Some Bashkirs in their posts claim that “In all conflicts with foreign countries after joining Russia, the Bashkirs not only did not oppose the central government but, on the contrary, defended the big country.”
I would like to refute this statement with some facts known in history.
For example, during the so-called Northern War, when Russia fought against Sweden (1700-1721), the Bashkirs fought their war with Russia for seven years (1704-1711) and even won it. As a result of this war, the government of Peter I recognized the Bashkirs as having all their rights and lands. That means, the Bashkirs took advantage of the moment when the Kremlin was weak and distracted by another war to start their own war with Moscow.
Did the Bashkirs turn to foreign states for help against the Russian government?
Of course, more than once.
In the war against Russia of 1704-1711, the Bashkir ambassador, Murat Sultan, went to the Crimean Khan and from there to the Turkish Sultan with a request to accept them as citizens and help with the troops against the Russians. How is this different today from the fact that the Bashkirs are seeking support from the Kremlin’s oppressors among foreign countries?
Also, the Bashkirs repeatedly invited or brought khans to Bashkir land in order to escape from Russia. So, they invited the descendants of the Siberian Khan Kuchum to rule Bashkiria, they invited the Karakalpak khans, and Aldar Batyr invited the Kazakh Khan Abulkhair to the Bashkir lands.
That means they were looking for different options, just to escape the oppression of Moscow.
Zaki Validi in his “Memoirs” writes that the Tatar writer Fuat Tuktarov, who came to visit him in the village, noted with surprise how Zaki Validi’s father, imam-khatib of the 2nd cathedral mosque of the village of Kuzyanovo, Akhmetshah Validov, in his Friday sermons, spoke words directed against the tsarist government Russia in connection with the beginning of the Balkan War.
Also, Zaki Validi recalls that his uncle, mullah d. Utyak Satlyk-Ulyt Khabibnazar wanted the defeat of Russia in the Russo-Japanese War.
All this suggests that the Bashkirs have never been loyal to Moscow and the Russian government, as they are trying to attribute to us. The Bashkirs, especially its elite, saw the Russian rulers as oppressors of their rights and freedoms and always tried to overthrow their rule at the first opportunity.
I note that these attempts to get rid of Russian power cannot in any way be regarded as betrayal. The Bashkirs honestly fulfilled their part of the agreements concluded upon entry, but the tsarist authorities constantly insidiously violated them. Therefore, the traitors are the central power here, which means that all agreements have lost their force and are no longer valid. The Bashkirs will always try to secede from Russia, and this time we will definitely not miss our chance.
Ruslan Gabbasov
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