#China-Kazakhstan relations

[just-a-ghost00]

Your next significant relationship - Who? When? Where?

Group 1 - Controler

Letters : N U Z E D M L K I O S Significant words/names/signs : SKZ, nudes, suki, soul, miso, sun, zen, Leo, kids, Nike, Mike, lion, Leon, noise, sound, Link, links, Dion, Zeus, Odin, Oden, onze (french for 11), douze (french for 12), uno, dos/due, dom, Muse, likes, silk, sold, DMs, solid, kudos, doki, slime, smile, Milo, miko

WHO ? - The Empress / STRENGTH / Herkimer diamond : power wash your energy This person is not what they seem. They may look harsh on the surface but deep down they are as fragile as Quartz. People may only judge them based on their looks and not who they are at there core. They are beautiful without a doubt. Extremely sensual and feminine. Their beauty feels ethereal. They are highly sensitive and spiritual. They could be a healer. The Herkimer diamond card mentions New York's Mohawk Valley where it can be found. So maybe this person is a New Yorker or they would like to travel to New York. With the strength card being related to fire, this person could have important fire placements in their chart (Leo, Sagittarius, Aries). They are powerful and determined. They know what they want and they won't back down no matter what you put them through. Though this person is affected by what people think of them, they would rather die than show it. They could have red hair. Their hair is rather long and straight. They like to wear bracelets. They are connected to the stars. They are grounded and protected by the universe. The Empress is also assiocated with Taurus. They present themselves as a woman. They feel close to their ancestors. It might be that there were warriors in their bloodline. Especially women. Their women ancestors were fierce in battle and they like to take after them and ask for their guidance. I'm feeling a strong connection to witches and shamans.

WHERE ? - 9 of swords / UNDERWORLD / Barite : get answers to your biggest questions. Places this person could be from or have been to at some point are : USA -> Nevada, Misouri, Georgia, Texas / China / India / Morocco / Mexico / Iran / Kazakhstan / Canada / Australia / Thailand / Nigeria / Peru / UK -> Scotland The 9 of swords card shows imagery of a woman lying down in the snow, with mountains in the background. So this person could live in a cold climate country/region. I'm thinking of the Alps, Himalaya, Caucasus, Alaska range. I'm thinking about Sweden, Denmark, Netherlands, Russia, Groenland, Iceland. Any city starting with a U or a B. Furthermore the character on the card has a dress with an important amount of stars on it, which reminded me of the European Union flag. In terms of the meeting, it could be through social media. The underworld card gives me a sense of mystery, of something being hidden. So it could be the dark web for some. Or on a website that keeps things hidden from people (i.e. content available only for subscribers or a private account). Also you could meet them in your dreams before you meet in 3D. Also, the underworld could be a metaphor for rave parties, clubs and so on. They could live or you could meet near an important building or monument.

WHEN ? - XXI The World / NATURE / Labradorite : protect your magic. The labradorite card mentions Aurora Borealis and the sign of Pisces. So Winter could be relevant, as well as the period from mid February to mid March. The number 21 could be relevent. So if we think in terms of dates it could be 02.21 or 03.21. The World speaks of cycles as well as the long term. So it could represent several years in terms of timing. When it comes to zodiac signs, The World is related to fixed signs. So Taurus, Leo, Scorpio and Aquarius season could be relevant as well. Which means that you could meet them between mid April to mid May, mid July to mid August, mid October to mid November or mid January to mid February. The World could also represent a time of your life when you are traveling abroad. Again, the character depicted on the card has a lot of stars in their hair. So I'm thinking of the USA as well as the EU. As she is dressed in red, holds red roses and has horns on her head, I'm also being reminded of Spain. The nature card could talk about a time of your life when you are in the wild, connecting with nature, taking a break from the drama of big city life.

Group 2 - Phone

Letters : T E N N U L N O R I S Significant words/names/signs : tennis, Noris, Noe, Noel, runs, Euro, sun, tenor, soul, norns, nine, tunes, Sonne (Rammstein song), Uriel, notes, nuns, trio, route, routines, Riolu (pokémon name), Loire (region in France), Lorie, LOTR, rise, sonnet, soir (french word for evening), nuit (french for night), riots, Lise, lotus

WHO? - IV The Emporor / Sacred Sexuality / Sapphire : find your tranquil place. This person is very masculine and grounded. They could be a father and/or a leader, a mentor, an entrepreneur. The sign of Aries could be significant. They are incredibly determined and strong. Their sexual drive is high. They pay a lot of attention to their health and appearance. They have a lot of sex appeal. This person could be in the fashion industry or could even be that they get money from people watching their body (selling pictures of them, having access to private erotic content). They could have a bit of a bad temper. Piercings also seem significant. On the sacred sexuality card, there’s a full moon and roses. This tell me this person is a romantic and is more of a night owl. They have an important status. We’re talking about company owners, freelance artists, lawyers, head officers, doctors, headmasters of big schools, politicians and so on.

WHERE? - 6 of swords / MOVEMENT / Garnet : get into your depth. -> places they could be from or have gone to : Czekoslovakia, Kenya, Madagascar, India. The 6 of swords depicts a beautiful woman rowing a boat on a lake. Behind her is a white mountain. In her boat are two herons. So Africa seems significant, particularly Tanzania where Kilimandjaro can be found. I’m also thinking of the Mt Fuji in Japan, in Yamanashi. This person lives near an important body of water. Or you might meet them there. Another thing that is significant is movement. So you could meet them where you’re going on a trip, as you travel or relocate. You could meet them on a boat. Anyplace you want to create something (art, music, writing and so on). When looking at « get into your depth » this gives me the feeling you could meet this person in the 5D before meeting them in person, like through dreams or meditation.

WHEN? Queen of wands and VI The Lovers - DARE TO DREAM - Citrine : manifest your masterpiece. First of all I have to say, when I was shuffling the cards for the WHEN? the bells of the nearby Church started ringing. So this tells me when you're going to Church either for communion or for a wedding. Summer is significant, especially from mid June to mid July. I would even say the month of June is the most significant of the two. When you go after your dreams, you will meet this person. On the DARE TO DREAM card, you can see a diamond trapped in an eagle's claw. For some reasons it reminded me of metal and rock bands, of concerts and big events like the Superbowl. So maybe one of your dreams is to go watch your favorite band/artist live or to go to Hellfest or any big convention that is happening in Summer. If there are any French people here, I'm thinking of the Olympics happening this Summer in Paris. And also the Japan Expo convention. In terms of timing, I’d say in a few months.

Group 3 - Mirror

First of all I want to say my coffee spilled as I did your reading. So either you or this person is super clumsy and/or coffee is significant in your relationship. Letters : E L I C O O E U J I A Y

Words/names/signs : Jay, Jey, Joy, Jolie, Julia, Julie, Jule, July, Lucy, cool, jail, Luc, Loïc, Alice, ciel (French for Sky), clue, juice, école (French for school), eco , CEO, Lucie, Lucia, Cloe

WHO? - XVII The Star / Ancestors / Obsidian : protect your soul. Aquarius comes in strongly for this reading. This person is an introvert. They are often seen as a daydreamer, someone that doesn’t care about earthly life. They look like their head is in the stars. Which, in some way is true. This person connects strongly with the Ethers. Social media seems to be important. They could be an influencer or have a certain amount of followers that they help. Think of tarot readings, raising awareness about certain subjects (mental health, disabilities, menstrual cycle, sexuality and so on). This person could be famous in some type of way or they are going to be at some point in their life. Overall they have a good reputation among their peers. They are valued for their work ethic and their deep insights. They are divinely protected. Family business comes to mind. They care about family a lot, especially the deceased ones. This person would be the type to seek out advice from their ancestors or try to honor them as much as they can. Scorpio is also a sign that seems relevant. I don’t know why but I thought of a surgeon. So maybe they have undergone an important surgery. Or they are very sharp. Because I definitely don’t feel this person is a surgeon. Well it could be, but honestly I feel more the energy of influencers and public speakers, like ambassadors of NGOs and stuff like that. Soft and caring, they feel and look rather feminine. Giving more than receiving. They love animals. They draw a lot of attention just from their presence. I think their aura is pretty strong and vibrant. Connected to nature, especially trees and plants.

WHERE? - 7 of pentacles / movement / Herkimer diamond You could meet at work, as you’re changing jobs or they are. During a break at work while you’re printing/scanning papers. In sacred spaces. New York. Somewhere in a lot of greenery like a park or a farm. As for places they could come from or have been to, we have : Norway, Ukraine, Arizona, China, Afghanistan, Herkimer county. If not these places, there could be farms where this person lives. Also they live in a place where there is a lot of activity, especially work wise. So this makes me think of hot spots like La Défense in Paris where a lot of businesses and political administrations can be found. Other places like that would be : Midtown New York, La City London, Marunouchi Tokyo, The Loop Chicago, Bankenviertel Frankfurt, Zuidas Amsterdam, Gangnam Seoul and so on.

WHEN? - 4 of swords / Death / Aquamarine : Keep your cool. You could meet on the fourth of a month, in April. At a time when you’ve lost your voice or when you are going Hermit mode, when you are sick or when you are mourning a loss. During a period of depression. During Scorpio season. In several weeks. Also it could be when someone or something pushes your buttons but you can’t express your frustration somehow. That could be anything really. Like queueing for registration in a building and someone is trying to take your spot. Or shopping at the mall and a customer is being super rude but since there are children around you can’t fully tell this person what you think of their attitude. Stuff like that.

[guzhufuren]

same ty for championing queer shows from countries where it's more difficult to get it produced or with negative societal pressure. I adore your blog and the lil community of rebloggers bc it's such a friendly welcoming intelligent space

着着你门

it's cause i was born and live in an asian country that hasn't been welcoming or accepting of queer people in over 9 centuries and is only getting slowly worse 😭😭 before that (and during that time too) there aren't even any easily attainable records of queerness in Kazakhstan. so i relate a lot to how hard it is for some other countries to push through and their art to be visible and heard

to be fair though, even in countries that consistently make qls it's not that easy for ql creators in the industry either. for now only Taiwan and soon Thailand have same sex marriage (and anti discrimination protection laws is a whole other thing). for example South Korea is pulling bullshit, like Love for Love's Sake almost became a censored adaptation for "queer being an unprofitable genre" reasons, High School Return of a Gangster did become a censored adaptation that erased all queerness from the source and named those same exact reasons, Taevin and Joowan's wedding photoshoot was taken down from a korean mall's billboards because of homophobic authorities. lgbtq rights need to be fought for everywhere. i just see that qls from other countries get enough traffic and want to boost China's too

talking about Kazakhstan, i was just describing in a conversation with sweetheart @vegasandhishedgehog how much i would love a period kazakh bl (it will not happen in my lifetime). two guys, nomads, living in a yurt under mountains for their winter halt location, riding horses and shepherding their sheep at day, warming each other's bodies at night. would fight gods to see this with my eyes

thank you so much for sending this sweet message bun i appreciate knowing this so much 😖💕🌸

[talonabraxas]

Shirdal 'Lion-Eagle' Talon Abraxas

Ancient origins of the griffin

A legendary creature with the body, tail, and back legs of a lion, the head and wings of an eagle, and, sometimes, an eagle's talons as its front feet first appears in ancient Iranian and Egyptian art dating back to before 3000 BCE. In Egypt, a griffin-like animal can be seen on a cosmetic palette from Hierakonpolis, known as the "Two Dog Palette", dated to 3300–3100 BCE. The divine storm-bird, Anzu, half man and half bird, associated with the chief sky god Enlil was revered by the ancient Sumerians and Akkadians. The Lamassu, a similar hybrid deity depicted with the body of a bull or lion, eagle's wings, and a human head, was a common guardian figure in Assyrian palaces.

In Iranian mythology, the griffin is called Shirdal, which means "Lion-Eagle." Shirdals appeared on cylinder seals from Susa as early as 3000 BCE. Shirdals also are common motifs in the art of Luristan, the North and North West region of Iran in the Iron Age, and Achaemenid art. The 15th century BCE frescoes in the Throne Room of the Bronze Age Palace of Knossos are among the earliest depictions of the mythical creatures in ancient Greek art. In Central Asia, the griffin image was later included in Scythian "animal style" artifacts of the 6th–4th centuries BCE.

In his Histories, Herodotus relates travelers' reports of a land in the northeast where griffins guard gold and where the North Wind issues from a mountain cave. Scholars have speculated that this location may be referring to the Dzungarian Gate, a mountain pass between China and Central Asia. Some modern scholars including Adrienne Mayor have theorized that the legend of the griffin was derived from numerous fossilized remains of Protoceratops found in conjunction with gold mining in the mountains of Scythia, present day eastern Kazakhstan. Recent linguistic and archaeological studies confirm that Greek and Roman trade with Saka-Scythian nomads flourished in that region from the 7th century BCE, when the semi-legendary Greek poet Aristeas wrote of his travels in the far north, to about 300 CE when Aelian reported details about the griffin - exactly the period during which griffins were most prominently featured in Greco-Roman art and literature. Mayor argues that over-repeated retelling and drawing or recopying its bony neck frill (which is rather fragile and may have been frequently broken or entirely weathered away) may have been thought to be large mammal-type external ears, and its beak treated as evidence of a part-bird nature that lead to bird-type wings being added. Others argue fragments of the neck frill may have been mistook for remnants of wings.

Lucius Flavius Philostratus (170 – 247/250 CE), a Greek sophist who lived during the reign of the Roman emperor Philip the Arab, in his "Life of Apollonius of Tyana" also writes about griffins that quarried gold because of the strength of their beak. He describes them as having the strength to overcome lions, elephants, and even dragons, although he notes they had no great power of flying long distances because their wings were not attached the same way as birds. He also described their feet webbed with red membranes. Philostratus says the creatures were found in India and venerated there as sacred to the sun. He observed that griffins were often drawn by Indian artists as yoked four abreast to represent the sun.

[itstokkii]

finally, some aph uzb headcanons

i realize i've done some korea, amekor, and turkuzbek hcs but i've never actually done one of my blorbo uzbekistan. so thats changing right now

- she's of average uzbek woman height(167cm) and her hair is that shade of brown that looks almost black, but when the sunlight hits just right it looks like a faint shade of auburn. you know, that kind of hair shade.

- her name is "nargiza" which translates to "narcissus flower" or "daffodil." her close friends and family(and turkey too ig 🙄) call her nargiz for short.

- her hobbies are embroidery and quiltmaking with tajikistan, trying out new desserts to bake, reading, gossiping, piano playing and knitting(she picked up both from russia), drinking hot black tea in even hotter weather(she's a tea elitist and Will Not Consider iced tea to be part of the tea category)

- best cook. she's the best cook out of the central asians and they always try to have her cook dinner("it just hits different when you cook food for us apa")

- she has a resting scary/angry face. she looks like she's about to kill someone. but when you ask her a question she'll immediately smile and won't hesitate to help you in whatever way she can.

- has the best relationship with kazakhstan and tajikistan. though sometimes she has a habit of babying kazakhstan as an older sister. old habits from the uzbek khanate die hard i guess...

- has a weird relationship with uyghurstan, and they have a few very awkward phone calls per year. if you heard the minutes of silence sandwiched in between their conversations you'd experience second hand embarrassment.

- her relations with iran are interesting. she adopted persian as the official and court language of the bukharan khanate. but she's also tried to take parts of iran's land a few times. for a while iran even exerted control over the bukharan khanate for a few years by persian ruler nader shah until he died. there's been a lot of cultural exchange from iran to uzbekistan historically, and uzbekistan is also considered a part of the greater iran region(maybe i should give her the ahoge...). nowruz, for example, is a holiday that came from persia and is celebrated in the central asian countries, especially tajikistan and uzbekistan.

- she...doesn't like russia. not at all. it's one of the few things she and kyrgyzstan both agree on, and they've both fantasized about throwing themselves at him like rabid dogs for a while(kyrgyzstan was more serious about it, and uzbekistan had to stop him) but after her independence she had to suck up to him due to her economic reliance on him. recently, though, she's been moving away from russia in favor of spotting economic opportunities within uzbekistan that will help with self-growth(and also reaching out to turkey and china for mutual trading)

- she's not the most developed nation out there, but is still very prissy about her overall appearance. she knows how to clean up. don't even get me started on the things she wears to weddings. she isn't worried about competition because she IS the competition.

- at home, she'll wear the usual stuff you'd see an uzbek mom wear, a matching dress and pants cut from atlas fabric. she'll have a small scarf wrapped around her hair to pull it back, and has her hair up in a ponytail, bun, or braids.

- when she's out, she wears perfectly coordinated outfits every single time, hair and makeup perfectly done.

- dont be fooled though. she Will wear the definitely fake chanel sweaters and slippers with pride.

- she fake smiles a lot and tries to stop her habit of having a resting scary face. even though that's her default, she's gotten a lot of flack from old ladies throughout the centuries for it.

- generally, she's not a super expressive, bubbly person(that's her sister tajikistan). she's fine with small talk(and DEFINITELY gossiping) but depending on who it is and whether they're in her social circle or not, she'll either enjoy it or hate every agonizing second of it. When you ask about her house though, she'll tell you everything with a certain sparkle in her eyes.

- if you want her to go through all 44 feelings at once and watch her freak out and overheat like an old gaming PC just bring up turkey i guess

- to get into her social circle takes a lot of time and a lot of waiting for her to open up and talk about personal things. Think maybe...20 years at the very least.

- leading into the other headcanon of her being a little insecure. throughout the years, the uber-collectivist society of uzbekistan caused her to become more and more hyperaware of her actions and how others will think about them. the one exception is that she can't hide her disappointment.

- her predecessors are the khwarazmian empire and timurid empire. she barely knew the khwarazmian empire as uzbekistan was born as one of the few tribes to emerge after khwarazmi was engulfed by the mongols.

- she was old enough to remember timurid, however. he was like her older brother, albeit one with...skewed moral values. he'd always insist that this was all to rekindle the empire that the great genghis khan left behind, and to spread islam as a religion.

"besides," he'd add, "isn't samarqand looking absolutely beautiful lately?"

"yes, because you kidnapped the best artisans and craftsmen after looting their cities." she deadpanned.

- she was quite surprised(and impressed, by a sliver) when her brother managed to successfully siege ankara and cause a civil war in the ottoman empire. she knew timurid was growing, but she had no idea he got this strong. it almost didn't seem surprising when he announced his plans to go after china, before he died(and then respawned as the mughal empire, but that's another story.)

- "russia when i catch you russia" - uzbekistan since the 1870s

- she has a house in tashkent and bukhara, but mostly lives in tashkent now that it's the capital. since she's literally the center of central asia and borders everyone including afghanistan, they all stay at her house when traveling(turkey is stuck at a hotel whenever he visits tho...)

- her spice tolerance? dont even ask. its not there. completely gone. give her a little heinz chili sauce and she's scrambling to find water.

- once korea took her out on a date to a korean restaurant. one bite of the kimchi and it was over for her

- if you ever come over to her house, she'll spoil you with food and gifts. there will be a drama series playing on her tv as you two chat for hours. when you leave expect it to be about 8 hours after you arrived and for the walk home to be extremely heavy as she gives you 3 bags full of gifts and dried fruits and desserts.

[blueiscoool]

Bronze Age Girl Buried With More Than 150 Sheep Ankle Bones Found in Kazakhstan

Archaeologists in eastern Kazakhstan have unearthed a Bronze Age burial mound of a girl surrounded by various grave goods in the Ainabulak-Temirsu Necropolis.

The young girl was laid to rest with a number of peculiar grave goods, including 180 animal ankle bones and a small, exquisite silver accessory depicting a frog on a disc.

The excavations are carried out together with experts from the University of Cambridge and under the direction of Rinat Zhumatayev, Head of Al-Farabi Kazakh National University (KazNU) Archaeology, Ethnology, and Muzology Department. The ongoing excavations have gained momentum since 2016 when the journey to explore the region’s historical treasures commenced in the Zaisan district, spearheaded by Abdesh Toleubaev.

According to The Astana Times, an English-language news outlet in Kazakhstan, the girl’s grave is located near Ainabulak village in the east of the country and dates from Central Asia’s Bronze Age, which lasted from roughly 3200 B.C.E. until 1000 B.C.E.

Rinat Zhumatayev, an archaeologist who led the excavation and heads the Department of Archaeology, Ethnology and Museology at Al-Farabi Kazakh National University in Kazakhstan, said: “She was buried on her left side, bent over. Small wire earrings were in both ears and beads around her neck.”

The frog-adorned artifact carries immense significance. Scholars associate the frog motif with water-related rituals found in China and Egypt, adding an intriguing layer to the ongoing research. According to the researchers, this is the first example discovered in Kazakhstan and may be associated with the image of a woman in labour and the cult of water.

The sheer volume of animal bone fragments buried in the burial mound also piqued researchers’ interest. The number of bones buried with this person was extravagant compared to other graves on the Eurasian steppe that contained animal remains, frequently in child and adolescent burials.

Some scientists think that the burial of astragalus bones was part of a “cult practice” and that the bones were used during meditation. However, other researchers view the bones as “symbols of well-being” and “good luck” that served as a “wish for a successful transition from [one] world to others,” Zhumatayev said.

“Our exploration is far from over. By the year’s end, we anticipate unveiling our findings and publishing a comprehensive scientific article,” shared Rinat Zhumatayev.

By Leman Altuntaş.

[mariacallous]

In the waters of the South China Sea, Chinese coast guard vessels have clashed with Philippine ships. In the air above the Taiwan Strait, Chinese warplanes have challenged Taiwanese jet fighters. And in the valleys of the Himalayas, Chinese troops have fought Indian soldiers.

Across several frontiers, China has been using its armed forces to dispute territory not internationally recognized as part of China but nevertheless claimed by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).

In August 2023, Beijing laid out its current territorial claims for the world to see. The new edition of the standard map of China includes lands that are today a part of India and Russia, along with island territories such as Taiwan and comprehensive stretches of the East and South China Seas that are also claimed by Brunei, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Vietnam.

China often invokes historical narratives to justify these claims. Beijing, for example, has said that the Japanese-administered Senkaku Islands, which it claims under the name of the Diaoyu Islands, “have been an inherent territory of China since ancient times.” Chinese officials have used the same words to back China’s right to parts of the northeastern Indian state of Arunachal Pradesh. The Chinese government also claims that its sovereignty over the South China Sea is based on its own historic maritime maps.

However, in certain periods since ancient times China has also held sway over other states in the region—Mongolia, North Korea, South Korea, and Vietnam. Yet Beijing is currently not laying claim to any of these.

Instead, Beijing has embraced a selective irredentism, wielding specific chapters of China’s historical record when they suit existing aims and leaving former Chinese territories be when they don’t. Over time, as Beijing’s interests and power relations have shifted, some of these claims have faded from importance, while new ones have taken their place. Yet for Taiwan, Chinese claims remain unchanged, as the fate of the island state is tied to the very legitimacy of the CCP as well as the vitality of Chinese President Xi Jinping’s political vision.

Many of the CCP’s territorial claims have roots in the 19th and 20th centuries during the late rule of the Qing Dynasty. Following diplomatic pressure and repeated military defeats, the Qing Dynasty was forced to cede territory to several Western colonial powers, as well as the Russian and Japanese empires. These concessions are part of what are known in China as the “unequal treaties,” while the 100 years in which the treaties were signed and enforced are known as the “century of humiliation.” These territorial losses eventually passed from the dynasty to the Republic of China and then, following the Chinese Civil War, to the CCP. As a result, upon the CCP’s establishment of the People’s Republic of China in 1949, the new Chinese state inherited outstanding territorial disputes with most of its neighbors.

But despite the humiliation the Qing Dynasty’s losses had caused, the CCP proved willing to compromise and reduce its territorial aims during times of high internal unrest. Following the Tibetan uprising in 1959, for instance, the CCP negotiated territorial settlements with countries bordering the Tibet region, including Myanmar, Nepal, and India. Similarly, when unrest rocked the Uyghur region in the 1960s and ‘90s, Beijing pursued territorial compromises with several bordering countries such as Afghanistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan. In the aftermath of the Great Leap Forward in the early 1960s and the 1989 Tiananmen Square Massacre, the CCP also pursued territorial settlements with Mongolia, Laos, and Vietnam in the hopes of securing China’s borders during times of domestic instability. Instead of pursuing diversionary wars, the CCP relied on diplomacy to settle border and territory disputes.

But China has changed quite a lot since then. In recent years, the CCP has avoided the inflammatory domestic political chaos of previous decades, and its once-tentative hold over border regions, such as Tibet and the Uyghur region, has been replaced by an iron grip. With this upper hand, the CCP has little incentive to pursue peaceful resolutions to remaining territorial disputes.

“China’s national power has increased significantly, reducing the benefits of compromise and enabling China to drive a much harder bargain,” said M. Taylor Fravel, a political science professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

In this context, the CCP has expanded its irredentist ambitions. After the discovery of potential oil reserves around the Senkaku Islands, and the United States’ return of the islands to Japan in the 1970s, Beijing drew on its historical record to lay claim to the islands, even though it had previously referred to them as part of the Japanese Ryukyu Islands. Similarly, though Beijing and Moscow settled a dispute over Heixiazi Island, located along China’s northeastern border, in 2004, the 2023 map of China depicted the entire island (ceded, along with vast Pacific territories, by the Qing Dynasty to the Russian Empire in 1860) as part of its domain, much to the ire of the Russian Foreign Ministry.

Collin Koh Swee Lean, a senior fellow with the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies at the Nanyang Technological University in Singapore, argues that the Chinese mapping of Heixiazi Island shows that Beijing holds on to certain core interests and simply waits for the opportune time to assert them.

“Given the current context of the war in Ukraine and Russia’s increased dependence on China, it might have appeared to Beijing that it has the chips in its pockets because, after all, Moscow needs Beijing more than the other way around,” Koh said on the German Marshall Fund’s China Global podcast.

This raises the question of whether territorial disputes that were settled during times of CCP weakness can be revisited and become subject to irredentist ambitions should power balances shift in China’s favor.

According to Steve Tsang, the director of the China Institute at the University of London’s School of Oriental and African Studies, there is currently a limit to how far the CCP will push territorial claims against Russia, since President Xi will need Russian support to sustain his grand ambitions for Chinese leadership on the global stage.

Although it would be a long shot, even Russia may not be safe from these ambitions indefinitely. Given that large swaths of Russia’s Pacific territories were part of China until 1860, “China could claim back the Russian Far East when it deems the time is right,” Tsang said. Such control would grant Beijing unrestricted access to the region’s abundance of coal, timber, tin, and gold while moving it geographically closer to its ambition of becoming an Arctic power.

While there is plenty of historical evidence pointing to former Chinese control over the southeastern portion of the Russian Far East, the historical record is less unequivocal about Chinese control over Taiwan. Anything resembling mainland Chinese control over Taiwan was not established until after 1684 by the Qing Dynasty, and even then central authority remained weak. In 1895, the Qing Dynasty ceded Taiwan to the Empire of Japan following the First Sino-Japanese War, and by the time Chinese authority was restored in 1945, Taiwan had undergone several decades of Japanization.

These details have not prevented the CCP from claiming that Taiwan has been an inalienable part of China since ancient times. Yet more than any other irredentist claim, Xi has made unification with Taiwan a major component of his vision to rejuvenate the Chinese nation.

Unification, however, has little to do with ancient history and more to do with the challenge that Taiwan presently poses to Xi’s aims, according to Chong Ja Ian, an associate professor who teaches about Chinese foreign policy at the National University of Singapore.

“The CCP pursues a Chinese nationalism that emphasizes unity and homogeneity centered around the CCP leadership while they also often claim that their single-party rule is acceptable to Chinese people,” Chong said.

In contrast, Taiwan holds free elections in which multiple political parties compete for the favor of a people that have increasingly developed an identity distinct from mainland China.

“The Taiwanese experience is a clear affront to the CCP narrative,” Chong said.

Control over Taiwan is also attractive to Beijing because it is key to unlocking the Chinese leadership’s broader ambition of maritime hegemony in waters where almost half of the world’s container fleet passed through in 2022.

As with the case of Taiwan, the CCP’s historical arguments regarding its claims on island groups and islets in the East and South China Seas are likewise much weaker than many of its land-based claims.

Instead, Chinese territorial intransigence in the maritime arena is more about a strategic shift in the value of the seas around China, Fravel said.

Today, it has been estimated that more than 21 percent of global trade passes through the South China Sea. And beneath these waters are not only subsea cables that carry sensitive internet data but also vast estimated reserves of oil and natural gas.

Although it may say otherwise, Beijing’s unwillingness to let up on its tenuous territorial maritime claims suggests that China is pursuing long-held ambitions and global aspirations rather than attempting to reverse past losses. So long as the CCP wields its historical record selectively and changeably to serve its aims—and is willing to back its claims up with military action—China’s neighbors will remain at risk.

[roseoftrafalgar]

Happy International Snow Leopard Day! ❄️ Ft. Law helping a snow leopard cub with a minor arm injury.

-> for some snow leopard facts, click the readmore!

Snow leopards are sometimes referred to “ghosts of the mountains” for their elusiveness and solitary nature.

They are found in the icy mountainous regions of Central Asia (i.e Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, etc.), South Asia (i.e. Nepal, Bhutan, Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, etc.), Russia, Mongolia, and China.

In northern Dolpo Nepalese folklore, it is sometimes believed that snow leopards carry the sins of their past lives & whoever kills them “inherits” their sins.

Often opportunistic hunters and less aggressive compared to other big cats when it comes to hunting their prey, as they will retreat from a kill if another predator threatens them. However, they are able to kill prey 3 times their own weight.

They’re more related to tigers than leopards.

They can jump 6 times their body length.

They typically have blue, green, or grey eyes & can see 6 times better than humans.

Their short nasal cavity warms the air they inhale before entering their lungs.

Their tails can serve as scarves & they sometimes like to nom on them.

-> Visit Snow Leopard Trust to learn more about snow leopards & conservation efforts, as there is less than around 10,000 in the wild!

[brookstonalmanac]

Holidays 4.15

Holidays

Anime Day

Anniversary of Tarija (Bolivia)

AR-15 Day

Ariadne Asteroid Day

ASL Day (American Sign Language Day)

Banyan Tree Day (Lahaina, Maui, Hawaii)

Bija Mangala (Field Cultivation Festival)

Buck Rogers Day

Children’s Day (Spain)

Criminal Investigation Department Employees Day (Ukraine)

Da Vinci Day

Day of Love (Georgia)

Day of People (Aysellant)

Day of Radio-Electronic Fight Troops (Russia)

Day of the Sun (North Korea)

Father Damien Day (Hawaii)

Fluff Appreciation Day

415 Day

Freak Out Day

Gallaudet Day

Good Roads Day (Illinois)

Great Stichwort

Hardware Freedom Day

Hillsborough Disaster Memorial Day (Liverpool, UK)

Himachal Day (India)

Historical City Day (Malacca)

Hug Your Boiler Day

Income Tax Pay Day

International Biomedical Laboratory Science Day

International Pompe Day

Ivory Soap Day

Jackie Robinson Day

Kim Il Sung Day (North Korea)

Lilac Day (French Republic)

Lover’s Day (Kazakhstan)

Mariah Carey Day (California)

Melaka UNESCO Heritage Day (Malaysia)

Microvolunteering Day

National Anime Day

National ASL Day

National Collegiate Recovery Day

National Griper’s Day

National Hookup Day

National Keaton Day

National Laundry Day

National Poet Day (Peru)

National Rubber Eraser Day

National Security Education Day (Hong Kong)

National That Sucks Day

National Titanic Remembrance Day

One Boston Day

Purple Up Day

Quantum Teleportation Day

Rubber Eraser Day

Swallow Day (UK)

Take a Wild Guess Day

Tax Day (US)

Tax Resistor's Day

That Sucks Day

Tipsa Diena (Traditional start of plowing; Ancient Latvia)

Titanic Remembrance Day

Type 1 Diabetes Day

Universal Day of Culture

World Art Day

World Tiny Art Gallery Day

Food & Drink Celebrations

Fast Food Day

McDonald’s Day

National Glazed Spiral Ham Day

National Takeout Day (Canada)

3rd Monday in April

Boston Marathon Day [3rd Monday]

National Stress Awareness Day [3rd Monday]

Landing of the 33 Patriots Day observed (Uruguay) [3rd Monday]

Patriots' Day (Maine, Massachusetts, Wisconsin) [3rd Monday]

Sechseläuten ends (Six Ringing Festival; Zurich, Switzerland) [3rd Monday]

Weekly Holidays beginning April 15 (3rd Week)

National Work Zone Safety Awareness Week [thru 4.19]

Undergraduate Research Week [thru 4.19]

Week of the Young Child [thru 4.19]

Independence & Related Days

Independence Day Holiday (Israel)

Unitedlands (Declared; 2022) [unrecognized]

Vishwamitra (f.k.a. Children’s Group; Declared; 2007) [unrecognized]

New Year’s Days

Day after Sidereal New Year (South and Southeast Asian) (a.k.a. …

Bengali New Year (India)

Bohag Bihu (Parts of India)

Himachl Day (Parts of India)

Lao New Yar (Laos)

Masadi (Parts of India)

Nababarsha (Parts of India)

New Year Holidays (Myanmar)

Sarhul (Parts of India)

Songkran (Thailand)

Water-Sprinkling Festival continues (Yunnan, China)

Poila Boishakh (Bengali New Year)

Festivals Beginning April 15, 2024

Boston Marathon (Boston, Massachusetts) [3rd Monday]

Coquina Beach Seafood & Music Festival (Coquina Beach, Florida) [thru 4.17]

Singing in the Sun (Myrtle Beach, South Carolina) [thru 4.20]

TED Conference (Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada) [thru 4.19]

Feast Days

Abbo II of Metz (Christian; Saint)

Arshile Gorky (Artology)

Bananas with Everything Day (a.k.a. Banana Day; Pastafarian)

Basilissa and Anastasia (Christian; Martyrs)

Day of Tellus Mater (Pagan)

Elizabeth Catlett Mora (Artology)

Father Damien (The Episcopal Church)

Festival of Hero/Bast (Ancient Egypt)

Festival of Matsu/Mazu (Goddess of the Sea; Taoism)

Fordicidia (Old Roman Festival of Fertility to honor Ceres)

Henry James (Writerism)

Hippachus (Positivist; Saint)

Hunna (Christian; Saint)

Jeffrey Archer (Writerism)

Kanamara Matsuri (Iron Phallus Festival; Japan)

Leonardo da Vinci (Artology)

Munde (Christian; Saint)

Padarn (Christian; Saint)

Pammy (Muppetism)

Paternus of Avranches (Christian; Saint)

Peter Gonzales (Christian; Saint)

Ruadan of Lothra (Christian; Saint)

Rusalja (Celebration of River Spirts Rusalki of the Lemko People of Carpathia; Starza Pagan Book of Days)

Tellus Mater (Old Roman Mother Earth Festival)

Vlad Tepes Day (Church of the SubGenius; Saint)

Lucky & Unlucky Days

Fortunate Day (Pagan) [14 of 53]

Sakimake (先負 Japan) [Bad luck in the morning, good luck in the afternoon.]

Uncyclopedia Bad to Be Born Today (because the Titanic Sank and it’s also Tax Day.)

Premieres

The Adventures off Marco Polo (Film; 1938)

Aftermath, by The Rolling Stones (Album; 1966)

The Art of Real Happiness, by Norman Vincent Peale (Book; 1950)

The Black Island, by Hergé (Graphic Novel; 1938) [Tintin #7]

Catalogue d’Oiseaux, by Olivier Messiaen (Pieno Pieces; 1959)

Colors (Film; 1988)

Dark Command (Film; 1940)

Donald’s Nephews (Disney Cartoon; 1938)

Don’t Speak, by No Doubt (Song; 1996)

84, Charing Cross Road, by Helene Hanff (Novel; 1970)

El Amor Bruno (Love, the Magician), by Manuel de Falla (Ballet; 1915)

Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore (Film; 2022)

Fargo (TV Series; 2014)

The Fitzgeralds and The Kennedys, by Doris Kearns Goodwin (Book; 1987)

Flashdance (Film; 1983)

Flowers for Algernon, by Daniel Keyes (Short Story; 1959)

Genghis Khan (Film; 1965)

Girls (TV Series; 2012)

The Hypo-Chondri-Cat (WB MM Cartoon; 1950)

The Little Goldfish (MGM Cartoon; 1939)

Little Red School Mouse (Noveltoons; 1949)

In Living Color (TV Series; 1990)

The Last Emperor (Film; 1988)

The Lumberjack (Oswald the Lucky Rabbit; 1929)

The Moon and Sixpence, by W. Somerset Maugham (Novel; 1919)

Mouse Come Home (Andy Panda Cartoon; 1946)

Outer Banks (TV Series; 2020)

Outer Range (TV Series; 2022)

Rattus Norvegicus, by The Stranglers (Album; 1977)

Ride ‘Em Plowboy (Oswald the Luck Rabbit Disney Cartoon; 1928)

Rio (Animated Film; 2011)

Robinson Crusoe’s Broadcast (Terrytoons Cartoon; 1938)

Rock & Rule (Animated Film; 1983)

Rock for Light, by The Bad Brains (Album; 1983)

Stage Fright (Film; 1950)

St. Matthew’s Passion, by Johann Sebastian Bach (Oratorio; 1729)

Think, recorded by Aretha Franklin (Song; 1968)

To the Finland Station, by Edmund Wilson (Novel; 1940)

The Twenty-One Balloons, by William Pène du Bois (Novel; 1947)

Whole Lotta Shakin’ Goin’ On, by Jerry Lee Lewis (Song; 1957)

Wild, by Cheryl Strayed (Memoir; 2012)

Today’s Name Days

Anastasia, Damian, Una (Austria)

Rastislav, Teodor (Croatia)

Anastázie (Czech Republic)

Olympia (Denmark)

Uljas, Uljo, Verner, Verni (Estonia)

Linda, Tuomi (Finland)

César, Paterne (France)

Anastasia, Damian, Una (Germany)

Leonidas (Greece)

Anasztázia, Tas (Hungary)

Anastasio, Annibale (Italy)

Aelita, Agita, Balvis, Gastons (Latvia)

Anastazijus, Liudvina, Modestas, Vaidotė, Vilnius (Lithuania)

Oda, Odd, Odin (Norway)

Anastazja, Bazyli, Leonid, Ludwina, Modest, Olimpia, Tytus, Wacław, Wacława, Wiktoryn, Wszegniew (Poland)

Aristarh, Pud, Trofim (Romania)

Fedor (Slovakia)

Telmo (Spain)

Oliver, Olivia (Sweden)

Mstyslav, Mstyslava (Ukraine)

Kenya, Octavia, Tavia, Tucker (USA)

Today is Also…

Day of Year: Day 106 of 2024; 260 days remaining in the year

ISO: Day 1 of week 16 of 2024

Celtic Tree Calendar: Saille (Willow) [Day 2 of 28]

Chinese: Month 3 (Wu-Chen), Day 7 (Ji-You)

Chinese Year of the: Dragon 4722 (until January 29, 2025) [Wu-Chen]

Hebrew: 7 Nisan 5784

Islamic: 66 Shawwal 1445

J Cal: 16 Cyan; Twosday [16 of 30]

Julian: 2 April 2024

Moon: 50%: 1st Quarter

Positivist: 22 Archimedes (4th Month) [Varro]

Runic Half Month: Man (Human Being) [Day 6 of 15]

Season: Spring (Day 28 of 92)

Week: 3rd Week of April

Zodiac: Aries (Day 26 of 31)

[yenleak]

Most often I do reblogs, but you can see my posts under #enlik:3. I like to share my own opinions and talk about the internal problems of different fandoms, but most of my posts are usually related to ATLA. My favorite ships are: Zutara, Jetko, Mailee, Maizula, Bakoda, Jiangtara, Sukka and so on.

Hypocritical and thoughtful, and I love questioning a lot of things including the ones I like. I adhere to different currents of feminism, taking a little from each, the only theory of feminism that doesn't go well for me is the liberal one which I openly criticize. My blog is definitely not for men AND misogynists.

I live in Kazakhstan and like to talk about my homeland, about Central Asia in general. I practice English with my blog because it is not mandatory in my country. However, I speak Russian well! Im also open to any content that includes the turkic culture! (✿◠‿◠)

From the rest: Infj 4w3 Capricorn, extremely introverted, I can play the piano, listen to almost everything but it is older stuff mostly; like to read modern classics and silly/angsty smut :D, my favorite film is “10 things I hate about you”, but im also into Bollywood and Studio Ghibli. Im not a fan of fast fashion and really into vintage clothes even though my wardrobe is mostly my mothers' stuff from early 2000s. As I said before I really like to think, thats why im so into different metas and analysis'. Neurodivergent and hot IRL, dreaming of starting to write my own fics and also enjoy life for real. Enlik is actually the name of my OC in ATLA universe, it can be translated as “edelweiss” from kazakh.

I will be glad to communicate with all those interested, so do not hesitate to write to me!

My Account is NOT a safe space for:

cis men

ai supporters

basic dni stuff: antifeminists, racists, pedophiles, pedo creators (esp those who draw nsfw with minors), homophobes, xenophobes, people who have anything against women in general.

war supporters, people who think that hatred and violence is the way out🖕🏼 and the silent ones

katara haters

aggressive aang/azula/sokka stans, the same can be said about k.t..ng/m.iko/z.kka shippers

weird MLM fans in the main like the whole fandom of jegulus and such.

Thats all, I guess. Hope you have fun on my page!

If you want to know more about the situation in Xinjiang!

[reddest-flower]

Soviet Asia

The October Revolution certainly began in the cities of St. Petersburg and Moscow. In June 1916, nonetheless, unrest broke out in the Kazakh steppe and Turkestan against the Tsar’s attempt to conscript the people of Central Asia into his futile European war. In Ferghana Valley and into the areas of the Kazakh and Kirghiz, the people attacked Russian settlers and then fled – en masse – into China’s Xinjiang. Chinese secret societies – rooted in anti-monarchical ideas – had infiltrated Central Asia. One such society was the Gelaohui, which had been brought to Xinjiang by the Hunan army of Zuo Zongtang. One of the members of the Gelaohui was Mao’s main general, Zhu De. […] He was a Great Elder of the Gelaohui lodge in Sichuan till he became a communist. The Gelaohui and the Red Spears moved between Central Asia and China, inculcating the view that the Tsar must be overthrown. The October Revolution had its origins, then, not only in St. Petersburg but also in Qaraqol (Kazakhstan).

Many Russian settlers in this region, uneasy about the revolts around them, joined the White Army to overthrow the October Revolution. The Soviets sent a Commission to investigate the situation in Turkestan. It recommended that the old Tsarist bureaucrats be removed from the area, that colonialist attitudes amongst the Russian settlers be eliminated and that the old feudal and patriarchal attitudes amongst the Central Asians be combatted. Tensions between Turkestan and Moscow prevailed. The communists in Tashkent – such as Turar Ryskulov, Mirsaid Sultan-Galiev and later Zeki Velidi Togan – fought for the autonomy of their region from Moscow and for a much less hostile position towards the elites of the Turkmen people. Moscow was not keen on this. Its representatives in the Commission – no Turkmen amongst them – wanted to integrate the area into the USSR and to move towards a much fiercer politics of class struggle. Lenin felt that the local communists had a better sense of the ground than his own comrades in Moscow. In his note to the ‘Communists of Turkestan’, Lenin wrote,

«The attitude of the Soviet Workers’ and Peasants’ Republic to the weak and hitherto oppressed nations is of very practical significance for the whole of Asia and for all the colonies of the world, for thousands and millions of people. I earnestly urge you to devote the closest attention to this question, to exert every effort to set an effective example of comradely relations with the peoples of Turkestan, to demonstrate to them by your actions that we are sincere in our desire to wipe out all traces of Great-Russian imperialism and wage an implacable struggle against world imperialism, headed by British imperialism.»

The idea of ‘Great Russian imperialism’ was crucial for the territory of the former Tsarist Empire. Central Asia had to be a model for a post-colonial world. Soviet troops routed the local kings of Khiva and Bukhara, putting in place of the monarchs the Khorezm People’s Soviet Republic and the Bukharan People’s Soviet Republic (both later incorporated into the Uzbek and Turkmen Soviet Socialist Republics). These republics – based on the policy of self-determination – needed to guard their autonomy carefully.

Uneasiness remained at the heart of the Central Asian areas. Questions of religious freedom and the rights of the small proprietors dogged the Soviet project. The Young Bukharans and the Young Khivans – such as Abdulrauf Fitrat, Fayzulla Khodzhayev and Akmal Ikramov – were impatient to transform the structure and culture of their societies. For them, the Soviet promise meant that their societies – mired in feudalism – could be wrenched into an egalitarian era. The Indian writer L.G. Ardnihcas travelled through Central Asia two decades later and found that ‘the early Bolsheviks made many mistakes of policy and procedure. They were imbued with a sense of superiority that was almost fatal to the cause’. At the Congress of the Toilers of the East at Baku in 1920, Grigory Zinoviev came to the heart of the problem in Central Asia. The most important issue, he said, was land reform. Zinoviev felt that the Central Asian peasantry was too timid to take action. ‘Centuries of stagnation’ as a result of ‘many centuries of oppression and slavery on the part of Europeans’, he said in his speech to the delegates, had halted the peasantry.

‘The solution of the land question in the East’, he said, ‘is surrounded with considerable difficulties which arise partly because the peasants, beaten and terrified by their oppressors, have not dared to take decisive revolutionary action’. It is here that the Bolsheviks had to act.

«In the Azerbaijan Republic, for instance, where the Soviet system is already in force, there are still peasants who fear to seize the land for themselves, being afraid of the revenge of the bourgeoisie and the landlords. The same difficulty is to be met in Turkestan where there are still Russians who were sent by Tsarism and the bourgeoisie especially to oppress the natives. This part of the inhabitants, not wishing to abandon its privileges, continues to act as before, though frequently covering itself with Soviet and Communist watchwords. The problem confronting all true representatives of the Soviet is to denounce these gentry and show the native peoples that Soviet Russia will not tolerate the former colonial policy of robbery, but is the bearer of culture and civilization in the best sense of the words. This we do, not after the fashion of the old colonists, but as elder brothers bringing light and culture.»

These ‘elder brothers’ were not Russian chauvinists, but Central Asians who had turned to Communism. The Soviets trained local men and women at the Communist University of the Toiling East (KUTV) in Moscow. These men and women then returned to their homes and developed – to the extent that they found possible – a Central Asian communism. The Communist Party, Ardnihcas wrote in The Soviet East, ‘decided to have its hands made of local flesh and blood and to discard the hand thrust from outside into the national republics’.

One of these republics was that of the Kyrgyz people, who lived between the USSR and China. When the Kara-Kyrgyz Autonomous Oblast was created in 1924, the Kyrgyz people had no alphabet for their language (although some used the Arabic script, but only rarely). Within a few years, the new Soviet introduced a Latin-based alphabet. As Raymond Steiger and Andrew Davies noted in 1942 in their book Soviet Asia, ‘Until a few years ago, there was no written alphabet of the Kirghiz language; the great majority of the people was illiterate. Today, the Kirghiz have an alphabet, and in 1939 there were 20,000 pupils in the republic’s 1,500 elementary schools, 119 high schools, and three universities. More than 20,000 teachers gave instruction in the native language from books printed in the new alphabet’. ‘It is the common people, the peasant, the labourer and the nomad shepherd,’ Ardnihcas wrote, ‘who have taken the lead in the achievement of the great transformation’.

Remarkable achievements of massive scale improved the lives of the peoples of Soviet Asia. The 1,500-kilometre Turkestan-Siberia (Turksib) Railway ran from Tashkent (Uzbek Soviet Socialist Republic) to connect with the Trans-Siberian Railway. This mammoth project went from 1926 to 1931 as part of the First Five-Year Plan of the USSR. A documentary of the construction – made by Viktor Turin and released in 1929 as Turksib – is a superb exploration of the problems faced by the nomadic peoples of the region and how the railway would lift some of their burdens. Ghafur Ghulam, later the National Poet of the Uzbek Soviet Socialist Republic, watched the train project come to fruition and wrote an ode to its importance (it was translated in 1933 by the African American communist poet Langston Hughes and his neighbour, the Georgian sculptor Nina Zorokovitz). ‘Crushed by the bronze five-pointed heart of the locomotive’, he wrote, ‘along these ancient roads which have seen so many things’ would now come the proletariat of Asia. They will now travel on a ‘steel caravan in union and solidarity’

[…]

None of these gigantic projects could have been conceived if the various republics were not linked together into the USSR. In hindsight, there is a great deal of criticism of the environmental problems from the Soviet-era fertilizer industry near the Aral Sea and of the use of industrial chemicals in the soil in the Ferghana Valley. This is, of course, true, but it not a problem solely of the communist experiment.

Inspiration for the common people of Central Asia came from the Soviet decrees that echoed off the walls of the colonies, their titles illustrative enough:

«To All the Muslim Workers in Russia and the East (November 1917). Declaration of the Rights of the Peoples of Russia (December 1917). Declaration of the Rights of Workers and Exploited People (January 1918).»

The declaration of December 1917 was most powerful. It called not only for ‘the equality and sovereignty of the peoples of Russia’ but also ‘the right of the peoples of Russia to free self-determination, even to the point of separation and the formation of an independent state’. This was unimaginable in the colonies. When US President Woodrow Wilson tried to take credit for the ideas of peace without annexation and for self-determination, the Indian journalist and nationalist K.P. Khandilkar wrote in Chitramaya-Jagat, ‘Lenin did it more than two years ago’.

Red Star Over the Third World, Vijay Prashad, 2019

[sunriseverse]

sunrise verse academic text reading list

this is a list of academic texts i've read or am planning on reading for sunrise verse research! up to date as of 2024.07.09

texts, longform

sexuality in china: histories of power and pleasure (read)

a flourishing yin: gender in china's medical history (in progress)

homoerotic sensibilities in late imperial china (read)

erotic colour prints of the ming dynasty: with an essay on chinese sex life from the han to the ch'ing dynasty (read)

food and environment in early and medieval china (read)

the development of chinese martial arts fiction (read)

kazakh traditions and ways (read)

kazakh folksongs: from two ends of the steppe (read)

the kazakh khanates between the russian and qing empires: central eurasian international relations during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries (read)

the formation of kazakh identity: from tribe to nation-state (read)

kazakh traditions of china (read)

the voice of the steppe: modern kazakh short stories (in progress)

women and gender relations in kazakhstan: the social cost (to read)

kazakh nomadic culture (read)

kazakh folk culture (read)

nomads and networks: the ancient art and culture of kazakhstan (read)

china's last nomads: the history and culture of kazakhs (read)

kazakhstan: ethnicity, language, and power (to read)

modern clan politics: the power of "blood" in kazakhstan and beyond (read)

travellers in the great steppe: from papal envoys to the Russian revolution (read)

disorder under heaven: collective violence in the ming dynasty (read)

the obsessive gormet: zhang dai - on food and drink (read)

power and glory: court arts of china's ming dynasty (to read)

chinese court costume: colour, form, and symbolism (read)

chinese clothing (read)

the eunuchs in the ming dynasty (to read)

the confusions of pleasure: commerce and culture in ming china (to read)

the urban life of the ming dynasty (to read)

chinese martial arts cinema (to read)

the libertine's friend (to read)

the cambridge history of china - volume 7: the ming dynasty (to read)

the cambridge history of china - volume 8: the ming dynasty (to read)

the troubled empire: china in the yuan and ming dynasties (to read)

women in song and yuan china (to read)

family instructions for the yan clan and other works by yan zhitui (in progress)

the kazakhs: children of the steppes (to read)

clothing, food, and travel: ming material culture as reflected in xingshi yinyuan zhuan (to read)

the ming world (to read)

jin yong's chivalry: gender and ethnicity in wuxia fiction, film, and television (to read)

texts, research papers/chapters

gender, power, and talent - the journey of daoist priestesses in tang china (to read)

wuxia fictions - chinese martial arts in film, literature and beyond (to read)

gender in kazakh dombyra performance (read)

dressing for power: rite, costume, and state authority in ming dynasty china (to read)

emotion and the language of intimacy in ming china: the shan'ge of feng menglong (to read)

law and custom in the steppe: the kazakhs of the middle horde and russian colonialism in the nineteenth century (to read)

the dragon's whim: ming and qing tales from "the cut sleeve" (to read)

whose wuxia and what kind of myth: a wuxia accompanying text perspective (to read)

women, property, and confucian reaction in sung and yuan china (to read)

the anatomy of eroticism: reimagining sex and sexuality in the late ming novel xiuta yeshi (to read)

a tale of two melons: emperor and subject in ming china (to read)

ming erotic novellas: genre, consumption, and religiosity in cultural practice (to read)

early modern ming-muslim globalisation (to read)

song broacde in the ming and qing dynasties (to read)

conservation study of ming dynasty silk costumes excavated in jiangshu region, china (to read)

between the islamic and chinese universal empires: the ottoman empire, ming dynasty, and global age of explorations (to read)

gender and empire: a view from yuan china (to read)

the food and cuisine cultures of the ming dynasty (to read)

perception of gender in kazakh and kyrgyz proverbs (to read)

confucian order and religious doctrines: rhetorical charaacterisations of illustrations in the fiction "quanxiang pinghua" in the yuan dynasty (to read)

rank badges of official costumes of ming and qing dynasties from the perspective of social semiotics (to read)

[sylvia-on-the-run]

Recent achievements include the Zhanatas wind farm, the Turgusun hydropower plant, and the modernization of the Shymkent oil refinery. These advances underscore the solid energy cooperation driving the development of both countries. The China-Kazakhstan oil and gas pipelines also operate with notable stability and security, ensuring a constant and vital energy supply for both economies.

A good article on chinese-kazakh relations

[zvaigzdelasas]

17 May 23

18 May 23

[irithnova]

How I characterise aph Mongolia:

Mongolian history books I've bought (his past)

Wikipedia (his past and cultural customs)

YouTube videos on Mongolian history (not just about the Empire)

The r/Mongolia subreddit on Reddit (Here I see Mongolians attitudes towards what's going on in the world today and just generally what's going on over there)

Eagle news (Mongolian news YouTube channel which is all in Mongolian so I can't understand it really but its good to watch)

MNB world (Mongolian news YouTube channel which is in English to help me understand current affairs in Mongolia, they also have some very good videos on Mongolian culture/history)

Mongolian meme pages on instagram (both political memes and just random memes)

Articles/videos about Mongolias current situation stuck between Russia and China

From all of this here is a braindump on my characterisation of him:

-He's got a pretty dry sense of humour but because his comebacks and comments are so witty its quite funny to watch

-Absolutely hates his government. In fact he doesn't like any of the political parties. He believes the reason why the country isn't completely falling apart is because of his efforts.

-Being trapped between Russia and China is a nightmare. He is very meticulous about the ways in which he goes about getting them off his ass. Loses sleep over it.

-Because of this he has become an excellent diplomat though. In addition he takes time to learn different languages and practices them to perfection as he believes that finding common language can build stronger bonds with other nations. For example, I think his Korean would be great.

-Again about losing sleep. Sometimes in his head he goes over the scenario of what if he dies and there is a new successor to be the nation avatar of Mongolia. They would be too young to understand the intracacies of the work he's accomplished to push back against his politicians and protect himself from Russia and China (to the best he can) . And by the time they're old enough to understand, it would be too late. Doesn't enjoy dwelling on that possibility.

-One of the nations who is very selfless when it comes to protecting his people and understanding his duties.

-Doesn't dislike Ulaanbaatar but absolutely despises it during the winter time. This is when pollution is the worst in the city and he gets a really terrible cough that's hard to stifle, especially during meetings, which he hates.

-Very outdoorsy. Even when he's in the city he'll often go for really long walks. He definitely spends most of his holidays in the countryside and goes to the countryside as often as he can.

-Owns a lot of horses. Even if work means he can't see them as often as he wants he loves tending to them, it really puts his mind at ease.

-Hobbies include: Horseriding, archery, wrestling (duh) but also chess. He's very good at chess. I also like to think that he enjoys knitting/reading. Definitely likes camping and stargazing!! Also: contortionism. Look it up.

-He has a horse plushie collection. He doesn't let anyone know.

-Can come off as introverted (and these days he kind of is) but he is assertive and headstrong when he needs to be.

-Feels a bit insecure about the fact that he thinks that others underestimate his intelligence.

-There's a bit of an identity crisis going on with him. While he's officially classified as "East Asian" he feels little connection to the other East Asians. While the central Asians are more culturally similar to him, they are Muslim/Turkic so he feels different to them in that sense too. I think he relates more to the people of Siberia (Yakutia(Sakha) , Buryatia etc) but they are not their own nations (they are inside Russia) and because of this there is no "North East Asian" category like there is a "South East Asian" category.

-Kind of wants to get closer to the central Asian countries but he feels that its a bit awkward. I do see him being friends with Kazakhstan though (Bayan-Olgii province!)

-Its also hard for him to get closer to them because unfortunately, there isn't much Mongolia as a nation can do with the central Asian nations. For example, trade is very limited between them. And what trade there is between them is insignificant compared to the amount of money trade with the East Asian nations gives him. Mongolians visit/go to university in East Asian countries far, far more frequently than Central Asian countries. So its difficult. Never mind the fact that Russia and China are basically cock blocking Mongolia from the rest of Central Asia.

-Smokes cigarettes

-Crafty and good at fixing things/DIY

-Gets kind of annoyed with the historical revisionism some Turks spout about Mongolia/Genghis Khan. Doesn't take this out on Turkey though.

-Also gets a bit annoyed at "Fingol" jokes and jokes about Hungarians/Bulgarians etc being Mongolians but does catch himself laughing sometimes if the joke is actually good and not meant to be a jab at the Finnish/Hungarians etc.

-Very complicated relationship with China.

-Complicated-ish relationship with Russia but less so compared to China. They drink together. When Russia was younger, Mongolia was kind of like a tough love mentor figure to him. Definitely not sadistic like some creepazoids in this fandom think he was...

-Close with Tibet and India🤍

-North/South Korea have a special place in his heart💜 also was like an older mentor figure to them.

-Actually on good terms with Japan now despite that Kamikaze situation

-Bros with Turkey

-If I headcanon that like. Buryatia/Yakutia(Sakha) /Tuva etc had their own nation avatars, he'd be close with them but would not be allowed to see them often (Russian government).

-Before the unification of the Mongol tribes by Genghis Khan, he was consistently ill. Top that off with being passed around family to family as people didn't know what to do with him and the general messiness of Mongolian history before the unification of the different clans and yeahhhh..

-Learned to fend for himself and be mentally strong at a young age

-Has very faint memories of those who came before him. Mainly just silhouettes/voices and even then its messy.

-Has complicated feelings about his Empire. Obviously he did achieve great things and what he did was impressive. He goes from feeling happy/prideful (good memories, many accomplishments) to feeling guilt/shame (I think he kind of regrets what happened in Baghdad) to contempt ("I was doing what everyone else was doing at the time, I just happened to be better. You all would have done the same!") to cynical (thinks that dwelling on the past is stopping him from focusing on the present, and its no use remembering it).

-Was kind of an arrogant douchebag during the height of his empire but tbh he had every right to be lmao.

-Did kind of mellow out though as he got older, he wasn't too douchey for too long. Moral of the story: teenage boys suck.

-Because of how his empire was formed/how the Mongol tribes were united, he had a pretty fast puberty for a nation after not aging that fast for so long.

-I feel like Mongolia really enjoys reading about different religions!

-During the Qing dynasty, it is said that literate Mongols produced excellent literature. I like to think Mongolia did a lot of writing/reading/song writing even, to take his mind off of what was going on.

-Complicated relationship with Manchuria.

-What's funny is, he'd go on about Manchuria copying him. From the banner system to his writing system to his traditional clothes. Because when he invaded China, he said very similar things about Mongolia ("he's a steppe nomad with no culture of his own, thats why he copies me!")

-Obviously is an amazing throat singer and does have a really good normal singing voice.

-Freakishly flexible (in a good way!) Again, look up Mongolian contortionism.

-Found a good balance between traditional and modern living which he prides himself on as he sees other nations get lost in it.

-Tends to keep to himself

-Is more open though when one visits him in his home country

-Loves going to all the different festivals he has when he gets the chance! He makes sure he schedules his work so he can attend. Loves naadam especially.

Other rando headcanons:

-Bisexual (tbh I headcanon all nations as bisexual....)

-Feels a bit naked without his glasses!

-I headcanon him as tol. Sorry

-His years of experience from horse riding has given him very good posture.

-I feel like his hair is a very dark brown, dark enough to be mistaken as black.

-Has a whole hair routine

-umm face scar/scars?? Yes

-cheekbones for days (this shouldn't even be a headcanon like we all know Mongolians have nice cheekbones)

-China has a weird nickname for him. "Milk-freak"

-Does seem a bit hard to approach

-Dilf

[aoawarfare]

Russian Colonialism in Central Asia 1860-1890

From 1860 to 1890, Russia conquered Central Asia. What started as crafting a strong border along their Siberian territories grew into the conquest of most of modern day Central Asia.

Russia and Central Asia have a long, intertwined history that altered between coexistence and conflict. The Russians didn’t start expanding eastwards until the 1500s and they didn’t ’t really consider invading the region until the 1700s and even then, it’s contained to the Steppe lands. We don’t really see engagements with major Central Asian powers until the late 1700s/early 1800s. Their approach isn’t systematic or well planned. The Russians are responding to events unfolding, both in the region and from the around the world, as much as they are trying to shape events to fit their own priorities. They don’t fully subdue the region until the 1880s and roughly 30 years later WWI begins. By 1917 the Tsarist Empire collapses, and Russia loses all control over their conquered territories, including Central Asia. It would be up to the Bolsheviks and the various Central Asian republics to determine what relations would look like during the rest of the 20th century.  

Early Russian Incursions (1580s-1700s)

As we mentioned, Russia and the various peoples of Central Asia traded and interacted with each other for most of their early history. The Russians did not consider expanding eastwards until the 1500s, starting with the overthrow of the Kazan khanate in 1552 and Astrakhan khanate in 1556 (two main centers of trade for people from all over the world). In 1580, they overthrew the Khanate of Sibr, opening up Siberia and introducing Kazakh peoples to Cossacks and Slavic merchants, and officials.

Peter the Great

[Image Description: A colored painting of a white man with curly brown hair and a mustache leaning against a chair. Behind him is a grey sky. The man is wearing a dark blue military frock coat with a light blue ribbon and a golden and green metal at his thought. His collar and cuffs are a bright red. He holds a sword with his right hand and a map with his left.]

Up until Peter the Great’s reign in 1682, the Russians and Central Asians spent their time learning about each other and establishing centers of trade. Neither saw each other as a source of danger since the Central Asians khanates were more concerned about fighting each other and resisting pressures from Safavid Iran and China whereas Russia was establishing itself as a state.

It was Peter the Great who turned Russia into an empire and pushed into the Central Asia region, sparking conflict with the Bashirs, Astrakhans, Khiva Khanate, and even Iran. Peter ordered several forts to be built along the current Kazakhstan border and took the Volga and Ural lands, encircling Central Asia. Their first proper incursion into the region was within Steppe lands. The Russians tried to implement tribute and oaths of loyalty, but the Kazakh people either resisted or manipulated Russian demands to fit their needs. They often played the Russians against their other enemies such as China, the Zunghar people, and the different Uzbek Khanates. However, the more involved they became with the Russians, the more restricted their political freedom became and by 1730 they officially asked the Russians for their protection.

Kazakhs and Kyrgyz peoples 1700s-1800s

The first Tsarina to truly interact with her Muslim subjects was Catherine the Great. She chose a position of tolerance while enforcing methods of police control. Catherine believed that if she could use the Islamic hierarchy to manage the people, she could instill law and order in the region. As long as she controlled who was recognized by the state as a legitimate source of religious authority, she could control the people and bind Islamic ideals to the Tsarist system. She implemented this policy with the Muslims in Siberia, the Volga and Ural regions, and the Crimea, utilizing the indigenous Tatars. When Russia tried to implement this system with the Kazakhs they ran into issues.

Catherine the Great

[Image Description: A colored painting of a white, big woman with grey hair pinned up and held in place by a golden crown. She is wearing a tan furred dress and a silver necklace with ornaments in the shape of snowflakes.]

Lack of knowledge is a key component in the Russian rule, and they were aware of this. As they incorporated the land, they sent several expeditions into the region to understand the territory, the people, and the benefits they could reap from the area. Ian W Campbell’s book Knowledge and Ends of Empire goes into great detail how much the Russians didn’t know as they conquered the Steppe lands and the efforts, they went through to fill in their knowledge gap.

Since the Kazakhs were nomads, they did not practice a type of Islam recognized by the Russians, so they were unable to utilize any existing religious structure, like they did with the Tatars. Instead, they had to engage with the different tribal leaders and indigenous informers and spies to manage the steppe peoples and enforce a form of sedentary lifestyle (with mixed results).

In an effort to “bring civilization” to the Kazakh people the Russians abolished the hordes and reorganized the land along tribal lines into three regions. They implemented a heavy bureaucracy consisting of auls, townships, and districts. In 1844, the Kazakhs traditional courts were stripped of authority over serious criminal cases and subjected Kazakhs to Russian military courts.

Authority was maintained by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and military governors, which tried their best to manage the theft and abuse the Kazakhs and Kyrgyz peoples experienced from Russians officials and the Cossacks. This abuse seems to have been driven by the lawlessness common to vast frontiers (one can think of the US’s own Wild West as an example) and because most Russians looked down on the Kazakhs and Kyrgyz as inferior people.

Uzbek Khanates 1800-1900

Driven by mistreatment, starvation, and fear of the Russians, many Kazakh peoples found shelter in the Uzbek khanates. By the 1800s, all three khanates were experiencing civil wars and intense rivalries with each other and either ignored or were disinterested in the Russian encroachment. They were vaguely curious about the increase of British visitors but didn’t seem to realize that it meant trouble for their people. To be fair, the British were notoriously bad at trying to enlist the aid of the khanates as can be seen with the Conolloy-Stoddart-Nasrullah affair.

Nasrullah, Khan of Bukhara

[Image Description: An ink drawing of a man in a turban and long, wispy black beards. He also had a drooping black mustache and a white long dress shirt. The paper the painting is drawn on is tan and below the man are words written in Arabic]

Charles Stoddart was sent to Bukhara by the East India Company to win over the emirate, Nasrullah. Instead Nasrullah found him so insulting, he threw him into a bug pit for a few days. Stoddart remained in Bukhara for three years before the Company sent Captain Arthur Connolly to rescue him. Connolly traveled disguised as a merchant, but the Emirate was on alert since Britain was invading Afghanistan at the same time. Around the time Connolly was arrested, the Afghans organized a revolt that drove the British out of their country (only one British survivor made it back to India). Nasrullah wasn’t impressed and felt even more insulted by Connolly’s and Stoddart’s behavior, so he beheaded them when he caught them trying to smuggle letters to India.

Modern historians have poked several holes into the Great Game narrative, and it may be safe to say that the Great Game is more of a reflection of Britain’s own insecurities and fears than reality (with the Russians taking advantage of said fears). At the same time, Russia was feeling insecure compared to the other European states, had a need to make up for the humiliating defeat suffered during the Crimean War, were concerned about the security of their southern frontier, and held racist beliefs about the inferiority of the Central Asian peoples.

Their first attempt was to invade Khiva in 1839, but that ended in disaster. They would not try again until 1858, pushing southward, along the Syr Darya. By 1860 they had taken and established forts in what is modern day Almaty, Kazakhstan and Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan. In 1864 Colonel Mikhail G. Cherniaev finished the conquest of the land along the Syr Darya by taking the towns of Yasi and Shymkent. In 1865, he took Tashkent from Kokand, conquering the last bit of Kazakh land.

At this point, we can organize the Russian conquest around three major events: the subjugation of the Bukhara and Khiva Khanates, the abolishment of the Kokand Khanate, and the slaughter of the Turkmen people in the Ferghana valley

Conquering the Bukharan Khanate

However, conquering Tashkent dragged them into the rivalry between Kokand and Bukhara. The Russians wanted to turn Tashkent into a buffer state between themselves and Bukhara while Bukhara hoped the Russians would return the city to them. When Emir Muzzafar sent an envoy to embassy to the Tsar, he was arrested and Muzzafar was told he no longer had the right to speak to the Tsar directly. Muzzafar was stunned and furious so he arrested a Russian diplomat sent from Tashkent. The Russians attacked the Bukharan town of Jizza but returned from lack of supplies. The Bukharans responded by marching on Tashkent but were defeated by the Russians at Irjar. The Russians then took Khujand, cutting off communications between Bukhara and Kokand, preventing a coordinated resistance.

Konstantin Petrovich Von Kaufmann

[Image Description: A black and white lithograph of a white man with a receding hairline. He has a grey bushy mustache. He wears a grey military tunic with epaulettes and several medals. His hands rest on his shoulder hilt.]

To neutralized Kokand, further the Russians a treaty with Kokand granting Russian merchants free trade rights in the khanate and vice versa in Russian Turkestan. However, since Russia’s economy was bigger, this made Kokand an economic vassal.

Bukhara tried to resist the Russians but because of a divided military, internal rebellions, and antiquated technology, Muzzafar was forced to surrender in June 1868. The treaty restored Muzzafar’s sovereignty but took Samarkand away, controlling Bukhara’s main water source. Russian merchants were allowed to conduct business in Bukhara with the same rights as local merchants and Bukhara had to pay a compensation for Russia’s expenses during the war.

While the conquest of the Syr Darya basin and Tashkent had been approved by ministers in St. Petersburg, the Bukharan conflict was decided by officers on the ground. They actually recalled Cherniaev in 1866 only for his replacement, Romanovskii to attack Khujand. In 1867, Romanovskii was replaced by Konstantin Petrovich Von Kaufmann (who was a bit of an asshole) who served as Turkestan’s first governor-general. Despite the fact that its military had gone rogue, the Russians could not tolerate retreating or returning the land. Think about how it would affect its standing amongst the European powers (sarcasm)

Kaufman called his conquered territory Turkestan and made Tashkent as its capital. Given its distant from St. Petersburg, Kaufman enjoyed remarkable independence and was more like an emperor than a civil servant.

Conquering the Khivan Khanate

By 1859, Russia had conquered the North Caucasus and created a port in modern day Turkmenboshi, Turkmenistan. This allowed the Russians to transport goods via the river, instead of making the long and dangerous journey from Khiva to Orenburg. This deeply hurt Khiva’s income and cut into the incomes of the Turkmen who protected or raided the traveling merchants.

That, combined with the Russian conquest of Kokand and Bukhara and Khiva was in serious trouble. Khivan Emir Muhammad Rahim, learned from Bukhara, released all Russian prisoners, and negotiated with Russia for peace. Kaufman, however, wasn’t interested in peace. Instead, he sent message after message to Alexander II to complain about Khiva’s insolence and the danger it posed to Russian merchants, finally getting his permission to launch a military campaign to punish Khiva. In 1872, Kaufman led an invasion of four columns, consisting of over 12,000 men and tens of thousands of camels and horses and attacked Khiva from three directions. The Khivans did not resist vigorously whereas the Turkmen fought viciously.

On June 14th, Muhammad Rahim surrendered and Kaufmen forced him to govern under a Russian led council while he ransacked the palace for personal prizes. On August 12th, 1873, Rahim signed a stricter treaty then the one Muzzafar signed. The treaty forced the khan to acknowledge he was an obedient servant of the Tsar, granted control of navigation over the river Amu Darya to the Russians, and granted extensive privileges to Russian merchants. They also agreed to pay Russian 2.2 million rubles over the course of twenty years.

The Turkmen

While Khiva was subdued, the Turkmen were as rebellious as ever and Kaufman jumped at the opportunity to expand his power and earn more “glory”. In July 1873, he required that the Turkmen pay 600,000 rubles with only two weeks to deliver, knowing it would be impossible to do. When they failed, Kaufman launched an attack on the Yomut, a Turkmen tribe. American journalist Januarius MacGahan reported the following:

This is war such as I had never before seen, and such as is rarely seen in modern days…I follow down to the marsh, passing two or three dead bodies on the way. In the marsh are twenty or thirty women and children, up to their necks in water, trying to hide among the weeds and grass, begging for their lives, and screaming in the most pitiful manner. The Cossacks have already passed, paying no attention to them. One villainous-looking brute, however, had dropped out of the ranks and leveling his piece as he sat on his horse, deliberately took aim at the screaming group, and before I could stop him, pulled the trigger. Fortunately, the gun missed fire, and before he could renew the cap, I rode up and cutting him across the face with my riding-whip, ordered him to his sotnia. - Januarius MacGahan

By end of July, the Turkmen agreed to pay and Kaufman extended the deadline.

Even though Russian conquered Kokand, they had a hard time implementing political control, having to deal with a still strong khanate and an angry populace. The death of the old khan, Alim Qul, allowed Khudoyar Khan to return to rule. However, his close ties with Russia inspired a revolt amongst the Kokandi Kyrgyz nobles who drove him out in August 1875. The Russians placed his son, Nasruddin on the throne, but another revolt drove him out as well and Russia was stuck with a region deep in civil war with no clear factions.

Kaufman, worried that Bukhara or the British would take advantage, launched another military campaign. This campaign was particularly bloody, with Major-General Mikhail D. Skobelev making it a point of murdering civilians to crush all future rebellions. Vladimir P. Nalivkin, a young officer serving under Skobelev wrote the following of an incident where Skobelev ordered his Cossacks to charge fleeing civilians while their divisional commander countermanded the order. He then told Nalivkin to chase after a Cossack bearing down on an unarmed man carrying his child. Nalivkin wrote the following:

“With a cry “leave him alone! Leave him alone!” I rushed towards the man (sart), but it was already too late: one of the Cossacks brought down his sword, and the unfortunate two or three-year-old child fell from the arms of the dumbfounded, panic-striken man, landing on the ground with a deeply cleft head. The man’s arms were apparently cut. The bloody child convulsed and died. The man blankly stared now at me, now at the child, with wildly darting, wide eyes. God forbid that anyone else should have to live through the horror I lived through in that moment. I felt as though insects were crawling up my spine and cheeks, something gripped me by the throat, and I could neither speak nor breathe. I had seen dead and wounded people many times; I had seen death before, but such horror, such abomination, such infamy I had never been seen with my own eye: this was new to me.” - Vladimir P. Nalivkin

The war ended in 1876 with the bombing of Andijan, which Skobelev described himself as a pogram. Kaufman abolished the Kokand Khanate on February 19th, the same day as the anniversary of Alexander II’s ascension to the throne. He renamed the region the Ferghana District and named Skobelev its governor.

Finally, the Russians finished their conquest by subjugating the Turkmen Tekke tribes who lived around the oases in the Qara Qum desert. The reason for the attack was geopolitical. The Russians had won a war against the Ottoman Empire in 1878 but the British prevented the Russians from seizing Constantinople, so Kaufman was ordered to march on India.

Kaufman sent three columns towards Afghanistan and Kashmir and a fourth column heading towards the town on Kelif on the Amu Darya. To get there, they had to march through Tekke Turkmen territory. The attack was called off a week later, but the Russians continued south to establish a line of forts on the border of Iranian Khurasan. These forts were vulnerable to Turkmen attack, so the Russians laid siege to the town of Gok Tepe.

Their artillery was devastating but the Russians were defeated by fierce Turkmen fighting when they decided to storm the town. Skobelev led a revenge campaign in November 1880, finally blowing up the walls of Gok Tepe in January 1881. He ordered the Cossacks to pursue and kill anyone fleeing. The total cost was 14,500 Turkmen killed, including many non-combatants, destroying the Tekke Turkmen for decades and finalizing Russian control over Central Asia.

References

For Prophet and Tsar: Islam and Empire in Russia and Central Asia by Robert D. Crews Published by Harvard University Press, 2006

The Rise and Fall of Khoqand: Central Asia in the Global Age 1709-1876 by Scott C. Levi Published by the University of Pittsburgh Press, 2017

The Bukharan Crisis: a Connected History of 18th Century Central Asia by Scott C. Levi Published by University of Pittsburgh Press, 2020

Tatar Empire: Kazan’s Muslims and the Making of Imperial Russia by Danielle Ross Published by Indiana University Press, 2020

Russia and Central Asia: Coexistence, Conquest, Coexistence by Shoshana Keller Published by University of Toronto Press, 2019

Russia’s Protectorates in Central Asia: Bukhara and Khiva, 1865-1924 by Seymour Becker, Published by RoutledgeCurzon, 2004

Tournament of Shadows: the Great Game and the Race for Empire in Central Asia by Karl E. Meyer and Shareen Blair Brysac Published by Basic Books, 1999

[jaybrd-webtoons]

13 y/o Oksana (left) vs 27 y/o present day Oksana (right)

They're both so pretty i love her design

🔪Lore Dump Time🩸(also TW- sh and child abuse)

Oksana is one of the founders of the ZPVT, the terrorist group that plays the role as the antagonists in the Nebo tse Dim universe. She is a cruel and heartless killer who's feared by a wide majority of Eastern Europe, and has a growing list of victims, including Denys, the father of our main character Anichka. Oksana is considered a Water Vyshika, or someone with the ability to wield magic powers relating to water.

Although Oksana is cold and brutal, she is not actually pure evil. Oksana is a broken villain, and she lived an incredibly miserable home life, with her alcoholic parents, who both relentlessly abused her and her younger brother, Vasyl, physically, sexually, and emotionally. Oksana was in a deep depression where she also cut herself.

Oksana had planned to run away with Vasyl one night, planned months in advance. On that night, she attacked her parents with a kitchen knife and gained her first victims, and at 13, her brutal killing spree has begun. Her childhood village of Vashne, Ukraine was surrounded by thick forests, and she and Vasyl ran off into the night.

The police were in hot pursuit of the two kids, as they were called just before Oksana's mother was attacked. They tried to open fire, but Oksana dove into a river and used her special powers to fend herself off from the police, eventually killing the entire police squad. However, during the shooting, Vasyl was hit and killed instantly. Oksana was devastated by the loss of her little brother, who died at just 9 years old.

Oksana lived alone for months, traveling to nearby villages and stealing food. She eventually met the main antagonist, a man who called himself 'Mull' who took her into open arms upon knowing the powers she possesses. She was one of the founders of the ZPVT, along with Mull and Viktor, a kind but broken man whom also suffered a tragic past. She would move to russia and live alongside Mull and Viktor, scouting out Vishiki willing to join their group.

12 Vishiki, including Oksana, would lead the major terrorist group as it rose to power and took over the country of russia, Kazakhstan, Mongolia, northern China, Estonian, Latvia, Lithuania, and Georgia.