Mir Jafar Abbas oghlu Baghirov ( az, Мирҹәфәр Аббас оғлу Бағыров, italic=no, Mircəfər Abbas oğlu Bağırov, russian: Мир Джафар Аббасович Багиров; 17 September 1896 – 7 May 1956) was the communist leader of the
Azerbaijan SSR
Azerbaijan ( az, Азәрбајҹан, Azərbaycan, italics=no), officially the Azerbaijan Soviet Socialist Republic (Azerbaijan SSR; az, Азәрбајҹан Совет Сосиалист Республикасы, Azərbaycan Sovet Sosialist R ...
from 1932 to 1953, under the
Soviet
The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, ...
leadership of
Joseph Stalin
Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin (born Ioseb Besarionis dze Jughashvili; – 5 March 1953) was a Georgian revolutionary and Soviet political leader who led the Soviet Union from 1924 until his death in 1953. He held power as General Secreta ...
.
Early life
Born in
Quba of
Baku Governorate
The Baku Governorate, known before 1859 as the Shemakha Governorate, was a province ('' guberniya'') of the Caucasus Viceroyalty of the Russian Empire, with its center in the booming metropolis and Caspian Sea port of Baku. Area (1897): 34,400 sq ...
in 1896, Baghirov studied
pedagogy
Pedagogy (), most commonly understood as the approach to teaching, is the theory and practice of learning, and how this process influences, and is influenced by, the social, political and psychological development of learners. Pedagogy, taken as ...
in
Petrovsk.
During 1915–1917, M J. Baghirov worked as a school teacher in a village in
Khudat
, native_name =
, pushpin_map = Azerbaijan
, pushpin_mapsize = 300
, subdivision_type = Country
, subdivision_name =
, subdivision_type1 = District
, subdivision_name1 = Kh ...
.
He joined the
Bolsheviks
The Bolsheviks (russian: Большевики́, from большинство́ ''bol'shinstvó'', 'majority'),; derived from ''bol'shinstvó'' (большинство́), "majority", literally meaning "one of the majority". also known in English ...
in March 1917 and was elected deputy chairman of the Quba revolutionary committee.
During 1918 - 1921, he participated in the
October Revolution
The October Revolution,. officially known as the Great October Socialist Revolution. in the Soviet Union, also known as the Bolshevik Revolution, was a revolution in Russia led by the Bolshevik Party of Vladimir Lenin that was a key moment ...
and
Russian Civil War
, date = October Revolution, 7 November 1917 – Yakut revolt, 16 June 1923{{Efn, The main phase ended on 25 October 1922. Revolt against the Bolsheviks continued Basmachi movement, in Central Asia and Tungus Republic, the Far East th ...
in ranks of a commander of
regiment
A regiment is a military unit. Its role and size varies markedly, depending on the country, service and/or a specialisation.
In Medieval Europe, the term "regiment" denoted any large body of front-line soldiers, recruited or conscripted ...
, military commissar of Azerbaijani division, advisor of the
Caucasus
The Caucasus () or Caucasia (), is a region between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea, mainly comprising Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, and parts of Southern Russia. The Caucasus Mountains, including the Greater Caucasus range, have historically ...
corps of the Russian military command, and the head of
revolutionary tribunal of Azerbaijani division. After the Soviet takeover of Azerbaijan, Baghirov was appointed the Chairman of the Revolutionary Committee of Karabakh region of Azerbaijan. It was reported that Baghirov worked also for the Azerbaijan Democratic Republic's police. In February 1921, he joined
Cheka
The All-Russian Extraordinary Commission ( rus, Всероссийская чрезвычайная комиссия, r=Vserossiyskaya chrezvychaynaya komissiya, p=fsʲɪrɐˈsʲijskəjə tɕrʲɪzvɨˈtɕæjnəjə kɐˈmʲisʲɪjə), abbreviated ...
, later renamed the
Ogpu
The Joint State Political Directorate (OGPU; russian: Объединённое государственное политическое управление) was the intelligence and state security service and secret police of the Soviet Union f ...
. In 1927–29, he served as the director of Department for Water Distribution of Transcaucasia. In December 1929 to August 1930, Baghirov was the head of state security services in Azerbaijan.
Relationship with Beria
In 1921, one of Baghirov's subordinates in Cheka was the young
Lavrentiy Beria
Lavrentiy Pavlovich Beria (; rus, Лавре́нтий Па́влович Бе́рия, Lavréntiy Pávlovich Bériya, p=ˈbʲerʲiə; ka, ლავრენტი ბერია, tr, ; – 23 December 1953) was a Georgian Bolshevik ...
, whose career he sponsored.
Beria repaid him when he was appointed overlord of the three Transcaucasian republics (Azerbaijan, Armenia and Georgia) in 1932, first by arranging for Baghirov to be appointed the 'responsible instructor' of the
Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union
The Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, – TsK KPSS was the executive leadership of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, acting between sessions of Congress. According to party statutes, the committee direct ...
in Azerbaijan, and then the boss of the Azerbaijan communist party. According to Beria's son, Sergo:
First Secretary of Communist Party
Baghirov was the first secretary of the
Central Committee
Central committee is the common designation of a standing administrative body of Communist party, communist parties, analogous to a board of directors, of both ruling and nonruling parties of former and existing socialist states. In such party org ...
of the
Azerbaijan Communist Party from December 1933 to April 1953. He was the only regional party boss apart from
Andrei Zhdanov in Leningrad to remain in office throughout the
Great Purge
The Great Purge or the Great Terror (russian: Большой террор), also known as the Year of '37 (russian: 37-й год, translit=Tridtsat sedmoi god, label=none) and the Yezhovshchina ('period of Nikolay Yezhov, Yezhov'), was General ...
, during which more than 10,000 people in Azerbaijan were shot on a charge of plotting to assassinate Baghirov. In October 1937, he was raised to full membership of the
Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union
The Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, – TsK KPSS was the executive leadership of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, acting between sessions of Congress. According to party statutes, the committee direct ...
after a clutch of incumbents had been denounced as 'enemies of the people'.
On 7 March 1953, just after the death of
Joseph Stalin
Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin (born Ioseb Besarionis dze Jughashvili; – 5 March 1953) was a Georgian revolutionary and Soviet political leader who led the Soviet Union from 1924 until his death in 1953. He held power as General Secreta ...
, Baghirov was appointed a candidate member of the Praesidium (
Politburo
A politburo () or political bureau is the executive committee for communist parties. It is present in most former and existing communist states.
Names
The term "politburo" in English comes from the Russian ''Politbyuro'' (), itself a contraction ...
) of the Central Committee, which means that he was officially the most senior communist official based in any of the smaller Soviet republics outside Russia. On 21 April, he transferred himself to the post of chairman of the Council of Ministers of the Azerbaijan SSR, but on 19 July was sacked, in the wake of the arrest of Beria.
Trial and Execution
Baghirov was arrested in 1954, and charged with having been a bandit during the
Russian Civil War
, date = October Revolution, 7 November 1917 – Yakut revolt, 16 June 1923{{Efn, The main phase ended on 25 October 1922. Revolt against the Bolsheviks continued Basmachi movement, in Central Asia and Tungus Republic, the Far East th ...
, with having been responsible for the deaths of a large number of senior Azerbaijani communists during the Great Purge, including
Gazanfar Musabekov,
Huseyn Rahmanov.
Hamid Sultanov
Hamid Hasan oglu Sultanov ( az, Həmid Sultanov; 26 May 1889 – 1938) was a Soviet Azerbaijani politician, People's Commissar for Internal Affairs of the Azerbaijan SSR and later Chair of the Council of People's Commissars of the Nakhchivan ASSR ...
,
Ayna Sultanova
Ayna Mahmud gizi Sultanova (1895 – 1938) was an Azerbaijani Communist party activist and statesperson. She was one of the first Azerbaijanis, Azerbaijani female revolutionaries and in 1938, became the first Azerbaijani female cabinet minister.
...
and many more, and of "being one of the most active and intimate accomplices of the traitor Beria." He was tried with five others at a special sessions of the Military Collegium of the USSR Supreme Court in Baku on 12–26 April 1956. In his final 17-minute speech before the court, he favored the sentence and refused to apply for any pardon. Baghirov was executed in 1956.
[
Mir Jafar Baghirov is a controversial figure in Azerbaijani history. By 1940 an estimated 70,000 Azeris had died as a result of purges carried out under Baghirov. The intelligentsia was decimated, broken, and eliminated as a social force and the old guard Communist elite was destroyed. However, Baghirov was also successful in resisting the Armenian demands to cede the Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast of the Azerbaijan SSR to the ]Armenian SSR
The Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic,; russian: Армянская Советская Социалистическая Республика, translit=Armyanskaya Sovetskaya Sotsialisticheskaya Respublika) also commonly referred to as Soviet A ...
.
He was credited for treating his junior son as an ordinary Soviet citizen. Baghirov sent his son, Vladimir (Jahangir) Baghirov, a military pilot, to the Soviet Army to fight against Nazi Germany. He was killed in battle in June 1943, after performing an aerial ramming
Aerial ramming or air ramming is the ramming of one aircraft with another. It is a last-ditch tactic in air combat, sometimes used when all else has failed. Long before the invention of aircraft, ramming tactics in naval warfare and ground warfare ...
.
Honours and awards
* Order of the Red Banner
The Order of the Red Banner (russian: Орден Красного Знамени, Orden Krasnogo Znameni) was the first Soviet military decoration. The Order was established on 16 September 1918, during the Russian Civil War by decree of th ...
(twice)
* Five Orders of Lenin
* Order of the Red Banner of Labor (twice)
* Order of the Red Banner of the Azerbaijan SSR
* Order of the Patriotic War
References
External links
M.J.Baghirov biography
{{DEFAULTSORT:Baghirov, Mir Jafar
1896 births
1956 deaths
20th-century Azerbaijani educators
People from Quba
People from Baku Governorate
Azerbaijani atheists
Azerbaijani revolutionaries
Bolsheviks
First secretaries in national subdivisions of the Soviet Union
Executed politicians
Executed Soviet people from Azerbaijan
Party leaders of the Soviet Union
Executed Azerbaijani people
Azerbaijani people executed by the Soviet Union
People of the Russian Civil War
People of the Russian Revolution
Azerbaijani educators
Politburo of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union candidate members
Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union members
First secretaries of the Azerbaijan Communist Party
Recipients of the Order of Lenin
Recipients of the Order of the Red Banner
Recipients of the Order of the Red Banner of Labour
First convocation members of the Soviet of the Union
Second convocation members of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union
Third convocation members of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union
Heads of the government of the Azerbaijan Soviet Socialist Republic
Deaths by firearm in Azerbaijan
Great Purge perpetrators
Members of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union executed by the Soviet Union