AHC: Redraw Soviet administrative divisions to prevent ethnic strife and future conflicts

[Angel Grace]

(reviving an old thread)

By the late 1950s to early 1960s (after the repatriation of ethnicities of the Caucasus that were deported to Siberia due to Stalin's orders), re-organize and re-draw the SSRs, Republics, Oblasts, Okrugs, and other divisions of the USSR to diminish ethnic tension the best as possible, not just redrawing already existing borders, but also creating additional republics for unrecognized peoples, giving groups proper autonomy, and perhaps even elevation to SSRs, bonus if maps of your proposals are made, but you do not need to make a map, just describing it is good enough.

This is not a "preserve the USSR" or "give EVERY single ethnic group in the USSR a republic" challenge, it's up to you if the USSR survives til this day, but it's more than likely that it will still dissolve like in OTL, the main purpose of this challenge is that many conflicts and tensions that we have today in post-Soviet countries due to the crappy borders would be butterflied away, Artsakh, Chechnya, Luhansk, and Donetsk come to mind.

However, at the same time elevating some Republics to SSR status could also cause additional conflicts in the dissolution, as the present Russian Federation could become diminished due to too many ethnic republics becoming independent states, additional wars due to states fighting to get their territory back, and the creation of extremely impoverished and tiny post-Soviet states a-la Moldova.

 

[Fries]

Oh, Jesus, this is really hard to do. You're already going to have existing strife in Central Asia and the Caucasus, problems in the European USSR, problems in the Asian USSR, and general Russophilia promoted by Stalin and later Soviet governments.

Nonetheless, here's my best attempt:

As a starter, get rid of Stalin's obsession over loyalty to the USSR above all and the nation below the USSR, likely preventing the Soviet government from re-instating imperial Russian assimilation policies. Retain the borders of Belarus and the Baltics. Stop Khrushchev from giving Crimea to Ukraine, letting it remain in Russia, and give the Karelians a bit more autonomy. Create a new Karakalpak Soviet Socialist Republic (or at least an ASSR) out of western Uzbekistan. Create autonomous republics for Abkhazia and South Ossetia and find some way to settle the Artsakh dispute (the NKAO isn't enough!).

That's everything off the top of my head, at least. There's probably a lot more I've missed.

 

[Aslangeo]

I also would split western Ukraine off into a separate SSR or alternatively leave chunks of it around Lvov as part of Poland

and/ or move Novorossiya into Russia proper or as a separate SSR - also Merge Ossetia North and South

Chechnya would always have been problematic and is ethnically compact anyway

A tidy up around the Fergana valley between Uzbekistan, Tadzhikistan and Kyrgyzstan might also be possible but this is very complex as the ethnicities are intermingled there

The Karelians are now pretty much assimilated into Russia now so there was never really a problem. During the Finnish occupation in WWII the Finns tried to ethnically cleanse the Slavic inhabitants , this proved challenging due to many mixed marriages

 

[American Socialist]

It would be to late in this timeline but the the Soviet leadership would have been wise to leave Greater Romania intact and keep Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania out of the union and make them client states instead.

 

[HelloThere]

(reviving an old thread)

By the late 1950s to early 1960s (after the repatriation of ethnicities of the Caucasus that were deported to Siberia due to Stalin's orders), re-organize and re-draw the SSRs, Republics, Oblasts, Okrugs, and other divisions of the USSR to diminish ethnic tension the best as possible, not just redrawing already existing borders, but also creating additional republics for unrecognized peoples, giving groups proper autonomy, and perhaps even elevation to SSRs, bonus if maps of your proposals are made, but you do not need to make a map, just describing it is good enough.

This is not a "preserve the USSR" or "give EVERY single ethnic group in the USSR a republic" challenge, it's up to you if the USSR survives til this day, but it's more than likely that it will still dissolve like in OTL, the main purpose of this challenge is that many conflicts and tensions that we have today in post-Soviet countries due to the crappy borders would be butterflied away, Artsakh, Chechnya, Luhansk, and Donetsk come to mind.

However, at the same time elevating some Republics to SSR status could also cause additional conflicts in the dissolution, as the present Russian Federation could become diminished due to too many ethnic republics becoming independent states, additional wars due to states fighting to get their territory back, and the creation of extremely impoverished and tiny post-Soviet states a-la Moldova.

Apart from literally deporting everyone who speaks another language and/or engaging in massive genocide against minorities which can't get an own SSR? Impossible. The USSR was (at least in theory) a federation of nations, not a classic nation-state. Such federations are always in danger of violent ethnic breakup when they collapse.

 

[Godot]

It's pretty damn difficult to do so in the regions where we see the most conflict - the Caucasus and Central Asia most notably. The areas are just too ethnically mixed to draw clean lines.

 

[Beatriz]

Draw economic borders or borders that are perpendicular to ethnic borders?

 

[Vladyslav]

Good luck!

Draw economic borders or borders that are perpendicular to ethnic borders?

As I wrote elsewhere, the rejection of the Soviet internal borders' ethnic principle requires the transformation of the USSR into "Martian Northern Eurasia" and in this case the conditional Volga-Vyatka Province fate will be a third-rate issue.

 

[prani]

Here is a radical Idea:
Dissolve the political union and establish a normal federation where all federating units are all on equal footing and abolish the right to secede right at the beginning. So No 15 republics just a bunch of Oblasts. So Russian is a Ethnicity not a Nationality. There would be no USSR since there are no republics, maybe Soviet Union or Soviet Federation.
Like this was an actual Idea by Stalin, he wanted to unite all Union republics with Russia cause it would be easy to administer but Lenin was against the Idea as he saw the USSR as a Internationalist project.

 

[Vladyslav]

Dissolve the political union and establish a normal federation where all federating units are all on equal footing and abolish the right to secede right at the beginning. So No 15 republics just a bunch of Oblasts

There was plans of economic-based territorial division instead OTL national-territorial in early 1920s but they didn't have political support and realized only for Russian territories as big oblasts and krais created in 1923-1929. There is also evidence that Andropov planned to abandon the national-territorial system, but any such plan is a very long political suicide letter

Like this was an actual Idea by Stalin, he wanted to unite all Union republics with Russia

Yes, he wanted to make Soviet Republics (Ukraine, Belarus and Transcaucasia) parts of RSFSR but Ukrainians didn't want to be a part of Russia.

 

[prani]

There is also evidence that Andropov planned to abandon the national-territorial system, but any such plan is a very long political suicide letter

Hold up there! Now this! This is news to me!
So the discussion was behind close doors? Or was it discussed out in open?

 

[Vladyslav]

Hold up there! Now this! This is news to me!
So the discussion was behind close doors? Or was it discussed out in open?

Andropov's advisor Arkady Volsky said that Androvov instructed him to develop a administrative-territorial reform that should eliminate republics project, but the documents that Volsky made have not yet been published (or Volsky lied and this project never existed)

 

[prani]

Andropov's advisor Arkady Volsky said that Androvov instructed him to develop a administrative-territorial reform that should eliminate republics project, but the documents that Volsky made have not yet been published (or Volsky lied and this project never existed)

Seemed that he made it up, like he might have had plans for administrative reforms i mean that sounds like Andropov but in his speeches and in the documents that his office and the CPSU secretariat released he did seemed to be committed to the idea of the Soviet union as it was during his lifetime as a multi national political union. The man was Marxist Leninst to the core, he does sound pragmatic but he wasn't willing to sacrifice something that seemed fundamental to the Leninst concept of the internationalist Identity of the USSR, a union that Transcends national and ethnic identity, United by ideas of Marxist Leninism.

I maybe wrong and he might have been a sly pragmatist all along.

 

[Vladyslav]

Seemed that he made it up, like he might have had plans for administrative reforms i mean that sounds like Andropov but in his speeches and in the documents that his office and the CPSU secretariat released he did seemed to be committed to the idea of the Soviet union as it was during his lifetime as a multi national political union. The man was Marxist Leninst to the core, he does sound pragmatic but he wasn't willing to sacrifice something that seemed fundamental to the Leninst concept of the internationalist Identity of the USSR, a union that Transcends national and ethnic identity, United by ideas of Marxist Leninism.

I maybe wrong and he might have been a sly pragmatist all along.

Dissolution of republics wasn't "pragmatist". It was a political suicide. Non-Russian rioted due to lesser oppressions and republican nomenklatura didn't want to lose its base of power. So Andropov would end in this case like Khrushchev in 1964

 

[prani]

Dissolution of republics wasn't "pragmatist". It was a political suicide. Non-Russian rioted sue to lesser oppressions and republican nomenklatura didn't want to lose its base of power. So Andropov would end in this case like Khrushchev in 1964

Something that is administratively/ governance wise pragmatic need not be politically or ideologically pragmatic and vice versa. They are two separate concepts. I said pragmatic in the context of Marxist Lennist theory not in the context of Soviet politics, cause Lenin himself was against such a idea.

Politically/ideologically it might be radical but administratively it is a pragmatic move, by the late 70s it was obvious even to the top leadership that the constitutional order of the union was causing a lot of administrative problems. Something had to give.

Back during the first tranche of Kosygin's reforms there was proposal to abolish a lot of republican level ministry and transfer power to the union centre and turn the old republican level ministry to regional offices of the union ministry. Ofcourse there was a lot of opposition from the local nomenklatura and appartchiks who would stand to lose power and influence, I'm pretty sure they'd have a fit when they hear republics are being abolished.

I clearly know it's a political/ideological suicide but that don't mean abolishing Soviet republics and replacing it with oblast is a pragmatic move governance wise.

 

[Vladyslav]

Back during the first tranche of Kosygin's reforms there was proposal to abolish a lot of republican level ministry and transfer power to the union centre and turn the old republican level ministry to regional offices of the union ministry.

It was just recentralization after Khrushchev's decentralization, not radical changing of system

Politically/ideologically it might be radical but administratively it is a pragmatic move, by the late 70s it was obvious even to the top leadership that the constitutional order of the union was causing a lot of administrative problems.

Only republic where problems with governance on republican level existed was Russia. It was too big and haven't its ComParty. At least in the 1980s, the creation of sub-Republican divisions in RSFSR was discussed, which were supposed to receive most of the Russian government powers.

 

[prani]

A

It was just recentralization after Khrushchev's decentralization, not radical changing of system

But that reform didn't pass now did it? It was shelved because of protest and not being in spirit of leninism.
Besides my point is about ideological pragmatism not political one.

 

[Vladyslav]

It was shelved because of protest and not being in spirit of leninism.
Besides my point is about ideological pragmatism not political one.

I think we have different meanings of word "political". My point was USSR couldn't eliminate national principle of territorial organization because this would cause protests both among the people and the political class. Don't fuck with half of country without veeeeeery big necessary is Political pragmatism 101, at least with more common meaning of word "political"

 

[HelloThere]

Dissolve the political union and establish a normal federation where all federating units are all on equal footing and abolish the right to secede right at the beginning.

That would be totally against the Leninist principle of national self-determination though. And even IOTL even though the USSR had the right to secede, the secessions in 1990/1991 were technically illegal (as Gorbachev stressed on multiple occasions) - the law regulating secession was only passed in 1990 and envisioned a withdrawal-phase of 10 years, beginning and ending with referendums.

 

[Wendell]

Soviet nationalities policy was intended to sow division and resentment in order to retain control of the country after the same cultural groups were exploited as a means by which to organize the state in lieu of mass industrialization in 1917.