Map Close  
Person info Close  
Information Close  
Source reference Close  
  Svenska
 
Previous page Page 487 Next page Smaller font Larger font Print friednly version  
Given the weakness of Soviet Armenia – the dismal economic situation, the fragility of popular backing for the regime, and the fact that more Armenians lived outside Armenia, in Georgia and Azerbaijan, than in Armenia itself – the Communists of Armenia were desperately interested in closer ties with the Georgian, Azerbaijani, and Russian Soviet republics. On September 30, 1921, Armenia signed a treaty of alliance with Russian Soviet Federated Socialist Republic (RSFSR) that established financial cooperation. A few months later Armenian delegates attended the All-Russian Congress of Soviets in Moscow, demonstrating their close links with RSFSR. While the Georgians, who were economically better off than the Armenians, hesitated to create economic ties with other republics, Armenia pushed for the establishment of a Transcaucasian economic union. Miasnikian supported the efforts of Sergo Ordjonikidze, the leading Communist in Transcaucasia, and his mentor, Joseph Stalin, to integrate the three republics in Transcaucasia into a single republic. On April 14, 1921, all railroads in Transcaucasia were put under one authority. Two weeks later foreign trade was put under a single agency, the Obvneshtorg. In May and June custom barriers and border guards were removed between the republics and between Transcaucasia and the RSFSR. Work began on the touchy matter of delineating the frontiers of the republics and determining the fate of areas such as Akhalkalak, Lori, Karabakh, and Nakhichevan, which were desired by several republics. The negotiations continued into 1923, and though Armenia received Lori, it lost two areas that historically had been part of the Armenian states – Karabakh and Nakhichevan. Both were awarded to the Azerbaijani republic, which was economically stronger than Armenia. Nakhichevan had a largely Muslim population, but Karabakh was overwhelmingly Armenian. Armenian Communists protested the decision of July 5, 1921, that placed Karabakh in Azerbaijan, but at the time they were more concerned about unity with the other Transcaucasian peoples and economic recovery than state sovereignty over historically Armenian territories.

Through 1921 and 1922 the progressive whittling away of the prerogatives of the individual republics and the consolidation of Transcaucasia into a single unit continued. In November 1921 the party organisations in Armenia and Azerbaijan approved a proposal calling for the political unification of Transcaucasia. Ordjonikidze was able to get the Georgia party congress to approve the measure, against the advice of the Georgian Central Committee. On March 12, 1922, representatives from Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia signed the treaty forming the federal Union of Soviet Socialist Republics of Transcaucasia (FSSSRZ). This rather loose arrangement was a compromise between the centralisers who wanted closer ties between the republics and the RSFSR, and the Georgians, who favoured greater autonomy for the republics. But the centralisers were not satisfied with this arrangement, and in September 1922 Stalin introduced a plan to bring all the national republics – Armenia, Azerbaijan Byelorussia, Georgia, and Ukraine – into the RSFSR as autonomous republics. This would effectively ended their independence and made them completely subordinate to the leadership in Moscow. Lenin opposed this centralising effort and though he was mortally ill, he was able to stop Stalin's design. Instead of merging into the RSFSR, the five national republics and RSFSR entered a new political federation, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, which came into existence formally in December 1922. at the same time the FSSSRZ was dissolved, and a slightly more centralised federation, the Transcaucasian Federated Soviet Socialist Republic (ZSFSR), was created. On December 20, the ZSFSR entered the USSR. The Soviet republic of Armenia, thus, was a member of the Transcaucasian Federation, which in turn was part of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.