Georgia after the collapse of the unified state in 1466

1) Borders Georgian kingdoms. (solid thick line).

2) The capitals of the Georgian kingdoms. (Circles).

3) The boundaries of the Principality of Sabediano during the period of greatest expansion in the 17th century. (dotted line).

Map 2. Georgian SSR.

Georgian SSR

1) The boundaries of autonomous entities. [dotted line]

Map 3. Georgia in the first half of 1992

Georgia in the first half of 1992

1) Borders of Georgia. [bold line]

2) The boundaries of autonomous regions. [dotted line]

4) Zone of the first Zviadist uprising in Mingrelia (January 1992) [dotted]

5) Zone of the second and third Zviadist uprisings (April and June 1992) [shaded]

6) The actions of the troops of the State Council of Georgia against the Zviadists in January - February 1992 and against the Ossetians in April - June 1992 [arrows]

Map 4. Georgia at the beginning of the Georgian-Abkhaz war.

Georgia at the beginning of the Georgian-Abkhaz war

2) Territory controlled by the State Council of Georgia by the end of August 1992 [bold line]

3) Areas of active armed struggle of the Zviadists against the State Council of Georgia. [points]

Map 5. Administrative regions of Abkhazia.

Administrative regions of Abkhazia

1) The boundaries of the administrative regions of the Abkhaz ASSR. [less bold lines]

2) Centers of administrative regions. [Underlined cities]

Map 6. Abkhazia during the Georgian-Abkhaz war of 1992-1993. before the signing of the Sochi agreements.

Abkhazia during the Georgian-Abkhaz war of 1992-1993. before the signing of the Sochi agreements

1) Territory taken under control by Georgian government forces in August 1992 [diagonal dashes]

2) The main fronts [bold line] (Bzybsky, Gumista, Vostochny) and lines of confrontation in secondary areas. [lines shown as dots]

3) The territory recaptured by the Abkhaz formations by October 6, 1992 [the Gagra zone, the territory is shown by dots]

4) The territory recaptured by the Abkhazian army as a result of the July offensive (before the conclusion of the Sochi agreements on July 27, 1993) [over Sukhumi; strokes diagonally intersecting]

Notes

NB! The Abkhaz army was officially created on October 11, 1992, so only after the capture of Gagra can the corresponding term be used.

Map 7. Western Abkhazia.

Western Abkhazia.

Map 8. Eastern Abkhazia.

Eastern Abkhazia

Map 9. Military operations in Sukhumi and its environs.

Military operations in Sukhumi and its environs

1) The most important strategic heights. [mountains shown]

2) The most important highways.

in November 1992 [upper arrow]

in January 1993 [bottom arrow]

in March 1993 [middle arrow]

The numbers on the map indicate the mountains: 1 - Apianda, 2 - Shroma, 3 - Akhbyuk, 4 - Yashtuharkhu, 5 - Birtskha.

Map 10. Military actions in Western Georgia during the fourth uprising in Mingrelia (September - November 1993).

Military operations in Western Georgia during the fourth uprising in Mingrelia (September - November 1993)

1) The territory controlled by the Zviadist formations under the command of Loti Kobalia at the time of the resumption of the war in Abkhazia on September 16, 1993 [bold line]

2) The main centers of the Zviadist movement. [cities in black]

3) Actions of the Zviadist troops. [bold arrows]

4) Actions of the Abkhaz troops. [dashed arrows]

5) Gali region, taken by the Abkhazians from the Zviadists on September 30, 1993 [shaded area]

6) Actions of the Russian units together with the Georgian troops against the Zviadists on October 19 - November 7, 1993 [bold dot arrows]

Map 11. fighting in Abkhazia from September 16, 1993 until the signing of the Moscow agreements on April 4, 1994

Fighting in Abkhazia from September 16, 1993 to the signing of the Moscow Accords on April 4, 1994

1) Front lines at the time of the signing of the Sochi agreements on July 27, 1993 [dotted lines]

3) The territory under the control of the Svan and Mingrelian armed formations after September 30, 1993 [shown by dots]

4) The actions of the Abkhaz troops in the Kodori Gorge in October 1993 - March 1994. [short arrows]

5) The territory that remained under the control of the Svan formations after the end of hostilities. [shaded area]

Georgian SSR as a part Soviet Union was on a special note. It was caused by objective factors. First, Joseph Stalin was born in Georgia. In addition, other Georgians, such as Grigory Ordzhonikidze and Lavrenty Beria, were part of the supreme power in the USSR. Political activity in the Georgian SSR has always been very high, and the cult of Stalin, for obvious reasons, was especially strong.

Special position

An economic favorable regime was created in the Georgian SSR. The republic annually received substantial subsidies from the Union budget. The level of consumption per capita in Georgia was 4 times higher than the same indicator of production. In the RSFSR, the consumption rate was only 75% of the level of production.

After the famous report of Nikita Khrushchev on February 14, 1956, on the exposure of the cult of personality, mass uprisings began in Tbilisi. Already on March 4, people began to gather at the monument to Stalin in the Georgian capital, the communist Parastishvili climbed onto the pedestal of the monument, drank wine from a bottle and, breaking it, said: “Let Stalin’s enemies die just like this bottle!”.

Peaceful rallies took place for five days. On the night of March 10, wanting to send a telegram to Moscow, a crowd of thousands went to the telegraph office. Fire was opened on her. According to the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Georgia, during the suppression of the riots, 15 people were killed and 54 were injured, 7 died in hospitals, 200 people were arrested.

Throughout the Union, the dismantling of monuments to Stalin began, only in Gori, in the homeland of the "leader of the peoples", by special permission from Khrushchev, the monument was left. For a long time it remained the most famous monument to Stalin, but it was also dismantled in our time, on the night of June 25, 2010. By order of Mikhail Saakashvili.

Guilt

Georgia cannot but be associated with wines, and the Georgian in the cultural field of the Soviet Union invariably acted as a toastmaster and a connoisseur of long beautiful toasts. The Georgian SSR was one of the main and oldest wine-growing regions of the Soviet Union, and Georgian wines have become an internationally recognized brand. It is known that on Yalta Conference Stalin treated Winston Churchill with Georgian Khvanchkara wine, after which the British minister became a devoted connoisseur of this brand.

Stalin himself loved the wines "Kindzmarauli", "Khvanchkara" and "Madjari".

High-quality table and fortified wines were produced in Georgia. The production of grape wines was carried out by Samtrest enterprises, which included exemplary state farms: Tsinandali, Napareuli, Mukuzani, Kvareli in Kakheti and Vartsikhe in the western part of Georgia. The Champagne Winery produced Soviet champagne and grape wines. In Georgia, by the 1960s, 26 brands of wine were being produced: 12 dry table wines, 7 semi-sweet, 5 strong, and 2 sweet desserts.

Tourism

Due to the optimal climatic conditions The Georgian SSR was a real tourist Mecca of the Soviet Union. For Soviet citizens Georgian resorts replaced Turkey, Egypt, and other hot foreign countries. In the resort of Abkhazia, which was part of the Georgian SSR, there were the most fashionable resorts of the USSR Pitsunda and Gagra.

During the Soviet era, Georgia was the best training base for Soviet skiers. Also, Georgia in general and Svaneti in particular became the main climbing bases of the Soviet Union.

Alpiniades and category ascents to the peaks of the Caucasus Mountains were periodically held here. A great contribution to the development of Soviet mountaineering and climbing was made by Mikhail Vissarionovich Khergiani, 7-time champion of the USSR and Honored Master of Sports of the Soviet Union.

Georgian tea

In addition to wine, the Georgian SSR was famous for its tea. Its quality, according to William Pokhlebkin, was competitive (at the world level), although with reservations.
Despite the fact that attempts to establish and organize tea production have been made in Georgia since mid-nineteenth century, its quality left much to be desired, and the volume of plantations did not reach 900 hectares.

In the early 1920s, young plantations were planted in Georgia, and active and fruitful selection work began. In 1948, Ksenia Bakhtadze managed to develop artificial hybrid varieties of tea: "Georgian No. 1" and "Georgian No. 2". For them, she was awarded the Stalin Prize. The variety "Georgian Selection No. 8" obtained later was able to withstand frosts down to -25. This variety has become a real sensation.

In Soviet times, Georgian tea became a brand known outside the Union. In the late 70s, he was already exported to Czechoslovakia, Bulgaria, Poland, East Germany, Hungary, Romania, Finland, Yugoslavia, Afghanistan, Iran, Syria, South Yemen and Mongolia.

Flowers, tangerines and the shadow economy

The Soviet people were not well versed in the specifics of the ethnic diversity of the Caucasian peoples, so the image of a Georgian, resourceful and wealthy businessman, was rather collective. However, in a way he was right.

In terms of industrial production, the Georgian SSR did not give the Soviet Union so much, but the Georgians provided Soviet citizens with everything necessary for the holidays: citrus fruits, wine, tea, tobacco, mineral water.

The Georgian SSR, according to economist Kennan Eric Scott of the Washington Institute, supplied 95% of tea and 97% of tobacco to the Soviet counters. The lion's share of citrus fruits (95%) also went to the regions of the USSR from Georgia.

In his report at the Woodrow Wilson Center in Washington, Eric Smith also noted that the Georgians played a significant role in the formation of the shadow economy of the Soviet Union, forming the market of the late USSR in the form of "diaspora competition".

In 1921, the state "Georgian Democratic Republic" disappeared on the world map and the "Georgian Soviet Socialist Republic" appeared. This transformation took place gradually, over a period of about a month.

1921

The GSSR was proclaimed on February 16 during the uprising in Shulaveri. When Tbilisi fell on February 25, it was proclaimed in earnest and finally, and this date is now considered the official beginning of the existence of this state. On the same day, many institutions of the new government arose - for example, the Georgian Cheka, which was headed by Stalin's childhood friend, his seminary classmate, Georgy Elisabedashvili. A month later he was replaced by Konstantin Tsintsadze.

On March 16, important negotiations between the Bolsheviks and the Turks will begin in Moscow: it will be decided to give part of Southern Georgia (Artvinsky district) to the Turks, for this the Turks will leave Adzharia, but they will pronounce autonomous status for it - for the sake of Muslim brothers. On the same day, the Turks were promised to transfer the Nakhichevan Republic (created on the same day) to Azerbaijan.

On March 17, the Minister of Defense of the Republic of Georgia, Grigol Lordkipanidze, will conclude a truce with the Bolsheviks. On March 18-19, the Georgian army will oust the Turks from Batumi, after which the Menshevik government will leave the country, and General Mazniashvili will hand over the city to the Red Army.

But Soviet power in Transcaucasia was not yet completely established. The Armenian rebels still held out, and on April 27 they proclaimed the formation of the Republic of Mountainous Armenia. They were soon defeated and on July 9 the leadership of the rebels left for Iran. July 16 was formed Autonomous Republic of Adjara.

March 28 was established Soviet Socialist Republic of Abkhazia, and on May 31, the Soviet Georgian leadership recognized it.

In June, Stalin will arrive in Tbilisi, but at a rally in the railway depot he will be greeted with whistles and shouts of "traitor!" Stalin will leave the country, maintaining a persistent hostility to both Georgia itself and its communist leadership.

For the rest of the year and for several more years, the Bolsheviks were engaged in drawing borders in the ethnically diverse Transcaucasia. At the same time, they proceeded from the fact that Azerbaijan is a state loyal to Moscow and Turkey, while Georgia and Armenia are still unreliable. Therefore, many controversial issues were resolved in favor of Azerbaijan.

Meanwhile, Stalin and Ordzhonikidze decided to create the Transcaucasian Republic, where to include Georgia with its neighbors in the form of autonomies. The Georgian Revolutionary Committee was surprised to find that once again Georgia is being erased from the map of the world. They immediately spoke out against this idea, and Lenin himself supported them. This conflict went down in history as the "Georgian affair". The situation began to resemble the "annexation of Georgia to Russia" in 1801: again, the Georgian leadership received completely different consequences than they expected. And now the creators of Soviet Georgia (Makharadze and Mdivani), whom Stalin called "social dukhans", now tried to save at least something from Georgian independence. Much later, before being shot in 1937, Mdivani would say: “It’s not enough to shoot me, I need to be quartered! After all, it was I who brought the 11th Army here, I betrayed my people and helped Stalin and Beria, these degenerates, to enslave Georgia.”

The efforts of the revolutionary committee were not in vain - the Transcaucasian Republic never appeared. Instead, they nevertheless made a federation consisting of relatively independent states.

Against the backdrop of these battles, new administrative units continued to emerge. On December 12, Georgian communists created South Ossetia, although the status of the Tskhinvali region remained uncertain for some time.

Soviet Georgia in 1921 is surprising if only because there were no Soviets themselves in it. The elections of these Soviets took place only at the end of the year, and on February 25, 1922, on the anniversary of the conquest, the First Congress of Soviets of Georgia opened in Tbilisi. Congress approved Constitution of Georgia and formed the management structure: an executive committee, people's commissariats, and so on appeared.

On March 12, 1922, the Transcaucasian republics were finally brought together into one federation and a Transcaucasian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic. It was headed by Ivan Orekhelashvili, an Imeretian, a communist since 1903. He will hold this position for 5 years, after which he will be transferred to other responsible posts, and in 1937 he will be shot.

On December 22, 1922, the Transcaucasian Federation signed an alliance agreement with Ukraine, Belarus and Russia, and so the state of the "Soviet Union" appeared on the world map.

Tourism

Meanwhile, while all these historical events were taking place, something else minor, but interesting, happened in Georgia - Georgian tourism and Soviet mountaineering were born. The founding father of the new sport was Giorgi Nikoladze, a mathematician, engineer and metallurgist who worked in Donetsk until 1918, and then returned to Western Georgia and was engaged in the creation of the Zestafon ferroalloy plant. In 1921, he organized the first campaign, about which little is known, and in 1922 - the second, with a group of 21 members for 15 days along the route Tbilisi-Kodjori-Tetritskaro-Bolnisi-Asureti-Tabakhmela. In 1923, he also organized the first ascent of Kazbek: on August 27, 18 climbers conquered the famous mountain, which marked the beginning of Soviet mountaineering, and August 27 was the birthday of the new Soviet sport.

Giorgi Nikoladze

insurrection

The first years of Soviet power were the most difficult for Georgia. Almost immediately, supply problems began, which led to famine and epidemics. On June 11, Catholicos Leonid died of cholera and was replaced by Catholicos Ambrosius (Besarion Khelaya), who was almost immediately arrested in the name of fighting religion.

All this did not contribute to the popularity of the new government. The fact that the Bolsheviks gave Klarjeti to the Turks also strongly compromised them in the eyes of the Georgian people. The Sovietization of the country was slow, only 10,000 people were recruited into the Communist Party. At the same time, the Georgian Social Democrats had not yet been destroyed and there were many of them - almost 60,000 people. All this was superimposed by friction within the Communist Party: Ordzhonikidze and Stalin wanted radical restructuring of society and the extermination of the Mensheviks, while the Georgian communists tried to be more democratic, more tolerant and generally more humane. As we can see, the first managed to crush the second. From that moment on, the Bolsheviks began to act more aggressively. All parties are ordered to either cease to exist or demonstrate their loyalty to the new government.

Against the backdrop of all this, uprisings began. In May 1921, the Svans disarmed the Red Army in Svaneti and started a war that lasted until December. Only with the help of serious reinforcements this uprising was crushed. In the same year, Kaikhosro Cholokashvili raised an uprising in Kakheti and Khevsureti. The uprising was crushed, and Cholokashvili fled to Chechnya.

Against this background, it happened historical event: Journey of Komsomol member Zinaida Richter to Far Khevsureti. She became the first Russian person in the region after 1914. Her report became a unique document describing Khevsureti in those turbulent years.

The failure of the uprisings led the National Socialists to think about unity. As a result, in May 1922, an organization appeared, known as the "Committee of Independence" ( Damoukedeblobis committee, abbreviated Damcon), which was headed by Gogita Pogava, then Nikoloz Kartsivadze, and after his arrest on March 16, 1923 - Kote Andronikashvili.

The Georgian Cheka worked quickly. From November 1922, it was headed by Epifan Kvantaliani, whose deputy Lavrenty Beria became in the same November. The Cheka managed to introduce its agents into the underground and gradually catch the organizers. In February 1923, as a result of the betrayal of Kote Misabishvili, mass arrests were made: Kote Abkhazi, Giorgi Kumsiashvili, Simon Bagration-Mukhransky and others were imprisoned. All of them were executed on May 20, 1923. In early 1924, Valiko Jugheli was caught and executed.

Then it was decided to start an uprising, and it was appointed for August 29, 1924. However, this uprising was put down in just three weeks. One of the centers of the uprising was the city of miners Chiatura. The only politicized proletariat in all of Georgia this time opposed the Soviet regime. The Chiatura uprising was led by Colonel Svimon Tsereteli. He had several detachments from different parties at his disposal: 112 fighters from the Social Democrats (+1 machine gun), 12 from the Federalists, 15 from the National Democrats.

In Moscow, the uprising was taken very seriously, and Stalin compared it to the Kronstadt uprising in terms of the level of danger. Additional troops were transferred to Georgia, and the Georgian coast was blocked to avoid foreign aid. On the very first day, the Red Army attacked Chiatura, Senaki and Abasha and pushed the rebels back into the mountains. The Red Army met stubborn resistance in Guria, the homeland of many Menshevik leaders. Everything was relatively calm in large cities and non-Georgian regions of the country.

Cholokashvili tried to raise an uprising in the east and attacked Manglisi, but the Red Army men seriously fortified in the city, so Cholokashvili retreated, went to Kakheti and from there made a campaign against Dusheti, which was taken. However, it was not possible to keep Dusheti.

Soon, on September 4, the Cheka also revealed the headquarters of the uprising, which was located in the Shio-Mgvime monastery. The leaders of the uprising were arrested and agreed to call for an end to the uprising in exchange for a promise to end the Red Terror. However, the Soviet leadership did not comply with this communication and the terror continued. People were shot by the thousands. A special method of execution was invented - right in the wagons, which made it possible to quickly take out the corpses. Such a carriage can now be seen in the museum of the Soviet occupation in Tbilisi.

Car from the museum. Looks like a reconstruction. Usually causes strong irritation among radical patriots of Russia.

It was a dark period in the history of Georgia. The exact number of victims is still not known. Approximately 3,000 people died directly in the battles, about 10,000 were shot, about 20,000 people were exiled to Siberia. The repressions went too far - so far that the Politburo ordered to find the perpetrators of the excess and punish them. Even the irreconcilable Ordzhonikidze admitted that it was a bit too much. On October 7, an amnesty was declared for everyone who would voluntarily surrender, and in 1925 all participants were amnestied. The Catholicos Ambrosius was released and ordered to slow down the persecution of the church. And yet, the persecution of the socialists quietly continued, and already in 1925-1926, about 500 of them were killed, and without trial.

The creator of all repressions - Epifan Kvantaliani - was removed in 1926 for no known reason (the case has not been declassified), and Lavrenty Beria took his place. In 1937, Kvantaliani will be shot.

Cholokashvili fled to Turkey at the end of 1924. His wife and mother were shot. Cholokashvili died in Paris in 1930, in 2005 his body was transferred to Georgia and buried in the Mtatsminda Pantheon.

Georgia in the 30s

The 1930s in Georgia began with a symbolic event: in 1930, the Alexander Nevsky Cathedral on Rustaveli Avenue was demolished.

Rare frame. The cathedral has already been demolished, the bell tower is still in place, the building of the Government House has not yet been built. Mount Mtatsminda is visible in the background.

The 1930s will become the era of Lavrenty Beria for Georgia. During this time, a lot will change in the country. One of the reasons for the change was the uprising mentioned above. In Moscow, it was decided that the uprising was the result of a wrong attitude towards the Georgian people, mainly peasants, and this attitude must be changed. Beria became the creator of change. Stalin met him around 1930, immediately began to trust him and entrusted Beria with the administration of Georgia. Beria was required to create a Georgian industry, create a proletariat, optimize the production of manganese, restore tea plantations, and most importantly, crush the Georgian Bolsheviks.

At the end of 1931, Beria became the head of Georgia and the Transcaucasus, which was formally expressed in a variety of party titles. The Georgian Bolsheviks immediately took a dislike to Beria and practically declared a boycott on him, so Orakhelashvili personally persuaded them to put up with this appointment. And he persuaded him to sign his own death warrant.

Beria coped well with the task. During his reign, tea plantations were restored in Georgia and 35 tea factories were built - which seriously reduced the country's dependence on tea imports. Beria began to conduct collectivization but do it rationally. Since mechanization Agriculture in the highlands is problematic, the peasants were allowed to keep land, and on collective farms they began to grow more profitable things - tobacco, tangerines and elite grape varieties. It became really profitable to work on collective farms and the peasants began to join them en masse. Under Beria, almost 80% of the peasants were united in collective farms.

Status of Abkhazia

Since 1921, Abkhazia has been one of the republics of the USSR, and Nestor Lakoba decided everything in it. He did not want collectivization and felt the strength to resist. Stalin put pressure on him from the Kremlin, while Lakoba resisted. He played for time and got out. It was during these years that he built a dacha for Stalin in Myusser, so that the leader would be closer. Seeing Lakoba's stubbornness, Stalin decided to use it for his own purposes. He confronted Lakoba with a choice: there would be no collectivization if Abkhazia changed the status of a republic to an "autonomous republic." And Lakoba agreed. Status meant little in the USSR, and collectivization was a sad thing.

The change was reluctantly approved by the Abkhazian Congress of Soviets on February 11, 1931, and then by the All-Georgian Congress of Soviets on February 19. On February 18-26, the Abkhaz gathered for a protest gathering in the village of Duripsh, but Beria brought in the army and everything calmed down.

As a result, the state of the SSR Abkhazia (a red flag with a hammer and sickle) disappeared from the world map and the state of the Abkhaz ASSR appeared (a red flag with a blue sun). The change in status meant that Abkhazia lost the right to secede from the USSR and the right to secede from the Georgian SSR.

Industrialization

Hands also reached industry: in 1933 the Rionskaya hydroelectric power station was launched and the Zemo-Avchalskaya hydroelectric power station near Tbilisi was finally completed, so that now two hydroelectric stations were operating in Georgia. In 1929, it began to be designed, and then the "monster" of Georgian industry, the Zestafon Ferroalloy Plant, was built. Enormous money was invested in the coal and manganese mining industry. The country's economy improved markedly, and this immediately affected the attitude of the local population - in general, it became loyal to the Soviet regime.

Having won this loyalty, Beria moved on to the extermination of the Georgian communists. Lavrenty Kartvelishvili, Budu Mdivani, Mamia Orakhelashvili, Samson Mamulia and some other leaders of the Georgian communist movement were arrested. iconic characters- Tskhakaya and Makharadze - were left alive, but forced out of political life.

In those years, Tbilisi itself changed noticeably. In 1934, a master plan for the reconstruction of the city was developed. It was then that the modern Freedom Square became main square cities. In the same year, the construction of the Government House began, which will eventually become the political center of the country. In 1936, the space on Mount Mtatsminda was turned into a park - this is how the Stalin Park of Culture and Recreation appeared. In 1938, the hands of the Kura were drained; Mandatovsky Island disappeared and the famous Dry Bridge appeared.

On November 7, 1933, the construction of the Dinamo Stadium, the main stadium in Georgia, began. October 12, 1935 the stadium was officially put into operation. In its first design, the stadium had a capacity of 23,000 people. (From 1937 to 1953 it was called " Dynami Stadium named after Beria")

Almost all of these projects were led by Archil Kurdiani. He was the chief architect of Tbilisi from 1936 to 1944. It was this man who created the face of Stalin's Tbilisi. Later, he will build a pavilion of the Georgian SSR in Moscow and receive the Stalin Prize for this. ( He will die in 1988 and will not have time to see how the House of Government built by him will be shot)

In 1939, the main Armenian temple in Tbilisi, the Vank Cathedral, was destroyed.

Vank Cathedral in last days existence. The bell tower on the left side of the frame has survived to this day.

In 1937, another historical event will quietly occur - the Transcaucasian Republic will be liquidated. This measure was discussed at the June plenum of the Central Committee of the party in 1936, when the draft Constitution was discussed. It was said that the republic had fulfilled its historical role and there was no longer a need for it. What kind of role this was was not specified, so historians to this day are speculating about the real reasons for the liquidation of the ZFR. Formally, it ceased to exist at the time of the appearance of the Constitution of the USSR in 1936.

Khanjyan's murder

The era of Beria became known for mysterious deaths. On July 9, 1936, Aghasi Khanjyan, the head of the Central Committee of Armenia, died under strange circumstances. He arrived in Tbilisi (the capital of the Transnistrian Federation) for a meeting, visited Beria in the evening and shot himself there. According to another version, Beria shot him personally. The details of this story have not been clarified so far. According to one version, Khanjyan veered into nationalism and began to cover for the Trotskyists. According to another, Beria was jealous of his success and was afraid that Khanjyan would take his place. According to the third, Khyanjan asked Beria to transfer the region of Javakheti to Armenia. Even the place of this murder is not exactly known, although many people claim that they were somewhere close at that moment.

The story of Khandzhyan also speaks of the fact that in those years Beria disposed of Armenia as at home, he could depose and kill Armenian party leaders.

A certain Amatuni, who was arrested in the year of the Great Terror, was appointed to replace Khanjyan, and Harutyunyan, an Armenian from Telavi, headed the Armenian Communist Party. He practically created the image of modern Yerevan and Jermuk, survived the deportation of Armenians, was removed from his post in November 1953 and died in Tbilisi.

Great terror

It was under Beria that Georgia was covered by the era of the "great terror". In the USSR, it lasted from 1936 to 1938, and in Georgia it appeared mainly in 1937. It was the year when the state, for reasons not yet clarified, began to exterminate everyone in a row: party leaders, generals, artists, writers and poets. It was a terrible period in the history of the USSR, and its senselessness and causelessness only add to its horror.

This year a lot of people were arrested and persecuted. Let's remember the main ones. Sandro Akhmeteli, head of the theater named after Rustaveli . Shot on June 27th. Memed Abashidze, writer. Mikhail Javakhishvili, writer. Shot on September 30th. I will be Mdivani, party leader. Shot on 10 July. Titian Tabidze, poet. Shot on December 16th. Dmitry Shevardnadze, painter. Lost in the camps. Michael Kahiani, party leader. Shot in December. In the same year he committed suicide Sergo Ordzhonikidze- and it is possible that he was killed. Writer committed suicide Paolo Yashvili. Somewhere in Russia, General Gekker, one of the conquerors of Georgia in 1921, was shot. And on June 4 she died a natural death Ekaterina Dzhugashvili Stalin's mother. She was buried in the Pantheon on Mtatsminda.

These arrests were superimposed by the Greek Operation of the NKVD, which began at the end of the year. It was ordered to arrest 15,000 Greeks, of which 1,000 were arrested in Adjara and Abkhazia.

The era of Beria will end in August 1938, when Beria becomes People's Commissar of the USSR, and his place will be taken by an inconspicuous person - Candid Charkviani from Lechkhum. This person will have to be the head of Georgia (Secretary of the Georgian Central Committee) throughout the 40s, throughout the war and the post-war era. He will hold on to power for a very long time and will only bring down the "Mingrelian case" for 52 years.

Candide Charkviani

Stalin's dachas

The Stalin era gave Georgia an original cultural phenomenon - Stalin's dachas. A lot of them were built here, about six. The complete list looks like this:

1. Dacha "Cold River" (Gagra paradise.) - 2 floors, approx. 500 sq. m., 1933.
2. Dacha "Ritsa" (Gudauta Paradise) - near Lake Ritsa, one floor, 200 sq. m. 1936
3. Dacha "New Athos" (Abkhazia) - 2 floors, approx. 200 sq. m., 1947

4. Dacha "Sukhumi" (Sukhumi paradise.) - on the territory of the arboretum, a two-story building, occupies more than 600 square meters. m, up to 20 rooms.
5. Dacha "Mussers" (Gudautsky paradise.) - one-story cottage, about 300 square meters. m, 1933.
6. Dacha "Tskhaltubo" (Imereti) - a two-story building, more than 200 square meters. m.

7. Dacha "Borjomi". Built before Stalin, but listed among Stalin's.

These dachas have the same construction: two floors, usually green, usually with 3 bedrooms, usually 20 rooms. Now almost all of them are considered museums and there are guided tours.

War

The Soviet-German war began far from Georgia, but very soon there was a danger of Turkey entering the war. This country was generally pro-German, and could invade both directly Georgia and Azerbaijan through Iran. Therefore, 4 armies were deployed on the borders of Transcaucasia, two of them on the Georgian-Turkish border. The situation on this border was alarming due to the pro-Turkish Muslim population - the so-called Meskhetian Turks.

Georgia was considered a distant rear; in September 1941, Aircraft Building Plant No. 31 was evacuated here from Taganrog, and this is how the famous Tbilisi Aviation Plant appeared, which during the war years produced Lagi, La-5, and since 1944 - Yak-3 fighters.

At the beginning of the war, 130,000 natives of Georgia served in the Red Army (conscription 1938-1940). They were relatively well trained military personnel, but almost all of them died in the first weeks of the war. Then the reservists fought, the level of training of which was very conditional. Around the reliability of soldiers of non-Slavic nationality, then there were many heated discussions.

At the very beginning of 1842, an important decision was made to form national units. Once such in the Red Army existed, but were abolished by the reform of 1938. Practice has shown that it is more efficient to keep privates of the same nationality together. This is how the first Georgian divisions began to appear: first, the 392nd and 406th divisions were reorganized, then the 224th Georgian division was formed in the Crimea, and later the 414th and 418th divisions were formed in Georgia.

The 224th division in May 1942 participated in the battles for the Kerch isthmus, was on the extreme right flank of the front, and there the main part of it died. The battles of those days in the Crimea are precisely characterized by the massive participation of national formations that did not fight very well: they were ordinary conscripts of 1941, they had a lower level of education, knowledge of the Russian language and training (in comparison with young people). Because of this, it was even decided to disband national divisions, but in the Caucasus it did not come to that. And yet the command tried to send "national" to the secondary sectors of the front and the Turkish border, and on important directions keep the Slavic units. This caused concern in the leadership of the republics, who anticipated repression and a tightening of national policy.

The worst parts were considered Azerbaijani. There were few negative comments about the Georgian divisions, but their level was not very high either. The 414th division was known for indiscipline, the 394th was also criticized, and only the 392nd division of Colonel Georgy Kuparadze performed well. This division fought near Nalchik, found itself in isolation after the German breakthrough on October 25, 1942, but managed to break through to its own through the Caucasian ridges.

George Kuparadze. In the past - an officer in the army of the Georgian Republic.

In July 1942, the Red Army was defeated near Kharkov, the Germans went to Rostov and took it on July 23. The attack on the Caucasus began. On August 21, the Germans reached Elbrus and raised their flag over it. Fights began for the passes of the Caucasus Range, which were defended by the 46th Army of General Vasily Sergatsky. On August 27, Sergatskov was removed from command and the army was handed over to the Ozurgeti Gurian Konstantin Leselidze. The army consisted of about 4 divisions, mostly Slavic. There were only 14,000 ethnic Georgians in the entire army, approximately 6% of its composition. There were exactly the same number of Armenians.

The rotation of the generals was made by Lavrenty Beria, who flew in from Moscow on August 23 to lead the defense. Under his leadership, work began to strengthen the ridge. The fighting went on throughout the autumn and the beginning of winter and subsided only in December. The Soviet leadership learned from this story mainly distrust of the national units and the Caucasian peoples. Two years later, on the initiative of Beria, the deportation of Chechens and Meskhetian Turks will begin.

Approximately 700,000 Georgians will die on the fronts of that war. Now almost every village has a large military burial with concrete steles. Sometimes whole memorials were built - for example, in Gurjaani and Sighnaghi.

Georgian battalions of the Wehrmacht

Uprising on Texel Island

The Georgian SS battalion "Queen Tamara" was recruited in 1943 from Georgian prisoners of war in Polish Radom. They were commanded by an ethnic German, Major Breitner. In August, the regiment was transferred to Holland, to the city of Zandvoort. When doubts arose about the loyalty of the battalion, it was transferred to the island of Texel - this happened on February 6, 1945. There, on the island, the battalion decided to rebel and call for help from the British. One of the leaders of the uprising was Yevgeny Artemidze. On the night of April 6, the battalion - which then numbered 800 people - revolted. Almost 400 German soldiers were destroyed in the first days. Local Dutch partisans joined the Georgian military. However, the Germans managed to keep a few pillboxes. Additional units of the German army were introduced to the island - about 2,000 people. After two weeks of fighting, the Germans managed to occupy the main part of the island, but they failed to destroy the rebels.

It seems to be the same battalion "Queen Tamara"

The German army in Holland capitulated on May 5, but the fighting on the island continued. Canadian units were introduced to the island, but they also failed to stop the battle, which died out only on May 20. This story entered the history of World War II under the name "The Last Battle of Europe". The Georgian battalion lost 560 people. 120 died local residents. The Germans lost an indefinite number of soldiers - about 1000.

In 1953, a monument was erected on the island to commemorate this event. In Georgia, in 1968, the film "The Crucified Island" was filmed.

The Georgian participants in the event were subsequently transferred to the USSR, where their fate is poorly known. Many ended up in camps. Yevgeny Artemidze escaped the camps, then lived in Manglisi for a long time and died on June 21, 2010, 2 months before I arrived in Manglisi in search of him.

Grave of Yevgeny Artemidze in Manglisi

Deportation of the Meskhetians

In 1944, the Soviet government decided to deport to Siberia those peoples that it did not like for some reason during the war years. In Russia, the first contenders for eviction were the Muslim Meskhetians. They did not commit any serious crimes against the Soviet regime, but they lived too close to the border. In addition, the conflict with the Christian population has not gone anywhere; the horrors of 1918 were well remembered in the region. Muslims were not liked here. And on July 31, it was ordered to take out all the Muslims. Including Armenians and Kurds. On November 15, all Muslims were taken out of their homes, taken to Akhaltsikhe, loaded into trains and sent to Kazakhstan. Either 90,000 or 110,000 were taken out.

Dark brown - evicted villages.

This drastic measure eliminated at least one ethnic conflict in the Caucasus. Who knows what horrors would have begun here in the 90s if not for this deportation. The Christian population reacted to the eviction with understanding and to this day does not want the return of the Meskhetian Muslims. The region gained stability, but for this it was necessary to break the fate of an entire people.

Deportation of Armenians

The eviction of the Meskhetians had at least understandable motives. But then the incomprehensible began: in 1949, a list of traitors and anti-Soviet elements was demanded from the party leadership of Armenia, and a list of 30 thousand. Objections and bewilderment were not accepted. In one day, arrests were made in Azerbaijan, Georgia and Armenia. The process took Georgia by the edge - only two echelons of Armenians were taken out. Historians still have not found an explanation for this deportation. This measure certainly had an important psychological consequence: in Transcaucasia, they realized that a whole people could go to court, and that a whole people could be evicted to Siberia. Of course, it would be technically difficult to deport the 4 million Georgian population, and while Stalin was alive, it was problematic to discredit this population on a national basis. You have to understand how everyone tensed up when Salin nevertheless died.

"Mingrelian case"

In the autumn of 1951, the story known as the "Mingrelian case" began. Stalin was looking for compromising evidence on Beria, and he started from afar - from compromising evidence on Georgian Mingrelians. In those years, they managed to get into many leadership positions - which, by the way, is happening in our time. Since 1948, the Ministry of Justice has been headed by Mingrelian Auxentiy Rapava (born in the village of Kortskheli), who really pushed Mingrelians to all positions.

The case began with the eradication of bribery among senior officials, which gradually grew into a search for traitors to the Motherland. It was assumed that the Mingrelians wanted to seize leadership positions, contact foreign countries and withdraw Georgia from the Soviet Union. The organizer of the whole process was the Minister of State Security Nikolai Rukhadze. Dozens of people were arrested, confessions were beaten out of them, but the case went slowly and it was not possible to knock out obvious compromising evidence. Rapava and all Mingrelians of the Ministry of Justice were arrested.

Miraculously, Konstatin Gamsakhurdia escaped arrest. But Kandid Charkviani, although he was not a Mingrelian, was accused of lack of vigilance, removed from the post of secretary of the Central Committee and exiled to Tashkent. His place was taken by the Gurian Akaki Mgeladze (another proof that Stalin especially trusted the Gurians).

It is not known how it would have ended, but in March 1953, Stalin died and the case was closed. Some were shot anyway, but on a different matter - for example, Auxentiy Rapava was shot in 1955.

Georgia in the era of Mzhavanadze

Stalin passed away in the spring of 1953, which gave rise to some reshuffling in the party leadership of Georgia. Mingrel Beria pushed Mingrelian Alexander Mirtskhulava (who had been arrested in the "Mingrelian case" a year ago) into the first secretaries of the Georgian Communist Party, but in July Beria was arrested, and already in September Mirtskhulava was removed. On September 20, 1953, a Kutaisi Imeretian became the head of the party and the country. It was Khrushchev's man. Back in the war, he served somewhere near Khrushchev in Ukraine. Khrushchev’s son later said: “ Vasily Pavlovich before recent years Georgian was listed only by surname. In 1953, after the death of Stalin and the arrest of Beria, my father faced a dilemma: whom to send to the troubled republic. A reliable, proven person was required - and here he remembered General Mzhavanadze, who served in Ukraine. He knew Vasily Pavlovich well from the war - so the general became secretary of the Central Committee...».

Mzhavanadze would last almost 20 years in power and become the father of Georgian Soviet corruption.

It was in this disturbing and eventful year that a new, expanded museum of Joseph Stalin was opened in the city of Gori.

Almost the first major event of the Mzhavanadze era was the shooting of a rally in 1956. It was strange story when the Soviet government was suddenly forced to fight Stalinism. Mzhavanadze could have prevented a lot, or at least tried, but he shied away from negotiations with the people, so he became to some extent the culprit of what was happening. After the shooting and the casualties, he took some measures to calm the people and thereby at least avoided being removed from office - which the second secretary of the party, Georgadze, did not avoid.

In the autumn of 1958, Pastenak was persecuted for his novel Doctor Zhivago. On March 17, 1959, the Georgian poet Galaktion Tabidze committed suicide - they said that in protest. He jumped out of the hospital window. However, there is another version of Tabidze's death. In the same hospital on March 15, the artist and writer Shalva Dadiani died. On the 17th, a group of intelligentsia came to say goodbye to him, whose behavior somehow offended Tabidze and he jumped out of the window. Both Dadiani and Tabidze were buried in the Pantheon on Mtatsminda.

In 1961, the second wave of de-Stalinization followed, and it began with the removal of Stalin from the Mausoleum in Moscow. They say that Khrushchev instructed Mzhavanadze to voice the proposal for the removal, but he ate two kilograms of ice cream, caught a cold, lost his voice, and under such a pretext evaded the task. Stalin was taken out, and then his monuments began to be demolished. It was then that the monument on the Kura embankment, the site of the 1956 rallies, was dismantled. The monument in Gori was left as an exception. It remained perhaps the only monument to Stalin in the entire USSR.

Khrushchev trusted Mzhavanadze, but for some reason he disliked Khrushchev so much that he joined the anti-Khrushchev conspiracy and even recruited supporters himself. As a result, in 1964, Khrushchev was removed, Brezhnev came to power in the USSR, and Mzhavanadze found himself in the position of his ally in a conspiracy.

Mzhavanadze was sent into retirement in 1972. Brezhnev's motives are not exactly known, but it is assumed that he wanted to see someone younger and more active in this post. In those years, Heydar Aliyev made a lot of noise, who in 1969 cleaned up corruption in Azerbaijan. Brezhnev wanted to repeat these purges in Georgia, but Mzhavanadze, at the age of 70, was no longer suitable for this. He was taken off, he went to m Moscow and lived there at the dacha until the end of his life.

Georgia in the First Shevardnadze Era

Jumber Patiashvili

The era of Jumber Patiashvili roughly coincided in time with the era of Gorbachev in the rest of the USSR. He became the first secretary of the party's Central Committee in July 1985. Then the Union still seemed indestructible and eternal. Georgia was rich, calm and famous. In 1987, a very minor event took place: Margaret Thatcher visited the USSR for the first time, and besides Moscow, she decided to see something else, and Georgia was suggested to her. On April 1, her plane landed in Tbilisi, where she was met by the chairman of the Council of Ministers, Otar Cherkezia.

Circassia, Thatcher and Jumber Patiashvili

Thatcher's visit was a bright, interesting and positive event. Probably the last positive event in the history of Soviet Georgia. And the whole of 1987 was the last quiet year. After 1987, the crisis in the Soviet Socialist Republic grew with each passing day. First of all, it was a crisis of interethnic relations. In Transcaucasia, it began in 1988 in Karabakh

Karabakh

January 1988 was the last calm month of the Soviet Transcaucasus. This was the month when the battle took place in distant Afghanistan, which became the historical basis of the film "9th Company". And in February it began: on February 13, the first rally took place in Stepanakert demanding that Karabakh be annexed to Armenia. In a few days, this will lead to the death of the first Azerbaijani, and on February 26, the famous Armenian pogrom in Sumgayit will begin.

Sumgayit pogrom - major event in the history of the Caucasus. Sobchak later wrote that it was the fear of a repetition of Sumgait that forced the Soviet leadership to use the army in difficult situations - even in Tbilisi in April 1989.

In those years, Azerbaijan was the most loyal country to the Soviet government, and Armenia was the most dissident. She just had more to complain about. Georgia was somewhere in the middle: its protest movement was still in its infancy. Something important happened in Armenia: the party leadership itself did not fight the calls to return Karabakh. As if the party itself rebelled against the existing order. The USSR supported Azerbaijan, and Azerbaijan decided to fight with stupid Soviet methods: "condemn, brand and ban." But the public opinion of the USSR was on the side of the Armenians, so the Azerbaijanis had a reason for discontent.

The head of the Communist Party of Armenia was then Suren Harutyunyan. In fact, he is responsible for the entire Karabakh history, but in 1990 he resigned, moved to Russia and held various important posts there for a long time. Amazing career.

On February 13, the first rally took place in Stepanakert calling for the return of Karabakh to Armenia. A few days later, the first Azerbaijani died, and on February 26, an Armenian pogrom began in Sumgayit. By summer, protests had swept across Armenia and Azerbaijan. On July 5, General Makashov uses the army to disperse a rally at the Yerevan airport. In autumn, the Soviet leadership is already en masse using the army to restore order: armored cars appear in Baku, Yerevan, and almost everywhere.

Against this background, Georgia remained a quiet peaceful republic, where protest moods did not go beyond newspaper articles. The first rally happened only in November.

First protests

At the beginning of 1988, the first political organizations already existed in Georgia, which were going to fight for the rights of the people, national identity and culture. Almost the very first was the National Democratic Party of Georgia, headed by Gia Chanturia.

The KGB gave her the following description:

The creation of the party was announced at a rally on August 30, 1988. From November 30 to December 1 of the same year, the first Constituent Congress of the NPD was held, which determined that its goal was "to restore the independence of Georgia." The methods of political struggle are the call for national disobedience and the real implementation of this disobedience. The ideological basis of the party is theodemocracy. One of the main principles of the party is not to compromise with the authorities. The chairman of the party, G. O. Chanturia, is one of the active organizers and inspirers of all anti-social manifestations in the republic. By nature, he is emotional, unbalanced, stands out for his ambition and desire for leadership. All these qualities predetermined the fact that the activity of the NPD is subject to its dictate.

On May 26, the first small rally of only 500 people took place. The reason was the decree of the USSR government on rallies.

On November 12, a large rally (sanctioned) was already held at the Tbilisi hippodrome. Nearly 30,000 people gathered. They demanded to cancel the decree on rallies, to allow the military to serve on the territory of Georgia, and even demanded the creation of a national army in Georgia. This was joined by protests against the construction of the Khudon hydroelectric power station on the Inguri. This hydroelectric power plant began to be built back in 1980, its fragments are clearly visible on the Mestian highway, and to this day it creates problems for the Georgian authorities.

However, the protest movement was hampered by a lack of unity. Chanturia had a conflict with Irakli Tsereteli, who created his own party: the National Independence Party of Georgia. In March 1989, its goals will be announced: "the overthrow of Soviet power in Georgia, Georgia's secession from the USSR, the dissolution of the Communist Party, the entry of UN troops into the territory of Georgia, joining the NATO military bloc, the creation of a new government of "independent Georgia".

Thus, the anti-Soviet movement was born, and the Soviet leadership of Georgia followed this with despondency and did nothing. And Patiashvili himself did not show any activity.

Ethnic painting 1989

Georgia of those years was quite ethnically motley, although 70% of its population were Kartvelian ethnic groups and subethnoi - which are called "Georgians" in Russia. The largest national minority (437,000 people) were Armenians - they were 9% of the population. They compactly inhabited two regions, and could, if desired, create problems for the integrity of the country.

There were two more powerful national minorities in the country - 6% Russians and 6% Azerbaijanis (341,000 and 307,000 people). However, these national minorities did not create problems.

3% of the population were Ossetians (164,000 people). It is in their midst that separatism will begin to grow, which will eventually result in the first ethnic conflict in Georgia.

2% of the population were Greeks (100,000 people), who also densely inhabited one area, but did not show inclinations towards separatism - on the contrary, they were not averse to leaving the USSR for Greece. In the end, they left.

And finally, one of the smallest ethnic minorities were Abkhazians - 95,000 Abkhazians also made up 2% of the country's population. At the time, Abkhazian separatism might have seemed the least serious and least dangerous.

Patiashvili had to lead the party during the difficult perestroika years. Soviet power was weakening, the Union was approaching disintegration. Everyone was dissatisfied with the authorities, and in this atmosphere, any spark was enough for a fire. April 9 became such a spark in Georgia.

April 9

On March 18, 1989, a rally was held in one Abkhazian village calling for secession from Georgia. This event caused outrage throughout Georgia, protest rallies were held in many cities from Sukhumi to Tbilisi. The Soviet government seemed to have nothing to do with it, but at that time it was customary to blame it for everything. On April 4, a large rally is going to be held in Tbilisi, organized by Irakli Tsereteli, Merab Kostava and Zviad Gamsakhurdia. Started as a protest against the events in Abkhazia, it quickly developed into a protest against Soviet power as such: already on April 6, the slogans "Down with Soviet power!"

On April 7, Patiashvili ordered the army to enter Tbilisi. On the same day, the situation was reported to Gorbachev, and he sent Eduard Shevardnadze to Georgia. On April 8, approximately 1,500 military men were brought into Tbilisi - a regiment from Spitak, a regiment from Ganja, a Tbilisi regiment and OMON. These units were led by Igor Rodionov, commander of the Transcaucasian Military District. Residents of Tbilisi remember how tanks entered Freedom Square and the tankers asked what kind of city it was. It seems that it was the appearance of tanks that turned the sluggish rally into a massive one: instead of the usual 200-300 people, the number of participants increased either to 3,000, or to 10,000.

Surprisingly, the part introduced from Ganja was the elite regiment of the Airborne Forces - the 345th Guards Paratrooper. The one that participated in the assault on Amin's palace in Afghanistan and in the battle for height 3234 (an event known from the film "9th Company").

April 9th ​​arrived. At night, at 03:45, Catholicos Ilia II asked the protesters to disperse, as they were in mortal danger. Already at 04:00 or 04:05 the order was given to start the displacement. Who gave it away is not known to her day, or Rodionov, or someone else. Armored vehicles and soldiers began to advance on the crowd, while tear gas grenades and sapper shovels were apparently used. The details of what happened are still being debated. 16 people died, and then three more, 183 people were hospitalized.

The curfew lasted for several days. A few days later, on April 13, when there were still tanks and soldiers everywhere, the Avetaran Cathedral was blown up in Tbilisi. This was done to prevent the collapse and is hardly related to the rally, but still the coincidence is amazing.

Then there was an investigation and trial. Rodionov was removed from his post. Patiashvili resigned. In 2003, he claimed that Shevardnadze also had something to do with what was happening. Tsereteli, Gamsakhurdia, Kostava and Chanturia were arrested, but released a little later.

Criminal authority Jaba Ioseliani later wrote that it was the events of April 9 that made him think about the helplessness of the people before the state and suggested the need to create self-defense forces ("Mkhedrioni").

April 9 became the official "Day of National Unity" in Georgia. In memory of this day, the adjacent park was renamed "April 9 Park". The streets of "April 9" appeared later in many cities of Georgia.

So loudly ended the transitional era of Jumber Patiashvili. He will return to politics in 1995 and become a dangerous competitor to Shevardnadze, in 2003 his support will seriously help Saakashvili to overthrow Shevardnadze, then he will go into opposition and be a presidential candidate in 2008.

Fergana

A month and a half later, an event occurred that had a somewhat indirect relation to Georgia. On May 16, fights broke out between Uzbeks and Meskhetian Muslims in the small Uzbek village of Kuvasay. The very ones who were once evicted from Georgia. On June 3, in the village of Tashlak, fights escalated into a war with houses set on fire and attacks on the military. On the same day, riots broke out in Margilan and Fergana. The army and police coped with the situation only by 11 June. As a result, 103 people died, 757 houses, 27 government buildings were burned, 275 cars were destroyed. 16,282 Meskhetians were evacuated from the Ferghana Valley. The word "Fergana" has acquired eerie associations for a long time.

These events somewhat sharpened the problem connected with the position of the Meskhetians. Talk about the need to return them to Georgia began again.

GEORGIAN SOVIET SOCIALIST REPUBLIC, Georgia, - allied Soviet socialist republic. Located in the center and west. parts of the Caucasus. The area is 69.7 thousand km 2, the population is 4954 thousand people. (1975). The average population density is 71 people. per 1 km2. The rural population is 51%. The main population is Georgians (66.8% according to the 1970 census); the population also includes Armenians, Russians, Azerbaijanis, Ossetians, Greeks, Abkhazians, and others. The capital is the city of Tbilisi (1030 thousand inhabitants, 1976). The composition of the cargo. The SSR includes the Abkhaz ASSR, the Adjara ASSR and the South Ossetian Autonomous Region.

The largest cities are: Kutaisi (177 thousand inhabitants), Rustavi (127 thousand inhabitants), Sukhumi (118 thousand inhabitants), Batumi (117 thousand inhabitants), Poti (54 thousand inhabitants). Cargo. The SSR was formed on February 25, 1921. From March 12, 1922 to December 5, 1936, it was part of the Transcaucasian Federation; On December 5, 1936, it became directly part of the USSR.

The climate of almost the entire territory of the republic is subtropical with moderately cold winters and long hot summers.

Before the Great October socialist revolution Georgia was a backward agrarian national outskirts of Russia. During the years of Soviet power, as a result of the steady development of all branches of the national economy, fundamental changes occurred in the structure of the republic's economy. A powerful highly developed industry has been created, including modern progressive branches, and a technically equipped diversified agriculture.

Health organization

Before the establishment of Soviet power in Georgia, there were devastating epidemics; overall and infant mortality were high. In 1913, per capita appropriations for health care amounted to only 90 kopecks. in year; there were only 2084 hospital beds, i.e. 8 beds per 10,000 people. The availability of doctors and paramedical workers was extremely low (see Table 4). The community network was almost non-existent. In the countryside, there were only 26 medical stations (132 hospital beds), which employed 38 doctors. The population was forced to turn to healers.

Table 4. GROWTH IN THE NUMBER OF DOCTORS AND MEDICAL WORKERS (ALL DEPARTMENTS) AND THEIR PROVISION OF THE POPULATION OF GEORGIA from 1913 to 1975

During the years of Soviet power, as a result of success in the development of the economy and culture, the growth of the well-being of the masses, the expansion, deepening and specialization of medical care, a significant improvement in the health status of the population was achieved, an increase in the average life expectancy of the population of the republic from 32 years in 1913 to 73 years in 1969 .

Vital movement of the population Cargo. The Soviet Socialist Republic during the years of Soviet power is characterized by a significant decrease in the indicators of general and infant mortality. Vital movement data Cargo. SSR are given in table. one.

Stationary medical care for the population is provided by St. 500 hospitals. The number of hospital beds in the republic increased from 2,084 in 1913 to 48,020 in 1975, or more than 23 times. General level of provision of the population with hospital beds in the system of the Ministry of Health. By 1976, the SSR reached 96.9 per 10,000 people of the population. The number of children's somatic beds, gynecological, oncological and beds of other profiles has especially increased, which is associated with the process of active specialization of medical care. Data on the growth in the number of hospital beds by specialty in Georgia and the provision of beds for the population are presented in Table. 2.

Table 1. VITAL MOVEMENT INDICATORS OF THE POPULATION OF GEORGIA from 1913 to 1975 (per 1000 people)

Table 2. NUMBER OF HOSPITAL BEDS BY SPECIALTIES AND PROVISION OF THE POPULATION WITH THEM. SSR from 1940 to 1975

Indicators	Number of beds by years
Total hospital beds
including:
therapeutic
surgical
children's somatic
for pregnant women and women in childbirth
gynecological
tuberculosis
oncological
dermatovenerologic
infectious (for children and adults)
Provision of the population with beds per 10,000 people. (all specialties)

Table 3. GROWTH IN THE NUMBER OF MEDICAL AND DIAGNOSTIC DEPARTMENTS (OFFICES) IN THE MEDICAL AND PREVENTIVE INSTITUTIONS OF THE MINISTRY OF HEALTH OF THE CARGO. SSR from 1950 to 1975

On the basis of the resolution of the Central Committee of the CPSU and the Council of Ministers of the USSR of July 5, 1968 "N" 517 "On measures to further improve health care and develop medical science in the country" design and construction of large diversified and specialized hospitals and dispensaries is carried out.

In 1973, a new modern complex of the Republican Clinical Hospital was built, a large complex of the Research Institute of Oncology, Radiology and Medical Radiology with 500 beds in Tbilisi, hospitals with 500 beds each in Makharadze, in Kutiri, Tsulukidze district, in Vladimirovka, Gulripsh district, are under construction -on, for 400 beds in Zugdidi, for 300 beds in Tskhinvali, for 264 beds in Sagarejo, etc. The construction of a rehabilitation hospital for 520 beds in Tbilisi has also begun. In 1975, a hospital building for patients with diseases of the ear, throat and nose and two clinical buildings of research institutes for therapy and cardiology were put into operation.

The number of outpatient clinics in Georgia before the Great October Socialist Revolution was so small that the majority of the working population could not use them. In 1913, there were 12 dispensaries, 37 medical and 17 feldsher stations in Georgia. From the first years of Soviet power, along with the growth of the network of hospitals, the network of outpatient clinics and polyclinics began to expand. So, only in Tbilisi in 1924 there were already 13 outpatient clinics.

In general, during the years of Soviet power, the number of non-hospital institutions increased from 66 in 1913 to 1345 in 1975, that is, more than 20 times.

From the end of the 60s. large multidisciplinary polyclinics, polyclinic departments of hospitals and medical units for 800-1200 or more visits per shift are being built; on the basis of these institutions, cardio-rheumatological, endocrinological and other specialized rooms, departments and centers are organized.

The network of children's outpatient clinics, polyclinics and women's clinics is developing at a particularly rapid pace: the number of these institutions increased from 283 in 1940 to 477 in 1975.

There are 74 ambulance and emergency medical aid stations in the republic (1975). Only the population of Tbilisi is served by 84 brigades, the number of calls reaches 1600 per day. In large cities, teams of specialized medical care (gynecological, pediatric, dental, oncological, neurological and anti-shock) have been created. Ambulances are radio-equipped.

From the first years of Soviet power in Georgia, specialized medical care began to develop; it was especially widely developed during the years of the 9th Five-Year Plan (1971-1975). The equipment of honey is constantly improving in the republic. technique and equipment of hospitals and outpatient clinics. Significant shifts in equipment have occurred in connection with the development of specialized medical care for the population. Data on the growth in the number of diagnostic and treatment departments (rooms) in the medical profession, institutions Cargo. SSR from 1950 to 1975 are presented in Table. 3. There are 168 electrocardiographic rooms, 117 functional diagnostic rooms, 51 bacteriological, 43 serological, 180 biochemical and 20 cytological laboratories in the republic (1975).

TB control

In the 20s. A tuberculosis control system began to be created, the first anti-tuberculosis institutions in Georgia were organized. In 1925, on the basis of the outpatient clinic, the first city anti-tuberculosis dispensary was organized in Tbilisi, and a year later the second city anti-tuberculosis dispensary was opened. In 1927, an anti-tuberculosis dispensary was organized in the Transcaucasian Railway. TB dispensaries in Kutaisi and Ozurgeti, an orphanage-sanatorium in Tbilisi. In 1928, at the department of faculty therapy, medical. Faculty of Tbilisi State University organized an associate professor of tuberculosis. In 1930 the Tbilisi Institute of Tuberculosis was opened. In 1936 at Tbilisi in-those of improvement of doctors the department of tuberculosis is organized. On the basis of in-that and chairs of tuberculosis the staff of phthisiatricians of Georgia basically grew up. There are 26 tuberculosis dispensaries, 75 cabinets, 11 tuberculosis hospitals and 18 specialized sanatoriums with 3,060 beds for the treatment of children in the republic (1975). Specialized boarding schools, forest schools and nursery schools have been opened. A fluorographic center has been established for the mass examination of the population. Prevention of tuberculosis through vaccination and revaccination, as well as chemoprophylaxis among persons in contact with tuberculosis patients, is widely carried out. As a result of ongoing activities, the incidence of tuberculosis over the past 15 years has decreased by almost 3 times.

Fight against cardiovascular diseases

In order to organize cardio-rheumatological care for the population and conduct scientific research in the field of cardiovascular pathology in Tbilisi, the Institute of Cardiology was established in 1946. In 1958, a cardio-rheumatological dispensary was organized. Out-of-hospital cardio-rheumatological care for the population in the M3 system Cargo. SSR is provided by 117 cardio-rheumatological rooms, as well as 117 functional diagnostic rooms and 168 ECG rooms. The methodical management of a network to lay down. - prof, the institutions rendering cardiorheumatological and cardiological help is carried out by 14 interdistrict cardiorheumatological centers. More than 430 cardio-rheumatological beds have been deployed in the republic to serve cardiological patients, most of which are deployed on the basis of clinical hospitals. In 1968 on the basis of Ying-that experimental therapy the republican heart attack center is organized. Questions of a cardiac surgery are engaged in Ying t of surgery of the Ministry of Health Gruz. SSR, Department of Thoracic Surgery and Department of Vascular Surgery, Tbilisi Institute for Postgraduate Medical Education.

Cancer care

In 1958, the Research Institute of Oncology was organized in Tbilisi, which is a scientific and methodological oncological center. There are 6 oncological dispensaries in the republic. In total in the republic (1975) 600 oncological and X-ray radiological beds were deployed, including 475 beds in hospitals of oncological dispensaries of the M3 system of the USSR. Mass targeted preventive examinations are widely carried out among the population for the purpose of early detection of precancerous diseases and malignant tumors.

Dermatovenerological care

Before the establishment of Soviet power, venereal diseases were widespread in Georgia. There was no fight against them, there were no specialized medical institutions, with the exception of the only clinic for women in Tbilisi. To Gruz. The SSR operates 113 medical-professional institutions of the dermatovenerological profile, including 35 dermatovenerological dispensaries, 22 of them with hospitals for 1105 beds, 78 departments and offices. As a part to lay down. - the prof. institutions there are 43 serological laboratories, 358 dermatovenereologists work. The scientific and methodical and coordinating center for the fight against skin and venereal diseases is the Dermatovenerological Institute, organized in 1935 (Tbilisi), which provides advisory assistance to all institutions of this profile.

Dental care in

Dental care in the republic is provided by 34 dental clinics (including 5 for children), 713 departments and offices. Dental offices are organized in schools with 800 or more students. To provide specialized dental surgical care, 90 beds have been deployed in the republic. Dental care for the population of mountainous and remote areas, as well as livestock breeders on summer and winter pastures, is provided by mobile dental outpatient clinics. Emergency dental care is provided to the population by duty dentists of the ambulance station. 1973 dentists, 359 dentists and 664 dental technicians work in the republic. Since 1950 at Tbilisi in-those of improvement of doctors departments of surgical, therapeutic and orthopedic stomatology are organized. Particular attention is paid to dental care for children. The network of children's dental clinics and offices is increasing, Ch. arr. orthodontic.

Maternal and child health

The first obstetric institution with 16 beds was opened in Tbilisi in 1873. Until 1921, there were only 4 women's clinics and 1 children's clinic in Georgia, owned by private individuals, 3 nurseries and 96 obstetric-gynecological beds.

By the end of 1975, there were 34 maternity hospitals (3083 beds) in the republic, 151 women's joint consultations; children's polyclinics and outpatient clinics -247. Until 1921 there were no dairy kitchens in Georgia, in 1975 there were 31 children's dairy kitchens. In 1975 there were 163 urban and 148 rural permanent nurseries for 9547 places. In 1975 in Gruz. The SSR had 31 children's sanatoriums with 2720 beds, of which 19 were somatic with 1535 beds.

Before the establishment of Soviet power for inpatient treatment of children in Tbilisi, there was a department with 100 beds at the city hospital, built with private funds. In 1940 there were 1427 beds for sick children (including 1022 beds in infectious b-tsah), and in 1975 - 27 children's hospitals for 3395 beds and, in addition, approx. 3100 children's beds in other hospitals. With the increase in the number of children's institutions, the number of children's doctors has also increased. Until 1921 there were 10 of them, and in 1975 - 2333.

In 1951, the Research Institute for the Protection of Motherhood and Childhood was organized, which is the base for the training and advanced training of medical staff of women's and children's medical and professional institutions, as well as the organizational and methodological center of all obstetric and gynecological care in the republic.

Medical care for industrial workers

There are 14 medical units in the republic. There are approx. 1880 beds (1975). Organized specialized departments equipped with modern honey. equipment and apparatus. Much attention is paid to the organization and work of workshop therapeutic sites.

Medical assistance to the rural population

After the establishment of Soviet power in Georgia, the network of both hospitals and outpatient institutions providing medical assistance to the rural population was growing. Central district hospitals are centers of qualified medical care for the population of rural areas; they represent all the main specialized departments - therapeutic, surgical, pediatric, gynecological, otorhinolaryngological, neurological.

The center of the qualified and specialized help to countrymen is republican-tsa with a consultative policlinic. At the hospital there is a department of exit emergency and planned advisory medical care, a cut is intended for urgent departure of doctors to rural areas for the purpose of consultation, performing emergency surgical interventions, as well as for delivering patients to the republican hospital. Branches have a dignity. aviation and by car. In the provision of inpatient and outpatient care to the rural population, honey also takes a significant part. institutions of the city, especially dispensaries and clinics of medical institutions of the republic.

During 1964-1974. the volume of outpatient and inpatient care for the rural population of Georgia has significantly increased and its quality has improved.

The material and technical base of rural honey has improved. institutions. In areas large, diversified-tsy and policlinics are under construction. In 1971-1975. 32 hospitals with 5,850 beds were built, including 26 multidisciplinary hospitals with 3,200 beds and 22 district clinics with 5,000 visits per shift. In 1975, 1,443 doctors and 7,900 paramedical workers worked in the countryside in Georgia.

Sanitary and epidemiological service

Prior to the establishment of Soviet power in Georgia, especially dangerous infections (plague, cholera, smallpox), as well as malaria, were widespread, from which entire villages died out; every third inhabitant suffered from it. Epidemics of infectious diseases were common, but cases of these diseases were not recorded.

During the years of Soviet power, as a result of socio-economic transformations, improving the welfare of the population, strengthening the material and technical base of health care, developing honey. science, training of highly qualified specialists and carrying out a complex to lay down. - professional, and dignity. - epidemiological measures in the republic a number of infectious diseases have been eliminated: cholera, plague, smallpox, diphtheria, malaria. In 1975, poliomyelitis, anthrax, brucellosis, and tetanus were registered in Georgia only in isolated cases.

Before the establishment of Soviet power in Georgia, there was not a single sanitary and anti-epidemic institution at all. But at the end of the 19th century. the difficult sanitary situation forced the opening of quarantine (sanitary) points in the cities of Tbilisi, Kutaisi, Sukhumi, Poti, Batumi, Zestaponi, Khashuri, Gori and other places, where the so-called. quarantine service. In 1893, a permanent sanitary supervision (sanitary and medical inspection) was established in Tbilisi, which, however, did not have legal rights and any material base. Prior to this, some sanitary and anti-epidemic measures were carried out by the Caucasian honey, created in 1864. society with the participation of the advanced public. In 1913, there were only 8 medical doctors in Georgia.

By 1975 in Gruz. The SSR operated 100 sanitary epidemiological stations, including 3 republican, 1 regional, 66 district, 2 port, as well as 4 disinfection stations, 71 departments of preventive disinfection. In 86 dignity. - epidemiological, stations there are bacteriol, laboratories. As a part of a dignity. - gigabyte. departments of the republican and regional SES there are toxicological departments and departments of physical and chemical. research methods, laboratory departments and groups for the determination of residual quantities of pesticides in food products. At republican dignity. - epidemiological, stations are organized noise-gauge and radiol, laboratories, virological departments as a part of bacterial, laboratories. In 1975, 1,018 doctors and 3,270 paramedical workers worked in sanitary epidemiological institutions, services of the republic.

Health education

The network of health education institutions in the republic includes 6 health education houses and 17 district health education classrooms at medical and professional institutions (1975). In the republic there are 32 doctors and 124 average medical workers on a dignity. education. There are 59 national universities of health, in which approx. 6 thousand people There are 4 people's universities of progress honey. science and practice, 152 public health schools, where St. 9 thousand people

Medical and physical education service

The Republican Medical and Sports Dispensary is an organizational and methodological center. Under his leadership, 9 medical and physical education dispensaries, 4 medical control rooms and 137 rooms to lay down work in the cities. physical education. The children's medical and physical education dispensary, one of the first in the USSR, was organized in Georgia (Tbilisi), it has a hospital with 80 beds, where children with various violations musculoskeletal system (1974).

Sanatorium-resort assistance

The diversity of the relief of Georgia, which led to the abundance of different climatic zones (from the mild climate of the humid subtropics of the Black Sea coast to the climate of mountainous areas of various altitudinal zoning), the presence of approx. 2000 sources of mineral waters (almost all types found in nature) have created extremely favorable conditions for the wide development of the resort business. richest Natural resources Georgia before the establishment of Soviet power were very little studied, treatment at the resorts was the privilege of the wealthy sections of society. As a result of a large research and survey work, the scientific and methodological leadership of the cut was headed by the Scientific Research Institute of Balneology and Physiotherapy named after. Koniashvili (established in 1926), the resort wealth of the republic was studied and systematized, developed master plans resort development. There are 284 sanatoriums of various profiles and recreation institutions in the republic (without one-, two-day) with total number 60.5 thousand beds. Georgia has become an all-Union health resort, providing an opportunity for hundreds of thousands of workers in all Union republics to rest and be treated. At the resorts of the republic, approx. 2 million people

The most popular among the balneological resorts of Georgia are Tskhaltubo (see) with thermal nitrogen-radon water, Menji with hydrogen sulfide waters, the Tbilisi balneological resort with thermal sulfur springs, and the mud resort of Akhtala. Among the drinking resorts, the most famous are Borjomi (see) with bicarbonate-sodium water, Sairme with bicarbonate sodium-calcium water, Java with bicarbonate sodium chloride water of the Essentuki-17 type. The mineral waters of Georgia are also used for treatment outside the resort: mineral waters are bottled from 13 deposits. The annual production of all factories of the republic for bottling mineral waters reaches 350 million bottles. Of the climatic resorts, the resorts of the Black Sea coast are especially popular, on a three-hundred-kilometer strip to-rogo (from the Chorokhi river to the Psou river) there are coastal health resorts - Gagra (see),

In pre-revolutionary Georgia, there were 145 privately owned and 7 hospital pharmacies, which employed 107 pharmacists and 597 assistant pharmacists. They were mostly in the cities. The rural population was almost completely deprived of medical assistance. There were no enterprises for the production of medicines, scientific pharmaceuticals, institutions and scientific personnel in the field of pharmacy. With the establishment of Soviet power in the republic, enterprises of the medical industry were created: the Tbilisi Chemical-Pharmaceutical Plant, the Batumi Chemical-Pharmaceutical Plant, the Tbilisi Plant of Organotherapeutic Preparations. Production and control over biol, preparations is carried out by Tbilisi research in-t of serums and vaccines. Pharmacy network in the republic is widely developed. In 1975, in the system of GAPU M3 Cargo. The SSR had 580 self-supporting pharmacies and 510 pharmacy points. When to lay down. institutions had 134 pharmacies. The study of the quality of medicines was carried out in 18 control and analytical laboratories.

medical personnel

In 1913, 461 doctors worked in Georgia, by 1975 their number had increased by more than 44 times, including 30 times in the countryside. The number of paramedical workers increased over the same period by more than 70 times (Table 4).

In Georgia in 1975 the level of provision with doctors per 10,000 population reached 41.1. The indicator of provision of the population of the republic with nurses is 100.8 per 10,000 population.

Medical education

There was not a single higher educational institution in pre-revolutionary Georgia. In 1975, in the republic, in addition to the Academy of Sciences, Gruz. SSR, university, research in-t of various profiles, there were medical in-t, in-t of improvement of doctors and 22 medical research in-that. In 1930, on the basis of medical. faculty of the Tbilisi un-that the medical institute (see the Tbilisi medical institute) which by 1975 let out more than 18 thousand specialists was formed. In 1935 the Tbilisi state in-t of improvement of doctors was based, in Krom annually pass specialization and improvement on 20 various specialties to 1200 doctors. During existence in-that received specialization or raised qualification over 40 thousand doctors. In 1975, 13 medical schools of the republic graduated more than 2 thousand people in the specialties of a nurse, paramedic, midwife, laboratory assistant.

medical science

Georgian medicine has a long historical tradition. As early as the 17th and 18th centuries, marked by the rise of national culture, original works on medicine appeared. After the accession of Georgia to Russia, Georgian honey. science was greatly influenced by Russian, as well as Western European medicine. However, the colonial policy of tsarism limited its development. With the establishment of Soviet power in Georgia, the intensive development of honey began. science and preparation of national scientific honey. frames.

In 1933, under the Tbilisi state. University on the basis of a physiological laboratory, on the initiative of I. S. Beritashvili, the Institute of Experimental Biology was founded, which in 1935 was renamed the Institute of Physiology. prof. I. S. Beritashvili, in which research is being conducted on problems of human and animal physiology, molecular biology, biophysics, biochemistry and radiobiology, as well as topical issues of practical medicine. Since 1965, the efforts of scientists from the Institute of Physiology. acad. I. S. Beritashvili is aimed at elucidating the mechanisms of memory, its various disorders and the influence of pharmacological agents. At the institute, the biophysical direction of research was started and subsequently received wide development.

Great merit in the development of honey. Sciences belong to scientists: A. S. Aladashvili, N. V. Antelava, M. M. Asatiani, S. S. Virsaladze, N. S. Kakhiani, N. A. Kipshidze, I. G. Koniashvili, N. I. Makhviladze, G. M. Mukhadze, V. M. Tsinamdzgvarishvili, Ya. P. Tsulukidze, K. D. Eristavi, et al. scientists D. M. Gedevanishvili, O. N. Gudushauri, N. A. Javakhishvili, A. D. Zurabashvili, H. N. Kipshidze, M. E. Komakhidze, G. M. Maruashvili, D. G. Mamatavrishvili , V. M. Okudzhava, I. K. Pipia, P. M. Sarajishvili, S. N. Khechinashvili, G. D. Khundadze, K. V. Chachava, S. N. Chekhinashvili and others.

In 1975, more than 2 thousand people worked in the field of medical science in the republic. scientific staff, including 1092 candidates and 283 doctors of medical sciences. Sciences. To Gruz. SSR has 158 scientific honey. societies.

Budget

For health care, the development of honey. science and medical training. personnel are annually allocated significant appropriations. The healthcare budget of the republic is constantly growing. So, in 1971 it amounted to 161.4 million rubles, and in 1974 - 188.2 million rubles. Per capita per year accounted for 39 rubles. 98 kop.

Bibliography: 50 Years of Soviet Georgia, Statistical Collection, Tbilisi, 1971; Shengelia M.S. History of Medicine in Georgia, Tbilisi, 1967.

I. Sh. Zedgenidze.

Georgian Soviet Socialist Republic

The Georgian SSR (Georgia) is located in the central and western part of Transcaucasia. It borders on the southwest. with Turkey. To the west it is washed by the Black Sea. Area 69.7 thousand sq. km 2. Population 4954 thousand people. (as of January 1, 1976). National composition (according to the 1970 census, thousand people): Georgians 3131, Ossetians 150, Abkhazians 79, Armenians 452, Russians 397, Azerbaijanis 218, Greeks 89, Jews 55, Ukrainians 50, etc. The average population density is 71.1 people. for 1 km 2(as of January 1, 1976). The capital is Tbilisi (1030 thousand inhabitants as of January 1, 1976). Big cities(thousand inhabitants): Kutaisi (177), Sukhumi (118), Batumi (117). New cities have grown: Rustavi (127), Tkvarcheli, Chiatura, Zestafoni, Tkibuli, Vale, Kaspi, etc. Georgia includes the Abkhaz ASSR, the Adjara ASSR, and the South Ossetian Autonomous Region. There are 66 districts, 51 cities and 60 urban-type settlements in the republic.

Nature. Up to 2/3 of the territory is occupied by mountains and foothills. In the north - the mountain system of the Greater Caucasus (the highest points are the city of Shkhara, 5068 m, Kazbek city, 5033 m), to the south - the Lesser Caucasus (South Georgian Highlands). Between them are intermountain lowlands - the Colchis lowland, the Inner Kartli, Lower Kartli and Alazani plains and the Iora plateau. Minerals: coal, oil, manganese, copper and polymetallic ores, barite. Altitude zonality is characteristic of the climate and soil and vegetation cover. In the western part, the climate is humid subtropical. The average January temperature (up to a height of 500-600 m) 3-7 °С, August 23-26 °С; rainfall up to 3000 mm in year. In Eastern Georgia, on the plains and plateaus, the average temperature in July is 24-25 °С, in January from 0 to -3 °С; rainfall from 300 to 1000 mm per year, in the mountains - up to 1800 mm. Main rivers: Kura, Rioni. Lakes - Paravani, Ritsa, etc. In the coastal strip of soil, subtropical podzolic, red and yellow soils; in the lowland part of Eastern Georgia - chernozems, chestnut and brown. In the mountains - brown, brown forest, humus-calcareous and mountain-meadow soils. About 39% of the territory is occupied by forests (mainly on the slopes of the mountains) - broad-leaved (beech, chestnut, oak, hornbeam) and coniferous (spruce, fir, pine). Pitsunda and Eldar pine, yew, boxwood, and zelkova have been preserved in certain regions of the republic. A significant territory of the eastern part of Georgia is occupied by steppes and thickets of thorny bushes. In the highland zones of the Greater Caucasus and the South Georgian Highlands, there are subalpine and alpine meadows.

History reference. A class society on the territory of Georgia arose at the beginning of the 1st millennium BC. e. In the 6th c. BC e. there was a slave-owning Colchis kingdom, in the 4th-3rd centuries. BC e. Iberia. At the beginning of the 6th - beginning of the 10th centuries. n. e. the territory was ruled by the Iranian Sassanids, Byzantium and the Arab Caliphate. In the 6th-10th centuries. the majority of the Georgian people. In the 8th - early 9th centuries. the Kakheti, Eretin, Tao-Klardzhet feudal principalities and the Abkhazian kingdom arose. 11th-12th centuries characterized by the economic and cultural flourishing of Georgia. By the 13th-14th centuries. include the invasion of the Mongol-Tatars, Timur. In the 15th - early 17th centuries. independent kingdoms and principalities were formed: Kartli, Kakheti, Imeretia, Samtskhe-Saatabago, Megrelia, Guria and Abkhazia. In the 16-18 centuries. the territory was the object of a struggle between Iran and Turkey; during this period, anti-feudal and national liberation movements against the Iranian-Turkish yoke took place (in 1625 under the leadership of G. Saakadze, the uprising of 1659, etc.). In 1801 Eastern, in 1803-64 Western Georgia was annexed to Russia (Tiflis and Kutaisi provinces). The people opposed social and national oppression (the Gurian uprising of 1841, the Megrelian uprising of 1857, and others). Peasant reform 1864 accelerated the development of capitalism; in the 90s 19th century the first social-democratic organizations appeared. The proletariat waged a strike struggle (the Batumi strike and demonstration of 1902, the general strike in the South of Russia in 1903). The working people of Georgia participated in the Revolution of 1905-07, in the February Revolution of 1917 and the Great October Socialist Revolution. In November 1917 petty-bourgeois parties seized power. In 1918-20 it was occupied by German, Turkish, and British troops. With the help of the Red Army, the working people of Georgia established Soviet power in 1921; On February 25, 1921, the Georgian SSR was formed. On March 12, 1922, it became part of the ZSFSR; since December 5, 1936, directly within the USSR as a union republic. As a result of the industrialization and collectivization of agriculture carried out under the leadership of the Communist Party and cultural revolution a socialist society was built in the republic.

During the years of the Great Patriotic War the Georgian people mobilized all their forces to repel the fascist aggression.

As of January 1, 1976, the Communist Party of Georgia had 307,929 members and 10,442 candidate members of the party; there were 606,324 members in the ranks of the Leninist Communist Youth Union of Georgia; there are more than 1826.7 thousand trade union members in the republic.

The Georgian people, together with all the fraternal peoples of the USSR, achieved new successes in communist construction in the post-war decades.

The Georgian SSR was awarded 2 Orders of Lenin (1935, 1965), the Order October revolution(1971) and the Order of Friendship of Peoples (1972).

Economy. During the years of socialist construction, Georgia became an industrial-agrarian republic. In the national economy of the USSR, it is distinguished by the extraction of manganese ores, the production of ferroalloys, steel pipes, electric locomotives, trucks, metal-cutting machine tools, some electrical products and devices, specific food products- tea, citrus fruits, tobacco, wines, essential and tung oils. Georgia is the main base of the subtropical economy of the USSR.

The Georgian SSR has developed economic ties with all the union republics.

In 1975, the volume of industrial output exceeded the 1940 level by 12 times, and the 1913 level by 118 times.

About production the most important types industrial products, see the data in Table. one.

Tab. 1. - Production of the most important types of industrial products

Electricity, bln. kWh
Coal, thous. t
Steel, thous. t
Rental, thous. t
Manganese ore, thous. t
Mineral fertilizers (in conventional units), thous. t
Cement, thous. t
Cotton fabrics, mln. m
Woolen fabrics, mln. m
Silk fabrics, mln. m
Leather shoes, million pairs
Long leaf tea of ​​primary processing, thous. t.
Canned food, mln conditional cans
Grape wine, mln. gave*
Meat, thous. t

* Without wine, refinement and bottling of which are carried out on the territory of other republics.

In Georgia, the Inguri hydroelectric power station, the largest in Transcaucasia, is under construction (1977). Coal is mined; manganese, polymetallic ores, barite, etc. are being developed. An important role is played by ferrous metallurgy, mechanical engineering, light and food industry.

Gross agricultural output in 1975 increased by 3.3 times in comparison with 1940. At the end of 1975 there were 310 state farms and 877 collective farms. In 1975, 20.8 thousand tractors (in physical units; 3 thousand in 1940), 1.4 thousand grain harvesters (0.5 thousand in 1940), 19.1 thousand trucks (2 .7 thousand in 1940). Agricultural land in 1975 amounted to 3.1 million hectares. ha(44.3% of the entire territory), including arable land - 0.8 million hectares. ha, hayfields - 0.15 million ha and pastures - 1.8 million. ha. Great importance has irrigation. Large irrigation systems: Alazanskaya, Samgorskaya, Tiriponskaya; under construction (1977) Upper Alazan irrigation system. A significant part of the Colchis lowland was drained. At the end of 1975, the area of ​​irrigated land was 368,000 ha. ha, drained - 151.3 thousand tons ha. Agriculture provides about 70% of the gross agricultural output (1975). The main branches of agriculture are tea growing, fruit growing (especially citrus growing), viticulture. The area of ​​tea plantations is 66 thousand hectares. ha in 1975 (50 thousand people) ha in 1940), vineyards - 126 thousand hectares. ha(70 thousand ha in 1940), fruit and berry plantations - 177 thousand hectares. ha(109 thousand ha in 1940). Gross harvest of tea - 335 thousand tons t in 1975 (51 thousand t in 1940), grapes - 563 thous. t(150 thousand t in 1940), fruits and berries - 500 thousand tons. t(143 thousand t in 1940). From grain crops, mainly corn and wheat are sown, from industrial crops - tobacco, essential oil. Data on sown areas and gross harvest of agricultural crops, see Table. 2.

The main branch of animal husbandry is cattle breeding. Sheep breeding (based on natural fodder lands), as well as sericulture, are developed. For the number of livestock and poultry and the production of livestock products, see the data in Table. 3 and 4.

Tab. 2. - Cultivated area and gross harvest of agricultural crops

Total sown area, thous. ha
Cereal crops
Industrial crops
Vegetables and potatoes
Forage crops
Gross collection, thous. t
Cereal crops
Sugar beet (factory)
Potato

Cattle
including cows
Sheep and goats
Bird, million

Tab. 4. - Production of basic livestock products

Meat (in slaughter weight), thous. t
Milk, thous. t
Eggs, mln.
Wool, thousand t

The main mode of transport is rail. Operating length railways 1.42 thousand km(1975). The length of roads is 21.5 thousand km. km(1975), including hard-surfaced 17.7 thous. km. Maritime (the main ports are Batumi, Poti) and air transport are developed. Baku-Batumi oil pipeline, gas pipelines from Azerbaijan and the North Caucasus.

The standard of living of the population of the republic is steadily rising. The national income for 1966-75 increased 1.9 times. Real incomes per capita in 1975 compared with 1965 increased 1.6 times. Retail turnover of state and cooperative trade (including public catering) increased from 333 million rubles. in 1940 to 3210 million rubles. in 1975, while the turnover per capita - 5.5 times. The amount of deposits in savings banks in 1975 reached 1,797 million rubles. (13 million rubles in 1940), the average deposit is 1279 rubles. (44 rubles in 1940). At the end of 1975, the city's housing stock amounted to 33.3 million sq. m 2 total (usable) area. During 1971-75, 8.9 million tons were put into operation at the expense of the state, collective farms and the population. m 2 total (usable) area.

Cultural building. According to the 1897 census, literates accounted for 23.6% of the population, including 29.1% among men and 17.1% among women. In 1914/15 school. There were 1765 general education schools of all kinds (157 thousand students) and 5 secondary specialized educational institutions. After the establishment of Soviet power, a new school was created with teaching in mother tongue. By 1939 the literacy of the population had risen to 89.3%; according to the 1970 census, it reached 99.9%.

In 1975 in permanent preschool institutions 143 thousand children were brought up.

In 1975/76 school. 1 million students studied in 4.4 thousand general education schools of all types, 41.5 thousand students studied in 88 vocational schools (including 39 vocational schools providing secondary education, - 18.5 thousand students), in 97 secondary specialized educational institutions - 49.4 thousand students, in 19 universities - 82.8 thousand students. The largest universities: Tbilisi University, Georgian Polytechnic Institute, Georgian Agricultural Institute, Conservatory, Academy of Arts, Pedagogical Institute.

In 1975, there were 802 people per 1,000 people employed in the national economy. with higher and secondary (complete or incomplete) education (in 1939 - 163 people).

The leading scientific institution is the Academy of Sciences of the Georgian SSR. In 1975 there were 25,000 scientific workers in the republic.

The network of cultural institutions has received significant development.

In 1975 there were 23 musical and drama theatres, including the Georgian Opera and Ballet Theatre. Z. P. Paliashvili, Drama Theatre. Shota Rustaveli, Drama Theatre. L. Meskhishvili, Drama Theatre. K. A. Mardzhanishvili; 2 thousand stationary film installations; over 2 thousand clubs. The largest libraries are the State Library of the Georgian SSR named after V.I. K. Marx (founded in 1923, in 1975 there were 5603 thousand copies of books, brochures, magazines, etc.), Central scientific Library Academy of Sciences of the Georgian SSR (2.4 million copies of books, pamphlets, and journals); in 1975 there were 3,858 public libraries (25,696,000 copies of books and journals); 81 museums.

In 1975, 1,964 book titles and pamphlets were published with a circulation of 15.6 million copies. (1639 titles with a circulation of 5618 thousand copies in 1940). Books are published in Georgian, Russian, Azerbaijani, Abkhaz, Ossetian, as well as in foreign languages

133 journal editions were issued with an annual circulation of 30.0 million copies, including 84 editions on Georgian language with a circulation of 25.2 million copies. (77 editions with an annual circulation of 1.7 million copies in 1940). 141 newspapers were published with an annual circulation of 678 million copies. The Georgian Telegraph Agency (GruzTAG, since 1972 - Gruzinform) has been operating since 1936. The Book Chamber was founded in 1924. Regular radio broadcasting began in 1927. Broadcasts are in Georgian, Russian, Azerbaijani, and Armenian; television broadcasts - since 1956 in Georgian and Russian. Telecentre in Tbilisi.

In 1975 there were 500 hospitals in the republic with 48,000 beds (314 hospitals with 13,300 beds in 1940); 20.4 thousand doctors and 49.9 thousand paramedical personnel worked (4.9 thousand doctors and 9.4 thousand paramedical personnel in 1940). Balneological and climatic resorts are popular: Bakuriani, Borjomi, Gagra, New Athos, Pitsunda, Sukhumi, Tskaltubo and etc.

Abkhaz ASSR

The Abkhaz ASSR (Abkhazia) was formed on March 4, 1921. It is located in the northwest. Transcaucasia. To the south-west washed by the Black Sea. Area 8.6 thousand sq. km 2. Population 500 thousand people. (as of January 1, 1976). National composition (according to the 1970 census, thousand people): Abkhazians 77, Georgians 200, Russians 93, Armenians 75, Greeks 13, etc. The average population density is 58.1 people. for 1 km 2(as of January 1, 1976). The capital is the city of Sukhumi (118 thousand inhabitants as of January 1, 1976).

In 1975 the volume of industrial output exceeded the level of 1940 by 8.8 times. Coal is mined. An important role is played by the branches of processing agricultural raw materials - tea, tobacco and shag, canning, wine-making. There are enterprises of machine-building, leather and footwear, woodworking and building materials industries. In 1975 there were 38 state farms and 103 collective farms. Agriculture mainly specializes in the cultivation of tea, tobacco, citrus, tung, essential oil crops. Viticulture and fruit growing, including subtropical, are developed. In 1975, the collection of varietal tea leaves - 63 thousand tons. t. The sown area of ​​all agricultural crops is 42 thousand ha. ha(1975); sow cereals, vegetables, gourds and tobacco. Animal husbandry is mainly dairy and dairy-meat; developed poultry farming. Livestock (as of January 1, 1976, thousand): cattle 141, sheep and goats 28, pigs 75. The main seaport is Sukhumi.

In 1975/76 school. in 416 general education schools 103.1 thousand students of all types studied (in 1914/15 academic year in 156 schools - 8.7 thousand), in 6 secondary specialized educational institutions - 2.9 thousand students, at the Institute of Subtropical Economy and the Pedagogical Institute (both in Sukhumi) - 6.2 thousand students (before the October Revolution, there were no secondary specialized and higher educational institutions).

In 1974, there were 783 people per 1,000 people employed in the national economy. with higher and secondary (complete and incomplete) education.

Among the scientific institutions are the Institute of Experimental Pathology and Therapy (with a monkey nursery), the Abkhaz branch of the Scientific Research Institute of Balneology and Physiotherapy.

In 1975, industrial output exceeded the 1940 level by 4.2 times. Main industries: oil refining, engineering, food. In 1975 there were 18 state farms and 92 collective farms in the Adjara ASSR. 70% of the area of ​​perennial plantations is occupied by subtropical crops, cultivated mainly in the coastal strip. The main ones are tea and citrus fruits. In 1975, the collection of varietal tea leaves amounted to 48.2 thousand tons. t. Subtropical fruits, tung, laurel, eucalyptus, and bamboo are also common. The sown area of ​​all agricultural crops is 13.4 thousand ha. ha(1975); they sow cereals, tobacco, potatoes and vegetables and gourds. Sheep and goats are reared (11,000 as of January 1, 1976), and cattle (116,000). The main seaport is Batumi.

In 1975/76 school. 75.9 thousand students studied in 434 general education schools of all types (in 1921/22 academic year, 10.1 thousand students studied in general education schools), more than 2 thousand students studied in 3 vocational schools, in 8 secondary specialized educational institutions - 3.3 thousand students, in the Pedagogical Institute. Sh. Rustaveli (in Batumi) - 2.4 thousand students (before the October Revolution there were no secondary specialized and higher educational institutions). There were 798 people per 1,000 people employed in the national economy in 1975. with higher and secondary (complete and incomplete) education. Among the scientific institutions is the Batumi Research Institute of the Academy of Sciences of the Georgian SSR. In 1975 there were: 1 theatre, 276 public libraries, 2 museums, 183 club institutions, 212 stationary film installations.

In 1975, 1,100 doctors worked, that is, 1 doctor per 323 inhabitants. (270 doctors, i.e. 1 doctor per 774 inhabitants, in 1940); there were 3.7 thousand hospital beds (0.9 thousand beds in 1940).

The Adzharian ASSR was awarded the Order of Lenin (1967), the Order of the October Revolution (1971) and the Order of Friendship of Peoples (1972).

South Ossetian Autonomous Region

The South Ossetian Autonomous Okrug (South Ossetia) was formed on April 20, 1922. It is located on the southern slopes of the Greater Caucasus. Area 3.9 thousand sq. km 2. Population 103 thousand people. (as of January 1, 1976). The average population density is 26.3 people. for 1 km 2. Center - Tskhinvali.

In 1975, industrial output exceeded the 1940 level by 27 times. Mining (extraction of polymetallic ores), forestry and woodworking, machine-building, food industry and production of building materials are developed. In 1975 there were 11 state farms and 20 collective farms. The sown area of ​​all agricultural crops in 1975 amounted to 22.2 thousand ha. ha. Cereals (wheat, corn, barley), sugar beets and vegetables are cultivated. Fruit growing and viticulture are developed. An important branch of agriculture is animal husbandry. Sheep and goats are bred (139.6 thousand heads as of January 1, 1976), cattle (67.7 thousand).

In 1975/76 school. in 214 general education schools of all types, 24.3 thousand students studied, in 1 vocational school - 210 students, in 4 secondary specialized educational institutions - 0.6 thousand students, in the pedagogical institute in Tskhinvali - 2.3 thousand students.

In 1975 there were 1 theatre, 163 public libraries, a museum, 89 club institutions, and 66 stationary film installations.

In 1975, there were 0,300 doctors, i.e., 1 doctor per 308 inhabitants, and there were 1,100 hospital beds. Jasa resort.

The South Ossetian Autonomous Okrug was awarded the Order of Lenin (1967) and the Order of Friendship of Peoples (1972).