On November 23, 1920, Stalin returned to Moscow from the Transcaucasus and presented a report on the situation to the Politburo. Afterward, in a resolution drafted by Lenin, the Politburo stated: “The most conciliatory policy possible shall be adopted with respect to Georgia, Armenia, Turkey, and Persia, aimed most of all at avoiding war.”23
The “most conciliatory policy possible” with respect to Georgia became apparent on December 15, 1920, when a session of the Caucasian Bureau of the RCP(b), after hearing Orjonikidze’s report on the situation in Georgia, passed a resolution on the need to foment armed rebellion in the republic. Earlier, on December 9, 1920, the RSFSR government notified its ambassador to Georgia, Aron Sheynman, that he was to suspend the export of crude oil to Georgia in view of the latest actions of the Georgian government, which were not compatible with the friendly treaty relations established between the RSFSR and the Georgian Republic. Official Georgian assurances that no unfriendly actions had actually occurred were disregarded.
On January 2, 1921, Kirov and Orjonikidze sent another letter to Moscow justifying “immediate military assistance to the workers of Georgia in their struggle to establish Soviet rule.” The commander of the 11th Army, former Staff Captain Anatoly Gekker (1888–1938), presented a detailed plan for organizing combat operations of Red Army units on Georgian territory.
On January 20, 1921, Russian People’s Commissar for Foreign Affairs Georgy Chicherin reported to Lenin that “Georgia has become insolent again” and it had to be “Sovietized” by military force. On January 26, 1921, a plenary session of the RCP(b) Central Committee discussed the Georgian question, and adopted the following decision at Lenin’s recommendation: “1) The People’s Commissar for Foreign Affairs is directed to delay the break with Georgia, systematically collecting precise material on its violation of the treaty and more insistently demanding the passage of munitions into Armenia; 2) The Caucasian Front is to be asked about how prepared our available armed forces are in case of immediate or imminent war with Georgia, and a committee comprised of Comrades Trotsky, Chicherin and Stalin is directed to formulate the question, specifying Georgia’s extreme insolence; 3) A directive is to be issued to the Republic’s Revolutionary War Committee and the Caucasus Front to prepare for war with Georgia if this becomes necessary.”24
The ensuing events followed the familiar scenario. First, on February 7, 1921, a revolutionary war committee was formed in the Lori neutral zone, headed by Ivan Lazyan. Armed demonstrations began on February 11, and soon Borchalo district was in rebel hands, whereupon the rebel leaders sent a message to Moscow requesting military assistance.
On February 14 and 15, 1921, Lenin sent successive telegrams to the 11th Army Revolutionary War Council, giving specific recommendations for the conduct of operations in Georgia. On February 16, 1921, a Georgian Revolutionary Committee was formed in the settlement of Shulaveri [now Shaumyani], consisting of Philipe Makharadze (chairman), Mamia Orakhelashvili, Aleksi Gegechkori, Shalva Eliava, Amayak Nazaretyan, and others. The Georgian Socialist Soviet Republic was proclaimed there on February 18, 1921, followed by a request to the RSFSR government for armed assistance to save the “insurgent Georgian proletariat.”
This request was immediately honored; units of the Caucasian Front’s 11th Army crossed the Georgian frontier and engaged Georgian border forces. The Georgian head of state, Noe Zhordania, attempted to contact Moscow by telegraph, but the leaders of the RSFSR People’s Commissariat for Foreign Affairs refused to correspond. At the same time, the RSFSR ambassador plenipotentiary to Georgia, Aron Sheynman, officially announced—on the first day the Red Army initiated hostilities—that Soviet Russia was uninvolved in the attack on Georgian border troops in Borchalo District.
The Soviet Russian government finally issued an official reply on February 18, 1921 via the Georgian Democratic Republic’s envoy to Poland, while a note from RSFSR People’s Commissar Georgy Chicherin to the Georgian government contained accusations of repressions against the population of the Lori neutral zone, which had provoked an uprising against Georgian occupation troops.
Multiple desperate radio appeals by Georgian head of state Noe Zhordania on February 20, 21, and 22, 1921 to the leaders of Soviet Russia demanding they halt the invasion of RSFSR armed forces into the territory of independent Georgia went unanswered.
The stubborn resistance of the armed forces of the Georgian Democratic Republic forced the government of Soviet Russia to utilize additional armed forces of its own. The Red Army offensive developed simultaneously in three directions: along the Georgian Military Road from Vladikavkaz; from Mamison Pass toward Kutaisi; and along the Black Sea coast from Sochi. Thus, the troop operation involved units of the 11th, 2nd, and 8th Armies coordinating with units of the 1st Cavalry Army under the command of Semën Budënny. Finally, on February 25, 1921, units of the Red Army entered Tiflis, and on March 18, Soviet rule was established in Batumi. The Georgian Democratic Republic had at last ceased to exist.
Following the fall of the Georgian Democratic Republic, one of the priorities of Soviet Russia’s representatives in Georgia was to ensure restoration of the transportation corridor in order to resume oil exports. By March 12, 1921, operation of the Baku–Tiflis pipeline had been restored. Lenin immediately brought this news to the delegates of the Tenth Congress of the RCP(b): “Have you read in the newspaper about the Baku–Tiflis oil pipeline opening? You will soon read about a similar oil pipeline to Batumi.... The point is to improve our economic situation, strengthen the technical equipment of our republic.... In this respect, any easing is of gigantic importance to us.”
On May 21, 1921, the RSFSR and the Georgian Socialist Soviet Republic signed a treaty creating a military and political alliance and integrating the main economic structures of the two states. Soviet rule had thus been established throughout the entire Transcaucasus. Later, characterizing the national policy of the RSFSR government in the region, the noted Azerbaijani writer, politician, and public figure Mammed Amin Rasulzade (1884–1955), who had fled Soviet Russia, wrote an open letter to Stalin which he published abroad in December 1923, saying: “What is happening in Russia is practically indistinguishable from what happened here 100 years ago. Just as was the case 100 years ago, Russia is again annexing more and more new colonies. The replacement of great-power chauvinism with workers’ cosmopolitanism essentially changes nothing, and will also ultimately result in the destruction of small nations. By the force of your arms, you are also suppressing national movements in the Caucasus and Turkestan, and you say that you are doing it in the interests of the local proletariat.... Without a shadow of a doubt, you have trampled on the lawful right of the absolute majority of the local population to self-determination and independence. Thus, it is perfectly clear that the dictatorship of the proletariat proclaimed in Azerbaijan and Turkestan is essentially that same dictatorship of Moscow, and nothing more.”