ABSTRACT
Two new states, Russia and Kazakhstan, had to divide the military assets of a third defunct state, the Soviet Union, of which both had been a part. Kazakhstan had to establish its state viability and to demonstrate its sovereignty. In December 1991, when the Soviet Union was legally disbanded, the armed forces stationed in Kazakhstan consisted of some 200,000 former Soviet military personnel under the command of Russian-speaking officers. Ethnic and civilizational fault-line issues were also driving military reform. According to 1989 census data, Kazakhstan’s general population was almost evenly divided between Europeans and Asians, the former primarily of ethnic Russian stock, the latter mainly of Turkic-Kazakh ancestry. Nazarbayev called a meeting of the Central Asian republics to discuss Yeltsin’s actions. The Central Asians endorsed the end of the Soviet state but refused to recognize the validity of the actions taken by the three Slavic republics in isolation. The three Slavic republics are: Russia, Belarus, and Ukraine.
