Central Asia in Soviet and British Strategy, 1918

Abstract

The author analyses Soviet Russia and Great Britain’s strategies for Central Asia, a crucial geopolitical region, the control of which allowed both Moscow and London to safeguard their state interests at the final stage of the Great War. The development of these plans was accompanied by intense internal political struggles in Britain over the 'Bolshevik menace' to British possessions in Asia and the crisis in the Ottoman Empire, Persia, and Afghanistan, which spawned ethno-confessional movements of various stripes. The author compares the role and place of Central Asia in Moscow's and London's foreign policy: while the former sought to use the situation to implement plans for a 'world revolution', the latter sought to strengthen its position in countering the national movements that sought support from the powers of the Quadruple Alliance. The relevance of the study stems from the persistence and even exacerbation of tensions in the region of interest to the author, which necessitates a study of the historical experience of dispute resolution. The novelty of the study is determined by the introduction into academic discourse of several official diplomatic documents together with the sources from private collections which are examined in a complex, comparative way making it possible to stipulate strategic goals of leading geopolitical actors at the final stage of the First World War. As the article elucidates, despite the existing domestic and foreign scholarship on the subject, various scenarios of military-political steps of Moscow and London in Central Asia require clarification while considering the German-Turkish projects of relying upon nationalistic movements under Islamic slogans.