Nation-States in the Former Soviet Union

During its existence between 1922 and 1991, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (U.S.S.R.) consisted of 15 republics, based on its 15 largest ethnicities. According to estimates a year before the breakup of the Soviet Union, Russians comprised 51 percent of the state’s population, Ukrainians 15 percent, Uzbeks 6 percent, and the remaining 28 percent spread among more than 100 other ethnicities officially recognized by the Soviet government.

The breakup of the U.S.S.R. in 1991 resulted in the conversion of the 15 republics into 15 independent states (Figure 8-20). These 15 states consist of five groups:

• Three Caucasus states: Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia.

• Three Baltic states: Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania.

• Three European states: Belarus, Moldova, and Ukraine.

• Five Central Asian states: Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan.

• Russia.

Former Soviet Union

The U.S.S.R. consisted of 15 republics that have become independent states.

Some of these new states are good examples of nation-states, and some are not. This page and the next discuss the former Soviet republics that are reasonably good examples of nation-states. Multinational states among the former Soviet republics are discussed further below. The best examples of nation-states are not necessarily the most stable and peaceful of the new states.

Armenia & Azerbaijan

The Caucasus region, an area about the size of Colorado, is situated between the Black and Caspian seas and gets its name from the mountains that separate Russia from Azerbaijan and Georgia. The region is home to several ethnicities. When the entire Caucasus region was part of the Soviet Union, the Soviet government promoted allegiance to communism and the Soviet state and quelled disputes among ethnicities, by force if necessary.

The breakup of the Soviet Union resulted in the creation of the three small states Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia. Armenia and Azerbaijan are both statistically good examples of nation-states, but they have fought over demarcating boundaries between the two ethnic groups. Georgia is a multinational state experiencing uprisings and independence movements by several of its ethnic groups.

Armenia

More than 3,000 years ago Armenians controlled an independent kingdom in the Caucasus. Converted to Christianity in 303 C.E., they lived for many centuries as an isolated Christian enclave under the rule of Turkish Muslims. A century ago, an estimated 1 million Armenians were killed by the Turks in actions now classified by most observers as genocide. After World War I the Allies created an independent state of Armenia, but it was soon dismantled by its neighbors. In 1921, Turkey and the Soviet Union agreed to divide Armenia between them. Today, Armenians comprise 98 percent of the population in Armenia, making it the most ethnically homogeneous country in the region.

Azerbaijan

Azerbaijanis trace their roots to Turkish invaders who migrated from Central Asia in the eighth and ninth centuries and merged with the existing Persian population. An 1828 treaty allocated northern Azerbaijani territory to Russia and southern Azerbaijani territory to Persia (now Iran). The western part of Azerbaijan, Nakhichevan (named for the area’s largest city), is separated from the rest of Azerbaijan by a 40-kilometer (25-mile) corridor that belongs to Armenia.

Armenians and Azerbaijanis both have achieved long-held aspirations of forming nation-states, but after their independence from the Soviet Union, the two went to war over the boundaries between them. The war concerned possession of Artsakh (known until 2017 as Nagorno-Karabakh), an 11,500-square-kilometer (4,400-square-mile) enclave within Azerbaijan that is inhabited primarily by Armenians but placed under Azerbaijan’s control by the Soviet Union during the 1920s. A 1994 cease-fire has left Artsakh technically part of Azerbaijan, but in reality it acts as an independent republic. Numerous clashes have occurred since then between Armenia and Azerbaijan.

Pause & Reflect 8.2.3

If Artsakh is recognized as a sovereign state, how would it compare in size to the microstates described earlier in this chapter?

Estonia, Latvia, & Lithuania

Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania are known as the Baltic states for their location on the Baltic Sea. They were independent countries between the end of World War I in 1918 and 1940, when the former Soviet Union annexed them under an agreement with Nazi Germany.

These three small neighboring Baltic countries have clear cultural differences and distinct historical traditions. Most Lithuanians are Roman Catholic and speak a language of the Baltic group within the Balto-Slavic branch of the Indo-European language family. Latvians are predominantly Lutheran, with a substantial Roman Catholic minority, and they speak a language of the Baltic group. Most Estonians are Protestant (Lutheran) and speak a Uralic language related to Finnish.

Belarus & Moldova

Belarus, Moldova, and Ukraine are situated between Russia to the east and European democracies to the west. Belarus has made a peaceful transition from Soviet republic to independent nation-state, but Moldova and Ukraine have experienced ethnic tensions and have had open warfare.

The ethnic distinction among Belarusians, Ukrainians, and Russians is somewhat blurred. The three groups speak similar East Slavic languages and trace their ethnic heritage to the same roots in medieval Europe. Belarusians and Ukrainians became distinct ethnicities from Russians when they were isolated from each other after invasions and conquests by Mongolians, Poles, and Lithuanians beginning in the thirteenth century. Russians conquered Belarus and Ukraine in the late eighteenth century, but after five centuries of exposure to non-Slavic influences, Belarusians and Ukrainians displayed sufficient cultural differences to consider themselves distinct from Russians.

Belarus

Palm Sunday, St. Peter and Paul’s Cathedral, Gomel, Belarus. The churchgoers carry pussy willow branches because Belarus has a climate that is too cool for palms to grow.

Moldovans are ethnically indistinguishable from Romanians, and Moldova (then called Moldavia) was part of Romania until the Soviet Union seized it in 1940. When Moldova changed from a Soviet republic to an independent country in 1992, many Moldovans pushed for reunification with Romania, both to reunify the ethnic group and to improve the region’s prospects for economic development.

But it was not to be that simple. When Moldova became a Soviet republic in 1940, its eastern boundary was the Dniester River. The Soviet government increased the size of Moldova by about 10 percent, transferring from Ukraine a 3,000-square-kilometer (1,200-square-mile) sliver of land on the east bank of the Dniester. The majority of the inhabitants of this area, known as Transnistria, are Ukrainian and Russian. They oppose Moldova’s reunification with Romania, and have proclaimed an independent state that has not been recognized by other countries.

Moldova

Sign in Transnistria promoting unity with Russia.

Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, & Uzbekistan

Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan are relatively stable nation-states. In contrast, Tajikistan is a nation-state that has suffered from a civil war between Tajiks who were former Communists, and an unusual alliance of Muslim fundamentalists and Western-oriented intellectuals. Fifteen percent of the population was made homeless during a civil war that lasted between 1992 and 1997. A U.N. peacekeeping force has helped to prevent a recurrence.