of the water resources by the settlers in a region where water was a matter of life-and‑death importance. This was especially pronounced in Semirechie where irrigated agriculture was much developed.

The settlement of the land by the Russians meant not only the taking away of the nomad land but created barriers to the herds of the nomads in their various migrations.

The Resettlement Administration was not the only government agency threatening the nomads. Equally menacing were the activities of the Forest Administration. This agriculture regarded the forests as the "sole (p29) property of the Treasury." What was comprehended by the term "forest" was truly remarkable, often including areas where there was not one tree. p38 The nomads pressed to the hills by the Resettlement Administration were hounded from there by the Forest Administration. Thus the nomads were caught between two fires.45

The nomads were not even afforded protection against squatters. When these people illegally occupied nomad territory their occupation was legalized by the Resettlement Administration despite the complaints of the natives.46

The natural increase in population among the Cossack stanitsas or villages brought fresh demands for nomad land. A notable example of this is afforded by the case of the Verny Cossack stanitsa in 1915. The normal partition was 30 dessiatines per soul (100‑150 per family) which was too large for the owner to work. The surplus was rented out to Kirghiz and Kazakhs to work. The increase in population caused the Military Governor of Semirechie, Governor Folbaum, to demand that the adjacent Kirghiz land be added to the partitions even though this meant the ejection of 3,500 Kirghiz families leading a settled agricultural existence there. The final decision was not given in this case but presumably was only interrupted by the outbreak of the Revolution.47

The government in its policies was careful to differentiate between the poor and the bais48 and local native officials, the natural leaders of the people. Bribes and the allotment of large areas of land to the bais and native officials kept the latter on the side of the government. Though the pasture lands formally belonged to the whole community the bais and officials used their wealth and official position to arrogate large tracts to their exclusive control and use.49

(p30) p39 The official policy of the government was to foster the transition from a nomad to a sedentary life. To this end they offered a tax exemption for the first five years and half payment of taxes for the succeeding five years to those nomads who would make the transition. The poor nomads were inclined to make the transition as it meant the securing of a portion (even if small) of land free both of Russian and bai, and the adoption of a more progressive form of economy (agriculture). The nomads feared as well that their herding land would be subject to further expropriation. It is significant that the majority of the petitions for transition came from those areas where expropriation was carried through in its most blatant form (Semirechie oblast, the Aktiubinsk and Kustanaisk uezds or districts of the Turgai oblast, the Uralsk and Temirsk uezds of the Uralsk oblast).50

The bais, on the other hand, opposed conversion. They owned large herds and feared that conversion might lead to expropriation of their land. In addition they would lose their authority over the people. Thus they used every method of persuasion, including coercion and even murder, to stop these petitions.

The official government position was the following: (1) the nomads, in passing from nomadism to agriculture, will be introduced to a much higher culture; (2) the transition to a sedentary state was advertised as final agrarian legislation after which all expropriation will come to an end; (3) the government protects the poor against the seizure of land by the bai upper class and assures them of a portion of land in sole and undivided ownership.51

In all this we see the characteristic prejudice of agricultural peoples against the nomad and the belief in the superiority of the sedentary (p31) life. The same policy was advocated towards the steppe nomad as was carried out against the American Indian; he was to be driven off into the desert and his place taken by "reliable Russian people." The steppe seemed limitless and p40 it was thought the process could be carried on for a long time before the nomads would feel the pinch. What was forgotten was that while summer pastures were plentiful winter pastures were not. The seizure of well-protected and well-watered spots by the Russians doomed the nomads and their flocks to face the full rigours of the steppe winter.52 The inclusion of hay fields as "forest" by the Forest Administration was equally prejudicial to the nomad's survival while the increasing encroachment of the Russian on the land denied him alternative and supplementary areas in years of drought.53

The Russian trader brought vodka, cigarettes, lacquered boots, and other articles of civilization to the nomad breaking down his natural economy and increasing his wants while at the same time the income of the latter was shrinking as his herds decreased in size owing to Russian encroachment on his pasture lands. Semirechie saw the intrusion of the great trading firms of Central Russia with the setting up of trading posts with travelling agents and intermediaries. In 1907 these centres numbered 320. This network penetrated into the most remote aul or nomad village of the nomad territory. In addition to the Russians there appeared Uzbek merchants, Tartars, and others. A great business in usury arose alongside this trading as the nomads often had no ready cash. Both operations were carried on by the trader. A glimpse of the way in which these speculators operated is given in the "Agricultural Survey of Semirechie oblast" for the year 1914:

(p32) Such a speculator settled down somewhere in places of the greatest concentration of Kirghiz and handed out goods all winter, for the most part on credit, until the spring; in the spring the debtors were obliged to leave in a determined place for the payment of their debt either live cattle or the products of herding needed by the speculator. In the p41 spring, gathering in such a manner herds of live cattle or transports of pastoral raw materials, the speculators either go to the great fairs farther away to sell these products or send them directly to railway stations for delivery farther on. In the last few years agencies of great Russian firms have appeared in the limits of the oblast for the buying of skins, wool, but these agencies buy only through the speculators, not receiving small parties from the immediate economies.54

In such a manner each year at least 14‑15% of the livestock of Semirechie left the oblast.

Statistics paint a distressing picture of the circumstances of the nomads in the years just preceding the Revolt. Among the Kirghiz there was created a landless proletariat hiring themselves out for labor; 50% of the Russian settlers in Kirghizia hired batraks or native hired hands while the manaps or native aristocracy also hired them.55 By 1913 about 4.5 million hectares of the best agricultural land in Kirghizia had been seized. The driving of the Kirghiz into the deserts and hills brought a drop in the quantity of cattle of 27% in only five years (1902‑1907) while the population decreased by 7 to 10% in ten years (1903‑1913).56 The nomad was possessed of land too poor for agriculture and insufficient for herding.57

Despite the fact that they were newcomers not enjoying the high protection of the Tsar even the Dungans and Taranchi prospered more (p33) than the Kirghiz. In the 1860s the Taranchi and Dungans58 revolted against the Chinese tyranny and p42 corruption in Sinkiang. The rebellion (1862‑1877) was suppressed by the Chinese with great cruelty. In the meantime Russia had occupied the Kulja area to pacify it and keep the revolt from spreading to its native peoples. When the Russians left the country in 1881 in accordance with the terms of the Treaty of St. Petersburg they took some of the Dungans and Taranchi with them, though most had fled earlier into Russian territory. The Dungans lived mostly in Semirechie oblast (14,130 out of a total of 16,279 in Russian Turkistan, according to the Census of 1897).59

The great claim of the Russians that the Russian peasants on the land would teach the natives a higher and superior culture must be taken with no little amount of reservation. According to the official report of Count Palen (q.v.)

Neither in the sense of the variety of culture, nor in the sense of the system of farming have the Russians surpassed the sedentary natives — Taranchi and Dungans; on the contrary, the latter raise rice, olives, different kinds of vegetables, grapes, pears, and even cotton, which demands a much more intensive culture than the usual peasant economy. Even the economy of the Kirghiz nomads, in the sense of adaptation to the natural conditions of the oblast, but naturally not in the sense of technique, stands higher than the economy of the Russians.

The cultivation of land on the peasant sections is most primitive. They plow to the depth of 2‑4 vershoks60 for one time, more with the spring. Manure is not (p34) used. The harvest, first reaching up to 150‑200 puds per dessiatine[,] is lowered to 30‑60 puds on peasant land in constant use.61

Such a primitive and inefficient technique of agriculture goes far to explain why the Russian peasant's appetite for nomad land was ever increasing and why they constantly strove to get more, legally or illegally.

The situation would have been bad enough if the lands went p43 only to Russian peasants. Speculation and official corruption were rife in the disposition of these lands. In 1916 General Kuropatkin wrote in his journal:

Especially inadmissible to me is the giving in 1913, 1914 and 1915 in Semirechie oblast of 1,800,000 dessiatines of pasture land to various individuals including 10,000 dessiatines to Porotikov, police chief of the city of Verny. I am afraid that this will be worse than the famous "Baskir land" [scandal]. We ourselves did not know at what we were driving. Turning the Kirghiz to sedentary life we parcelled out among them only the plough lands while the pasture lands — 1,800,000 dessiatines — we gave to speculators, not to the Kirghiz. At the same time there took place a bacchanalia in all oblasts of the krai with the forest lands of the krai.62

In conclusion a few words need be said about the situation among the Turkomans of the Transcaspian region.

The Russians came into this area later than into the other localities of Central Asia, the Turkomans not laying down their arms until after the great siege of Geok Tēpē (1881). Russian colonization here was slight and though the Russians formed 10% of the population in 1914 they were mostly soldiers in garrison. The region is dominated by desert and was the largest and most thinly populated of all the regions of Russian Central Asia. Only the southwest is sufficiently irrigated by the waters of the Murgab and Tedjen rivers. For the rest of this enormous region water was provided only by wells and karez.

The oasis of Merv saw a great extension of cotton growing which already by 1916 constituted 44.6% of the communal sown area, and (p35) averaged 49.5% of the private mulk lands.63 General Kuropatkin, visiting the area in 1916, found that some of the Turkomans had prospered greatly from cotton while the rest had become impoverished. Conflict with the Russians in the economic sphere was confined largely to disputes over water, the Russians taking over the water and selling it back to the natives. In the appropriation of water, the Tsarist estate of Bairam-Ali, near Merv, set up to teach the natives improved techniques of agriculture, was especially guilty.

The Author's Notes:

1 V. V. Barthold, La découverte de l'Asie ; Histoire de l'Orientalisme en Europe et en Russie (Paris, 1947), p228. It should be said, however, that the advantages looked better on paper in tonnage of cargo. In spite of all political difficulties one small sailing ship could load more at Canton than several great caravans.

3 Barthold, op. cit., p274. Cf. Manchu empire's policy towards Mongols. See O. Lattimore, "Mongolia," China Year Book, 1933, p193.

4 When the pastoral economy is dislocated by new forms of administrative control, trade, and — especially — colonization, the bolder spirits among the tribesmen are apt to strike back by "going on the war-path." Hence they are described as "marauders" by their civilized conquerors, who eventually write the history of what happened. Cf. the American folk-historical picture of the Indians as "people who tried to drive out the white man."

6 M. K. Rozhkova, "Russkie fabrikanty i rynki srednego vostoka vo vtoroi chetverti XIX veka," Istoricheskie zapiski, no. 27 (1948), p144.

7 P. Lyashchenko, History of the National Economy of Russia to the 1917 Revolution (New York, 1949), p354.

9 P. G. Galuzo, Turkestan — Koloniya (Ocherk istorii Turkestana ot zavoevaniya russkimi do revolyutsii 1917 goda) (Moscow, 1929), p8.

12 A. Meakin, In Russian Turkestan: A Garden of Asia and Its People (London, 1915), p31.

15 Lyashchenko, op. cit., p610‑611. It is significant to note that while cotton production rose to 14 million puds by the eve of World War I the importation of foreign cotton (chiefly American) remained at 10 million puds, showing no decrease. See Boris I. T. Roustam-Bek, "First Mohammedan Republic," Asia, May 1920, p391.

17 Georgii Safarov, Kolonialnaya revolyutsiya (opyt turkestana) (Moscow, 1921), p39.

19 See Karl Stählin, Russisch-Turkestan, Gestern und Heute (Berlin, 1935), pp15‑16.

24 This was by no means confined to Russian Turkistan. For Russia proper see M. Dobb, Soviet Economic Development since 1917 (New York, 1948), p44. It is also true of China and, in general, countries where the farmer has little working capital, and where tenantry is largely on a share-cropping, rather than a monetary basis.

33 Lyashchenko, op. cit., p617; A. M. Pankratova and A. L. Sidorov (Editors), Revolyutsia 1905‑1907 godov v natsionalnikh raionakh Rossii. Sbornik statei (State Printing-house of Political Literature, 1949), p520.

36 Handbook of Siberia and Arctic Russia (Great Britain Admiralty, 1918), vol. I, p200.

37 G. I. Broido, "Materialy k istorii vosstaniya kirghiz v 1916 g.," Novy Vostok, no. 6 (1924), p409.

38 This payment represented not only the price of the land but the redemption of feudal obligations to the lord.

40 The same held true in the Chinese colonization of Mongol land. See O. Lattimore, The Mongols of Manchuria (New York, 1934), p107.

41 O. A. Vaganov, "Zemelnaya politika tsarskogo pravitelstva v Kazakhstane," Istoricheskie zapiski, no. 31 (1950), p71.

44 A. V. Shestakov, "Vosstanie v Srednei Azii 1916 g.," Istorik Marksist, no. 2 (1926), p96. For a comparable situation in regard to the Chinese seizure of Mongol lands, see Lattimore, op. cit., pp103‑105.

48 Bai, a Turkish word (properly an adjective) meaning "rich." In Central Asia the word is often added to the name of a prosperous influential person to distinguish him from the mass of people.

49 As with the nomads of Central Asia the Mongols recognized only the ownership of the whole tribe over territory. The renting of Mongol land to Chinese farmers during the Manchu dynasty brought a change. Though the income from land rentals was a tribal fund to be divided among the ruling prince, the officials and the tribe as a whole the privileged class among the Mongols, through their management of funds, profited the most. Tracts of tribal land were recognized by the Chinese authorities as belonging to the Mongol privileged classes for the latter's support in expropriating the rest of the tribal territory as "surplus." See Lattimore, op. cit., chapter III.

52 The practice of spending winters in the same place appears to be an ancient and general one among Central Asian nomads. Owen Lattimore, High Tartary (Boston, 1930), p243 ff.; idem. 40, 73 ff. Alfred E. Hudson, "The Social Structure of the Kazakhs," Yale University Publications in Anthropology, no. 20 (New Haven, 1928), p30.

53 The nomad does not wander aimlessly but in a well defined circuit. The circuit is usually not great while among the mountain nomads it may be very short. Thus the Kaying Kirghiz of Sinkiang, who are mountain nomads, move a total annual distance of but 10 miles. C. P. Skrine, Chinese Central Asia (Boston and New York, 1926), p153.

54 Quoted by S. Brainin and S. Shafiro, Vosstanie kazakhov Semirechya v 1916 godu (Alma-Ata and Moscow, 1936), p5.

55 Introduction: T. R. Ryskulov: Vosstanie 1916 g. v Kirgizstane: Dokumenty i Materialy sobrannye L. V. Lesnoi. Pod redaktsei i s predsloviem T. R. Ryskulova (Moscow, 1937), p5 (?).

56 A. Zorin, "Kirgizskaya Sovetskaya Sotsialisticheskaya Respublika," Bolshaya Sovetskaya Entsiklopediya, vol. XXXII, column 377.

57 The difference between the extensive herding economy of the nomad and the valued intensive agriculture of the Russian settler is illustrated by the fact that while the latter received an average income of 19 roubles 20 kop. per acre the former received only 2 roubles 73 kop. Safarov, op. cit., p45.

58 The Taranchi are a people of mixed Turkic, eastern Iranian, and other mixtures. The origin of the Dungans or Chinese Moslems is still to be settled definitely. Massalsky regards them as Mohammedanized Chinese while other authors think they are Sinized elements of the old Turkic Uighurs. Evkall thinks they are the descendants of Arab mercenaries entering the country from the eighth century A.D. and now much diluted by marriage among the Chinese. See Waldemar Jochelson, Peoples of Asiatic Russia (New York, 1928), p104; Robert Evkall, Cultural Relations on the Kansu-Tibetan Frontier (Chicago, 1939), p8; see also Owen Lattimore, Pivot of Asia; Sinkiang and the Inner Asian Frontiers of China and Russia (Boston, 1950); Taranchis, p126, 196; Dungans, pp141, 143.

62 Kuropatkin's Journal, "Vosstanie 1916 g. v Srednei Azii," Krasnyi Arkhiv (hereafter cited as K. A.), no. 34 (1929), p65. Emphasis in original.

p27 1859	118
1860	139
1861	336
1862	723
1863	1091
1864	972
1865	462	13

1885	101
1886	110
1887	110
1888	115
1889	124

1888	873,000 puds16
1889	1,470,000 "
1890	2,673,000 "
1890‑96	4,300,000-4,900,000 puds
1907	10,700,000 puds

p21 (p11) 2 The Economic Background to the Revolt of 1916