ABSTRACT
As I have already discussed in the Introduction, a structural analysis of Mongolian society at the beginning of the twentieth century reveals its unbalanced state: the Manchu administration, which tactically caused a clash of interests between the noyon and lamas, was becoming less and less effective and stable relative to the new modernist ideas of Mongolian nationalism. In different parts of the country strong leaders appeared from the local elite, and their influence, supported by local corporations, created obstacles to centrifugal tendencies for unity. The 1920s were times of change: conditions emerged that simultaneously spurred marginalisation and increased the potential of quick promotion up the social ladder. In this period of political disarray and social instability, new political tendencies had a chance to greatly influence the restructuring of the society. One of these tendencies was Russian Bolshevism. In Soviet Russia, the party of professional revolutionaries had undergone
its evolution and developed into a broad bureaucratic oppressive organisation that pervaded and controlled all layers of society. The Bolsheviks’ tactics of seizing power was easily adopted by certain Mongolian activists. The appearance of such socially engaged activists occurs regularly in nomadic society, and they become particularly entrenched during periods of political chaos and undoing of the ruling elite. They can be characterised by openness, intense activity, readiness to break down the existing order, and a constantly increasing desire for success and power. These energetic people most frequently hailed from the unprivileged or marginalised strata, which were the breeding grounds of the early Mongolian People’s Party (MPP), the People’s government and their ‘sympathising elements’. Let us draw attention to a few biographical details of Mongolia’s pioneer
revolutionaries1 that illustrate their social background: the urton2 station servant Damdin Sükhbaatar worked as a typesetter at the State Printing House in Urga; the arad-khamjilgaa and horse thief Soliyn Danzan worked his way up the ladder in the Ministry of Finance; Dogsomyn Bodoo, a lama from a poor arad family, was a clerk and editor at the Russian-Mongolian printing house. Such revolutionary activists as Ambaagiyn Yapon-Danzan, and Sundui came from the lower classes. The intellectual B. Tserendorj was
of arad origin. The MPP also included secular and religious (the Shabi) officials: Namsraijav-gun, Dorjmerin and Maksarjav. The future party leaders’ activities on the eve of the revolution were similar in that they did not occupy high positions (some of them were in the opposition), but had a talent for appearing at the right place at the right time. Specifically, they had the opportunity to communicate with Russian White emigrants, revolutionaries, and Buryat public activists, and to read the Soviet press, thus receiving information about events in Russia. Even before the revolution, the leaders of the two political groups in Urga (called the Urga and the Züün-hüree revolutionary societies in Soviet and Mongolian literature) were under the influence of Bolshevism. Interest in Bolshevism among Mongolian activists was inspired mainly by
geopolitical motivations: caught between ‘hammer and anvil’, Outer Mongolia could not ignore the emerging power of revolutionary Russia, whose intelligence service monitored the entire Soviet-Mongolian border. Against repressive Qing policies (the abolition of Outer Mongolian autonomy in 1919 and the actions of General Hsu Shu-cheng in Urga), the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic’s cancellation of unequal treaties with Mongolia and China induced the Mongols to heed the advice of Soviet communists. Mongolian revolutionaries took their first steps under the close guidance
of the Section of the Eastern Peoples of the Siberian Bureau of the CC of the RCP(b) in Irkutsk, whose functions fell under the jurisdiction of the Far Eastern Secretariat of the Executive Committee of the Communist International (ECCI) at the beginning of 1921. It was this organisation, more commonly known as the Comintern (which underwent periodic changes in structure and suffered the drawbacks of the USSR’s communist state-building3), that led Mongolia’s social transformation of the 1920s-1930s. Under the Comintern’s leadership, a very weak, diffuse, ill-matched,
inconsistent People’s party took shape in Mongolia. The merging of the two political groups in Urga on 25 June 1920 marked its birth. From the very beginning, MPP representatives endeavoured to copy Soviet structures and methods of acquiring and maintaining power; their successors did the same, while dealing with problems caused by the socialist development strategy. The international situation and the traditional tendency to side with the strong were not the only factors that pushed the Mongols to so vigorously borrow from the Soviet social experience. Among representatives of the various layers of Mongolian society, internal discord – which had existed for centuries and increased during the long period ofManchu rule, the ruling strata’s disintegration, the separatism in many parts of the country, and the lack of centralised management – provoked social transformation in the frameworkof the traditional struggle for power. For Mongolian activists, Soviet Russia and the Comintern were a new, effective way to conquer political rivals and acquire power. From the very beginning the Comintern planned to organise the MPP
using the RCP(b) as a model. Generally speaking, the politics and course of the MPP (and later MPRP), its composition, growth, strengthening influence,
and internal struggles mirrored social change in Mongolia throughout the twentieth century. The MPP’s goals formed the basis of its organisation and structure: acquiring and maintaining power, and providing the party ranks with social welfare. The party’s tactical aims changed at different stages of its establishment and development, as did its social composition, nominal and actual leaders and hierarchy. The participants of the Urga groups – S. Danzan, D. Bodoo, D. Sükhbaatar, D. Doksom, M. Dugarjav, O. Dendev, D. Losol, A. Jigmiddorj, D. Chagdarjav and Kh. Choibalsan – represented the party core. In 1921-1922, without any concerted effort, party and CC membership increased. The MPP of that period was later called the ‘coalition between herdsmen, arad and the mass of Mongolian national feudalists for the struggle against the Chinese and imperialism’.4 This description demonstrates the MPP’s obvious tendency to adjust the concepts and terms of communist ideology to Mongolian realities: first, ordinary arad were not able to consciously participate in the party’s establishment and formation; second, they did not perceive resistance to Chinese colonisation as a struggle against imperialism, and the term ‘imperialism’ itself was foreign to them. Following the negotiation process in Irkutsk in August 1920, the Mon-
golian delegation described MPP members as hailing from the ‘working intelligentsia’, stressing that it was a ‘particularly Mongolian organisation’, ‘not considerable in numbers, but compact and intellectually advanced’.5
The support of ‘wide sections of the population’ was necessary to increase party membership and successfully penetrate all structures of society. The arad, as a social strata, were passive and did not play a significant role in politics (despite all the postulates of communist ideology). Party members initially focused on acquiring power in the capital, where the political climate was determined by the high lamas, the noyon and a small number of secular officials. However, questions remained: Whom to join – the lamas, the nobles or the officials? How to use the intrigues of the Bogdo Gegen court in the most advantageous way? On whom to rely? Whose influence to use? Secular officials, mainly nobles without property, were weak and suppressed by the Qing administration. Those nobles possessing some property were too few in number.6 Complicating matters, the Manchu repeatedly tried to provoke conflicts between the noyon and the high lamas. By the beginning of the twentieth century, the lamas were the biggest,
richest and most privileged strata, the most experienced administrators, educated officials and politicians, and the spiritual leaders of the arad. In addition, in the first quarter of the twentieth century, Outer Mongolia was generally associated with the figure of the Bogdo Gegen. Considering all these factors, Mongolian revolutionaries paid special attention to Buddhist sangha in their fight for power. In 1920, Bodoo and Doksom wrote to the Mongolian-Tibetan section of the Secretariat of the Eastern Peoples:
