File 1341/1921 Pt 1 'Khorassan Intelligence Summaries 1921-1922' [‎535v] (718/1080)

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There has been a large influx of destitude people from Kazan and Samara
who are being fed at the expense of the State.
Despite there having been of late some improvement in the treatment of
the people by the Bolsheviks the public aversion from them shows no decrease,
They are hated by the workers in the factories despite the solicitude for their
welfare always expressed by the labour idealists at Moscow.
The Women’s Union has formed a branch at Kizil Arvat. This ogranizv
tion illustrates one of the Bolsheviks* peculiar methods of running the State.
They are unable to pay their way, they are unable to employ people in the
accepted sense of the word so by means of propagandist orators and perfervid
articles in their controlled press they work up a species of hysteria for this or
that public purpose and register names of those who profess their willingness
to assist. Having formed a nucleus they proceed to expand it by compulsory
registration and forced labour and then appl^ the organization so formed to
the end they have in view, though continuing to exalt the workers therein
in the columns of their papers for which no price is charged. The workers in
these organizations get the meagre daily ration and perhaps a few hundred
paper roubles per month, despite which wage no form of more hopeless
slavery has ever existed.
In the organization quoted above, the Women’s Union, the poor creatures
whq have been inveigled or forced into its ranks find they have to do all sorts
of squalid and menial work. There is no discrimination of creed or caste—
all alike have to labour at washing clothes for troops, tailoring and repairing
garments, boot making, etc., etc.
Askhabad .—The same story comes from Askhabad as from elsewhere, a
story of hopeless public weariness of Bolshevik administration and of the
Bolsheviks themselves. Dood is still scarce despite the Bolshevik promises
of coming abundance, clothes are practically non-obtainable and a costume of
gunny bags passes without comment nowadays. Footwear is hardly procure
able and numbers of people go barefoot.
Scarcity has caused a backwash of the tide ojf refugees from Kazan, many
having been returned east. According to the Press of the last week in June
there had been one case of cholera in the to wn.
Turkmen detachments formerly stationed along the lin© at the various
railway stations have been swept up and sent tp Tashkent, the reason being
unknown, but possibly to replace more veteran formations moved up in
response to the Japanese situation.
No signs pf perturbation or of preparation to meet the crisis in the Far
East are evident from a perusal of the Askhabad press. There is also an
absense of that excess of vituperation of the enemy which marked the period
when the Soviet Government was fighting Baron Wrangel. On the contrary,
references are made to soldiers being dismissed on indefinite furlough and
to the formation of a triumvirate whose special duty it has been to assist
soldiers so dismissed or who haye been superannuated. Up to the 20 ch May,
|B3k men were despatched towards Krasnovodsk and 2,21V towards Tashkent—
all men of the Bed Army proceeding on indefinite leave. Prom the
May to tfie lust week in June 1 , 9£>0 men were similarly discharged.
On the 24th June the last train with Austr o-Gerjnan settlers and refugees
was despatched from Askhabad. These numbered 90 in all. Preparations lor
the evacuation of Poles and Latvians are jn progress, also for the transfer of
Qirqiz to the Qirqiz Republic (whose capital appeals to be the t° wn lately tq
acquire prominence in the Bolshevik press, namely, Almata) and of pagistanis
to the Republic of Dagestan. The reasons prompting this policy do not
transpire unfortunately, but if one might be hazarded it would be clamour 04
the part of foreigners to escape from the awful conditions produced by
Moscow’s attempt to create the Communists’ Utopia.
Arhk, Kaakhka y Dush k t Russian Sarakhs, Uejen. —Nothing to report.
JMerv. There no news of importance from this centre. The great heat of
the summer in Turkestan discourages tiavelling, consequently there has
peen a diminution in the number of Persian subjects returning to Persia au4