Countries participating in the Caucasian War 1817 1864. Caucasian War. Monuments to the heroes of the Caucasian War

Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation

Federal state budget educational

institution of higher professional education

"Ufa State Oil

Technical University"

Branch of the Federal State Budgetary Educational Institution of Higher Professional Education USPTU in Salavat

"Caucasian War 1817-1864"

Russian history

Executor

student gr. BTPzs-11-21P. S. Ivanov

Supervisor

Art. teacher S. N. Didenko

Salavat 2011

1. Historiographical review

Terminological dictionary

Caucasian War 1817 - 1864

1 Causes of the war

2 Progress of hostilities

4 Results and consequences of the war

1.Historiographical review

In the historical development of Russia, territorial expansion has always played a major role. The annexation of the Caucasus in this case occupies an important place in the formation of the Russian multinational state.

The establishment of Russian power in the North Caucasus region was accompanied by a long military confrontation with the local population, which went down in history as the Caucasian War of 1817 - 1864.

According to the chronological principle, all domestic historiography about the Caucasian War of 1817 - 1864 can be divided into three periods: pre-Soviet, Soviet and modern.

In the pre-Soviet period, the history of the Caucasian War of 1817 - 1864 was, as a rule, dealt with by military historians who participated in hostilities in the Caucasus. Among them, N.F. should be noted. Dubrovina, A.L. Zisserman, V.A. Potto, D.I. Romanovsky, R.A. Fadeeva, S.S. Esadze. They sought to reveal the causes and factors of the outbreak of the war in the Caucasus, to identify key points in this historical process. We also introduced various archival materials into circulation and highlighted the factual side of the issue.

The determining factor for a certain internal unity of pre-revolutionary Russian historiography is the so-called “imperial tradition”. At the heart of this tradition is the assertion that Russia was brought to the Caucasus by geopolitical necessity, and increased attention to the civilizing mission of the empire in this region. The war itself was seen as Russia’s struggle against Islamism and Muslim fanaticism that had established itself in the Caucasus. Accordingly, there was a certain justification for the conquest of the Caucasus, and the historical significance of this process was recognized.

At the same time, pre-revolutionary researchers raised in their works the problem of assessing this historical event by contemporaries. They paid main attention to the views of government officials and representatives of the military command in the Caucasus. Thus, historian V.A. Potto examined in some detail the activities of General A.P. Ermolov, showed his position on the issue of annexation of the North Caucasus. However, V.A. Potto, recognizing the merits of A.P. Ermolov in the Caucasus, did not show the consequences of his harsh actions against the local population and exaggerated the incompetence of his successors, in particular I.F. Paskevich, on the issue of conquering the Caucasus.

Among the works of pre-revolutionary researchers, the work of A.L. deserves great attention. Zisserman's "Field Marshal Prince Alexander Ivanovich Baryatinsky", which still remains the only full-fledged biography dedicated to one of the most prominent military leaders in the Caucasus. The historian paid attention to the assessment of the final period of the Caucasian War (II half of 1850 - early 1860s) by Russian state and military leaders, publishing their correspondence on Caucasian affairs as appendices in his monograph.

Among the works touching on the assessment of the Caucasian War by contemporaries, one can note the work of N.K. Schilder "Emperor Nicholas the First, his life and reign." In his book, he published the diary of A.Kh. as an appendix. Benckendorf, which records the memories of Emperor Nicholas I about his trip to the Caucasus in 1837. Here, Nicholas I assessed the actions of Russia during the war with the highlanders, which to a certain extent reveals his position on the issue of annexing the North Caucasus.

In the works of historians of the pre-Soviet period, attempts were made to show the points of view of contemporaries on the methods of conquering the Caucasus. For example, in the work of D.I. Romanovsky's notes were published as appendices by Admiral N.S. Mordvinov and General A.A. Velyaminov about methods of conquering the Caucasus. But it is worth noting that pre-revolutionary historians did not devote special research to the views of the participants in the events on the methods of integrating the Caucasus into the national structure of the Russian Empire. The priority task was to show directly the history of the Caucasian War. The same historians who turned to the assessment of this historical event by contemporaries concerned themselves mainly with the views of statesmen and military leaders of the Russian Empire, and only at a certain time stage of the war.

The formation of Soviet historiography of the Caucasian War was greatly influenced by statements about it by revolutionary democrats, for whom the conquest of the Caucasus was not so much a scientific as a political, ideological and moral problem. The role and authority of N.G. Chernyshevsky, N.A. Dobrolyubova, A.I. Herzen in the Russian social movement was not allowed to ignore their position. In this case, it is worth noting the work of V.G. Gadzhiev and A.M. Pickman, devoted to the consideration of the views on the problem of the Caucasian War by A.I. Herzen, N.A. Dobrolyubova, N.G. Chernyshevsky. The advantage of this work is that the authors were able to identify their assessments of the Caucasian War from the works of representatives of the democratic direction of socio-political thought in Russia. A certain drawback of the work is the desire to show the condemnation of the policies of tsarism in the Caucasus by the revolutionary democrats, hence a certain ideological stretch. If, A.I. Herzen really condemned the war in the Caucasus, then N.A. Dobrolyubov considered it expedient to annex the North Caucasus and advocated its integration into the national structure of the Russian Empire. But it can be noted that the work of V.G. Gadzhiev and A.M. Pickman is still of scientific interest in considering the problem of assessing the Caucasian War of 1817 - 1864 by representatives of revolutionary democratic thought, since it remains the only study of its kind in Russian historiography.

Soviet historiography also published works devoted to the views of representatives of Russian literature on the war between Russia and the mountaineers M.Yu. Lermontova, L.N. Tolstoy. These works were mainly an attempt to show that Russian writers condemned the war and sympathized with the mountaineers of the Caucasus, who were waging an unequal struggle against tsarism. For example, V.G. Gadzhiev only mentioned that P. Pestel could not understand the relationship between Russia and the mountain peoples, which explains his extremely harsh judgments about the mountain people of the Caucasus.

The gap in Soviet historiography was that the problem of annexing the Caucasus was practically not considered by state and military leaders of the Russian Empire, with the exception of a few personalities - A.P. Ermolova, N.N. Raevsky, D.A. Milyutina. Soviet works on the Caucasian War only indicated that the government's position was subordinated to the desire for conquest. At the same time, no analysis of the views of government officials was carried out. True, some works noted that among the Caucasian administration there were thoughts for the peaceful conquest of the Caucasus. So, for example, in the work of V.K. Gardanov quoted the statement of Prince M.S. Vorontsov about the need to establish peaceful and trade relations with the mountaineers. But as already noted, Soviet historiography does not provide a sufficiently complete analysis of the views of government and military leaders on the problem of the Caucasian War.

Despite the above, until the beginning of the 1980s, the study of the Caucasian War of 1817 - 1864 was in a state of deep crisis. A dogmatic approach to the interpretation of historical sources predetermined the further development of this issue: the process of the region’s entry into the Russian Empire turned out to be one of the least studied historical phenomena. As has already been noted, ideological restrictions affected primarily, and foreign researchers, naturally, did not have sufficient access to the necessary sources.

The Caucasian War turned out to be so complex and intractable for official historiography that for half a century of research, not even a factual history of this phenomenon has appeared, where the most important military events, the most influential figures, and so on would be presented in chronological order. Historians, having fallen under the ideological control of the party, were forced to develop the concept of the Caucasian War in relation to the class approach.

The establishment of a class-party approach to the study of history for the Caucasian War resulted in a shuffling of “anti-colonial” and “anti-feudal” accents in the 1930-1970s. The militant atheism of the 1920s-1930s had a noticeable influence on the historiography of the Caucasian War: historians had to look for a way to assess the liberation movement of the highlanders under the leadership of Shamil, in which the “anti-feudal” and “anti-colonial” components obscured the “reactionary-religious”. The result was a thesis about the reactionary essence of muridism, softened by an indication of its role in mobilizing the masses to fight the oppressors.

The term “tsarist autocracy” was introduced into scientific circulation, which united everyone who was associated with the colonial policy of tsarist Russia. As a result, the “depersonalization of the Caucasian War” was characteristic. This trend was observed until the second half of the 1950s. After the 20th Congress of the CPSU in 1956 and the debunking of Stalin’s personality cult, Soviet historians were called upon to get rid of the dogmatism of the Stalin era. At the past scientific sessions of Soviet Caucasian historians in 1956 in Makhachkala and Moscow, the concept of the Caucasian War as a movement of the mountaineers of the North Caucasus against the colonialist policy of tsarism and the oppression of local feudal lords was finally accepted in Soviet historiography.8 At the same time, the class approach, of course, remained decisive in the consideration historical events.

The process of “incorporating” Shamil and the resistance of the mountaineers into the overall picture of the liberation movement in Russia turned out to be very difficult. In the 1930s, Imam Shamil, a fighter against the colonial policies of tsarism, was included in the list of national heroes of the liberation movement along with S. Razin, E. Pugachev, S. Yulaev. After the Great Patriotic War, Shamil’s status looked strange against the backdrop of the deportation of Chechens, Ingush and Karachais, and he was gradually relegated to “second-class” historical figures.

When, in the early 1950s, the solemn march of the thesis about the “progressive significance” of the annexation of national borderlands began through the pages of scientific literature, Shamil was transferred to the category of enemies of both his own and the Russian people. The Cold War environment contributed to the transformation of the imam into a religious fanatic, a British, Iranian and Turkish mercenary. It came to the point that the thesis about the agent nature of the Caucasian War appeared (according to some authors, it began due to the machinations of “agents” of world and, first of all, British imperialism, as well as under the influence of supporters of pan-Turkism and pan-Islamism).

In 1956-1957 In the course of scientific discussions about the nature of the Caucasian War, two groups of historians emerged quite clearly. The first included those who considered the activities of Imam Shamil to be progressive, and the war itself to be anti-colonial, an integral part of the fight against autocracy. The second group was formed by scientists who called Shamil’s movement a reactionary phenomenon. The discussions themselves turned out to be unproductive, typical of the era of the “Khrushchev Thaw”, when it was already possible to raise questions, but it was not yet possible to offer answers. A well-known compromise was reached on the basis of Lenin’s thesis about “two Russias” - one represented by tsarism and oppressors of all kinds, and the other, represented by advanced, progressive figures of science, culture and the liberation movement. The first was the source of oppression and enslavement of non-Russian peoples, the second brought them enlightenment, economic and cultural uplift.

One of the striking illustrations of the situation in the field of studying the Caucasian War that existed during the Soviet period is the fate of the monograph by N.I. Pokrovsky "Caucasian Wars and Shamil's Imamate". This book, written at the highest professional level and which has not lost its significance to this day, lay successively in three publishing houses from 1934 to 1950, and was published only in 2000. Publication seemed dangerous to publishing house employees - ideological attitudes changed dramatically, and participation in a publication that contained “erroneous views” could end tragically. Despite the real danger of repression and the need to carry out work in the appropriate methodological and ideological direction, the author was able to demonstrate the complexity of such a historical phenomenon as the Caucasian War. He considered the campaigns of the late 16th - early 17th centuries to be his starting point. and, recognizing the great importance of the military-strategic factor in the development of events, he spoke cautiously about the economic component of Russian expansion. N.I. Pokrovsky did not avoid mentioning the raids of the mountaineers, the cruelty shown by both sides, and even decided to show that a number of the actions of the mountaineers cannot be clearly defined as anti-colonial or anti-feudal. An extremely difficult task was to analyze the struggle between supporters of Sharia - the code of Muslim law - and adats - codes of local customary law, since a purely scientific text could be interpreted as propaganda of religious prejudices or remnants.

In the mid-1980s, the liberation of historians from ideological constraints seemed to create the conditions for a serious, balanced, academic approach to the problem. However, due to the aggravation of the situation in the North Caucasus and Transcaucasia, the history of the inclusion of these regions into the Russian Empire has become painfully relevant. A superficial interpretation of the thesis about the significance of historical lessons is transformed into attempts to use the results of research in political struggle. In this case, the parties resort to an openly biased interpretation of evidence and an arbitrary selection of the latter. Incorrect “transfers” of ideological, religious and political structures from the past to the present and vice versa are allowed. For example, both from a formational point of view and from the position of Eurocentrism, the Caucasian peoples were at a lower stage of social development, and this was an important justification for their conquest in the 19th century. However, in modern literature there are absurd accusations of historians of “justifying colonialism” if they appropriately explained the actions of the tsarist government. There has been a dangerous tendency to hush up tragic episodes and various “sensitive” topics. One of these topics is the raiding component of the life of many ethnic groups inhabiting the Caucasus, the other is the cruelty of both sides in waging war.

In general, there is a dangerous growth in “nationally colored” approaches to studying the history of the Caucasian War, the revival of non-scientific methods, the translation of scientific controversy into a moral and ethical channel, followed by an unconstructive “search for the culprit.”

The history of the Caucasian War was greatly deformed during the Soviet period, since the study of this phenomenon within the framework of formational teaching was unproductive. In 1983 M.M. Bliev published an article in the journal History of the USSR, which was the first attempt to break out of the framework of the “anti-colonial-anti-feudal concept.” It was published in a situation when ideological restrictions were still unshakable, and the delicacy of the topic required maximum caution in formulation and emphasized correctness in relation to those whose point of view the author disputed. First of all, M.M. Bliev expressed his disagreement with the dominant thesis in Russian historical literature that the Caucasian War was of a national liberation, anti-colonial character. He focused attention on the powerful military expansion of the mountaineers of the North Caucasus in relation to their neighbors, on the fact that the capture of prisoners and booty, extortion of tribute became commonplace in relations between mountain tribes and inhabitants of the plains. The researcher expressed doubts about the validity of the traditional chronological framework of the war, putting forward the thesis about the intersection of two expansionist lines - the imperial Russian and the raiding mountaineers.

Since the beginning of the 1990s, a new stage can be noted in Russian historiography in considering the issues of the Caucasian War of 1817 - 1864. The modern period is marked by pluralism of scientific positions and the absence of ideological pressure. In this regard, historians have the opportunity to write more objective scientific works on the history of the annexation of the North Caucasus and conduct independent historical analysis. Most modern domestic researchers strive to find a “golden mean” and, moving away from ideological and political emotions, engage in purely scientific research on Caucasian issues. If we ignore frankly opportunistic works, the range of studies on this problem that have been published recently will be quite small. It consists of monographs by N.I. Pokrovsky, M.M. Blieva, V.V. Degoeva, N.S. Kinyapina, Ya.A. Gordina. In addition, a whole group of young scientists is currently successfully working on this topic, as evidenced by the materials of conferences, round tables, etc.

Article by V.V. Degoev’s “The Problem of the Caucasian War of the 19th Century: Historiographical Results” became a kind of summing up of the results of the study of the Caucasian War by the beginning of the 21st century. The author clearly identified the main flaw in most previous studies on the history of the Caucasus in the 19th century: “theoretical schemes and moral assessments prevailed over the system of evidence.” A significant part of the article is a demonstration of how domestic historians, who were in the grip of official methodology, who were constantly afraid that with the next change in the “course” they would find themselves under the gun of rabid and not at all scientific criticism, entailing tragic consequences for them, tried to construct something acceptable from the point of view of “the only true teaching” and from the point of view of professionalism. The thesis about refusing to recognize the anti-colonial and anti-feudal element as dominant in the Caucasian War looks very productive. The historian’s theses about the influence of geopolitical and natural-climatic factors on the development of events look important and very productive (the lot of all mountain tribes was constant war with each other, since geographical conditions and the peculiarities of the development of ethnic groups prevented their unification into a powerful proto-state.

From the east and west they were cut off from the rest of the world by the sea, in the south and north there were hostile ecosystems (steppe and arid highlands), as well as powerful states (Russia, Turkey, Persia), which turned the Caucasus into a zone of their rivalry).

In 2001, a collection of articles by V.V. was published. Degoev “The Great Game in the Caucasus: History and Modernity”, in three sections of which (“History”, “Historiography”, “Historical and Political Journalism”) the results of many years of scientific research and reflection of this scientist are presented. The article “Stepchildren of Glory: a man with a gun in the everyday life of the Caucasian War” is devoted to the everyday life of the long-term confrontation between the highlanders and the Russian army. What makes this work particularly valuable is that it is perhaps the first attempt in Russian historiography to analyze the life of a “colonial” type of war. The popular style of presentation of the material did not deprive another book by V.V. of scientific significance. Degoev "Imam Shamil: prophet, ruler, warrior."

A notable phenomenon in the historiography of the Caucasian War in recent years was the publication of the book by Ya.A. Gordin “Caucasus, Land and Blood”, which shows how a certain imperial set of ideas was implemented in practice, how these imperial ideas were transformed in accordance with the situation and external “challenges”.

Summarizing the analysis of scientific works on this topic, in general we can say that domestic historiography is represented by a small number of works on this issue, and ideology has had a strong influence on the study of the issue.

royal war imam shamil

2.Terminological dictionary

Dubrovin Nikolai Fedorovich (1837 - 1904) - academician, military historian.

Zisserman Arnold Lvovich (1824 - 1897) - colonel, participant in the Caucasian War, military historian and writer.

Potto Vasily Alexandrovich (1836<#"justify">3.Caucasian War 1817 - 1864

3.1 Causes of the war

“Caucasian War 1817 - 1864.” - military actions related to the annexation of Chechnya, Mountainous Dagestan and the North-West Caucasus by Tsarist Russia.”

The Caucasian War is a collective concept. This armed conflict lacks internal unity, and for its productive study, it is advisable to divide the Caucasian War into a number of fairly separate parts, separated from the general flow of events on the basis of the most important component of a given specific episode (group of episodes) of military operations.

The resistance of free societies, the military activity of the local elite and the activities of Imam Shamil in Dagestan are three different “wars”. Thus, this historical phenomenon is devoid of internal unity and acquired modern shape solely due to its territorial localization.

An unbiased analysis of the chronicle of hostilities in this region allows us to consider the Persian campaign of Peter the Great in 1722-1723 as the beginning of the conquest of the Caucasus, and the suppression of the uprising in Chechnya and Dagestan in 1877 as its end. Earlier military enterprises in Russia in the 16th - early 18th centuries. can be attributed to the prehistory of events.

The main goal of the Russian Empire was not just to establish itself in this region, but to subordinate the peoples of the Caucasus to its influence.

The immediate impetus that provoked the war was the manifesto of Alexander I on the annexation of Kartli and Kakheti to Russia (1800-1801). The reaction of the states neighboring Georgia (Persia and Turkey) was not long in coming - a long-term war. Thus, in the 19th century. In the Caucasus, the political interests of several countries converged: Persia, Turkey, Russia and England.

Therefore, the speedy conquest of the Caucasus was considered an urgent task of the Russian Empire, but it turned into problems for more than one Russian emperor.

3.2. Progress of hostilities

To illuminate the course of the war, it would be advisable to highlight several stages:

· Ermolovsky period (1816-1827),

· The beginning of gazavat (1827-1835),

· Formation and functioning of the Imamate (1835-1859) Shamil,

· End of the war: the conquest of Circassia (1859-1864).

As already noted, after the transfer of Georgia (1801 - 1810) and Azerbaijan (1803 - 1813) to Russian citizenship, the annexation of the lands separating Transcaucasia from Russia and the establishment of control over the main communications was considered by the Russian government as the most important military-political task . However, the mountaineers did not agree with this state of events. The main opponents of the Russian troops were the Adyghes of the Black Sea coast and the Kuban region in the west, and the highlanders in the east, united in the military-theocratic Islamic state of the Imamate of Chechnya and Dagestan, headed by Shamil. At the first stage, the Caucasian War coincided with Russian wars against Persia and Turkey, and therefore Russia was forced to conduct military operations against the highlanders with limited forces.

The reason for the war was the appearance of General Alexei Petrovich Ermolov in the Caucasus. He was appointed in 1816 commander-in-chief of the Russian troops in Georgia and on the Caucasian line. Ermolov, a European-educated man, a hero of the Patriotic War, carried out a lot of preparatory work in 1816-1817 and in 1818 suggested that Alexander I complete his policy program in the Caucasus. Ermolov set the task of changing the Caucasus, putting an end to the raiding system in the Caucasus, with what is called “predation.” He convinced Alexander I of the need to pacify the highlanders solely by force of arms. Soon the general moved from individual punitive expeditions to a systematic advance deep into Chechnya and Mountainous Dagestan by surrounding mountainous areas with a continuous ring of fortifications, cutting clearings in difficult forests, building roads and destroying “rebellious” villages.

His activities on the Caucasian line in 1817 - 1818. the general started from Chechnya, moving the left flank of the Caucasian line from the Terek to the river. Sunzha, where he strengthened the Nazran redoubt and founded the fortification of Pregradny Stan in its middle reaches (October 1817) and the Grozny fortress in the lower reaches (1818). This measure stopped the uprisings of the Chechens living between Sunzha and Terek. In Dagestan, the highlanders who threatened Shamkhal Tarkovsky, captured by Russia, were pacified; To keep them in submission, the Vnezapnaya fortress was built (1819). An attempt to attack it by the Avar Khan ended in complete failure.

In Chechnya, Russian troops destroyed auls, forcing the Chechens to move further and further from Sunzha into the depths of the mountains or move to a plane (plain) under the supervision of Russian garrisons; A clearing was cut through the dense forest to the village of Germenchuk, which served as one of the main defensive points of the Chechen army.

In 1820, the Black Sea Cossack Army (up to 40 thousand people) was included in the Separate Georgian Corps, renamed the Separate Caucasian Corps and also strengthened. In 1821, the Burnaya fortress was built, and the crowds of the Avar Khan Akhmet, who tried to interfere with Russian work, were defeated. The possessions of the Dagestan rulers, who united their forces against Russian troops on the Sunzhenskaya Line and suffered a series of defeats in 1819-1821, were either transferred to Russian vassals with subordination to Russian commandants, or became dependent on Russia, or were liquidated. On the right flank of the line, the Trans-Kuban Circassians, with the help of the Turks, began to disturb the borders more than ever; but their army, which invaded the land of the Black Sea army in October 1821, was defeated.

In 1822, to completely pacify the Kabardians, a series of fortifications were built at the foot of the Black Mountains, from Vladikavkaz to the upper reaches of the Kuban. In 1823 - 1824 The actions of the Russian command were directed against the Trans-Kuban highlanders, who did not stop their raids. A number of punitive expeditions were carried out against them.

In Dagestan in the 1820s. A new Islamic movement began to spread - muridism (one of the directions in Sufism). Ermolov, having visited Cuba in 1824, ordered Aslankhan of Kazikumukh to stop the unrest caused by the followers of the new teaching. But he was distracted by other matters and could not monitor the execution of this order, as a result of which the main preachers of Muridism, Mulla-Mohammed, and then Kazi-Mulla, continued to inflame the minds of the mountaineers in Dagestan and Chechnya and proclaim the proximity of gazavat, that is, a holy war against the infidels . The movement of the mountain people under the flag of Muridism was the impetus for expanding the scope of the Caucasian War, although some mountain peoples (Kumyks, Ossetians, Ingush, Kabardians, etc.) did not join this movement.

In 1825, there was a general uprising of Chechnya, during which the highlanders managed to capture the Amiradzhiyurt post (July 8) and tried to take the Gerzel fortification, rescued by the detachment of Lieutenant General D.T. Lisanevich (July 15). The next day, Lisanevich and General Grekov, who was with him, were killed by the Chechens. The uprising was suppressed in 1826.

From the very beginning of 1825, the coasts of the Kuban again began to be subject to raids by large parties of Shapsugs and Abadzekhs; The Kabardians also became worried. In 1826, a number of expeditions were made to Chechnya, cutting down clearings in dense forests, laying new roads and restoring order in villages free from Russian troops. This ended the activities of Ermolov, who in 1827 was recalled by Nicholas I from the Caucasus and sent into retirement for his connections with the Decembrists.

Period 1827-1835 associated with the beginning of the so-called gazavat - the sacred struggle against the infidels. The new Commander-in-Chief of the Caucasian Corps, Adjutant General I.F. Paskevich abandoned a systematic advance with the consolidation of the occupied territories and returned mainly to the tactics of individual punitive expeditions, especially since at first he was mainly occupied with wars with Persia and Turkey. The successes he achieved in these wars contributed to maintaining external calm in the country; but muridism spread more and more, and Kazi-Mulla, proclaimed imam in December 1828 and the first to call for ghazavat, sought to unite the hitherto scattered tribes of the Eastern Caucasus into one mass hostile to Russia. Only the Avar Khanate refused to recognize his power, and Kazi-Mulla’s attempt (in 1830) to take control of Khunzakh ended in defeat. After this, the influence of Kazi-Mulla was greatly shaken, and the arrival of new troops sent to the Caucasus after the conclusion of peace with Turkey forced him to flee from his residence, the Dagestan village of Gimry, to the Belokan Lezgins.

In 1828, in connection with the construction of the Military-Sukhumi road, the Karachay region was annexed. In 1830, another defensive line was created - Lezginskaya. In April 1831, Count Paskevich-Erivansky was recalled to command the army in Poland; in his place were temporarily appointed commanders of the troops: in Transcaucasia - General N.P. Pankratiev, on the Caucasian line - General A.A. Velyaminov.

Kazi-Mulla transferred his activities to the Shamkhal possessions, where, having chosen as his location the inaccessible tract Chumkesent (not far from Temir-Khan-Shura), he began to call all the mountaineers to fight the infidels. His attempts to take the fortresses of Burnaya and Vnezapnaya failed; but the movement of General G.A. was also unsuccessful. Emanuel to the Aukhov forests. The last failure, greatly exaggerated by the mountain messengers, increased the number of Kazi-Mulla’s followers, especially in central Dagestan, so that in 1831 Kazi-Mulla took and plundered Tarki and Kizlyar and attempted, but unsuccessfully, with the support of the rebel Tabasarans (one of the mountain peoples Dagestan) to capture Derbent. Significant territories (Chechnya and most of Dagestan) came under the authority of the imam. However, from the end of 1831 the uprising began to decline. The detachments of Kazi-Mulla were pushed back to Mountainous Dagestan. Attacked on December 1, 1831 by Colonel M.P. Miklashevsky, he was forced to leave Chumkesent and went to Gimry. Appointed in September 1831, the commander of the Caucasian Corps, Baron Rosen, took Gimry on October 17, 1832; Kazi-Mulla died during the battle.

Gamzat-bek was proclaimed the second imam, who, thanks to military victories, rallied around himself almost all the peoples of Mountainous Dagestan, including some of the Avars. In 1834, he invaded Avaria, treacherously took possession of Khunzakh, exterminated almost the entire khan’s family, which adhered to a pro-Russian orientation, and was already thinking about conquering all of Dagestan, but died at the hands of an assassin. Soon after his death and the proclamation of Shamil as the third imam, on October 18, 1834, the main stronghold of the Murids, the village of Gotsatl, was taken and destroyed by a detachment of Colonel Kluki von Klugenau. Shamil's troops retreated from Avaria.

On the Black Sea coast, where the highlanders had many convenient points for communication with the Turks and trading in slaves (the Black Sea coastline did not yet exist), foreign agents, especially the British, distributed anti-Russian appeals among the local tribes and delivered military supplies. This forced Baron Rosen to instruct General A.A. Velyaminov (in the summer of 1834) a new expedition to the Trans-Kuban region to establish a cordon line to Gelendzhik. It ended with the construction of fortifications of Abinsky and Nikolaevsky.

So, the third imam was the Avar Shamil, originally from the village. Gimry. It was he who managed to create the imamate - a united mountain state on the territory of Dagestan and Chechnya, which lasted until 1859.

The main functions of the imamate were the defense of the territory, ideology, ensuring law and order, economic development, and solving fiscal and social problems. Shamil managed to unite the multi-ethnic region and form a coherent centralized system of government. The head of state - the great imam, “father of the country and checkers” - was a spiritual, military and secular leader, had enormous authority and a decisive voice. All life in the mountain state was built on the basis of Sharia - the laws of Islam. Year after year, Shamil replaced the unwritten law of customs with laws based on Sharia. Among his most important acts was the abolition of serfdom. The Imamate had an effective armed force, including cavalry and foot militia. Each branch of the military had its own division.

The new commander-in-chief, Prince A.I. Baryatinsky, paid his main attention to Chechnya, the conquest of which he entrusted to the head of the left wing of the line, General N.I. Evdokimov - an old and experienced Caucasian; but in other parts of the Caucasus the troops did not remain inactive. In 1856 and 1857 Russian troops achieved the following results: the Adagum Valley was occupied on the right wing of the line and the Maykop fortification was built. On the left wing, the so-called “Russian road”, from Vladikavkaz, parallel to the ridge of the Black Mountains, to the fortification of Kurinsky on the Kumyk plane, is completely completed and strengthened by newly constructed fortifications; wide clearings have been cut in all directions; the mass of the hostile population of Chechnya has been driven to the point of having to submit and move to open areas, under state supervision; The Aukh district is occupied and a fortification has been erected in its center. In Dagestan, Salatavia is finally occupied. Several new Cossack villages were established along Laba, Urup and Sunzha. The troops are everywhere close to the front lines; the rear is secured; vast expanses of the best lands are cut off from the hostile population and, thus, a significant share of the resources for the fight are wrested from the hands of Shamil.

On the Lezgin line, as a result of deforestation, predatory raids gave way to petty theft. On the Black Sea coast, the secondary occupation of Gagra marked the beginning of securing Abkhazia from incursions by Circassian tribes and from hostile propaganda. The actions of 1858 in Chechnya began with the occupation of the Argun River gorge, which was considered impregnable, where N.I. Evdokimov ordered the foundation of a strong fortification, called Argunsky. Climbing up the river, he reached, at the end of July, the villages of the Shatoevsky society; in the upper reaches of the Argun he founded a new fortification - Evdokimovskoye. Shamil tried to divert attention by sabotage to Nazran, but was defeated by a detachment of General I.K. Mishchenko and barely managed to escape into the still unoccupied part of the Argun Gorge. Convinced that his power there had been completely undermined, he retired to Veden - his new residence. On March 17, 1859, the bombardment of this fortified village began, and on April 1 it was taken by storm.

Shamil fled beyond the Andean Koisu; all of Ichkeria declared its submission to us. After the capture of Veden, three detachments headed concentrically to the Andean Koisu valley: Chechen, Dagestan and Lezgin. Shamil, who temporarily settled in the village of Karata, fortified Mount Kilitl, and covered the right bank of the Andean Koisu, opposite Conkhidatl, with solid stone rubble, entrusting their defense to his son Kazi-Magoma. With any energetic resistance from the latter, forcing the crossing at this point would cost enormous sacrifices; but he was forced to leave his strong position as a result of the troops of the Dagestan detachment entering his flank, who made a remarkably courageous crossing across the Andiyskoe Koisu at the Sagytlo tract. Shamil, seeing danger threatening from everywhere, fled to his last refuge on Mount Gunib, having with him only 332 people. the most fanatical murids from all over Dagestan. On August 25, Gunib was taken by storm, and Shamil himself was captured by Prince A.I. Baryatinsky.

Conquest of Circassia (1859-1864). The capture of Gunib and the capture of Shamil could be considered the last act of the war in the Eastern Caucasus; but there still remained the western part of the region, inhabited by warlike tribes hostile to Russia. It was decided to conduct actions in the Trans-Kuban region in accordance with the system adopted in recent years. The native tribes had to submit and move to the places indicated to them on the plane; otherwise, they were pushed further into the barren mountains, and the lands they left behind were populated by Cossack villages; finally, after pushing the natives from the mountains to the seashore, they could either move to the plain, under our closest supervision, or move to Turkey, in which it was supposed to provide them with possible assistance. To quickly implement this plan, I.A. Baryatinsky decided, at the beginning of 1860, to strengthen the troops of the right wing with very large reinforcements; but the uprising that broke out in the newly calmed Chechnya and partly in Dagestan forced us to temporarily abandon this. Actions against the small gangs there, led by stubborn fanatics, dragged on until the end of 1861, when all attempts at indignation were finally suppressed. Then only it was possible to begin decisive operations on the right wing, the leadership of which was entrusted to the conqueror of Chechnya, N.I. Evdokimov. His troops were divided into 2 detachments: one, Adagumsky, operated in the land of the Shapsugs, the other - from Laba and Belaya; a special detachment was sent to operate in the lower reaches of the river. Pshish. In autumn and winter, Cossack villages are established in the Natukhai district. The troops operating from the direction of Laba completed the construction of villages between Laba and Belaya and cut through the entire foothill space between these rivers with clearings, which forced the local communities to partly move to the plane, partly to go beyond the pass of the Main Range.

At the end of February 1862, Evdokimov’s detachment moved to the river. Pshekh, to which, despite the stubborn resistance of the Abadzekhs, a clearing was cut and a convenient road was laid. All inhabitants living between the Khodz and Belaya rivers were ordered to immediately move to Kuban or Laba, and within 20 days (from March 8 to 29), up to 90 villages were resettled. At the end of April, N.I. Evdokimov, having crossed the Black Mountains, descended into the Dakhovskaya Valley along the road that the mountaineers considered inaccessible to us, and set up a new Cossack village there, closing the Belorechenskaya line. Our movement deep into the Trans-Kuban region was met everywhere by desperate resistance from the Abadzekhs, reinforced by the Ubykhs and other tribes; but the enemy’s attempts could not be crowned with serious success anywhere. The result of the summer and autumn actions of 1862 on the part of Belaya was the strong establishment of Russian troops in the space limited on the west by the rivers Pshish, Pshekha and Kurdzhips.

At the beginning of 1863, the only opponents of Russian rule throughout the Caucasus region were the mountain societies on the northern slope of the Main Range, from Adagum to Belaya, and the coastal tribes of Shapsugs, Ubykhs, etc., who lived in the narrow space between the sea coast and the southern slope Main Range, Aderby Valley and Abkhazia. The final conquest of the country fell to the lot of Grand Duke Mikhail Nikolaevich, appointed governor of the Caucasus. In 1863, the actions of the troops of the Kuban region. should have consisted of spreading Russian colonization of the region simultaneously from two sides, relying on the Belorechensk and Adagum lines. These actions were so successful that they put the mountaineers of the northwestern Caucasus in a hopeless situation. Already from mid-summer 1863, many of them began to move to Turkey or to the southern slope of the ridge; most of them submitted, so that by the end of summer the number of immigrants settled on the plane, along the Kuban and Laba, reached 30 thousand people. At the beginning of October, the Abadzekh elders came to Evdokimov and signed an agreement according to which all their fellow tribesmen who wanted to accept Russian citizenship pledged no later than February 1, 1864 to begin moving to the places indicated by him; the rest were given 2 1/2 months to move to Turkey.

The conquest of the northern slope of the ridge was completed. All that remained was to move to the southwestern slope in order to, going down to the sea, clear the coastal strip and prepare it for settlement. On October 10, our troops climbed to the very pass and in the same month occupied the river gorge. Pshada and the mouth of the river. Dzhubgi. The beginning of 1864 was marked by unrest in Chechnya, stirred up by followers of the new Muslim sect of Zikr; but these unrest were soon pacified. In the western Caucasus, the remnants of the highlanders of the northern slope continued to move to Turkey or to the Kuban plane; from the end of February, actions began on the southern slope, which ended in May with the conquest of the Abkhaz tribe Akhchipsou, in the upper reaches of the river. Mzymty. The masses of native inhabitants were pushed back to the seashore and were taken to Turkey by arriving Turkish ships. On May 21, 1864, in the camp of the united Russian columns, in the presence of the Grand Duke Commander-in-Chief, a thanksgiving prayer service was served to mark the end of a long struggle that had cost Russia countless victims.

4 Results and consequences of the war

The process of integration of the North Caucasus was a unique event in its own way. It reflected both traditional schemes that corresponded to the national policy of the empire in the annexed lands, as well as its own specifics, determined by the relationship between the Russian authorities and the local population and the policy of the Russian state in the process of establishing its influence in the Caucasus region.

The geopolitical position of the Caucasus determined its importance in expanding Russia's spheres of influence in Asia. Most assessments of contemporaries - participants in military operations in the Caucasus and representatives of Russian society show that they understood the meaning of Russia's struggle for the Caucasus.

In general, contemporaries’ understanding of the problem of establishing Russian power in the Caucasus shows that they sought to find the most optimal options for ending hostilities in the region. Most representatives of government authorities and Russian society were united by the understanding that the integration of the Caucasus and local peoples into the common socio-economic and cultural space of the Russian Empire required some time.

The results of the Caucasian War were Russia’s conquest of the North Caucasus and its achievement of the following goals:

· strengthening the geopolitical position;

· strengthening influence on the states of the Near and Middle East through the North Caucasus as a military-strategic springboard;

· the acquisition of new markets for raw materials and sales on the outskirts of the country, which was the goal of the colonial policy of the Russian Empire.

The Caucasian War had enormous geopolitical consequences. Reliable communications were established between Russia and its Transcaucasian lands due to the fact that the barrier separating them, which was the territories not controlled by Russia, disappeared. After the end of the war, the situation in the region became much more stable. Raids and rebellions began to happen less frequently, largely because the indigenous population in the occupied territories became much smaller. The slave trade on the Black Sea, which had previously been supported by Turkey, completely ceased. For the indigenous peoples of the region, a special system of government, adapted to their political traditions, was established - the military-people's system. The population was given the opportunity to decide their internal affairs according to folk customs (adat) and Sharia law.

However, Russia provided itself with problems for a long time by including “restless”, freedom-loving peoples - echoes of this can be heard to this day. The events and consequences of this war are still painfully perceived in the historical memory of many peoples of the region and significantly affect interethnic relations.

List of used literature

1.500 greatest people of Russia / author.-comp. L. Orlova. - Minsk, 2008.

.World history of wars: encyclopedia. - M., 2008.

.Degoev V.V. The problem of the Caucasian War of the 19th century: historiographical results // “Collection of the Russian Historical Society”, vol. 2. - 2000.

.Zuev M.N. Russian history. Textbook for universities. M., 2008.

.Isaev I.A. History of the Fatherland: A textbook for applicants to universities. M., 2007.

.History of Russia XIX - early XX centuries: Textbook for universities / Ed. V.A. Fedorov. M., 2002.

.History of Russia: Textbook for universities / Ed. M.N. Zueva, A.A. Chernobaeva. M., 2003.

.Sakharov A.N., Buganov V.I. History of Russia from ancient times to the end of the 19th century. - M., 2000.

.Semenov L.S. Russia and international relations in the Middle East in the 20s of the 19th century. - L., 1983.

.Universal school encyclopedia. T.1. A - L/chap. Ed. E. Khlebalina, leading Ed. D. Volodikhin. - M., 2003.

.Encyclopedia for children. T. 5, part 2. History of Russia. From palace coups to the era of the Great Reforms. - M., 1997.

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The concept of the "Caucasian War", its historical interpretations

The concept of "Caucasian War" was introduced by the pre-revolutionary historian Rostislav Andreevich Fadeev in the book "Sixty Years of the Caucasian War", published in 1860.

Pre-revolutionary and Soviet historians up until the 1940s preferred the term "Caucasian Wars of the Empire"

"Caucasian War" became a common term only during Soviet times.

Historical interpretations of the Caucasian War

In the vast multilingual historiography of the Caucasian War, three main trends stand out, which reflect the positions of the three main political rivals: the Russian Empire, the Western great powers and supporters of the Muslim resistance. These scientific theories determine the interpretation of war in historical science.

Russian imperial tradition

The Russian imperial tradition is represented in the works of pre-revolutionary Russian and some modern historians. It originates from the pre-revolutionary (1917) course of lectures by General Dmitry Ilyich Romanovsky. Supporters of this direction include the author of the famous textbook Nikolai Ryazanovsky “History of Russia” and the authors of the English-language “Modern Encyclopedia on Russian and Soviet History” (edited by J.L. Viszhinsky). The above-mentioned work of Rostislav Fadeev can also be attributed to this tradition.

These works often talk about the “pacification of the Caucasus”, about Russian “colonization” in the sense of the development of territories, the emphasis is placed on the “predation” of the highlanders, the religious-militant nature of their movement, the civilizing and reconciling role of Russia is emphasized, even taking into account the mistakes and “ excesses."

In the late 1930s and 1940s, a different point of view prevailed. Imam Shamil and his supporters were declared proteges of the exploiters and agents of foreign intelligence services. Shamil's long resistance, according to this version, was allegedly due to the help of Turkey and Britain. From the late 1950s to the first half of the 1980s, the emphasis was on the voluntary entry of all peoples and borderlands without exception into the Russian state, the friendship of peoples and the solidarity of workers in all historical eras.

In 1994, the book “The Caucasian War” by Mark Bliev and Vladimir Degoev was published, in which the imperial scientific tradition is combined with an Orientalist approach. The overwhelming majority of North Caucasian and Russian historians and ethnographers reacted negatively to the hypothesis expressed in the book about the so-called “raid system” - the special role of raids in mountain society, caused by a complex set of economic, political, social and demographic factors.

Western tradition

It is based on the premise of Russia’s inherent desire to expand and “enslave” the annexed territories. In 19th-century Britain (fearing Russia's approach to the "jewel of the British crown" India) and 20th-century USA (worried about the USSR/Russia's approach to the Persian Gulf and the oil regions of the Middle East), the highlanders were considered a "natural barrier" to the Russian Empire's path to the south. The key terminology of these works is “Russian colonial expansion” and the “North Caucasian shield” or “barrier” opposing it. A classic work is the work of John Badley, “Russia’s Conquest of the Caucasus,” published at the beginning of the last century. Currently, supporters of this tradition are grouped in the “Society for Central Asian Studies” and the journal “Central Asian Survey” published by it in London.

Anti-imperialist tradition

Early Soviet historiography of the 1920s - the first half of the 1930s. (the school of Mikhail Pokrovsky) considered Shamil and other leaders of the mountaineer resistance as leaders of the national liberation movement and spokesmen for the interests of the broad working and exploited masses. The raids of the highlanders on their neighbors were justified by the geographical factor, the lack of resources in the conditions of almost miserable urban life, and the robberies of the abreks (19-20 centuries) - by the struggle for liberation from the colonial oppression of tsarism.

During the Cold War, Leslie Blanch emerged from among Sovietologists who creatively reworked the ideas of early Soviet historiography with his popular work “Sabres of Paradise” (1960), translated into Russian in 1991. A more academic work - Robert Bauman's study "Unusual Russian and Soviet Wars in the Caucasus, Central Asia and Afghanistan" - talks about the Russian "intervention" in the Caucasus and the "war against the highlanders" in general. Recently, a Russian translation of the work of the Israeli historian Moshe Hammer “Muslim resistance to tsarism. Shamil and the conquest of Chechnya and Dagestan” has appeared. The peculiarity of all these works is the absence of Russian archival sources in them.

Periodization

Prerequisites for the Caucasian War

At the beginning of the 19th century, the Kartli-Kakheti kingdom (1801-1810), as well as the Transcaucasian khanates - Ganja, Sheki, Kuba, Talyshin (1805-1813) became part of the Russian Empire.

Treaty of Bucharest (1812), which ended the Russian-Turkish War of 1806 - 1812, recognized Western Georgia and the Russian protectorate over Abkhazia as Russia's sphere of influence. In the same year, the transition to Russian citizenship of Ingush societies, enshrined in the Vladikavkaz Act, was officially confirmed.

By Gulistan Peace Treaty of 1813, which ended the Russian-Persian War, Iran renounced sovereignty over Dagestan, Kartli-Kakheti, Karabakh, Shirvan, Baku and Derbent khanates in favor of Russia.

The southwestern part of the North Caucasus remained in the sphere of influence of the Ottoman Empire. The inaccessible mountainous regions of Dagestan and Chechnya and the mountain valleys of Trans-Kuban Circassia remained outside Russian control.

Since the power of Persia and Turkey in these regions was limited, the mere fact of recognizing these regions as Russia’s sphere of influence did not at all mean automatic subordination of the local population to it.

Between the newly acquired lands and Russia lay the lands of de facto independent mountain peoples, predominantly Muslim. The economy of these regions depended to a certain extent on raids on neighboring regions, which, precisely for this reason, could not be stopped, despite the agreements reached with the Russian authorities.

The Russian government, in a hurry to quickly restore order in the North Caucasus and considering it unnecessary to delve deeply into local subtleties, decided to simply cut the Gordian knots of mountain politics with a sword. We can say that the basis of the war, in addition to the known reasons, was an intercivilizational conflict, which in the more developed Transcaucasia was much less pronounced and therefore did not lead to such severe consequences.

Thus, from the point of view of the Russian authorities in the Caucasus at the beginning of the 19th century, there were two main tasks:

• The need to annex the North Caucasus to Russia for territorial unification with Transcaucasia.
• The desire to stop the constant raids of mountain peoples on the territory of Transcaucasia and Russian settlements in the North Caucasus.

It was they who became the main causes of the Caucasian War.

Brief description of the theater of operations

The main flashpoints of the war were concentrated in inaccessible mountainous and foothill areas in the North-Eastern and North-West Caucasus. The region where the war took place can be divided into two main theaters of war.

Firstly, this is the North-Eastern Caucasus, which mainly includes the territory of modern Chechnya and Dagestan. The main opponent of Russia here was the Imamat, as well as various Chechen and Dagestan state and tribal entities. During the military operations, the mountaineers managed to create a powerful centralized state organization and achieve noticeable progress in armament - in particular, the troops of Imam Shamil not only used artillery, but also organized the production of artillery pieces.

Secondly, this is the North-Western Caucasus, which primarily includes the territories located south of the Kuban River and which were part of historical Circassia. These territories were inhabited by a large people of Adygs (Circassians), divided into a significant number of subethnic groups. The level of centralization of military efforts throughout the war here remained extremely low, each tribe fought or made peace with the Russians independently, only occasionally forming fragile alliances with other tribes. Often during the war there were clashes between the Circassian tribes themselves. Economically, Circassia was poorly developed; almost all iron products and weapons were purchased on foreign markets; the main and most valuable export product was slaves captured during raids and sold to Turkey. The level of organization of the armed forces corresponded approximately to European feudalism, the main force of the army was the heavily armed cavalry, consisting of representatives of the tribal nobility.

Periodically, armed clashes between the highlanders and Russian troops took place in the territory of Transcaucasia, Kabarda and Karachay.

The situation in the Caucasus in 1816

At the beginning of the 19th century, the actions of Russian troops in the Caucasus had the character of random expeditions, not connected by a common idea and a specific plan. Often conquered regions and sworn nations immediately fell away and became enemies again as soon as Russian troops left the country. This was due, first of all, to the fact that almost all organizational, managerial and military resources were diverted to waging the war against Napoleonic France, and then to organizing post-war Europe. By 1816, the situation in Europe had stabilized, and the return of occupation troops from France and European states gave the government the necessary military strength to launch a full-scale campaign in the Caucasus.

The situation on the Caucasian line was as follows: the right flank of the line was opposed by the Trans-Kuban Circassians, the center by the Kabardian Circassians, and against the left flank across the Sunzha River lived the Chechens, who enjoyed a high reputation and authority among the mountain tribes. At the same time, the Circassians were weakened by internal strife, and a plague epidemic raged in Kabarda. The main threat came primarily from the Chechens.

The policy of General Ermolov and the uprising in Chechnya (1817 - 1827)

In May 1816, Emperor Alexander I appointed General Alexei Ermolov as commander of the Separate Georgian (later Caucasian) Corps.

Ermolov believed that it was impossible to establish lasting peace with the inhabitants of the Caucasus due to their historically developed psychology, tribal fragmentation and established relations with the Russians. He developed a consistent and systematic plan of offensive action, which included, at the first stage, the creation of a base and the organization of bridgeheads, and only then the start of phased but decisive offensive operations.

Ermolov himself characterized the situation in the Caucasus as follows: “The Caucasus is a huge fortress, defended by a garrison of half a million. We must either storm it or take possession of the trenches. The assault will be expensive. So let’s wage a siege!” .

At the first stage, Ermolov moved the left flank of the Caucasian line from the Terek to Sunzha in order to get closer to Chechnya and Dagestan. In 1818, the Nizhne-Sunzhenskaya line was strengthened, the Nazran redoubt (modern Nazran) in Ingushetia was strengthened, and the Groznaya fortress (modern Grozny) in Chechnya was built. Having strengthened the rear and created a solid operational base, Russian troops began to advance deep into the foothills of the Greater Caucasus Range.

Ermolov’s strategy consisted of a systematic advance deep into Chechnya and Mountainous Dagestan by surrounding mountainous areas with a continuous ring of fortifications, cutting clearings in difficult forests, building roads and destroying rebellious villages. The territories liberated from the local population were populated by Cossacks and Russians and Russian-friendly settlers, who formed “layers” between tribes hostile to Russia. Ermolov responded to the resistance and raids of the mountaineers with repressions and punitive expeditions.

In Northern Dagestan, the Vnezapnaya fortress was founded in 1819 (near the modern village of Andirei, Khasavyurt region), and in 1821, the Burnaya fortress (near the village of Tarki). In 1819 - 1821, the possessions of a number of Dagestan princes were transferred to Russian vassals or annexed.

In 1822, the Sharia courts (mekhkeme), which had been operating in Kabarda since 1806, were dissolved. Instead, a Temporary Civil Court was established in Nalchik under the full control of Russian officials. Together with Kabarda, the Balkars and Karachais, dependent on the Kabardian princes, came under Russian rule. In the area between the Sulak and Terek rivers, the lands of the Kumyks were conquered.

In order to destroy the traditional military-political ties between the Muslims of the North Caucasus, hostile to Russia, on the orders of Yermolov, Russian fortresses were built at the foot of the mountains on the rivers Malka, Baksanka, Chegem, Nalchik and Terek, forming the Kabardian line. As a result, the population of Kabarda found itself locked in a small area and cut off from Trans-Kubania, Chechnya and mountain gorges.

Ermolov's policy was to brutally punish not only the “robbers”, but also those who do not fight them. Yermolov’s cruelty towards the rebellious highlanders was remembered for a long time. Back in the 40s, Avar and Chechen residents could tell the Russian generals: “You have always destroyed our property, burned villages and intercepted our people!”

In 1825 - 1826, the cruel and bloody actions of General Ermolov caused a general uprising of the highlanders of Chechnya under the leadership of Bey-Bulat Taimiev (Taymazov) and Abdul-Kadir. The rebels were supported by some Dagestan mullahs from among the supporters of the Sharia movement. They called on the mountaineers to rise to jihad. But Bey-Bulat was defeated by the regular army, and the uprising was suppressed in 1826.

In 1827, General Alexei Ermolov was recalled by Nicholas I and sent into retirement due to suspicion of connections with the Decembrists.

In 1817 - 1827, there were no active military operations in the North-West Caucasus, although numerous raids by Circassian detachments and punitive expeditions of Russian troops took place. The main goal of the Russian command in this region was to isolate the local population from the Muslim environment hostile to Russia in the Ottoman Empire.

The Caucasian line along the Kuban and Terek was shifted deeper into Adyghe territory and by the early 1830s it reached the Labe River. The Adygs resisted, using the help of the Turks. In October 1821, the Circassians invaded the lands of the Black Sea Army, but were repulsed.

In 1823 - 1824, a number of punitive expeditions were carried out against the Circassians.

In 1824, the uprising of the Abkhazians was suppressed, forced to recognize the power of Prince Mikhail Shervashidze.

In the second half of the 1820s, the coastal areas of the Kuban again began to be subject to raids by detachments of Shapsugs and Abadzekhs.

Formation of the Imamate of Mountainous Dagestan and Chechnya (1828 - 1840)

Operations in the Northeast Caucasus

In the 1820s, the muridism movement arose in Dagestan (murid - in Sufism: a student, the first stage of initiation and spiritual self-improvement. It can mean a Sufi in general and even just an ordinary Muslim). Its main preachers—Mulla-Mohammed, then Kazi-Mulla—propagated a holy war in Dagestan and Chechnya against infidels, primarily Russians. The rise and growth of this movement was largely due to the brutal actions of Alexei Ermolov, a reaction to the harsh and often indiscriminate repression of the Russian authorities.

In March 1827, Adjutant General Ivan Paskevich (1827-1831) was appointed commander-in-chief of the Caucasian Corps. The general Russian strategy in the Caucasus was revised, the Russian command abandoned the systematic advance with the consolidation of occupied territories and returned mainly to the tactics of individual punitive expeditions.

At first, this was due to the wars with Iran (1826-1828) and Turkey (1828-1829). These wars had significant consequences for the Russian Empire, establishing and expanding the Russian presence in the North Caucasus and Transcaucasia.

In 1828 or 1829, communities of a number of Avar villages elected as their imam an Avar from the village of Gimry Gazi-Muhammad (Gazi-Magomed, Kazi-Mulla, Mulla-Magomed), a student of the Naqshbandi sheikhs Mohammed Yaragsky and Jamaluddin Kazikumukh, influential in the North-Eastern Caucasus. This event is usually considered as the beginning of the formation of a single imamate of Nagorno-Dagestan and Chechnya, which became the main center of resistance to Russian colonization.

Imam Ghazi-Muhammad became active, calling for jihad against the Russians. From the communities that joined him, he took an oath to follow Sharia, renounce local adats and break off relations with the Russians. During the reign of this imam (1828-1832), he destroyed 30 influential beks, since the first imam saw them as accomplices of the Russians and hypocritical enemies of Islam (munafiks).

In the 1830s, Russian positions in Dagestan were strengthened by the Lezgin cordon line, and in 1832 the Temir-Khan-Shura fortress (modern Buinaksk) was built.

Peasant uprisings occurred from time to time in the Central Ciscaucasia. In the summer of 1830, as a result of the punitive expedition of General Abkhazov against the Ingush and Tagaurians, Ossetia was included in the administrative system of the empire. Since 1831, Russian military control was finally established in Ossetia.

In the winter of 1830, the Imamat launched an active war under the banner of defending the faith. Ghazi-Muhammad's tactics consisted of organizing swift, unexpected raids. In 1830, he captured a number of Avar and Kumyk villages, subject to the Avar Khanate and Tarkov Shamkhalate. Untsukul and Gumbet voluntarily joined the Imamate, and the Andians were subjugated. Gazi-Muhammad tried to capture the village of Khunzakh (1830), the capital of the Avar khans who accepted Russian citizenship, but was repulsed.

In 1831, Gazi-Muhammad sacked Kizlyar, and the following year besieged Derbent.

In March 1832, the imam approached Vladikavkaz and besieged Nazran, but was defeated by the regular army.

In 1831, Adjutant General Baron Grigory Rosen was appointed head of the Caucasian Corps. He defeated the troops of Gazi-Muhammad, and on October 29, 1832, he stormed the village of Gimry, the capital of the imam. Gazi-Muhammad died in battle.

In April 1831, Count Ivan Paskevich-Erivansky was recalled to suppress the uprising in Poland. In his place were temporarily appointed in Transcaucasia - General Nikita Pankratiev, on the Caucasian line - General Alexey Velyaminov.

Gamzat-bek was elected the new imam in 1833. He stormed the capital of the Avar khans, Khunzakh, destroyed almost the entire clan of the Avar khans and was killed for this in 1834 by right of blood feud.

Shamil became the third imam. He pursued the same reform policy as his predecessors, but on a regional scale. It was under him that the state structure of the Imamate was completed. The imam concentrated in his hands not only religious, but also military, executive, legislative and judicial powers. Shamil continued his reprisal against the feudal rulers of Dagestan, but at the same time tried to ensure the neutrality of the Russians.

Russian troops waged an active campaign against the Imamate, in 1837 and 1839 they ravaged Shamil’s residence on Mount Akhulgo, and in the latter case the victory seemed so complete that the Russian command hastened to report to St. Petersburg about the complete pacification of Dagestan. Shamil with a detachment of seven comrades retreated to Chechnya.

Operations in the North-West Caucasus

On January 11, 1827, a delegation of Balkar princes submitted a petition to General George Emmanuel to accept Balkaria as Russian citizenship, and in 1828 the Karachay region was annexed.

According to the Peace of Adrianople (1829), which ended the Russian-Turkish War of 1828 - 1829, Russia's sphere of interests recognized most of the eastern coast of the Black Sea, including the cities of Anapa, Sudzhuk-Kale (in the area of ​​modern Novorossiysk), and Sukhum.

In 1830, the new “proconsul of the Caucasus” Ivan Paskevich developed a plan for the development of this region, practically unknown to the Russians, by creating overland communications along the Black Sea coast. But the dependence of the Circassian tribes inhabiting this territory on Turkey was largely nominal, and the fact that Turkey recognized the North-West Caucasus as a Russian sphere of influence did not oblige the Circassians to anything. The Russian invasion of the territory of the Circassians was perceived by the latter as an attack on their independence and traditional foundations, and was met with resistance.

In the summer of 1834, General Velyaminov made an expedition to the Trans-Kuban region, where a cordon line to Gelendzhik was organized, and the Abinsk and Nikolaev fortifications were erected.

In the mid-1830s, the Russian Black Sea Fleet began establishing a blockade of the Black Sea coast of the Caucasus. In 1837 - 1839, the Black Sea coastline was created - 17 forts were created over 500 kilometers from the mouth of the Kuban to Abkhazia under the cover of the Black Sea Fleet. These measures practically paralyzed coastal trade with Turkey, which immediately put the Circassians in an extremely difficult situation.

At the beginning of 1840, the Circassians went on the offensive, attacking the Black Sea line of fortresses. On February 7, 1840, Fort Lazarev (Lazarevskoye) fell, on February 29, the Velyaminovskoye fortification was taken, on March 23, after a fierce battle, the Circassians broke into the Mikhailovskoye fortification, which was blown up by soldier Arkhip Osipov due to its inevitable fall. On April 1, the Circassians captured the Nikolaevsky fort, but their actions against the Navaginsky fort and the Abinsky fortification were repelled. The coastal fortifications were restored by November 1840.

The very fact of the destruction of the coastline showed how powerful the resistance potential of the Trans-Kuban Circassians was.

The rise of the Imamate before the start of the Crimean War (1840 - 1853)

Operations in the Northeast Caucasus

In the early 1840s, the Russian administration attempted to disarm the Chechens. Standards for the surrender of weapons by the population were introduced, and hostages were taken to ensure their compliance. These measures caused a general uprising at the end of February 1840 under the leadership of Shoip-Mullah Tsentoroevsky, Javatkhan Dargoevsky, Tashu-haji Sayasanovsky and Isa Gendergenoevsky, which was led by Shamil upon arrival in Chechnya.

On March 7, 1840, Shamil was proclaimed the imam of Chechnya, and Dargo became the capital of the Imamate. By the fall of 1840, Shamil controlled all of Chechnya.

In 1841, riots broke out in Avaria, instigated by Hadji Murad. The Chechens raided the Georgian Military Road, and Shamil himself attacked a Russian detachment located near Nazran, but had no success. In May, Russian troops attacked and took the position of the imam near the village of Chirkey and occupied the village.

In May 1842, Russian troops, taking advantage of the fact that Shamil’s main forces had set out on a campaign in Dagestan, launched an attack on the capital of the Imamat, Dargo, but were defeated during the Battle of Ichkera with the Chechens under the command of Shoip-Mullah and were driven back with heavy losses. Impressed by this catastrophe, Emperor Nicholas I signed a decree prohibiting all expeditions for 1843 and ordering them to limit themselves to defense.

The Imamat troops seized the initiative. On August 31, 1843, Imam Shamil captured a fort near the village of Untsukul and defeated a detachment that went to the rescue of the besieged. In the following days, several more fortifications fell, and on September 11, Gotsatl was taken and communication with Temir Khan-Shura was interrupted. On November 8, Shamil took the Gergebil fortification. The mountaineer detachments practically interrupted communication with Derbent, Kizlyar and the left flank of the line.
In mid-April 1844, Shamil's Dagestani troops under the command of Hadji Murat and Naib Kibit-Magoma launched an attack on Kumykh, but were defeated by Prince Argutinsky. Russian troops captured the Darginsky district in Dagestan and began building the forward Chechen line.

At the end of 1844, a new commander-in-chief, Count Mikhail Vorontsov, was appointed to the Caucasus, who, unlike his predecessors, had not only military, but also civil power in the North Caucasus and Transcaucasia. Under Vorontsov, military operations in the mountainous areas controlled by the Imamate intensified.

In May 1845, the Russian army invaded the Imamate in several large detachments. Without encountering serious resistance, the troops crossed the mountainous Dagestan and in June invaded Andia and attacked the village of Dargo. The Battle of Dargin lasted from July 8 to July 20. During the battle, Russian troops suffered heavy losses. Although Dargo was captured, the victory was essentially pyrrhic. Due to the losses suffered, Russian troops were forced to curtail active operations, so the battle of Dargo can be considered a strategic victory for the Imamate.

Since 1846, several military fortifications and Cossack villages arose on the left flank of the Caucasian line. In 1847, the regular army besieged the Avar village of Gergebil, but retreated due to a cholera epidemic. This important stronghold of the Imamate was taken in July 1848 by Adjutant General Prince Moses Argutinsky. Despite this loss, Shamil’s troops resumed their operations in the south of the Lezgin line and in 1848 attacked Russian fortifications in the Lezgin village of Akhty.

In the 1840s and 1850s, systematic deforestation continued in Chechnya, accompanied by periodic military clashes.

In 1852, the new head of the Left Flank, Adjutant General Prince Alexander Baryatinsky, drove the warlike highlanders out of a number of strategically important villages in Chechnya.

Operations in the North-West Caucasus

The Russian and Cossack offensive against the Circassians began in 1841 with the creation of the Labinsk Line proposed by General Gregory von Sass. Colonization of the new line began in 1841 and ended in 1860. During these twenty years, 32 villages were founded. They were populated mainly by Cossacks of the Caucasian Linear Army and a number of non-residents.

In the 1840s - the first half of the 1850s, Imam Shamil tried to establish ties with Muslim rebels in the North-West Caucasus. In the spring of 1846, Shamil made a push into Western Circassia. 9 thousand soldiers crossed to the left bank of the Terek and settled in the villages of the Kabardian ruler Muhammad Mirza Anzorov. The imam counted on the support of the Western Circassians under the leadership of Suleiman Efendi. But neither the Circassians nor the Kabardians agreed to join Shamil’s troops. The imam was forced to retreat to Chechnya. On the Black Sea coastline in the summer and autumn of 1845, the Circassians tried to capture forts Raevsky and Golovinsky, but were repulsed.

At the end of 1848, another attempt was made to unite the efforts of the Imamate and the Circassians - the naib of Shamil, Muhammad-Amin, appeared in Circassia. He managed to create a unified administrative management system in Abadzekhia. The territory of Abadzekh societies was divided into 4 districts (mekhkeme), from the taxes from which detachments of horsemen of Shamil’s regular army (murtaziks) were supported.

In 1849, the Russians launched an offensive to the Belaya River in order to move the front line there and take away the fertile lands between this river and Laba from the Abadzekhs, as well as to counter Mohammed-Amin.

From the beginning of 1850 until May 1851, the Bzhedugs, Shapsugs, Natukhais, Ubykhs and several smaller societies submitted to Mukhamed-Amin. Three more mehkeme were created - two in Natukhai and one in Shapsugia. A huge territory between Kuban, Laba and the Black Sea came under the authority of the Naib.

The Crimean War and the end of the Caucasian War in the North-East Caucasus (1853 - 1859)

Crimean War (1853 - 1856)

In 1853, rumors of an impending war with Turkey caused a rise in resistance among the highlanders, who counted on the arrival of Turkish troops in Georgia and Kabarda and on the weakening of Russian troops by transferring some units to the Balkans. However, these calculations did not come true - the morale of the mountain population dropped noticeably as a result of the many years of war, and the actions of the Turkish troops in Transcaucasia were unsuccessful and the mountaineers failed to establish interaction with them.

The Russian command chose a purely defensive strategy, but the clearing of forests and the destruction of food supplies among the mountaineers continued, albeit on a more limited scale.

In 1854, the commander of the Turkish Anatolian army entered into communication with Shamil, inviting him to move to join him from Dagestan. Shamil invaded Kakheti, but, having learned about the approach of Russian troops, retreated to Dagestan. The Turks were defeated and thrown back from the Caucasus.

On the Black Sea coast, the positions of the Russian command were seriously weakened due to the entry of the fleets of England and France into the Black Sea and the loss of naval supremacy by the Russian fleet. It was impossible to defend the coastline forts without the support of the fleet, and therefore the fortifications between Anapa, Novorossiysk and the mouths of the Kuban were destroyed, and the garrisons of the Black Sea coastline were withdrawn to the Crimea. During the war, Circassian trade with Turkey was temporarily restored, allowing them to continue their resistance.

But leaving the Black Sea fortifications did not have more serious consequences, and the Allied command was practically not active in the Caucasus, limiting itself to supplying the Circassians with weapons and military materials to the Circassians fighting with Russia, as well as transferring volunteers. The landing of the Turks in Abkhazia, despite its support from the Abkhaz prince Shervashidze, did not have a serious impact on the course of military operations.

The turning point in the course of hostilities came after the accession to the throne of Emperor Alexander II (1855-1881) and the end of the Crimean War. In 1856, Prince Baryatinsky was appointed commander of the Caucasian Corps, and the corps itself was reinforced by troops returning from Anatolia.

The Treaty of Paris (March 1856) recognized Russia's rights to all conquests in the Caucasus. The only point limiting Russian rule in the region was the prohibition of maintaining a navy in the Black Sea and building coastal fortifications there.

Completion of the Caucasian War in the North-East Caucasus

Already at the end of the 1840s, the fatigue of the mountain peoples from the many years of war began to manifest itself; it was reflected in the fact that the mountain population no longer believed in the achievability of victory. Social tension grew in the Imamat - many mountaineers saw that Shamil’s “state of justice” was based on repression, and the naibs were gradually turning into a new nobility, interested only in personal enrichment and glory. Dissatisfaction with the strict centralization of power in the Imamate grew - Chechen societies, accustomed to freedom, did not want to put up with a rigid hierarchy and unquestioning submission to Shamil’s authority. After the end of the Crimean War, the activity of the operations of the mountaineers of Dagestan and Chechnya began to decline.

Prince Alexander Baryatinsky took advantage of these sentiments. He abandoned punitive expeditions to the mountains and continued systematic work on building fortresses, cutting clearings and relocating Cossacks to develop the territories taken under control. To win over the mountaineers, including the “new nobility” of the Imamate, Baryatinsky received significant sums from his personal friend Emperor Alexander II. Peace, order, and the preservation of the customs and religion of the mountaineers in the territory subject to Baryatinsky allowed the mountaineers to make comparisons not in favor of Shamil.

In 1856 - 1857, a detachment of General Nikolai Evdokimov drove Shamil out of Chechnya. In April 1859, the new residence of the imam, the village of Vedeno, was stormed.

On September 6, 1859, Shamil surrendered to Prince Baryatinsky and was exiled to Kaluga. He died in 1871 during the pilgrimage (Hajj) to Mecca and was buried in Medina (Saudi Arabia). In the North-East Caucasus the war has ended.

Operations in the North-West Caucasus

Russian troops launched a massive concentric offensive from the east, from the Maykop fortification founded in 1857, and from the north, from Novorossiysk. Military operations were carried out very brutally: villages that offered resistance were destroyed, the population was expelled or resettled to the plains.

Russia's former opponents in the Crimean War - primarily Turkey and partly Great Britain - continued to maintain ties with the Circassians, promising them military and diplomatic assistance. In February 1857, 374 foreign volunteers, mostly Poles, landed in Circassia, led by the Pole Teofil Lapinsky.

However, the defense capability of the Circassians was weakened by traditional inter-tribal conflicts, as well as disagreements between the two main leaders of the resistance - Shamile's naib Muhammad-Amin and the Circassian leader Zan Sefer Bey.

The end of the war in the Northwestern Caucasus (1859 - 1864)

In the North-West, fighting continued until May 1864. At the final stage, military operations were particularly brutal. The regular army was opposed by scattered detachments of Circassians who fought in the inaccessible mountainous regions of the North-West Caucasus. Circassian villages were burned en masse, their inhabitants were exterminated or expelled abroad (primarily to Turkey), and partly resettled on the plain. On the way, thousands of them died from hunger and disease.

In November 1859, Imam Muhammad-Amin admitted his defeat and swore allegiance to Russia. In December of the same year, Sefer Bey suddenly died, and by the beginning of 1860, a detachment of European volunteers left Circassia.

In 1860, the Natukhais stopped resisting. The Abadzekhs, Shapsugs and Ubykhs continued the struggle for independence.

In June 1861, representatives of these peoples gathered for a general meeting in the valley of the Sache River (in the area of ​​modern Sochi). They established the supreme authority - the Mejlis of Circassia. The Circassian government tried to achieve recognition of its independence and negotiate with the Russian command on the conditions for ending the war. The Mejlis turned to Great Britain and the Ottoman Empire for help and diplomatic recognition. But it was already too late; given the existing balance of forces, the outcome of the war did not raise any doubts and no help was received from foreign powers.

In 1862, Grand Duke Mikhail Nikolaevich, the younger brother of Alexander II, replaced Prince Baryatinsky as commander of the Caucasian Army.

Until 1864, the highlanders slowly retreated further and further to the southwest: from the plains to the foothills, from the foothills to the mountains, from the mountains to the Black Sea coast.

The Russian military command, using the “scorched earth” strategy, hoped to completely clear the entire Black Sea coast of the rebellious Circassians, either exterminating them or driving them out of the region. The emigration of the Circassians was accompanied by mass deaths of exiles from hunger, cold and disease. Many historians and public figures interpret the events of the last stage of the Caucasian War as the genocide of the Circassians.

On May 21, 1864, in the town of Kbaada (modern Krasnaya Polyana) in the upper reaches of the Mzymta River, the end of the Caucasian War and the establishment of Russian rule in the Western Caucasus was celebrated with a solemn prayer service and a parade of troops.

Consequences of the Caucasian War

In 1864, the Caucasian War was formally recognized as over, but isolated pockets of resistance to the Russian authorities persisted until 1884.

For the period from 1801 to 1864, the total losses of the Russian army in the Caucasus were:

• 804 officers and 24,143 lower ranks killed,
• 3,154 officers and 61,971 lower ranks wounded,
• 92 officers and 5915 lower ranks were captured.

At the same time, the number of irretrievable losses does not include military personnel who died from wounds or died in captivity. In addition, the number of deaths from disease in places with an unfavorable climate for Europeans was three times higher than the number of deaths on the battlefield. It is also necessary to take into account that civilians also suffered losses, and they could reach several thousand killed and wounded.

According to modern estimates, during the Caucasian Wars, the irretrievable losses of the military and civilian population of the Russian Empire suffered during military operations, as a result of illnesses and deaths in captivity, amounted to at least 77 thousand people.

Moreover, from 1801 to 1830, the combat losses of the Russian army in the Caucasus did not exceed several hundred people per year.

Data on mountaineer losses are purely estimates. Thus, estimates of the Circassian population at the beginning of the 19th century range from 307,478 people (K.F.Stal) to 1,700,000 people (I.F. Paskevich) and even 2,375,487 (G.Yu. Klaprot). The total number of Circassians who remained in the Kuban region after the war is about 60 thousand people, the total number of Muhajirs - migrants to Turkey, the Balkans and Syria - is estimated at 500 - 600 thousand people. But, in addition to purely military losses and the death of the civilian population during the war, the population decline was influenced by the devastating plague epidemics at the beginning of the 19th century, as well as losses during the resettlement.

Russia, at the cost of significant bloodshed, was able to suppress the armed resistance of the Caucasian peoples and annex their territories. As a result of the war, the local population of many thousands, who did not accept Russian power, was forced to leave their homes and move to Turkey and the Middle East.

As a result of the Caucasian War, the ethnic composition of the population in the North-West Caucasus was almost completely changed. Most of the Circassians were forced to settle in more than 40 countries of the world; according to various estimates, from 5 to 10% of the pre-war population remained in their homeland. To a significant extent, although not so catastrophically, the ethnographic map of the North-Eastern Caucasus has changed, where ethnic Russians settled large areas cleared of the local population.

Enormous mutual grievances and hatred gave rise to inter-ethnic tensions, which then resulted in inter-ethnic conflicts during the Civil War, leading to the deportations of the 1940s, from which the roots of modern armed conflicts largely grow.

In the 1990s and 2000s, the Caucasus War was used by radical Islamists as an ideological argument in the fight against Russia.

21st century: echoes of the Caucasian War

The question of the Circassian genocide

In the early 1990s, after the collapse of the USSR, in connection with the intensification of the search for national identity, the question arose about the legal qualification of the events of the Caucasian War.

On February 7, 1992, the Supreme Council of the Kabardino-Balkarian SSR adopted a resolution “On condemnation of the genocide of the Circassians (Circassians) during the Russian-Caucasian War.” In 1994, the KBR Parliament addressed the State Duma of the Russian Federation with the issue of recognition of the Circassian genocide. In 1996, the State Council - Khase of the Republic of Adygea and the President of the Republic of Adygea addressed a similar question. Representatives of Circassian public organizations have repeatedly made appeals for recognition of the Circassian genocide by Russia.

On May 20, 2011, the Georgian parliament adopted a resolution recognizing the genocide of the Circassians by the Russian Empire during the Caucasian War.

There is also an opposite trend. Thus, the Charter of the Krasnodar Territory says: "The Krasnodar region is the historical territory of formation of the Kuban Cossacks, the original place of residence of the Russian people, who make up the majority of the region's population". This completely ignores the fact that before the Caucasian War, the main population of the territory of the region were Circassian peoples.

Olympics - 2014 in Sochi

An additional aggravation of the Circassian issue was associated with the Winter Olympics in Sochi in 2014.

Details about the connection between the Olympics and the Caucasian War, the position of Circassian society and official bodies are set out in a certificate prepared by the "Caucasian Knot" "Circassian question in Sochi: Capital of the Olympics or land of genocide?"

Monuments to the heroes of the Caucasian War

The installation of monuments to various military and political figures from the Caucasian War causes mixed assessments.

In 2003, in the city of Armavir, Krasnodar Territory, a monument to General Zass, who in the Adyghe region is usually called the “collector of Circassian heads,” was unveiled. Decembrist Nikolai Lorer wrote about Zass: “In support of the idea of ​​fear preached by Zass, on the mound at the Strong Trench at Zass, Circassian heads constantly stuck out on pikes, and their beards fluttered in the wind.”. The installation of the monument caused a negative reaction from Circassian society.

In October 2008, a monument to General Ermolov was erected in Mineralnye Vody, Stavropol Territory. It caused a mixed reaction among representatives of various nationalities of the Stavropol Territory and the entire North Caucasus. On October 22, 2011, unknown persons desecrated the monument.

In January 2014, the Vladikavkaz mayor's office announced plans to restore the previously existing monument to the Russian soldier Arkhip Osipov. A number of Circassian activists spoke out categorically against this intention, calling it militaristic propaganda, and the monument itself a symbol of empire and colonialism.

Notes

The “Caucasian War” is the longest military conflict involving the Russian Empire, which dragged on for almost 100 years and was accompanied by heavy casualties on the part of both the Russian and Caucasian peoples. The pacification of the Caucasus did not occur even after the parade of Russian troops in Krasnaya Polyana on May 21, 1864 officially marked the end of the conquest of the Circassian tribes of the Western Caucasus and the end of the Caucasian War. The armed conflict, which lasted until the end of the 19th century, gave rise to many problems and conflicts, the echoes of which are still heard at the beginning of the 21st century.

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Caucasian War 1817-64, military actions related to the annexation of Chechnya, Mountainous Dagestan and the North-Western Caucasus by Tsarist Russia. After the annexation of Georgia (1801) and Azerbaijan (1803), their territories were separated from Russia by the lands of Chechnya, Mountainous Dagestan (although legally Dagestan was annexed in 1813) and the North-West Caucasus, inhabited by warlike mountain peoples who raided the Caucasian fortified line, interfered with relations with Transcaucasia. After the end of the wars with Napoleonic France, tsarism was able to intensify military operations in this area. General A.P., appointed commander-in-chief in the Caucasus in 1816. Ermolov moved from individual punitive expeditions to a systematic advance into the depths of Chechnya and Mountainous Dagestan by surrounding mountainous areas with a continuous ring of fortifications, cutting clearings in difficult forests, laying roads and destroying “rebellious” villages. This forced the population either to move to the plane (plain) under the supervision of Russian garrisons, or to go into the depths of the mountains. The first period of the Caucasian War began with an order dated May 12, 1818 from General Ermolov to cross the Terek. Ermolov drew up a plan of offensive action, at the forefront of which was the widespread colonization of the region by the Cossacks and the formation of “layers” between hostile tribes by relocating loyal tribes there. In 1817 the left flank of the Caucasian line was moved from the Terek to the river. The Sunzha, in the middle reaches of which the fortification of Pregradny Stan was laid in October 1817, which was the first step in a systematic advance into the territories of the mountain peoples and actually marked the beginning of K.V. In 1818, the Grozny fortress was founded in the lower reaches of the Sunzha. A continuation of the Sunzhenskaya line were the fortresses of Vnezapnaya (1819) and Burnaya (1821). In 1819, the Separate Georgian Corps was renamed the Separate Caucasian Corps and strengthened to 50 thousand people; The Black Sea Cossack army (up to 40 thousand people) in the North-West Caucasus was also subordinated to Ermolov. In 1818, a number of Dagestan feudal lords and tribes united and in 1819 began a campaign against the Sunzha line. But in 1819-21. they suffered a series of defeats, after which the possessions of these feudal lords were either transferred to Russian vassals with subordination to Russian commandants (the lands of the Kazikumukh Khan to the Kyurinsky Khan, the Avar Khan to Shamkhal Tarkovsky), or became dependent on Russia (the lands of Utsmiya Karakaitag), or were liquidated with the introduction of Russian administration ( Mehtuli Khanate, as well as the Azerbaijani Khanates of Sheki, Shirvan and Karabakh). In 1822 26 A number of punitive expeditions were carried out against the Circassians in the Trans-Kuban region.

The result of Ermolov's actions was the subjugation of almost all of Dagestan, Chechnya and Trans-Kubania. General I.F., who replaced Ermolov in March 1827 Paskevich abandoned a systematic advance with the consolidation of occupied territories and returned mainly to the tactics of individual punitive expeditions, although under him the Lezgin Line was created (1830). In 1828, in connection with the construction of the Military-Sukhumi road, the Karachay region was annexed. The expansion of colonization of the North Caucasus and the cruelty of the aggressive policy of Russian tsarism caused spontaneous mass uprisings of the mountaineers. The first of them occurred in Chechnya in July 1825: the highlanders, led by Bey-Bulat, captured the Amiradzhiyurt post, but their attempts to take Gerzel and Grozny failed, and in 1826 the uprising was suppressed. At the end of the 20s. in Chechnya and Dagestan, a movement of mountaineers arose under the religious cover of muridism, an integral part of which was ghazavat (Jihad) “holy war” against the “infidels” (i.e. Russians). In this movement, the liberation struggle against the colonial expansion of tsarism was combined with opposition to the oppression of local feudal lords. The reactionary side of the movement was the struggle of the top of the Muslim clergy for the creation of a feudal-theocratic state of the imamate. This isolated supporters of Muridism from other peoples, incited fanatical hatred of non-Muslims, and most importantly, preserved backward feudal forms of social structure. The movement of the highlanders under the flag of Muridism was the impetus for expanding the scale of the KV, although some peoples of the North Caucasus and Dagestan (for example, Kumyks, Ossetians, Ingush, Kabardians, etc.) did not join this movement. This was explained, firstly, by the fact that some of these peoples could not be carried away by the slogan of Muridism due to their Christianization (part of the Ossetians) or the weak development of Islam (for example, Kabardians); secondly, the “carrot and stick” policy pursued by tsarism, with the help of which it managed to attract part of the feudal lords and their subjects to its side. These peoples did not oppose Russian rule, but their situation was difficult: they were under the double oppression of tsarism and local feudal lords.

The second period of the Caucasian War represents the bloody and formidable era of Muridism. At the beginning of 1829, Kazi-Mulla (or Gazi-Magomed) arrived in the Tarkov Shankhaldom (a state on the territory of Dagestan in the late 15th - early 19th centuries) with his sermons, while receiving complete freedom of action from the shamkhal. Having gathered his comrades, he began to go around aul after aul, calling on “sinners to take the righteous path, instruct the lost and crush the criminal authorities of the auls.” Gazi-Magomed (Kazi-mullah), proclaimed imam in December 1828 and put forward the idea of ​​​​unifying the peoples of Chechnya and Dagestan. But some feudal lords (Avar Khan, Shamkhal Tarkovsky, etc.), who adhered to the Russian orientation, refused to recognize the authority of the imam. Gazi-Magomed's attempt to capture the capital of Avaria, Khunzakh, in February 1830 was unsuccessful, although the expedition of the tsarist troops in 1830 to Gimry failed and only led to the strengthening of the imam's influence. In 1831, the murids took Tarki and Kizlyar, besieged Burnaya and Vnezapnaya; their detachments also operated in Chechnya, near Vladikavkaz and Grozny, and with the support of the rebel Tabasarans they besieged Derbent. Significant territories (Chechnya and most of Dagestan) came under the authority of the imam. However, from the end of 1831, the uprising began to decline due to the desertion of the peasantry from the murids, dissatisfied with the fact that the imam had not fulfilled his promise to eliminate class inequality. As a result of large expeditions of Russian troops in Chechnya, undertaken by the commander-in-chief in the Caucasus, General G.V., appointed in September 1831. Rosen, the detachments of Gazi-Magomed were pushed back to Mountainous Dagestan. The imam with a handful of murids took refuge in Gimry, where he died on October 17, 1832 during the capture of the village by Russian troops. Gamzat-bek was proclaimed the second imam, whose military successes attracted almost all the peoples of Mountain Dagestan, including some of the Avars, to his side; however, the ruler of Avaria, Hansha Pahu-bike, refused to speak out against Russia. In August 1834, Gamzat-bek captured Khunzakh and exterminated the family of Avar khans, but as a result of a conspiracy by their supporters, he was killed on September 19, 1834. In the same year, Russian troops, in order to stop the relations of the Circassians with Turkey, conducted an expedition to the Trans-Kuban region and laid the fortifications of Abinsk and Nikolaevskoe.

Shamil was proclaimed the third imam in 1834. The Russian command sent a large detachment against him, which destroyed the village of Gotsatl (the main residence of the murids) and forced Shamil’s troops to retreat from Avaria. Believing that the movement was largely suppressed, Rosen remained inactive for 2 years. During this time, Shamil, having chosen the village of Akhulgo as his base, subjugated part of the elders and feudal lords of Chechnya and Dagestan, brutally dealing with those feudal lords who did not want to obey him, and won wide support among the masses. In 1837, the detachment of General K.K. Fezi occupied Khunzakh, Untsukul and part of the village of Tilitl, where Shamil’s troops retreated, but due to heavy losses and lack of food, the tsarist troops found themselves in a difficult situation, and on July 3, 1837, Fezi concluded a truce with Shamil. This truce and the withdrawal of the tsarist troops were actually their defeat and strengthened the authority of Shamil. In the North-West Caucasus, Russian troops in 1837 founded the fortifications of the Holy Spirit, Novotroitskoye, Mikhailovskoye. In March 1838, Rosen was replaced by General E.A. Golovin, under whom the fortifications of Navaginskoye, Velyaminovskoye, Tenginskoye and Novorossiysk were created in the North-West Caucasus in 1838. The truce with Shamil turned out to be temporary, and in 1839 hostilities resumed. Detachment of General P.Kh. Grabbe, after an 80-day siege, captured the residence of Shamil Akhulgo on August 22, 1839; The wounded Shamil and his murids broke through to Chechnya. On the Black Sea coast in 1839, the Golovinskoye and Lazarevskoye fortifications were laid and the Black Sea coastline from the mouth of the river was created. Kuban to the borders of Megrelia; in 1840 the Labinsk line was created, but soon the tsarist troops suffered a number of major defeats: the rebel Circassians in February April 1840 captured the fortifications of the Black Sea coastline (Lazarevskoye, Velyaminovskoye, Mikhailovskoye, Nikolaevskoye). In the Eastern Caucasus, the Russian administration's attempt to disarm the Chechens sparked an uprising that spread throughout Chechnya and then spread to Mountainous Dagestan. After stubborn battles in the area of ​​​​the Gekhinsky forest and on the river. Valerik (July 11, 1840) Russian troops occupied Chechnya, the Chechens went to Shamil’s troops operating in Northwestern Dagestan. In 1840-43, despite the strengthening of the Caucasian Corps by an infantry division, Shamil won a number of major victories, occupied Avaria and established his power in a large part of Dagestan, expanding the territory of the Imamate by more than doubling and increasing the number of his troops to 20 thousand people. In October 1842, Golovin was replaced by General A. I. Neigardt and 2 more infantry divisions were transferred to the Caucasus, which made it possible to somewhat push back Shamil’s troops. But then Shamil, again seizing the initiative, occupied Gergebil on November 8, 1843 and forced the Russian troops to leave Avaria. In December 1844, Neigardt was replaced by General M.S. Vorontsov, who in 1845 captured and destroyed Shamil’s residence, aul Dargo. However, the highlanders surrounded Vorontsov’s detachment, which barely managed to escape, having lost 1/3 of its personnel, all its guns and convoy. In 1846, Vorontsov returned to Ermolov’s tactics of conquering the Caucasus. Shamil’s attempts to disrupt the enemy’s offensive were unsuccessful (in 1846, the failure of the breakthrough into Kabarda, in 1848, the fall of Gergebil, in 1849, the failure of the assault on Temir-Khan-Shura and the breakthrough in Kakheti); in 1849-52 Shamil managed to occupy Kazikumukh, but by the spring of 1853 his troops were finally driven out of Chechnya to Mountainous Dagestan, where the position of the highlanders also became difficult. In the North-Western Caucasus, the Urup Line was created in 1850, and in 1851 the uprising of Circassian tribes led by Shamil's governor Muhammad-Emin was suppressed. On the eve of the Crimean War of 1853-56, Shamil, counting on the help of Great Britain and Turkey, intensified his actions and in August 1853 tried to break through the Lezgin line at Zagatala, but failed. In November 1853, Turkish troops were defeated at Bashkadyklar, and Circassian attempts to seize the Black Sea and Labinsk lines were repulsed. In the summer of 1854, Turkish troops launched an offensive against Tiflis; At the same time, Shamil’s troops, breaking through the Lezgi line, invaded Kakheti, captured Tsinandali, but were detained by the Georgian militia, and then defeated by Russian troops. Defeat in 1854-55. The Turkish army finally dispelled Shamil's hopes for outside help. By this time, what had begun in the late 40s had deepened. internal crisis of the Imamate. The actual transformation of Shamil's governors, the naibs, into self-interested feudal lords, whose cruel rule aroused the indignation of the mountaineers, exacerbated social contradictions, and the peasants began to gradually move away from Shamil's movement (in 1858, an uprising against Shamil's power even broke out in Chechnya in the Vedeno region). The weakening of the Imamate was also facilitated by devastation and heavy casualties in a long, unequal struggle in conditions of shortages of ammunition and food. The conclusion of the Paris Peace Treaty of 1856 allowed tsarism to concentrate significant forces against Shamil: the Caucasian Corps was transformed into an army (up to 200 thousand people). The new commanders-in-chief, General N. N. Muravyov (1854 56) and General A.I. Baryatinsky (1856 60) continued to tighten the blockade ring around the Imamate with a strong consolidation of the occupied territories. In April 1859, Shamil's residence, the village of Vedeno, fell. Shamil with 400 murids fled to the village of Gunib. As a result of the concentric movements of three detachments of Russian troops, Gunib was surrounded and taken by storm on August 25, 1859; Almost all the murids died in battle, and Shamil was forced to surrender. In the Northwestern Caucasus, the disunity of the Circassian and Abkhazian tribes facilitated the actions of the tsarist command, which took away fertile lands from the mountaineers and handed them over to the Cossacks and Russian settlers, carrying out the mass eviction of the mountain peoples. In November 1859, the main forces of the Circassians (up to 2 thousand people) led by Muhammad-Emin capitulated. The lands of the Circassians were cut by the Belorechensk line with the Maykop fortress. In 1859 61 the construction of clearings, roads and the settlement of lands seized from the highlanders were carried out. In mid-1862, resistance to the colonialists intensified. To occupy the territory remaining with the mountaineers with a population of about 200 thousand people. in 1862, up to 60 thousand soldiers were concentrated under the command of General N.I. Evdokimov, who began advancing along the coast and deep into the mountains. In 1863, tsarist troops occupied the territory between the rivers. Belaya and Pshish, and by mid-April 1864 the entire coast to Navaginsky and the territory to the river. Laba (along the northern slope of the Caucasus ridge). Only the highlanders of the Akhchipsu society and the small tribe of Khakuchi in the valley of the river did not submit. Mzymta. Pushed to the sea or driven into the mountains, the Circassians and Abkhazians were forced either to move to the plain or, under the influence of the Muslim clergy, to emigrate to Turkey. The unpreparedness of the Turkish government to receive, accommodate and feed masses of people (up to 500 thousand people), the arbitrariness and violence of local Turkish authorities and difficult living conditions caused a high mortality rate among the displaced, a small part of whom returned to the Caucasus again. By 1864, Russian control was introduced in Abkhazia, and on May 21, 1864, tsarist troops occupied the last center of resistance of the Circassian Ubykh tribe, the Kbaadu tract (now Krasnaya Polyana). This day is considered the date of the end of K.V., although in fact military operations continued until the end of 1864, and in the 60-70s. Anti-colonial uprisings took place in Chechnya and Dagestan.

The Caucasian War (1817 - 1864) - long-term military operations of the Russian Empire in the Caucasus, which ended with the annexation of this region to Russia.

This conflict began the difficult relationship between Russian people and Caucasians, which has not stopped to this day.

The name “Caucasian War” was introduced by R. A. Fadeev, a military historian and publicist, a contemporary of this event, in 1860.

However, both before Fadeev and after him, pre-revolutionary and Soviet authors preferred to use the term “Caucasian wars of the empire,” which was more correct - the events in the Caucasus represent a whole series of wars, in which Russia’s opponents were different peoples and groups.

Causes of the Caucasian War

• At the beginning of the 19th century (1800-1804), the Georgian Kartli-Kakheti kingdom and several Azerbaijani khanates became part of the Russian Empire; but between these regions and the rest of Russia there were lands of independent tribes who carried out raids on the territory of the empire.
• A strong Muslim theocratic state emerged in Chechnya and Dagestan - the Imamat, headed by Shamil. The Dagestan-Chechen Imamate could become a serious adversary of Russia, especially if it received the support of such powers as the Ottoman Empire.
• We should not exclude the imperial ambitions of Russia, which wanted to spread its influence in the east. The independent mountaineers were a hindrance to this. Some historians, as well as Caucasian separatists, consider this aspect to be the main reason for the war.

Russians were familiar with the Caucasus before. Even during the collapse of Georgia into several kingdoms and principalities - in the middle of the 15th century - some rulers of these kingdoms asked for help from Russian princes and tsars. And, as you know, he married Kuchenya (Maria) Temryukovna Idarova, the daughter of a Kabardian prince.

Of the major Caucasian campaigns of the 16th century, Cheremisov’s campaign in Dagestan is famous. As we see, Russia’s actions in relation to the Caucasus were not always aggressive. It was even possible to find a truly friendly Caucasian state - Georgia, with which Russia was united, of course, by a common religion: Georgia is one of the most ancient Christian (Orthodox) countries in the world.

The lands of Azerbaijan also turned out to be quite friendly. From the second half of the 19th century, Azerbaijan was completely overwhelmed by a wave of Europeanization associated with the discovery of rich oil reserves: Russians, British and Americans became regular guests in Baku, whose culture the locals willingly adopted.

Results of the Caucasian War

No matter how severe the battles with the Caucasians and other close peoples (Ottomans, Persians) were, Russia achieved its goal - it subjugated the North Caucasus. This affected relations with local peoples in different ways. It was possible to reach an agreement with some by returning the selected arable land to them in exchange for a cessation of hostilities. Others, like the Chechens and many Dagestanis, harbored a grudge against the Russians and throughout subsequent history made attempts to achieve independence - again by force.

In the 1990s, Chechen Wahhabis used the Caucasian War as an argument in their war with Russia. The significance of the annexation of the Caucasus to Russia is also assessed differently. The patriotic environment is dominated by the idea expressed by the modern historian A. S. Orlov, according to which the Caucasus became part of the Russian Empire not as a colony, but as an area equal in rights with other regions of the country.

However, more independent researchers, and not only representatives of the Caucasian intelligentsia, talk about the occupation. Russia seized the territories that the mountaineers considered theirs for many centuries, and began to impose its own customs and culture on them. On the other hand, “independent” territories inhabited by uncultured and poor tribes professing Islam could at any time receive support from major Muslim powers and become a significant aggressive force; more than likely they would have become colonies of the Ottoman Empire, Persia, or some other eastern state.

And since the Caucasus is a border area, it would be very convenient for Islamic militants to attack Russia from here. Having put a “yoke” on the rebellious and warlike Caucasus, the Russian Empire did not take away their religion, culture and traditional way of life; Moreover, capable and talented Caucasians received the opportunity to study at Russian universities and subsequently formed the basis of the national intelligentsia.

Thus, father and son Ermolov raised the first professional Chechen artist - Pyotr Zakharov-Chechen. During the war, A.P. Ermolov, while in a destroyed Chechen village, saw a dead woman on the road and a barely alive child on her chest; this was the future painter. Ermolov ordered army doctors to save the child, after which he handed him over to the Cossack Zakhar Nedonosov to be raised. However, it is also a fact that a huge number of Caucasians emigrated to the Ottoman Empire and the countries of the Middle East during and after the war, where they formed significant diasporas. They believed that the Russians had taken their homeland away from them.

The concept of “Caucasian war” was introduced by the publicist and historian R. Fadeev.

In the history of our country, it refers to the events associated with the annexation of Chechnya and Circassia to the empire.

The Caucasian War lasted 47 years, from 1817 to 1864, and ended with the victory of the Russians, giving rise to many legends and myths, sometimes very far from reality.

What are the reasons for the Caucasian war?

As in all wars - in the redistribution of territories: three powerful powers - Persia, Russia and Turkey - fought for dominion over the “gates” from Europe to Asia, i.e. over the Caucasus. At the same time, the attitude of the local population was not taken into account at all.

In the early 1800s, Russia was able to defend its rights to Georgia, Armenia and Azerbaijan from Persia and Turkey, and the peoples of the North and Western Caucasus went to it as if “automatically”.

But the mountaineers, with their rebellious spirit and love of independence, could not come to terms with the fact that Turkey simply ceded the Caucasus to the king as a gift.

The Caucasian War began with the appearance of General Ermolov in this region, who suggested that the Tsar take active action with the aim of creating fortress settlements in remote mountainous areas where Russian garrisons would be located.

The mountaineers resisted fiercely, having the advantage of the war on their territory. But nevertheless, Russian losses in the Caucasus until the 30s amounted to several hundred per year, and even those were associated with armed uprisings.

But then the situation changed dramatically.

In 1834, Shamil became the head of the Muslim mountaineers. It was under him that the Caucasian war took on its greatest scope.

Shamil led a simultaneous struggle both against the tsarist garrisons and against those feudal lords who recognized the power of the Russians. It was on his orders that the only heir of the Avar Khanate was killed, and the captured treasury of Gamzat Bek made it possible to significantly increase military spending.

In fact, Shamil’s main support was the murids and the local clergy. He repeatedly raided Russian fortresses and renegade villages.

However, the Russians also responded with the same measure: in the summer of 1839, a military expedition captured the residence of the imam, and the wounded Shamil managed to move to Chechnya, which became a new arena of military action.

General Vorontsov, who became the head of the tsarist troops, completely changed the situation by stopping expeditions to mountain villages, which were always accompanied by large material and human losses. The soldiers began to cut clearings in the forests, erect fortifications, and create Cossack villages.

And the mountaineers themselves no longer trusted the imam. And at the end of the 40s of the 19th century, the territory of the imamate began to shrink, resulting in a complete blockade.

In 1848, the Russians captured one of the strategically important villages - Gergebil, and then Georgian Kakheti. They managed to repel the attempts of the murids to destroy the fortifications in the mountains.

The despotism of the imam, military exactions, and repressive policies pushed the mountaineers away from the muridism movement, which only intensified internal confrontation.

With its end, the Caucasian War entered its final stage. General Baryatinsky became the tsar's deputy and commander of the troops, and the future minister of war and reformer Milyutin became the chief of staff.

The Russians switched from defense to offensive actions. Shamil found himself cut off from Chechnya in Mountainous Dagestan.

At the same time, Baryatinsky, who knew the Caucasus well, as a result of his rather active policy of establishing peaceful relations with the mountaineers, soon became very popular in the North Caucasus. The mountaineers were inclined towards the Russian orientation: uprisings began to break out everywhere.

By May 1864, the last center of resistance of the murids was broken, and Shamil himself surrendered in August.

On this day the Caucasian War ended, the results of which were reaped by contemporaries.