THE MONGOLS & THE UZBEKS (1200-1800)
After Genghis Khan died his massive empire spanning much of Eurasia was divided up among his four legitimate sons. Technically Genghis Khan probably had nearly a thousand sons, but those didn't count. Unlike the British, whose system of secession was a complete clusterfuck (see CGP Grey's video on the royal family), Mongolia seemed to have things figured out and set up a government where each of the sons was entitled to a different portion of their empire. Chaghatai Khan, one of Genghis' sons recieved Uzbekistan including the prosperous regions south of the Aral Sea (which has nearly dried up now because of intense irrigation in the region, but back then was still a sea and very useful for agriculture).
Eventually, as these Empires tend to, the Mongolian Empire disintegrated into nothingness. All around their huge empire local chieftains and warlords began to seize back land that they couldn't fully rule over under the Mongols and this is what happened in Uzbekistan. Various ethnically Turkic leaders began to take back their land. One, Timur, renowned at the time as a military genius rose above the other tribal leaders and started his own dynasty, the Timurid Dynasty (because why not name your dynasty after yourself?). The Timurid dynasty was a new renaissance for the region that had for the longest time been subjugated by the Khans, as a Khanate (another word for a colony or province of the Mongolian Empire). During this time much of the visual art we associate with the region was produced, these ornate and colorful paintings of great parties and dinners and other events with colorful Arabic script.
Then in 1406, Timur died and so did his Empire. Many Empires in antiquity and the middle ages didn't last much longer than their founder or leader. This has to do with the founder/leader having ineffectual (like in the case of Oliver Cromwell, who you may know better as "Old Ironsides" who seized the British crown, renamed himself Lord Protector and went off on an ill-fated attempt at creating a dynasty, that fell at the first hurdle when his wimpy son Richard proved to be so unpopular that he got the much less cool nickname "Tumbledown Dick") children or just not being able to successfully transfer power from one generation to the next. These are the benefits of having a meritocracy...
The Timurid Dynasty was now in shambles, but the vibrant culture and arts of the region had not died. The culture of the region took on a new cultural identity with the arrival of the Uzbek ethnic group, the namesake of the country today. They set up shop similarly to how Timur had, but this time things weren't working out so well. Firstly their was almost constant religious conflict with Iran, who were Shia Muslim, while the multi-religious populace of Uzbekistan were primarily Sunni Muslim and the trade that brought so much MOOOONEY to the region in previous centuries now wasn't nearly as lucrative. The political instability of much of Central Asia led to an increased need for alternative trade routes to China and India and since Chris Columbus accidentally rammed into a continent he didn't know was there, there needed to be more options and it seemed that the Indian Ocean was where it was at.
The Silk Road was a relic of the past and the various Kingdoms and Dynasties that were once prosperous trading Empires were reduced to small squabbling factions and small feudal kingdoms, while the European Colonies in Maritime India, like Portuguese India (settled by Vasco de Gama in 1498, who unlike Christopher Columbus actually found India) were hugely prosperous as port-towns in Indian Ocean trade.
THE RUSSIANS (1800-1929)
The Russians march east through the impenetrable Siberian wilderness and Central Asian steppe took them from Moscow to Alaska, on the way adding to their vast territorial Empire. This is the reason that Russia is the largest country on Earth today. Their method of colonialism was much more akin to America's. The British or French method is land in some foreign land, claim it for my country and set up outposts there. The British didn't come en masse and live in their colonies (except for British North America, Australia and New Zealand) and these colonies weren't part of Britain, rather they were outer territories. On the other hand, when America manifest destinied the whole West they populated it with White Americans and moved their borders around it, rather than claiming it as some kind of outer territory. America didn't get to doing that until after World War II.
So, the Russians see that the Uzbek tribes are in shambles because the Silk Road isn't as lucrative as it once was and see this as an opportunity to annex some more land in an attempt to own Eurasia (which they got pretty close to). The Russians weren't totally without reason to annex this land (their sailors were getting captured by Uzbek slavers), so Russia decided to react to this by annexing their entire country.
Russia had already annexed Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan and were planning on combining Uzbekistan with Turkmenistan into one Republic. (Fun Fact: Kyrgyzstan is the country the least amount of people know about.) Meanwhile the British already in control of Pakistan and India to the south have eyes on Afghanistan, as do the Russians. The British already had colonies in the Middle East (as you may remember from the Yemen post) and the Russians had eyes on the region as well, but they couldn't march their terrifyingly huge army down there unless they could get through Britain. This whole Geo-Political staring-contest turned possible-World War was called the Great Game, and the real losers of the Great Game were the Afghans, Uzbeks, Turkmen and Arabians who all ended up as pawns in a pointless colonial dick-measuring contest.
Now, you may be asking why does Russia want Uzbekistan which as we've established wasn't making any money off of Silk Road trade anymore (as it's the early to mid 1800s and the Suez Canal was being dug as they spoke. Well, Uzbekistan was a source of cheap cotton for Europe, and their were in dire need of cotton.
Their previous source of cotton: the Southern U.S. was in some hot water (the Civil War) and wasn't a reliable source for cheap cotton anymore, so they turned their gaze to Central Asia (primarily Afghanistan, Turkmenistan & Uzbekistan).
Russia had been in the region since the mid 1840s, after their conquest of modern-day Azerbaijan, Georgia and Armenia, they looked to the north. In the 1870s Russia's influence was incredibly strong in the region. The Uzbek tribes had lost their grip on the land due to tribal in-fighting and conflict with other groups in the region. The Russians weren't overly bothersome of the natives, not meddling in their religion or culture and not changing the economy or government structure that much.
The Russians did try and shake up the Uzbek economy with new agricultural jobs. They wanted to transform the Uzbek society into a Russia-style Agricultural Capitalist one (and I know it's weird to see Russia and Capitalist in the same sentence).
The Russians built railroads, Orthodox-churches and schools that taught the children Russian and as the Russians did with their other territorial possessions tried to slowly encroach Russian culture and ideals into the Uzbek society. The Uzbeks an ethnic group with very little in common with the Russians (the Uzbeks are muslim, while the Russians were Christian and the Uzbek culture is more closely related to Iranian culture, or maybe Turkish culture because of the Turkic influences of the past). As usually happens when a colonizing force tries to quell or replace the culture of the colonized, various movements to reclaim their lost culture were born and were actively targeted by the local Russian government.
What was once a minor economic shift brought on by the Russians became a full on culture clash. The British controlled areas of Ceylon (Sri Lanka), India and Singapore, as well as their holdings in Africa at the time had often shifted their agriculture from primarily food production (staples like beans, rice, yams and fruit) to cash crops like tea, coffee, palm oil, etc. and this happened in Uzbekistan. Uzbekistan became a highly specialized agricultural territory for Russia as their primary cotton producer and because of this food production was slowed which led to mass-starvation and economic imbalance. This is one of the biggest challenges faced by former colonies today.
In the waning days of the Russian Empire, Uzbek Jadidists (young intellectuals & revolutionaries) saw that the Russian Empire was on the way out. They had just been crucified by Japan in the Russo-Japanese War and they could sense the Tsar was losing popularity.
In 1917 the October Revolution in Russia toppled the Tsar and the Jadidists knew that they could utilize this transition of power to secede from Russia and set up a government in Quqon, a small city in the East of Uzbekistan. This revolution failed, while the Russian one didn't and the newly formed USSR gained control of Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan (at this point jointly run.)
USSR CONTROL (1929-1991)
Stalin could see that Uzbekistan and other central Asian republics in the USSR were hotbeds of hatred for the government in Moscow and were the sites of many failed revolutions. Stalin decided to split Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan up. He thought that maybe this would help the Uzbek and Turkmen Ethnic Groups feel they had their own identity. This didn't help because the Uzbeks were still under Soviet control and they were pissed.
The Soviets made everything worse. The food shortage caused by the lack of food-based agriculture was never resolved, if anything it was worsened by Stalin. (Stalin was really bad at not killing his people).
Uzbekistan also became the dumping ground for those exiled by Soviet Russia and if you know anything about Soviet Russia it's that they loooooooooved exiling Political Prisoners, unless they just killed them. Uzbekistan was home mostly to Chechens, Azeris, Crimeans, North Koreans and other groups that were from lands Russia conquered and would have some reason to be kind of pissed at Moscow and Russia's government, but obviously grouping together revolutionaries doesn't make the revolutionary problem go away, it worsens it.
Things grew to a boiling point until the rule of Gorbachev kicked in and they could use their newfound privileges as Soviet Citizens given to them by the glasnost and perestroika systems to tell Moscow how much they fucking hated them!
INDEPENDENCE (1991-PRESENT)
The USSR officially dissolved in December of 1991, exactly one year before the release of the Chronic by Dr. Dre and Uzbekistan was glad. They held an independence referendum which seemed like a formality at that point and it passed with 98% percent of the vote (2% of the population accidentally scribbled in the wrong box at the polling place) and Uzbekistan officially became a nation adopting the very chic and trendy "stan" suffix that all the other cool kids were using.
The first years of independence were rocky (like most countries) as the country was rife with terrorism, especially in its new capital of Tashkent and their newly elected president Islom Karimov was almost killed. This might have been good though because Karimov's establishment worsened and worsened until he was named the most ruthless dictator in Central Asia. He's been the first and only president of Uzbekistan since the early 90s and probably will stay that way until he's dead.
Life in Uzbekistan is still rough. One could compare it to living in China. Political freedom is very limited with no right to free speech, very limited democracy (most elections are rigged or postponed and Karimov signed a controversial bill to abolish term limits. Immediate Dictator red-flag), air-quality is poor from the unregulated industry in many of Uzbekistans cities and the quality of life is on the low end of the former Soviet states.
FUN FACTS
Uzbekistan the largest doubly-landlocked country. Not only is it landlocked, but all countries bordering it are landlocked.
Tashkent's Metro stations are elaborately designed with carvings and other Soviet-era architectural flourishes.
It is unacceptable to handshake a woman if you are a man in Uzbekistan.
It is Uzbek tradition that if somebody is going away for a really long time they are to eat some bread, then the loaf is hidden until they return.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
http://www.travelingeast.com/asia/uzbekistan/ten-interesting-facts-about-uzbekistan/
http://www.uzbekistan.org/uzbekistan/history/
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-16218972
After Genghis Khan died his massive empire spanning much of Eurasia was divided up among his four legitimate sons. Technically Genghis Khan probably had nearly a thousand sons, but those didn't count. Unlike the British, whose system of secession was a complete clusterfuck (see CGP Grey's video on the royal family), Mongolia seemed to have things figured out and set up a government where each of the sons was entitled to a different portion of their empire. Chaghatai Khan, one of Genghis' sons recieved Uzbekistan including the prosperous regions south of the Aral Sea (which has nearly dried up now because of intense irrigation in the region, but back then was still a sea and very useful for agriculture).
Eventually, as these Empires tend to, the Mongolian Empire disintegrated into nothingness. All around their huge empire local chieftains and warlords began to seize back land that they couldn't fully rule over under the Mongols and this is what happened in Uzbekistan. Various ethnically Turkic leaders began to take back their land. One, Timur, renowned at the time as a military genius rose above the other tribal leaders and started his own dynasty, the Timurid Dynasty (because why not name your dynasty after yourself?). The Timurid dynasty was a new renaissance for the region that had for the longest time been subjugated by the Khans, as a Khanate (another word for a colony or province of the Mongolian Empire). During this time much of the visual art we associate with the region was produced, these ornate and colorful paintings of great parties and dinners and other events with colorful Arabic script.
Then in 1406, Timur died and so did his Empire. Many Empires in antiquity and the middle ages didn't last much longer than their founder or leader. This has to do with the founder/leader having ineffectual (like in the case of Oliver Cromwell, who you may know better as "Old Ironsides" who seized the British crown, renamed himself Lord Protector and went off on an ill-fated attempt at creating a dynasty, that fell at the first hurdle when his wimpy son Richard proved to be so unpopular that he got the much less cool nickname "Tumbledown Dick") children or just not being able to successfully transfer power from one generation to the next. These are the benefits of having a meritocracy...
The Timurid Dynasty was now in shambles, but the vibrant culture and arts of the region had not died. The culture of the region took on a new cultural identity with the arrival of the Uzbek ethnic group, the namesake of the country today. They set up shop similarly to how Timur had, but this time things weren't working out so well. Firstly their was almost constant religious conflict with Iran, who were Shia Muslim, while the multi-religious populace of Uzbekistan were primarily Sunni Muslim and the trade that brought so much MOOOONEY to the region in previous centuries now wasn't nearly as lucrative. The political instability of much of Central Asia led to an increased need for alternative trade routes to China and India and since Chris Columbus accidentally rammed into a continent he didn't know was there, there needed to be more options and it seemed that the Indian Ocean was where it was at.
The Silk Road was a relic of the past and the various Kingdoms and Dynasties that were once prosperous trading Empires were reduced to small squabbling factions and small feudal kingdoms, while the European Colonies in Maritime India, like Portuguese India (settled by Vasco de Gama in 1498, who unlike Christopher Columbus actually found India) were hugely prosperous as port-towns in Indian Ocean trade.
THE RUSSIANS (1800-1929)
The Russians march east through the impenetrable Siberian wilderness and Central Asian steppe took them from Moscow to Alaska, on the way adding to their vast territorial Empire. This is the reason that Russia is the largest country on Earth today. Their method of colonialism was much more akin to America's. The British or French method is land in some foreign land, claim it for my country and set up outposts there. The British didn't come en masse and live in their colonies (except for British North America, Australia and New Zealand) and these colonies weren't part of Britain, rather they were outer territories. On the other hand, when America manifest destinied the whole West they populated it with White Americans and moved their borders around it, rather than claiming it as some kind of outer territory. America didn't get to doing that until after World War II.
So, the Russians see that the Uzbek tribes are in shambles because the Silk Road isn't as lucrative as it once was and see this as an opportunity to annex some more land in an attempt to own Eurasia (which they got pretty close to). The Russians weren't totally without reason to annex this land (their sailors were getting captured by Uzbek slavers), so Russia decided to react to this by annexing their entire country.
Russia had already annexed Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan and were planning on combining Uzbekistan with Turkmenistan into one Republic. (Fun Fact: Kyrgyzstan is the country the least amount of people know about.) Meanwhile the British already in control of Pakistan and India to the south have eyes on Afghanistan, as do the Russians. The British already had colonies in the Middle East (as you may remember from the Yemen post) and the Russians had eyes on the region as well, but they couldn't march their terrifyingly huge army down there unless they could get through Britain. This whole Geo-Political staring-contest turned possible-World War was called the Great Game, and the real losers of the Great Game were the Afghans, Uzbeks, Turkmen and Arabians who all ended up as pawns in a pointless colonial dick-measuring contest.
Now, you may be asking why does Russia want Uzbekistan which as we've established wasn't making any money off of Silk Road trade anymore (as it's the early to mid 1800s and the Suez Canal was being dug as they spoke. Well, Uzbekistan was a source of cheap cotton for Europe, and their were in dire need of cotton.
Their previous source of cotton: the Southern U.S. was in some hot water (the Civil War) and wasn't a reliable source for cheap cotton anymore, so they turned their gaze to Central Asia (primarily Afghanistan, Turkmenistan & Uzbekistan).
Russia had been in the region since the mid 1840s, after their conquest of modern-day Azerbaijan, Georgia and Armenia, they looked to the north. In the 1870s Russia's influence was incredibly strong in the region. The Uzbek tribes had lost their grip on the land due to tribal in-fighting and conflict with other groups in the region. The Russians weren't overly bothersome of the natives, not meddling in their religion or culture and not changing the economy or government structure that much.
The Russians did try and shake up the Uzbek economy with new agricultural jobs. They wanted to transform the Uzbek society into a Russia-style Agricultural Capitalist one (and I know it's weird to see Russia and Capitalist in the same sentence).
The Russians built railroads, Orthodox-churches and schools that taught the children Russian and as the Russians did with their other territorial possessions tried to slowly encroach Russian culture and ideals into the Uzbek society. The Uzbeks an ethnic group with very little in common with the Russians (the Uzbeks are muslim, while the Russians were Christian and the Uzbek culture is more closely related to Iranian culture, or maybe Turkish culture because of the Turkic influences of the past). As usually happens when a colonizing force tries to quell or replace the culture of the colonized, various movements to reclaim their lost culture were born and were actively targeted by the local Russian government.
What was once a minor economic shift brought on by the Russians became a full on culture clash. The British controlled areas of Ceylon (Sri Lanka), India and Singapore, as well as their holdings in Africa at the time had often shifted their agriculture from primarily food production (staples like beans, rice, yams and fruit) to cash crops like tea, coffee, palm oil, etc. and this happened in Uzbekistan. Uzbekistan became a highly specialized agricultural territory for Russia as their primary cotton producer and because of this food production was slowed which led to mass-starvation and economic imbalance. This is one of the biggest challenges faced by former colonies today.
In the waning days of the Russian Empire, Uzbek Jadidists (young intellectuals & revolutionaries) saw that the Russian Empire was on the way out. They had just been crucified by Japan in the Russo-Japanese War and they could sense the Tsar was losing popularity.
In 1917 the October Revolution in Russia toppled the Tsar and the Jadidists knew that they could utilize this transition of power to secede from Russia and set up a government in Quqon, a small city in the East of Uzbekistan. This revolution failed, while the Russian one didn't and the newly formed USSR gained control of Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan (at this point jointly run.)
USSR CONTROL (1929-1991)
Stalin could see that Uzbekistan and other central Asian republics in the USSR were hotbeds of hatred for the government in Moscow and were the sites of many failed revolutions. Stalin decided to split Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan up. He thought that maybe this would help the Uzbek and Turkmen Ethnic Groups feel they had their own identity. This didn't help because the Uzbeks were still under Soviet control and they were pissed.
The Soviets made everything worse. The food shortage caused by the lack of food-based agriculture was never resolved, if anything it was worsened by Stalin. (Stalin was really bad at not killing his people).
Uzbekistan also became the dumping ground for those exiled by Soviet Russia and if you know anything about Soviet Russia it's that they loooooooooved exiling Political Prisoners, unless they just killed them. Uzbekistan was home mostly to Chechens, Azeris, Crimeans, North Koreans and other groups that were from lands Russia conquered and would have some reason to be kind of pissed at Moscow and Russia's government, but obviously grouping together revolutionaries doesn't make the revolutionary problem go away, it worsens it.
Things grew to a boiling point until the rule of Gorbachev kicked in and they could use their newfound privileges as Soviet Citizens given to them by the glasnost and perestroika systems to tell Moscow how much they fucking hated them!
INDEPENDENCE (1991-PRESENT)
The USSR officially dissolved in December of 1991, exactly one year before the release of the Chronic by Dr. Dre and Uzbekistan was glad. They held an independence referendum which seemed like a formality at that point and it passed with 98% percent of the vote (2% of the population accidentally scribbled in the wrong box at the polling place) and Uzbekistan officially became a nation adopting the very chic and trendy "stan" suffix that all the other cool kids were using.
The first years of independence were rocky (like most countries) as the country was rife with terrorism, especially in its new capital of Tashkent and their newly elected president Islom Karimov was almost killed. This might have been good though because Karimov's establishment worsened and worsened until he was named the most ruthless dictator in Central Asia. He's been the first and only president of Uzbekistan since the early 90s and probably will stay that way until he's dead.
Life in Uzbekistan is still rough. One could compare it to living in China. Political freedom is very limited with no right to free speech, very limited democracy (most elections are rigged or postponed and Karimov signed a controversial bill to abolish term limits. Immediate Dictator red-flag), air-quality is poor from the unregulated industry in many of Uzbekistans cities and the quality of life is on the low end of the former Soviet states.
FUN FACTS
Uzbekistan the largest doubly-landlocked country. Not only is it landlocked, but all countries bordering it are landlocked.
Tashkent's Metro stations are elaborately designed with carvings and other Soviet-era architectural flourishes.
It is unacceptable to handshake a woman if you are a man in Uzbekistan.
It is Uzbek tradition that if somebody is going away for a really long time they are to eat some bread, then the loaf is hidden until they return.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
http://www.travelingeast.com/asia/uzbekistan/ten-interesting-facts-about-uzbekistan/
http://www.uzbekistan.org/uzbekistan/history/
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-16218972
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