Eyvaz Taha - Sep 15, 2017
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| The Azerbaijan Democratic Party |
The story goes back to three years ago. The publication Shargh in its issue dated December 16, 2004 (25 Azar 1383) published an article entitled "A Look at Newly Released Documents Regarding the Formation of the Azerbaijan Democratic Party by Stalin’s Order." In the said article, relying on three documents obtained by Jamil Hasanli from the KGB archives, a stamp of betrayal was placed on the record of the Pishevari government. That year, when the intimacy of this newspaper with Pan-Iranists had reached its peak, numerous articles were published about the Democratic government in Tabriz. The fundamental approach of these articles was to remove the Azerbaijani element from the conditional legitimacy of the movement. Since Shargh, at least by its own claim, respected freedom of speech, I sent a humble response. The editors of Shargh requested a moderation of one of the points in my reply, but after my refusal, my text was sent to the archive of that esteemed journal’s darkroom. Shargh is now caught in the twilight of its exile, but the story of our amazement and bewilderment remains. There is no sorrow, because this is Asian democracy. That reply was lost in the turmoil I experienced some time ago, but the carefulness of a friend in preserving an image of that humble reply has caused it to be brought back to the field once again. Now that reply, with a delay of over two years, reads as follows:
First: The esteemed author, based on the "conspiracy theory," has imagined that all people in the world—from the Mongols of the Karakoram desert to the Bedouin Arabs, and from Alexander the Great to Ashraf Khan of Afghanistan—have plotted out of envy and hatred to attack Iran. And only Mr. Cyrus acted out of humanitarianism, invading other countries and plundering their wealth in distant lands. Whereas past military campaigns and conquests, often spanning thousands of kilometers and unfamiliar distant lands, had motives far broader than a mere conspiracy theory. These conquests included a wide range of motives and objectives, from seeking pastures and expanding the domain of rule to the spirit of supremacy.
Second: The esteemed author, while lamenting the invasions and occupations, quickly changed the tone to proudly state that these invaders were inevitably "assimilated" into Iranian culture and reinstated to the "customs and traditions of this land." If this is truly the case, then what is left to lament or to play the victim about? Let those uncultured invaders flood this land and in a short time be absorbed into this culture and find its customs and traditions. Is there a greater service to human culture than this?!
Third: If you truly believe that "the people of Azerbaijan in the last more than a hundred years have been pioneers of Iranian national movements," you should at least doubt that what happened in Azerbaijan in 1945 could simply have been the result of betrayal and conspiracy. Otherwise, you would consider Azerbaijanis no more than puppets, which is inconsistent with your premise of their vigilance and pioneering spirit. Perhaps a part of those same pioneering people, due to Reza Shah's centralism and his firm belief in harsh homogenization or ruthless destruction of subcultures, had become weary. Perhaps their disgust and hatred erupted in the chaotic political opportunity. If a pure, democratic, just, and self-sufficient central government existed against the Democrats, one could judge the Democrats differently. But when a conspiratorial, autocratic, and alienated government fought against that movement, you should allow some doubt. The esteemed author probably assumed that those alleged separatist acts took place in a flawless utopia created by Reza Shah’s rule; a utopia that his son wanted to bring to the gates of great civilization. Therefore, anyone or any group or ethnic community that was not humble and obedient to ethnic homogenization in that utopia was deemed treacherous and worthy of political annihilation.
Fourth: Historical events often have multiple causes and complex motives. Therefore, in explaining any event, we are forced to multiply causes and then identify the most direct ones. As a result, attributing a major event solely to "Stalin’s ambition for northern oil" simplifies and reduces history to a political trick. If a foreign country’s support for a movement is the criterion of its evilness, then based on the archives of the American embassy in Tehran or SAVAK’s documents, many politicians, intellectuals, and social movements would be caught in a tangle of betrayal, compromises, and cooperation. Even sentences such as "Before the entry of government forces into Tabriz, the brave people of this city had driven back the remaining traitors from their city and homeland" will disgrace their speaker, as these words are exactly taken from propaganda used in the mass media and later in the royal textbooks. If the intention is to examine a historical period based on documents, one must also consult thousands of pages of documents left by the Democratic government. The reality is that even the vast written documents seem vague and insufficient compared to what happened on December 17, 1946 (26 Azar 1325) at Tabriz’s Saat Square. On that day, elementary school students were paraded to burn the "Anadili" (mother tongue) textbooks while chanting "Long live the Shah." This book-burning celebration lasted for hours and days and burned books that contained nothing but Azerbaijani oral literature and some children’s poems. Perhaps the goal of that burning, which soon consumed many non-textbook books as well, was to remove obstacles and pave the way for the creation of a public culture whose foundation was laid in the first Academy of Persian Language and Literature. Additionally, the fate of the leaders of the Democratic Party across the borders—who mostly, due to religious tendencies, were tragically marginalized in history—stands as a big blemish on the argument of their pure mercenary nature. If they continued to pursue their lost ideal mostly in secrecy and poverty and loneliness, it indicates that the esteemed author has gone astray from the path of justice in judging them. The tragic fate of a "sincere" person suffices for everyone to know that Stalin himself was one of the main factors in the collapse of Pishevari’s government.
Fifth: If the esteemed author’s opinion were correct, then with Pishevari’s fall, the "nationalities problem" would have disappeared. However, events over the past sixty years have gone in the opposite direction. The issue of ethnic oppression during the Pahlavi era was always a significant concern for the Azerbaijani masses and intellectuals. Shahriar (the famous Azerbaijani poet) suffered almost all his life from the identity crisis caused by ethnic oppression under the government and constantly condemned the humiliations and efforts to eradicate the Azerbaijani language. Just when the Pahlavi family believed the army cooks could silence the voices of separatists, Shahriar composed the poem "Salam bar Heydar Baba" (Greetings to Heydar Baba) out of historical necessity and to counter the cultural annihilation process. Even if we ignore Shahriar, by the abundance of efforts, protests, and writings, the ethnic question still occupies the minds of politicians and officials as a fundamental "problem of society." If after the 1920s, the doctrine of homogenization had been successful, and various ethnic groups considered reading and writing in their mother tongue as treason to the country’s territorial integrity, then the respected author would not need to wield the whip of accusation and branding to enlighten the audience.
Sixth: No matter how much you think the Democratic government had foreign roots, its emergence was still domestic. In conspiracy theory, we always give excessive importance to external factors at the expense of forgetting the capability of the internal context. Whereas unless the internal context is ready, an external factor can hardly trigger a conspiracy of the magnitude the esteemed author claims. In other words, you arrogantly attack our identity based on three documents pulled from Stalin’s archive, but at the same time, you turn a blind eye to thousands of documents that testify to a broad program to eradicate the Turkish (Azerbaijan) language.
Original article in Persian
Here's the English translation of the article published in Shargh titled:
A Look at Newly Published Documents on the Formation of the Azerbaijan Democratic Party
By Order of Stalin
By Mohammad Hosseinzadeh
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Perhaps few civilizations in the world can be compared to the land and civilization of Iran, which has stood at the crossroads of events and faced attacks and invasions by distant and nearby societies. As a result of these bloody and tragic events, heavy human, material, and spiritual costs have been imposed on this land. Sometimes it was occupied for years, and the occupiers, by ravaging the lives, property, and honor of its people, even pushed some inhabitants to change their language. However, Iranian culture and civilization, amid these conquests and bloody invasions, with its deep roots in the history, mythology, literature, and culture of this nation, absorbed the invaders and once again manifested the “Iranian culture.” The invasions of Alexander, Genghis Khan, Timur, and others are examples of this process, where after some time, the invader was forced to recognize and legitimize the culture, customs, and traditions of this land even for themselves. What we today know as "Iranian culture and civilization" is nothing but the historical cultural creation and effort of all Iranians—whether Baluch, Persian, Kurdish, Azeri, and others—each having a worthy share in its elevation. Hafez, Qatran of Tabriz, Aziz Khan Makri, Sattar Khan, Nizami Ganjavi, Ferdowsi, and others were all born from these pure-hearted Iranians.
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This process has appeared differently in modern Iran. Iran’s geographical and strategic location, adjacency to the Persian Gulf and Indian Ocean, oil, and other factors have drawn the attention of major powers in recent centuries. For this purpose, military occupation at times and the incitement of various puppets at others have been tools of new invaders to achieve their ambitions. At one time, Sheikh Khazal signed a brotherhood agreement with the British government; at another, in Soviet-occupied Azerbaijan and Kurdistan, a faction was formed by Stalin’s order. But again, it is Iran and Iranians—in the pure-hearted peoples of Azerbaijan, Khuzestan, and Kurdistan—that rise up, and what remains is Iran and Iranians.
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The people of Azerbaijan have been among the pioneers of Iranian national movements over the last century. Tabriz is one of the main Iranian cities actively participating in the tobacco boycott and in 1901 (1280 Solar Hijri) led a vigorous struggle to expel the Belgian customs officials responsible for Iranian customs. The fundamental role of the people of Tabriz in the Constitutional Revolution is well known to every serious historian.
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The occupation of Iran in September 1941 by British forces (in the south) and the Red Army (in the north) provided another opportunity for this cycle and orbit to repeat. The greed for Iran’s territorial integrity, occupation of the country, and the dissatisfaction of the people with the ruling political system created a situation for Stalin to seize the northern Iranian oil resources. A precise and complex plan was initiated by the Soviet Union under Stalin’s orders, along with the cooperation of several internal puppets. The first step was “geological exploration for oil in northern Iran,” conducted under the responsibility of Mir Jafar Baghirov, secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Azerbaijan, by order of the Soviet Union’s State Defense Committee. Next, the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union issued an important order to Mir Jafar Baghirov requesting actions to organize a separatist movement in Azerbaijan and “other northern provinces of Iran.” The following steps were planned: preparation for forming an autonomous region with broad powers, starting a party to lead the separatist movement, establishing a Kurdish autonomy movement, formulating slogans for the 15th parliamentary elections, approving an armed group for the defense needs of Soviet supporters, establishing the Azerbaijan Friends Association, publishing newspapers in Baku and inside Iran, sending printing equipment, and forming a special fund with a credit of one million foreign rubles! As can be seen, all stages of the movement in Azerbaijan and Mahabad were planned, and Soviet party officials were responsible for overseeing their implementation. This precise planning ultimately failed. The announcement of the negative balance policy by the late Dr. Mohammad Mosaddegh in the 14th parliament blocked any foreign domination, especially over northern oil resources. The invading army retreated from the Soviets, and before government forces entered Tabriz, the brave people of this city, through an uprising, pushed traitors out of their city and land, bringing shame upon them. From December 12, 1945 (21 Azar 1324) to December 12, 1946 (21 Azar 1325), a single year was enough to reveal the fragility and inauthenticity of this movement.
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The internal and external backgrounds of the separatist movement in Azerbaijan and Mahabad have been the subject of much attention by researchers in recent years. However, the 40th issue of the cultural and social quarterly "Goftogu" entitled “Kurd and Kurdistan,” while examining social, cultural, political, and international aspects related to the Kurds, published three very valuable and important documents on Stalin’s role in the formation of the Azerbaijan and Mahabad Democratic Party, which are unique. These documents, recently obtained from the archive of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and made available to researchers in the Republic of Azerbaijan, clearly reveal the external (Soviet) roots and close the door on any doubts and debates.