Red Army invasion of Georgia
Encyclopedia
The Red Army invasion of Georgia also known as the Soviet–Georgian War or the Soviet invasion of Georgia (15 February – 17 March 1921) was a military campaign by the Soviet Russian (RSFSR) Red Army
Red Army
The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army started out as the Soviet Union's revolutionary communist combat groups during the Russian Civil War of 1918-1922. It grew into the national army of the Soviet Union. By the 1930s the Red Army was among the largest armies in history.The "Red Army" name refers to...

 against the Democratic Republic of Georgia
Democratic Republic of Georgia
The Democratic Republic of Georgia , 1918–1921, was the first modern establishment of a Republic of Georgia.The DRG was created after the collapse of the Russian Empire that began with the Russian Revolution of 1917...

 (DRG) aimed at overthrowing the Social-Democratic
Georgian Social Democratic (Menshevik) Party
200px|thumb|Menshevik Flag of Georgia, created by Iakob NikoladzeThe Social Democratic Labour Party of Georgia was a political party in Georgia. It was founded as the Georgian branch of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party separated itself from the Russian mother-party.The party dominated...

 (Menshevik
Menshevik
The Mensheviks were a faction of the Russian revolutionary movement that emerged in 1904 after a dispute between Vladimir Lenin and Julius Martov, both members of the Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party. The dispute originated at the Second Congress of that party, ostensibly over minor issues...

) government and installing the Bolshevik
Bolshevik
The Bolsheviks, originally also Bolshevists , derived from bol'shinstvo, "majority") were a faction of the Marxist Russian Social Democratic Labour Party which split apart from the Menshevik faction at the Second Party Congress in 1903....

 regime in the country. The conflict was a result of expansionist policy by the Soviets, who aimed at control of the same territories which had been part of the Russian Empire
Russian Empire
The Russian Empire was a state that existed from 1721 until the Russian Revolution of 1917. It was the successor to the Tsardom of Russia and the predecessor of the Soviet Union...

. until the turbulent events of World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...

, as well as the revolutionary efforts of mostly Russia-based Georgian
Georgia (country)
Georgia is a sovereign state in the Caucasus region of Eurasia. Located at the crossroads of Western Asia and Eastern Europe, it is bounded to the west by the Black Sea, to the north by Russia, to the southwest by Turkey, to the south by Armenia, and to the southeast by Azerbaijan. The capital of...

 Bolshevik elite, who did not enjoy sufficient support in their native country to seize power without foreign intervention.

Independence of the DRG had been recognized by Russia in the 7 May 1920 treaty
Treaty of Moscow (1920)
The Treaty of Moscow , signed between Soviet Russia and the Democratic Republic of Georgia in Moscow on May 7, 1920, granted Georgia de jure recognition of independence in exchange of the promise not to grant asylum on Georgian soil to troops of powers hostile to Bolshevik Russia.- Background...

 and the invasion of Georgia was not universally agreed upon in Moscow
Moscow
Moscow is the capital, the most populous city, and the most populous federal subject of Russia. The city is a major political, economic, cultural, scientific, religious, financial, educational, and transportation centre of Russia and the continent...

. It was largely engineered by two influential Georgia-born Soviet Russian officials – Joseph Stalin
Joseph Stalin
Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin was the Premier of the Soviet Union from 6 May 1941 to 5 March 1953. He was among the Bolshevik revolutionaries who brought about the October Revolution and had held the position of first General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union's Central Committee...

 and Grigoriy (Sergo) Ordzhonikidze
Grigoriy Ordzhonikidze
Grigol Ordzhonikidze ორჯონიკიძე - Grigol Orjonikidze, , generally known as Sergo Ordzhonikidze ; – February 18, 1937) was a Georgian Bolshevik, later member of the CPSU Politburo and close friend to Joseph Stalin...

, who obtained, on 14 February 1921, a consent of the Soviet leader, Vladimir Lenin
Vladimir Lenin
Vladimir Ilyich Lenin was a Russian Marxist revolutionary and communist politician who led the October Revolution of 1917. As leader of the Bolsheviks, he headed the Soviet state during its initial years , as it fought to establish control of Russia in the Russian Civil War and worked to create a...

, to advance into Georgia on the pretext of supporting the "peasants and workers rebellion" in the country. The Soviet forces took the Georgian capital Tbilisi
Tbilisi
Tbilisi is the capital and the largest city of Georgia, lying on the banks of the Mt'k'vari River. The name is derived from an early Georgian form T'pilisi and it was officially known as Tiflis until 1936...

 (then known as Tiflis to most non-Georgian
Georgian language
Georgian is the native language of the Georgians and the official language of Georgia, a country in the Caucasus.Georgian is the primary language of about 4 million people in Georgia itself, and of another 500,000 abroad...

 speakers) after heavy fighting and declared the Georgian Soviet Socialist Republic on 25 February 1921. The rest of the country was overrun within three weeks, but it was not until September 1924 that the Soviet rule was firmly established. Almost simultaneous occupation of a large portion of southwest Georgia by Turkey
Turkey
Turkey , known officially as the Republic of Turkey , is a Eurasian country located in Western Asia and in East Thrace in Southeastern Europe...

 (February — March 1921) threatened to develop into a crisis between Moscow and Ankara
Ankara
Ankara is the capital of Turkey and the country's second largest city after Istanbul. The city has a mean elevation of , and as of 2010 the metropolitan area in the entire Ankara Province had a population of 4.4 million....

 and led to significant territorial concessions by the Soviets to the Turkish National Government in the Treaty of Kars
Treaty of Kars
The Treaty of Kars was a "friendship" treaty signed in Kars on October 13, 1921 and ratified in Yerevan on September 11 1922.Signatories included representatives from the Grand National Assembly of Turkey, which in 1923 would declare the Republic of Turkey, and also from Soviet Armenia, Soviet...

.

Background

Georgia effectively escaped Russian control in the chaotic aftermath of the February Revolution
February Revolution
The February Revolution of 1917 was the first of two revolutions in Russia in 1917. Centered around the then capital Petrograd in March . Its immediate result was the abdication of Tsar Nicholas II, the end of the Romanov dynasty, and the end of the Russian Empire...

 in Russia in 1917. After an abortive attempt to unite with Armenia
Armenia
Armenia , officially the Republic of Armenia , is a landlocked mountainous country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia...

 and Azerbaijan
Azerbaijan
Azerbaijan , officially the Republic of Azerbaijan is the largest country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia. Located at the crossroads of Western Asia and Eastern Europe, it is bounded by the Caspian Sea to the east, Russia to the north, Georgia to the northwest, Armenia to the west, and Iran to...

 into a federative state
Transcaucasian Democratic Federative Republic
The Transcaucasian Democratic Federative Republic , was a short-lived state composed of the modern-day countries of Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia in the South Caucasus.-...

, Georgian leaders proclaimed the country’s independence as the Democratic Republic of Georgia on 26 May 1918. Through sporadic conflicts with its neighbors and occasional outbreaks of civil strife, Georgia managed to maintain its precarious independence and achieved more or less firm control over its newly established borders in the troubled years of the Russian Civil War
Russian Civil War
The Russian Civil War was a multi-party war that occurred within the former Russian Empire after the Russian provisional government collapsed to the Soviets, under the domination of the Bolshevik party. Soviet forces first assumed power in Petrograd The Russian Civil War (1917–1923) was a...

.

Despite relatively high public support and some successful reforms, the Social Democratic leadership of Georgia failed to create a stable economy and build a strong and disciplined army that could be able to oppose an invasion. Although there were a significant number of highly qualified officers who had served in the Imperial Russian military, the army was underfed and poorly equipped. A parallel military structure, the People’s Guard of Georgia
People’s Guard of Georgia
The Peoples Guard of Georgia was a volunteer force of Georgian civilians, who resisted the Red Army invasion in February 1921. It was formed by 600 fighting men supported by 100 woman, who helped nurse the wounded.....

, was recruited from the members of the Menshevik Party, and was hence more honored and disciplined, but dominated by party functionaries and highly politicized.

Prelude to the war

Since early 1920, the local Bolsheviks were actively fomenting political unrest in Georgia, capitalizing on agrarian disturbances in rural areas and inter-ethnic tensions within the country. The operational centre of the Soviet military-political forces in the Caucasus
Caucasus
The Caucasus, also Caucas or Caucasia , is a geopolitical region at the border of Europe and Asia, and situated between the Black and the Caspian sea...

 was the Kavburo (Caucasian Bureau
Office
An office is generally a room or other area in which people work, but may also denote a position within an organization with specific duties attached to it ; the latter is in fact an earlier usage, office as place originally referring to the location of one's duty. When used as an adjective, the...

), attached to the Central Committee of the Russian Communist Party
Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union
The Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union , abbreviated in Russian as ЦК, "Tse-ka", earlier was also called as the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party ...

. Set up in February 1920, this body was presided by the Georgian Bolshevik Grigoriy Ordzhonikidze
Grigoriy Ordzhonikidze
Grigol Ordzhonikidze ორჯონიკიძე - Grigol Orjonikidze, , generally known as Sergo Ordzhonikidze ; – February 18, 1937) was a Georgian Bolshevik, later member of the CPSU Politburo and close friend to Joseph Stalin...

, with Sergei Kirov as his deputy. While the Allied powers
Allies of World War I
The Entente Powers were the countries at war with the Central Powers during World War I. The members of the Triple Entente were the United Kingdom, France, and the Russian Empire; Italy entered the war on their side in 1915...

 were preoccupied with the Turkish War of Independence
Turkish War of Independence
The Turkish War of Independence was a war of independence waged by Turkish nationalists against the Allies, after the country was partitioned by the Allies following the Ottoman Empire's defeat in World War I...

, the Sovietization
Sovietization
Sovietization is term that may be used with two distinct meanings:*the adoption of a political system based on the model of soviets .*the adoption of a way of life and mentality modelled after the Soviet Union....

 of the Caucasus appeared to the Bolshevik leaders an easier task. Furthermore, the Ankara
Ankara
Ankara is the capital of Turkey and the country's second largest city after Istanbul. The city has a mean elevation of , and as of 2010 the metropolitan area in the entire Ankara Province had a population of 4.4 million....

-based Turkish national government led by Kemal Pasha
Kemal Pasha
Kemal Pasha is a Indonesian football player, who currently plays for Bogor Raya F.C. in Liga Primer Indonesia.-References:...

 expressed its full commitment to a close co-operation with Moscow, promising to compel "Georgia… and Azerbaijan… to enter into union with Soviet Russia… and… to undertake military operations against the expansionist Armenia." The Soviet leadership successfully exploited the situation and sent in its army to occupy Baku
Baku
Baku , sometimes spelled as Baki or Bakou, is the capital and largest city of Azerbaijan, as well as the largest city on the Caspian Sea and of the Caucasus region. It is located on the southern shore of the Absheron Peninsula, which projects into the Caspian Sea. The city consists of two principal...

, the capital of the Democratic Republic of Azerbaijan.

Following the establishment of Soviet rule in Baku in April 1920, Ordzhonikidze, acting most probably on his own initiative, advanced on Georgia to support a planned Bolshevik coup
1920 Georgian coup attempt
The Georgian coup in May 1920 was an unsuccessful attempt to take power by the Bolsheviks in the Democratic Republic of Georgia. Relying on the 11th Red Army of Soviet Russia operating in neighboring Azerbaijan, the Bolsheviks, attempted to take control of a military school and government offices...

 in Tbilisi. The coup failed, however, allowing the government to concentrate all forces on successfully blocking the advance of Russian troops on the Georgian-Azerbaijani border. Facing an uneasy war
Polish-Soviet War
The Polish–Soviet War was an armed conflict between Soviet Russia and Soviet Ukraine and the Second Polish Republic and the Ukrainian People's Republic—four states in post–World War I Europe...

 with Poland
Poland
Poland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...

, the Soviet Russian leader, Vladimir Lenin
Vladimir Lenin
Vladimir Ilyich Lenin was a Russian Marxist revolutionary and communist politician who led the October Revolution of 1917. As leader of the Bolsheviks, he headed the Soviet state during its initial years , as it fought to establish control of Russia in the Russian Civil War and worked to create a...

, ordered to start negotiations with Georgia. In the Treaty of Moscow
Treaty of Moscow (1920)
The Treaty of Moscow , signed between Soviet Russia and the Democratic Republic of Georgia in Moscow on May 7, 1920, granted Georgia de jure recognition of independence in exchange of the promise not to grant asylum on Georgian soil to troops of powers hostile to Bolshevik Russia.- Background...

 signed on 7 May 1920, Soviet Russia recognized Georgia’s independence and concluded a non-aggression pact. The treaty de jure
De jure
De jure is an expression that means "concerning law", as contrasted with de facto, which means "concerning fact".De jure = 'Legally', De facto = 'In fact'....

 established the existing borders between the two nations and obliged Georgia to surrender all third-party elements considered hostile by Moscow
Moscow
Moscow is the capital, the most populous city, and the most populous federal subject of Russia. The city is a major political, economic, cultural, scientific, religious, financial, educational, and transportation centre of Russia and the continent...

. In a secret supplement, Georgia promised to legalize the local Bolshevik party.

Despite the peace treaty, an eventual overthrow of the Menshevik-dominated government of Georgia was both intended and planned. With its well-established diplomatic ties with several Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...

an nations and its control of strategic transit routes from the Black Sea to the Caspian, Georgia was viewed by the Soviet leadership as "an advance post of the Entente
Allies of World War I
The Entente Powers were the countries at war with the Central Powers during World War I. The members of the Triple Entente were the United Kingdom, France, and the Russian Empire; Italy entered the war on their side in 1915...

" and Stalin called his homeland "the kept woman of the Entente". Another reason why it was thought impossible to allow the Georgian government to stay in power was the Bolsheviks’ desire to take revenge on the Russian Mensheviks in European exile whose anti-Soviet propaganda could not so easily be silenced.

The cessation of Red Army operations against Poland, the defeat of the White Russian
White movement
The White movement and its military arm the White Army - known as the White Guard or the Whites - was a loose confederation of Anti-Communist forces.The movement comprised one of the politico-military Russian forces who fought...

 leader Wrangel
Pyotr Nikolayevich Wrangel
Baron Pyotr Nikolayevich Wrangel or Vrangel was an officer in the Imperial Russian army and later commanding general of the anti-Bolshevik White Army in Southern Russia in the later stages of the Russian Civil War.-Life:Wrangel was born in Mukuliai, Kovno Governorate in the Russian Empire...

 and the fall of the Democratic Republic of Armenia
Democratic Republic of Armenia
The Democratic Republic of Armenia was the first modern establishment of an Armenian state...

 provided a favorable situation to suppress the last independent nation in the Caucasus
Caucasus
The Caucasus, also Caucas or Caucasia , is a geopolitical region at the border of Europe and Asia, and situated between the Black and the Caspian sea...

 to resist Soviet control. By that time, the British
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

 expeditionary corps had completely evacuated the Caucasus and the West
Western world
The Western world, also known as the West and the Occident , is a term referring to the countries of Western Europe , the countries of the Americas, as well all countries of Northern and Central Europe, Australia and New Zealand...

 was reluctant to intervene in support of Georgia.

However, Russian military intervention was not universally agreed upon in Moscow and there was considerable disagreement among the Bolshevik leaders on how to deal with the southern neighbor. The People's Commissar of Nationalities Affairs, Joseph Stalin
Joseph Stalin
Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin was the Premier of the Soviet Union from 6 May 1941 to 5 March 1953. He was among the Bolshevik revolutionaries who brought about the October Revolution and had held the position of first General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union's Central Committee...

, who had, by the end of the Civil War, already accumulated a remarkable amount of bureaucratic power in his own hands, took a particularly hard line with his native Georgia, strongly supporting a military overthrow of the Georgian government and continuously urging Lenin to give his consent to advance into Georgia. The People's Commissar of War, Leon Trotsky
Leon Trotsky
Leon Trotsky , born Lev Davidovich Bronshtein, was a Russian Marxist revolutionary and theorist, Soviet politician, and the founder and first leader of the Red Army....

, strongly disagreed with what he described as a “premature intervention” explaining that the population would be able to carry the revolution. Pursuant to his national policy on the right of nations to self-determination
Self-determination
Self-determination is the principle in international law that nations have the right to freely choose their sovereignty and international political status with no external compulsion or external interference...

, Lenin had initially rejected use of force, calling for extreme caution in order to ensure that the Russian factor would help and not dominate the Georgian revolution. However, as victory in the Civil War drew ever closer, Moscow’s actions became less restrained and, for many Bolsheviks, self-determination was increasingly "a diplomatic game which has to be played in certain cases".

According to Moscow, relations with Georgia deteriorated over alleged violations of the peace treaty, re-arrests of Georgian Bolsheviks, obstruction of the passage of convoys passing through to Armenia, and a suspicion that Georgia was aiding armed rebels in the North Caucasus
North Caucasus
The North Caucasus is the northern part of the Caucasus region between the Black and Caspian Seas and within European Russia. The term is also used as a synonym for the North Caucasus economic region of Russia....

.

Red Army invasion

The tactics used by the Soviets to gain control of Georgia were similar to those applied in Azerbaijan and Armenia in 1920, i.e., to send in the Red Army while encouraging local Bolsheviks to stage unrest. However, this policy was rather difficult to implement in Georgia, where the Communist party did not enjoy popular support and remained an isolated political force.

On the night of 11 to 12 February 1921, with the instigation of Ordzhonikidze, the Bolsheviks attacked local Georgian military posts in the ethnic Armenian
Armenians
Armenian people or Armenians are a nation and ethnic group native to the Armenian Highland.The largest concentration is in Armenia having a nearly-homogeneous population with 97.9% or 3,145,354 being ethnic Armenian....

 district of Lorri
Lorri
-Given name:*Lorri Bagley, an American actress and model*Lorri Jean, a leader in the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender civil rights movement in America-Acronym:...

 and the nearby village of Shulaveri, near the Armenian and Azerbaijani borders. The Armenia-based Red Army units quickly came to an aid of the insurrection, though without Moscow's formal approval. When the Georgian government protested to the Soviet envoy in Tbilisi, Aron Sheinman, about the incidents, he denied any Russian involvement and declared that any disturbances which might be taking place must be a spontaneous revolt by the Armenian communists. Meanwhile, the Bolsheviks had already set up a Georgian Revolutionary Committee (Georgian Revkom) in Shulaveri, a body that would soon acquire the functions of a rival government. Chaired by a Georgian Bolshevik Filipp Makharadze
Filipp Makharadze
Filipp Makaradze was a Bolshevik revolutionary and government official.-Life:...

, the Revkom formally applied to Moscow for help.

Disturbances erupted also in the town of Dusheti
Dusheti
Dusheti is a town in Georgia, situated in the Mtskheta-Mtianeti region, 54 km northeast of the nation’s capital of Tbilisi.Dusheti is located on both banks of the small mountainous river of Dushetis-Khevi at the foothills of the Greater Caucasus crest at an elevation of 900 m above sea level...

 and among Ossetians in northeast Georgia who resented the Georgian government's refusal to grant them autonomy. Georgian forces managed to contain the disorders in some areas, but the preparations for a Soviet intervention were already being set in train. When the Georgian army moved to Lorri to crush the revolt, Lenin finally gave in to the repeated requests of Stalin and Ordzhonikidze to allow the Red Army to invade Georgia, on the pretext of aiding a staged uprising, and establish Bolshevik power. An ultimate decision was made on the 14 February meeting of the Central Committee of the Communist Party
Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union
The Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union , abbreviated in Russian as ЦК, "Tse-ka", earlier was also called as the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party ...

:
Yet, the decision to support the invasion was not unanimous. It was opposed by Karl Radek
Karl Radek
Karl Bernhardovic Radek was a socialist active in the Polish and German movements before World War I and an international Communist leader after the Russian Revolution....

 and was held secret from Trotsky who was in the Ural
Ural (region)
Ural is a geographical region located around the Ural Mountains, between the East European and West Siberian plains. It extends approximately from north to south, from the Arctic Ocean to the bend of Ural River near Orsk city. The boundary between Europe and Asia runs along the eastern side of...

 area at that time. The latter was so upset by the news of the Central Committee decision and Ordzhonikidze’s role in engineering it that on his return to Moscow he demanded, though fruitlessly, the set up of a special party commission to investigate the affair. Later Trotsky would reconcile himself to the accomplished fact and even defended the invasion in a special pamphlet.

Battle for Tbilisi

At dawn on 16 February the main 11th Red Army troops under Anatoli Gekker
Anatoli Gekker
Anatoli Ilyich Gekker was a Soviet military commander involved in the Russian Civil War.Gekker was born into a family of a military doctor in Tiflis , Georgia, then part of Imperial Russia. Having graduated from Vladimir Military School in St Petersburg , he briefly attended the General Staff...

 crossed into Georgia and started the Tiflis Operation aimed at capturing the capital of Georgia. At the battle on the Khrami River
Khrami River
The Khrami River is a 201 km-long river in eastern Georgia and partly in western Azerbaijan, the right tributary to the Kura River. It originates in the Trialeti Range and flows into the deep valley, being primarily fed by snow. Its tributaries are: the Debeda and Mashavera rivers. The Tsalka...

, the Georgian border forces under General Stephen Akhmeteli
Stepane Akhmeteli
Stepane Akhmeteli was a Georgian military commander.Akhmeteli received his military education in Sumy and became an officer in the Imperial Russian army. He was awarded for his service during the Russo-Japanese war and World War I. He met the Russian revolution of 1917 in the capacity of...

 were overwhelmed and suffered a defeat. Retreating westward, the Georgian commander General Tsulukidze blew up railway bridges and demolished roads in an effort to delay the enemy’s advance. Simultaneously, Red Army units marched to Georgia from the north through the Daryal and Mamisoni passes and along the Black Sea
Black Sea
The Black Sea is bounded by Europe, Anatolia and the Caucasus and is ultimately connected to the Atlantic Ocean via the Mediterranean and the Aegean seas and various straits. The Bosphorus strait connects it to the Sea of Marmara, and the strait of the Dardanelles connects that sea to the Aegean...

 coast towards Sukhumi
Sukhumi
Sukhumi is the capital of Abkhazia, a disputed region on the Black Sea coast. The city suffered heavily during the Georgian-Abkhaz conflict in the early 1990s.-Naming:...

. While these events were proceeding, the Soviet Commissar for Foreign Affairs issued a series of statements disclaiming all knowledge of military actions between Georgia and the Red Army, and professing willingness to mediate in any disputes which have arisen within Georgia.
By 17 February the Soviet infantry and cavalry divisions supported by aviation had significantly advanced to the Georgian capital, less than 15 kilometers southwest. The Georgian army put up a stubborn fight in defense of the approaches to Tbilisi, which they held for a week in the face of overwhelming forces of the Red Army. The strategic heights of Kojori
Kojori
Kojori is a townlet in Georgia, some 20 kilometers southwest of the nation’s capital of Tbilisi. It is a climatic spa and a home to several dachas of the Tbilisite families....

 and Tabakhmela
Tabakhmela
Tabaxmela is a village in the Kartli region, in Tbilisi, Georgia. The village is also home to several traditional religious festivals throughout a year, particularly Tamaroba ....

 passed from hands to hands from 18 February to 20 February when the Georgian forces under General Giorgi Mazniashvili
Giorgi Mazniashvili
Giorgi Mazniashvili was a Georgian general and one of the most prominent military figures in the Democratic Republic of Georgia...

 rolled back the Red Army units which suffered heavy losses and started regrouping in an attempt to squeeze the circle around Tbilisi. By 23 February the railway bridges had been restored and Soviet tank
Tank
A tank is a tracked, armoured fighting vehicle designed for front-line combat which combines operational mobility, tactical offensive, and defensive capabilities...

s and armored trains joined the main Red Army troops into a renewed assault on the capital. While the armored trains laid down suppressing fire, the tanks and infantry penetrated the Georgian positions on the Kojori heights. On 24 February the Georgian commander-in-chief, Giorgi Kvinitadze
Giorgi Kvinitadze
Giorgi Kvinitadze was a Georgian military commander who rose from an officer in the Imperial Russian army to commander-in-chief of the Democratic Republic of Georgia...

, in an untenable position, bowed to the inevitable and ordered a withdrawal to save his army from complete encirclement and the city from destruction. The Georgian government and Constituent Assembly
Constituent assembly
A constituent assembly is a body composed for the purpose of drafting or adopting a constitution...

 evacuated for Kutaisi, western Georgia.

On 25 February the triumphant Red Army entered Tbilisi and the Bolshevik soldiers engaged in widespread looting. The Revkom headed by Mamia Orakhelashvili and Shalva Eliava
Shalva Eliava
Shalva Eliava was a Georgian Old Bolshevik and Soviet official who contributed to Sovietization of Central Asia and Caucasus but fell victim to Stalin’s Great Purge....

 ventured into the capital and proclaimed the overthrow of the Menshevik government, the dissolution of the Georgian National Army and People’s Guard, and the formation of a Georgian Soviet Republic. On the same day, in Moscow, Lenin received the congratulations of his commissars – "The red banner blows over Tbilisi. Long live Soviet Georgia!"

Kutaisi Operation

The Georgian commanders planned to concentrate their forces at the town of Mtskheta
Mtskheta
Mtskheta , one of the oldest cities of the country of Georgia , is located approximately 20 kilometers north of Tbilisi at the confluence of the Aragvi and Kura rivers. The city is now the administrative centre of the Mtskheta-Mtianeti region...

, northwest to Tbilisi, and to continue battle on the new lines of defense. The fall of the capital, however, heavily demoralized the Georgian troops who had finally to abandon their positions at Mtskheta. The army was gradually disintegrating as it continued its retreat westward, offering largely unorganized, but sometimes fierce resistance to the advancing Russian troops. It took months to the Soviets to take hold of major cities and towns of eastern Georgia.

The Mensheviks entertained hopes of aid from a French naval squadron
French Navy
The French Navy, officially the Marine nationale and often called La Royale is the maritime arm of the French military. It includes a full range of fighting vessels, from patrol boats to a nuclear powered aircraft carrier and 10 nuclear-powered submarines, four of which are capable of launching...

 cruising in the Black Sea off the Georgian coast. On 28 February the French even opened fire on the 31st Rifle Division of the 9th Red Army under V. Chernishev operating at the coast, but did not land troops. Yet the Georgians managed to regain control of the coastal town of Gagra
Gagra
Gagra is a town in Abkhazia, Georgia’s breakaway republic, sprawling for 5 km on the northeast coast of the Black Sea, at the foot of the Caucasus Mountains...

. Their success was temporary, however, and the Soviet forces joined by the Abkhaz
Abkhaz people
The Abkhaz or Abkhazians are a Caucasian ethnic group, mainly living in Abkhazia, a disputed region on the Black Sea coast. A large Abkhazian diaspora population resides in Turkey, the origins of which lie in the emigration from the Caucasus in the late 19th century known as Muhajirism...

 peasant militias, Kyaraz, succeeded in taking Gagra on 1 March New Athos
New Athos
New Athos is a town in the Gudauta raion of Abkhazia, situated some 22 km from Sukhumi by the shores of the Black Sea. The town was previously known under the names Nikopol, Acheisos, Anakopia, Nikopia, Nikofia, Nikopsis, Absara, Psyrtskha...

 on 3 March and Sukhumi on 4 March and advanced eastward to occupy Zugdidi
Zugdidi
Zugdidi is a city in the Western Georgian historical province of Samegrelo . It is situated in the north-west of that province. The city is located 318 kilometres west of Tbilisi, 30 km. from Black sea coast and 30 km. from Egrisi range. 100-110 metres above sea level. As of 2007, it had a...

 on 9 March and Poti
Poti
Poti is a port city in Georgia, located on the eastern Black Sea coast in the region of Samegrelo-Zemo Svaneti in the west of the country. Built near the site of the ancient Greek colony of Phasis, the city has become a major port city and industrial center since the early 20th century. It is also...

 on 14 4 March.

The Georgians’ attempt of holding out near Kutaisi
Kutaisi
Kutaisi is Georgia's second largest city and the capital of the western region of Imereti. It is 221 km to the west of Tbilisi.-Geography:...

 was further dashed by the surprise advance of a Red Army detachment from North Caucasia which traversed the virtually impermeable Mamisoni Pass through deep snow drifts and advanced down the Rioni Valley
Rioni River
The Rioni or Rion River is the main river of western Georgia. It originates in the Caucasus Mountains, in the region of Racha and flows west to the Black Sea, entering it north of the city of Poti...

. After a bloody clash at Surami
Surami
Surami is a townlet in Georgia’s Shida Kartli region with the population of 9,800 . It is a popular mountain climatic resort and a home to a medieval fortress.- Location :...

 on 5 March 1921, the 11th Red Army also crossed the Likhi Range
Likhi Range
Likhi Range or Surami Range is a mountain range in Georgia, a part of the Caucasus mountains. It connects the Greater Caucasus and Lesser Caucasus ranges....

 into the western part of the country. On 10 March the Soviet forces entered Kutaisi, which had been abandoned by the Georgian leadership, army and People’s Guard to the key Black Sea port city of Batumi
Batumi
Batumi is a seaside city on the Black Sea coast and capital of Adjara, an autonomous republic in southwest Georgia. Sometimes considered Georgia's second capital, with a population of 121,806 , Batumi serves as an important port and a commercial center. It is situated in a subtropical zone, rich in...

 in southwest Georgia. Part of the Georgian forces withdrew into the mountains and continued to fight.

Crisis with Turkey

On 23 February ten days after the Red Army began its march on Tbilisi, Kazım Karabekir
Kazim Karabekir
Musa Kâzım Karabekir was a Turkish general and politician. He was commander of the Eastern Army in the Ottoman Empire at the end of World War I and served as Speaker of the Grand National Assembly of Turkey before his death.-Early years:Karabekir was born in 1882 as the son of an Ottoman General,...

, the commander of the Eastern Front
Eastern Front (Turkey)
The Eastern Front is one of the fronts of the Army of the Grand National Assembly during the Turkish War of Independence. Its commanded all military units in Eastern Region...

 of the Army of the Grand National Assembly, issued an ultimatum demanding the evacuation of Ardahan
Ardahan
Ardahan is a city in northeastern Turkey, near the Georgian border.-Ancient and medieval:In Ancient times the region was called Gogarene, which is assumed to derive from the name of Gugars, who were a Proto-Kartvelian tribe...

 and Artvin
Artvin
-History:See Artvin Province for the history of the region.-Places of interest:* Artvin or Livana castle, built in 937There are a number of Ottoman Empire houses and public buildings including:* Salih Bey mosque, built in 1792...

 by Georgia. The Mensheviks, under fire from both sides, had to accede and the Turkish forces advanced into Georgia, occupying the frontier areas. This brought the Turkish army within a short distance of still Georgian-held Batumi and as the Red Army’s 18th Cavalry Division under Dmitri Zhloba
Dmitri Zhloba
Dmitry Petrovich Zhloba was a Soviet military commander who participated in the Russian Civil War.He was born in Kiev, Ukraine, then part of Imperial Russia. During the Russian Revolution of 1905, he was a member of an armed workers' detachment in Mykolaiv. In May 1916, he was arrested for...

 approached the city, created the circumstances for a possible armed clash. The Mensheviks hoped to use these circumstances and reached, on 7 March a verbal agreement with Karabekir, permitting the Turkish army to enter the city while leaving the government of Georgia in control of its civil administration. On 8 March Turkish troops under Colonel Kizim-Bey took up defensive positions surrounding the city, leading to a crisis with Soviet Russia. Georgy Chicherin
Georgy Chicherin
Georgy Vasilyevich Chicherin was a Marxist revolutionary and a Soviet politician. He served as People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs in the Soviet government from March 1918 to 1930.-Childhood and early career:...

, Soviet People's Commissar of Foreign Affairs, submitted a protest note to Ali Fuat Cebesoy
Ali Fuat Cebesoy
Ali Fuat Cebesoy was a Turkish officer, politician and statesman.-Early life:Ali Fuat was born in September 1882 to father Ismail Fazil Pasha and mother Zekiye Hanım...

, the Turkish representative in Moscow. In response Ali Fuat handed two notes to the Soviet government. The Turkish notes claimed that the Turkish armies were just providing security to the local Muslim
Muslim
A Muslim, also spelled Moslem, is an adherent of Islam, a monotheistic, Abrahamic religion based on the Quran, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God as revealed to prophet Muhammad. "Muslim" is the Arabic term for "submitter" .Muslims believe that God is one and incomparable...

 elements which were put under threat by the Soviet military operations in the region.

By that time, despite Moscow’s military successes, the situation in the Caucasus front became very precarious. Armenians, aided by the Red Army involvement in Georgia, had revolted, retaking Yerevan
Yerevan
Yerevan is the capital and largest city of Armenia and one of the world's oldest continuously-inhabited cities. Situated along the Hrazdan River, Yerevan is the administrative, cultural, and industrial center of the country...

 on 18 February 1921. In the North Caucasus
North Caucasus
The North Caucasus is the northern part of the Caucasus region between the Black and Caspian Seas and within European Russia. The term is also used as a synonym for the North Caucasus economic region of Russia....

, Dagestan
Dagestan
The Republic of Dagestan is a federal subject of Russia, located in the North Caucasus region. Its capital and the largest city is Makhachkala, located at the center of Dagestan on the Caspian Sea...

i rebels continued to fight the Soviets. The Turkish occupation of Georgia’s territories implied the near certainty of a Soviet-Turkish confrontation and the Georgians repeatedly refused to capitulate. Lenin, who feared an unfavourable outcome of the Georgian campaign, sent, on 2 March his "warm greetings to Soviet Georgia" but clearly revealed his desire to bring hostilities to an end as quickly as possible. He emphasized the "tremendous importance of devising an acceptable compromise for a bloc" with the Georgian Mensheviks. On 8 March the Georgian Revkom reluctantly proposed a coalition government, but the Mensheviks refused.

However, when the Turkish authorities proclaimed the annexation of Batumi on 16 March the Georgian government was forced to make a choice. Their hopes for French or British intervention had already vanished as France never considered sending an expeditionary force and the United Kingdom ordered the Royal Navy
Royal Navy
The Royal Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Founded in the 16th century, it is the oldest service branch and is known as the Senior Service...

 not to intervene. Furthermore, on 16 March the British and Soviet governments signed a trade agreement, in which Prime Minister
Prime Minister of the United Kingdom
The Prime Minister of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is the Head of Her Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom. The Prime Minister and Cabinet are collectively accountable for their policies and actions to the Sovereign, to Parliament, to their political party and...

 Lloyd George
David Lloyd George
David Lloyd George, 1st Earl Lloyd-George of Dwyfor OM, PC was a British Liberal politician and statesman...

 effectively promised to refrain from anti-Soviet activities in all territories of the former Russian Empire. Simultaneously, a treaty of friendship
Treaty of Moscow (1921)
The Treaty of Moscow or Treaty of Brotherhood was a friendship treaty between the Grand National Assembly of Turkey under the leadership of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk and Bolshevist Russia under the leadership of Vladimir Lenin, signed on 16 March 1921...

 was signed in Moscow between Soviet Russia and the Grand National Assembly of Turkey
Grand National Assembly of Turkey
The Grand National Assembly of Turkey , usually referred to simply as the Meclis , is the unicameral Turkish legislature. It is the sole body given the legislative prerogatives by the Turkish Constitution. It was founded in Ankara on 23 April 1920 in the midst of the Turkish War of Independence...

, whereby Ardahan and Artvin were awarded to Turkey, which renounced its claims to Batumi.

The Turks were reluctant to evacuate Batumi and continued its occupation, however. The Georgian leaders quite ready, rather than have the Turks take Batumi, to see it occupied by the Bolsheviks agreed on talks with the Revkom to prevent Georgia's permanent loss of the city. In Kutaisi, the Georgian Defense Minister Grigol Lordkipanidze
Grigol Lordkipanidze
Grigol Lordkipanidze was a Georgian politician and author.During the Russian Revolution of 1917, he was involved in the Georgian independence movement. From 1919 to 1921, he served as a Minister of Education and then as a Defense Minister in the government of Noe Zhordania, a Menshevik leader of...

 and the Soviet plenipotentiary Avel Enukidze
Avel Enukidze
Avel Safronovich Enukidze - А́вель Сафронович Енуки́дзе - , a prominent "Old Bolshevik" and, at one point, a member of the Soviet Central Committee in Moscow...

 arranged an armistice on 17 March and then, on 18 March, an agreement which allowed the Red Army to advance in force to Batumi.

Amid the ongoing Turkish-Soviet consultations in Moscow, the armistice with the Mensheviks allowed the Bolsheviks to act indirectly from behind the scene, through several thousand soldiers of the Georgian National Army mobilized at the outskirts of Batumi and inclined to fight for the city. On 18 March the Georgians under General Mazniashvili engaged in a heavy street fighting with the Turkish garrison. While the battle raged, the Menshevik government boarded an Italian vessel
Regia Marina
The Regia Marina dates from the proclamation of the Kingdom of Italy in 1861 after Italian unification...

 and sailed into exile escorted by French warships. Fighting ended on 19 March with the port and most of the city in the Georgian hands. On the same day, Mazniashvili surrendered the city to the Revkom and Zhloba’s cavalry entered Batumi to reinforce the Bolshevik authority there.

The sanguinary events in Batumi halted the Russian-Turkish negotiations, and it was not until 26 September when the talks between Turkey and the Soviets, nominally including also the representatives of the Armenian
Armenian SSR
The Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic The Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic The Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic The Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic The Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic The Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic The Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic The Armenian Soviet...

, Azerbaijani
Azerbaijan SSR
The Azerbaijan Soviet Socialist Republic , also known as the Azerbaijan SSR for short, was one of the republics that made up the former Soviet Union....

 and Georgian SSRGeorgian SSRs, finally reopened in Kars
Kars
Kars is a city in northeast Turkey and the capital of Kars Province. The population of the city is 73,826 as of 2010.-Etymology:As Chorzene, the town appears in Roman historiography as part of ancient Armenia...

. The Treaty of Kars
Treaty of Kars
The Treaty of Kars was a "friendship" treaty signed in Kars on October 13, 1921 and ratified in Yerevan on September 11 1922.Signatories included representatives from the Grand National Assembly of Turkey, which in 1923 would declare the Republic of Turkey, and also from Soviet Armenia, Soviet...

, signed on 13 October contained the provisions agreed upon in March and some other new territorial settlements just reached. In exchange for Artvin, Ardahan, and Kars, Turkey abandoned its claims to Batumi, whose largely Muslim Georgian population was to be granted autonomy within the Georgian SSR.

Aftermath

Despite the Georgian government’s emigration
Government of the Democratic Republic of Georgia in Exile
The Government of the Democratic Republic of Georgia continued to function as the government in exile after the Soviet Russian Red Army invaded Georgia and the Bolsheviks took over the country early in 1921....

 and the demobilization of the National Army, pockets of guerrilla resistance still remained in the mountains and some rural areas. The invasion of Georgia brought about serious controversies among the Bolsheviks themselves. The newly established Communist government initially offered unexpectedly mild terms to their former opponents who still remained in the country. Lenin also favored a policy of conciliation in Georgia, where a pro-Bolshevik revolt did not enjoy the popular backing claimed for it, and the population was solidly anti-Bolshevik. In 1922, a strong public resentment over the forcible Sovietization indirectly reflected in the opposition of Soviet Georgian authorities to Moscow’s centralizing policies promoted by Dzerzhinsky
Felix Edmundovich Dzerzhinsky
Felix Edmundovich Dzerzhinsky was a Communist revolutionary, famous as the first director of the Bolshevik secret police, the Cheka, known later by many names during the history of the Soviet Union...

, Stalin and Ordzhonikidze. The problem, known in modern history writing as the "Georgian Affair
Georgian Affair
The Georgian Affair of 1922 was a political conflict within the Soviet leadership about the way in which social and political transformation was to be achieved in the Georgian SSR...

", was to become one of the major points at issue between Stalin and Trotsky in the last years of Lenin's leadership and found its reflection in "Lenin's Political Testament"
Lenin's Testament
Lenin's Testament is the name given to a document written by Vladimir Lenin in the last weeks of 1922 and the first week of 1923. In the testament, Lenin proposed changes to the structure of the Soviet governing bodies...

.

The world largely neglected the violent Soviet takeover of Georgia. On 27 March 1921, the exiled Georgian leadership issued an appeal from their temporary offices in Istanbul
Istanbul
Istanbul , historically known as Byzantium and Constantinople , is the largest city of Turkey. Istanbul metropolitan province had 13.26 million people living in it as of December, 2010, which is 18% of Turkey's population and the 3rd largest metropolitan area in Europe after London and...

 to "all socialist parties and workers' organizations" of the world, protesting against the invasion of Georgia. The appeal went unheeded, though. Beyond passionate editorials in some Western newspapers and calls for action from such Georgian sympathizers as Sir Oliver Wardrop, the international response to the events in Georgia was silence.

In Georgia, an intellectual resistance to the Bolshevik regime and occasional outbreaks of guerrilla warfare evolved into a major rebellion in August
August Uprising in Georgia
The August Uprising was an unsuccessful insurrection against Soviet rule in the Georgian Soviet Socialist Republic from late August to early September 1924....

 1924. Its failure and the ensuing wave of large-scale repressions orchestrated by the emerging Soviet security officer, Lavrentiy Beria
Lavrentiy Beria
Lavrentiy Pavlovich Beria was a Georgian Soviet politician and state security administrator, chief of the Soviet security and secret police apparatus under Joseph Stalin during World War II, and Deputy Premier in the postwar years ....

, heavily demoralized the Georgian society and exterminated its most active pro-independence part. Within a week, from 29 August to 5 September 1924, 12,578 people, chiefly nobles and intellectuals, were executed and over 20,000 exiled to Siberia
Siberia
Siberia is an extensive region constituting almost all of Northern Asia. Comprising the central and eastern portion of the Russian Federation, it was part of the Soviet Union from its beginning, as its predecessor states, the Tsardom of Russia and the Russian Empire, conquered it during the 16th...

. From that time, no major overt attempt was made to challenge Soviet authority in the country until a new generation of anti-Soviet movements emerged in the late 1970s.

Assessment

Soviet historians considered the Red Army invasion of Georgia a part of the larger conflict which they referred to as "the Civil War
Russian Civil War
The Russian Civil War was a multi-party war that occurred within the former Russian Empire after the Russian provisional government collapsed to the Soviets, under the domination of the Bolshevik party. Soviet forces first assumed power in Petrograd The Russian Civil War (1917–1923) was a...

 and Foreign Intervention
Allied Intervention in the Russian Civil War
The Allied intervention was a multi-national military expedition launched in 1918 during World War I which continued into the Russian Civil War. Its operations included forces from 14 nations and were conducted over a vast territory...

". In early Soviet history writing, the Georgian episode was considered as a "revolutionary war" and is described in just this term in the first edition of the Great Soviet Encyclopaedia. Later, the term "revolutionary war" went out of fashion among Soviet writers, partly because it was not easy to distinguish from "aggression", in the Soviets' own definition of that word. Hence, the later Soviet histories put things differently. The Red Army intervention, according to the official Soviet version, was in response to a plea for help that followed an armed rebellion by Georgia's peasants and workers. This version exculpated Russia from any charge of aggression against Georgia by pointing out that the Georgians themselves asked Moscow to send the Red Army into their country, so as to remove their existing government and replace it with a communist one.

Using its control over education and the media, the Soviet Union successfully created an image of a popular socialist revolution in Georgia. Most Georgian historians were not allowed to consult Spetskhran
Spetskhran
Spetskhran were limited access collections and archival reserves in libraries and archives of the Soviet Union, as part of the system of censorship in the Soviet Union....

, special restricted access library collections and archival reserves that also covered the "unacceptable" events in Soviet history, particularly those that could be interpreted imperialist or contradicted a concept of a popular uprising against the Menshevik government.

The 1980s wave of Mikhail Gorbachev
Mikhail Gorbachev
Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev is a former Soviet statesman, having served as General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1985 until 1991, and as the last head of state of the USSR, having served from 1988 until its dissolution in 1991...

's Glasnost
Glasnost
Glasnost was the policy of maximal publicity, openness, and transparency in the activities of all government institutions in the Soviet Union, together with freedom of information, introduced by Mikhail Gorbachev in the second half of the 1980s...

 ("publicity") policy refuted an old Soviet version of the 1921-4 events. The first Soviet historian, who attempted, in 1988, to revise the hitherto commonly accepted interpretation of the Soviet-Georgian war, was a notable Georgian scholar, Akaki Surguladze
Akaki Surguladze
Akaki Surguladze was a Georgian historian. He was the first Soviet scholar, who attempted, in 1988, to revise the hitherto commonly accepted official Soviet version of the Soviet-Georgian War which led to the forcible Sovietization of Georgia in 1921.- References :...

, ironically the same historian whose 1982 monograph described the alleged Georgian worker revolt as a truly historical event.

Under strong public pressure, the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet
Presidium of the Supreme Soviet
The Presidium of the Supreme Soviet was a Soviet governmental institution – a permanent body of the Supreme Soviets . This body was of the all-Union level , as well as in all Soviet republics and autonomous republics...

 of the Georgian SSR set up, on 2 June 1989, a special commission for investigation of legal aspects of the 1921 events. The commission came to the conclusion that "the [Soviet Russian] deployment of troops in Georgia and seizure of its territory was, from a legal point of view, a military interference, intervention, and occupation with the aim of overthrowing the existing political order." At an extraordinary session of the Supreme Soviet
Supreme Soviet
The Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union was the Supreme Soviet in the Soviet Union and the only one with the power to pass constitutional amendments...

 of the Georgian SSR convened on 26 May 1990, the Sovietization of Georgia was officially denounced as "an occupation and effective annexation of Georgia by Soviet Russia."

Modern Georgian politicians and some observers have repeatedly drawn parallels between the 1921 events and Russia’s policy towards Georgia and Western Europe’s reluctance to confront Russia over Georgia in the 2000s, especially during the August 2008 war
2008 South Ossetia war
The 2008 South Ossetia War or Russo-Georgian War was an armed conflict in August 2008 between Georgia on one side, and Russia and separatist governments of South Ossetia and Abkhazia on the other....

.

Legacy

On July 21, 2010, Georgia declared February 25th as Soviet Occupation Day
Soviet Occupation Day
Soviet Occupation Day may refer to:* Soviet Occupation Day, Georgia* Soviet Occupation Day, Latvia* Soviet Occupation Day, Moldova...

 to recall the Red Army invasion in 1921. The Georgian parliament voted in favor of the government’s initiative. The decision, endorsed unanimously by the Parliament of Georgia
Parliament of Georgia
Parliament of Georgia is the supreme legislature of Georgia. It is unicameral and has 150 members, known as deputies, from which 75 members are proportional representatives and 75 are elected through single-member district plurality system, representing their constituencies...

instructs the government to organize various memorial events every February 25 and to fly the national flag half-mast to commemorate, as the decision puts it, the hundreds of thousands of victims of political repressions of the Communist occupational regime.
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