HIPÓTESIS DE PLANTA A PARTIR DE LAS FECHAS DE LAS OBRAS:

It has been seen throughout this thesis that Britain's military presence in Transcaucasia went far beyond strategic and defensive tasks, and by concentrating systematically all power in its hands, the military command also extended its power over the whole economic system. In justifying the actions of

54. Volkhonskiy, Mukhanov, Po Sledam Azerbaydzhanskoy, p. 96.

55. Azerbaydzhanskaya Demokraticheskaya Respublika (1918-1920), p. 208. 56. Ibid.

local British commanders, the former financial advisor to Bicherakhov, Lt. Col. H.K. Newcombe, stated in a report to the War Office on 14 August 1919 that:

Our forces being quite small were faced with the problems of restoring law and order amongst [the local population] without the loss of our men. To this end, it was necessary that we should re-establish to a certain extent, the industrial life, giving employment to the workmen, and making adjustments in their wages, in order to meet the increased cost of living resulting from the general disorganisation and non-production…. At this time, I would like to point out that all operations related to the restoration of oil production, of shipping and of the railways was simply one of supervision and incurred no legal financial responsibilities. All this was absolutely essential for the peaceful and bloodless maintenance of our very small force.57

By ignoring the governments of the Transcaucasian Republics, the British not only showed that they felt themselves in complete control of the region, but also that they had not yet decided what legal status should define the nature of British imperialism in the region. British economic policies implemented in the South Caucasus were, as has been seen throughout this work, designed to include Baku oilfields within the orbit of British imperialism. Large oil companies like ‘Shell’ and the ‘Anglo- Persian Company’, which hoped to benefit from control over Baku oil, undoubtedly shaped the policy

of the British government towards the region. The influence of big oil companies over the British government was very strong. Their decisions to invest or raise prices or withdraw capital exercised great influence on the British government’s policies. ‘The concentration and internationalisation of capital that had taken place over previous decades strengthened the influence which big capital had on government’.58 It should be noted that the interests of the oil monopolies did not always coincide with the general line of government policy. Nor was the state unwilling to make use of the rivalries between major oil companies. When Winston Churchill as Minister of War failed to agree with Shell about the price of oil supplies to the British fleet, he eagerly encouraged the British government to strike a deal with the Anglo-Persian Oil Company, which became the main supplier of oil to the British fleet.59 Yet while the process by which key economic interests shaped government policy was complex, the key point to note here is that British intervention was designed above all to advance British imperial interests rather than the interests of the local population.

57. Report by WO Controller of Finance Lt. Col. H.K. Newcombe, 15 August 1919, T 1/12368. 58. V. George, P. Wilding, Ideology and Social Welfare, London, Routledge, 1976, p. 104. 59. F.C. Gerretson, History of the Royal Dutch, Brill, Netherlands, Leiden, 1953, pp. 291-95.

In the face of the deteriorating socio-economic situation and the ongoing demonstrations of the workers, which were increasingly visible from the start of January 1919, a protracted government crisis began in the country. At a meeting of Parliament on 28 January, the ‘Ittihad’ faction accused the

government of failing to manage the economic crisis or root out corruption. It was supported by the socialists, who stated that the country still ‘has neither elected bodies nor the democratic municipal

government, and the land is still in the hands of the propertied class’. In the ensuing debate, the government suffered a no-confidence vote, and although the Musavat faction managed to defend the government in tough parliamentary battles, on 25 February 1919, the opposition forced Prime Minister Khoyski to resign.60

These political struggles were matched by developments among the working population. The growing labour movement was increasingly politicized by the Bolsheviks, who in March 1919 took control of the Baku Worker Conference and placed their representatives on its presidium. One senior manager of Nobel’s Baku operations noted that this created a general character of conflict and fostered an aggressive ‘anti-compromise’ policy among the workers.61

The Baku Worker Conference decided in early May to hold a strike, including among its demands the adoption of new forms of collective bargaining and the restoration of trade with Soviet Russia, a demand that was both economic and political in character. In response, the government declared the strike political, and urged people not to participate in it, on the grounds that its main purpose was to undermine the foundations of Azerbaijani statehood. The government clearly understood the need to export oil to Soviet Russia through Astrakhan in order to stabilize the socio-economic situation in the Republic, but it could do nothing given the policy of local British military commanders acting on orders from London. In the event the strike was a failure. Most Muslim workers did not support it, and the Musavat government began to arrest the strike leaders, while the Commander in Chief of the Allied Forces in Transcaucasia, General Milne, ordered the court-martial of those involved in damaging railways, roads, bridges, military depots, and so on.62

60. Volkhonskiy, Mukhanov, Po Sledam Azerbaydzhanskoy, p. 90.

61. T. Nasirov, Bor'ba za Vlast' v Azerbaydzhane (1917-1920), Baku, Izdatelstvo Azerbaydzhan, 1993, p. 57. 62. Bor'ba za Pobedu Sovetskoy Vlasti, p. 127.

The crisis nevertheless continued as the decline of the oil industry sharply aggravated unemployment among the Baku workers. Every day, hundreds of workers were thrown out into the street. By May 1919, the number of unemployed people in Baku exceeded 10,000 (the real number was probably higher). The nominal and especially the real salary of most workers decreased rapidly (in the course of 1919 real wages fell by about 50%). Prices for basic necessities in the markets rose at a rapid pace. The urban working class of Azerbaijan was subjected to huge exploitation and oppression by a local capitalist elite that itself faced huge pressures as a result of the economic policies followed by the British. The working day in Baku's industries and factories was 9.5-10 hours. It was still higher in the silk-winding enterprises, copper mines and copper smelting plants (typically 10-12 hours). The low wages condemned many workers and their families to a half-starved existence. The unbearable work, bad housing conditions, lack of labour protection, and high level of disease led to a rapid exhaustion and extremely high mortality among the Baku proletarians.63

The Musavat government was operating under constraints that meant it could not respond effectively to such popular protest. The shortage of tax revenue - given the refusal of the British to pay excise duty - meant that it could do little to help the welfare of the people. Nor given the policy of the British could it establish any kind of economic ties with Soviet Russia, even though some members of the government were by the spring of 1919 interested in negotiating a possible trade agreement with the Bolsheviks, in order to increase exports.64

The failure to take many practical measures to relieve the suffering may also have reflected the fact that the Musavat dominated government represented the interests of land owners and owners of capital. Although it introduced an eight-hour day, in practice workers who had a job typically worked for 12-14 hours, while thousands more had no work at all. On 22 July 1919, the Bolshevik newspaper Molot wrote that:

Thousands of unfortunate victims of capital, unemployed, living skeletons, facing painful death from hunger, now roam the city looking for an opportunity to sell themselves for bread in order to save their whole family from inevitable death. The Musavat government was both unable and unwilling to manage the situation.65

63. Guliyev, Borba Kommunisticheskoy Partii, p. 120. 64. Ibid.,p. 124.

The situation was little better in the countryside where agricultural production also fell into complete decay as a result of the economic crisis created by the years of occupation and the economic policies pursued by the British. In some districts the area under crops decreased by 60%. The area of grain crops on average decreased by 40%, the area of vineyards by 30%, and orchards by 40%. The livestock population decreased by more than half (over 50% of peasant farms were left without any livestock). Hundreds of villages and thousands of peasant houses were destroyed or fell into disrepair. Much of the peasantry of Azerbaijan was starving. Recognising that the landlord-dominated government was in no great hurry to solve the land issue, a large section of the peasantry was increasingly influenced by Bolshevik propaganda, and refused to give up recruits to the army. On 2 April 1919, the Defence Minister was informed by a report that:

There is now intensified propaganda both among the population and among the troops throughout the territory of Azerbaijan, and the propagandists convince the population not to give their sons for army recruits.66

Yet despite such resistance, the situation in villages worsened day by day. Once again, as in the winter of 1918, the peasants restarted their terrorist tactics and seized the lands of the beks (the local princes). A telegram sent by the Elisavetpol governor Colonel Vekilov on 25 February 1919, clearly captured the mood of the peasants:

Among the dark masses of Muslims of Azerbaijan, incendiary information has been spread that the government of Azerbaijan consists exclusively of khans, beks and big landowners who allegedly protect only persons of the Beks’ rank and a wealthy class of the population.67

Certainly, by the middle of 1919, Azerbaijan was the site of an important revolutionary peasant movement that took the form of an armed struggle against big landowners. In the Ganja - Kazah region of Azerbaijan alone, the number of rebels quickly reached 10,000. It can be safely asserted that during the spring and summer of 1919, the Musavat government almost completely lost the support of the bulk of the peasantry, just as it had lost (to the extent it ever had) any support among the industrial workers of Baku.

66. Ratgauzer, Bor'ba za Sovetskiy Azerbaydzhan, p. 5. 67. Ibid., p. 7.

The previous pages have shown how the Musavat-dominated government was throughout the period of British occupation unable to shape the development of an economy which was controlled by the British in order to promote British interests (above all the control of a secure supply of oil). The government was unable to control key areas of the economy or persuade the British to pay the excise duty that was needed if the country was to be run effectively. Leading members of the government resented the condescending way in which they were treated and understood that they were victims of British policy. Yet they were powerless to protest against the situation. They lacked support from the broad mass of the people of Azerbaijan, both urban and rural, who felt little sympathy for a government that was widely seen as dominated by the interests of wealthy landowners and industrialists. They were as a result unable to use even the cloak of nationalism to turn the people against the British, recognising that their own fate largely depended on the support of foreign powers, even after the British pulled out most of their troops in the summer of 1919. Azerbaijan during this time was treated as a kind of colony by foreign powers, above all the British, who saw the country largely in terms of its role in sustaining the commercial and political interests of the British Empire.