ABSTRACT
This chapter pauses to examine in detail Lakoba’s relationship with his main patron, Sergo Orjonikidze, the head of the powerful “Caucasian Network” and the leading Party boss in the Transcaucasus, and then how Lakoba began to cultivate his relationship with another rising figure in the region, the ambitious secret police head Lavrenty Beria. After a brief discussion of the challenges and opportunities presented by the evolving “indigenization” aspect of Soviet nationality policy in the mid-1920s, the chapter turns to examine the situation in the Tsebelda region of Abkhazia, a very small district populated with ethnic Armenians that became central to the machinations involved with the buying and selling of tobacco.
