Russian conquest of Central Asia
| Russian conquest of Central Asia | |||||||||
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| Part of the Russian conquests | |||||||||
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| Belligerents | |||||||||
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 Kazakhstan Bukhara Khiva KokandTurkmen tribes Kyrgyz tribes .svg){kind=small} Afghanistan
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| Commanders and leaders | |||||||||
 Nicholas I Alexander II Alexander III Nicholas II Vasily Perovsky Konstantin von Kaufman Ivan Lazarev Nikolai Lomakin Mikhail Skobelev Ormon Khan |
Kenesary Khan † Nasrullah Khan Muzaffaruddin Bahadur Khan Allah Quli Bahadur Abu al-Ghazi Muhammad Amin Bahadur Qutlugh Muhammad Murad Bahadur Sayyid Muhammad Muhammad Rahim Bahadur II Muhammad Mallya Beg Khan Muhammad Sultan Khan Alimqul † Muhammad Khudayar Khan Turkmen tribes: Berdi Murad Khan † Kara Bateer † Abdur Rahman Khan
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| Strength | |||||||||
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In 1839: 5,000 troops 10,000 camels In 1853: 2,000+ troops In 1864: 2,500 troops In 1873: 13,000 troops In 1879: 3,500 troops In 1881: 7,100 troops In 1883–1885: 1,500 troops |
In 1853: ~12,000 troops In 1865: ~36,000 troops |
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| Casualties and losses | |||||||||
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In 1839: 1,054 killed or died of diseases In 1879: 200+ killed ~250 wounded In 1881: 59–268 killed 254–669 wounded 645 died of diseases In 1885: 11 killed or wounded |
In 1853: 230+ killed Turkmen tribes: In 1879: 2,000+ killed 2,000+ wounded In 1881: ~8,000 killed (incl. civilians) In 1885:~900 killed or wounded |
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Russian victory
The Russian conquest of Central Asia took place in the second half of the nineteenth century. The land that became Russian Turkestan and later Soviet Central Asia is now divided between Kazakhstan in the north, Uzbekistan across the center, Kyrgyzstan in the east, Tajikistan in the southeast and Turkmenistan in the southwest. Before the Russians came the north was held by the Kazakh steppe nomads and their ancestors while the south was approximately part of Greater Iran. The area was called Turkestan because most of its inhabitants spoke Turkic languages.
Outline: In the eighteenth century Russia gained increasing control over the Kazakh steppe. In 1839 they failed to conquer the Khanate of Khiva south of the Aral Sea. In 1847-53 they built a line of forts from the north side of the Aral Sea eastward up the Syr Darya river. In 1847-1864 they crossed the eastern Kazakh steppe and built a line of forts along the northern border of Kyrgyzstan. 1864-1868 they moved south from Kyrgyzstan, captured Tashkent and Samarkand and dominated the Khanates of Kokand and Bokhara. They now held a triangle whose southern point was 1000 miles south of Siberia and 1200 miles southeast of their supply bases on the Volga. The next step was to turn this triangle into a rectangle by crossing the Caspian Sea. In 1873 they conquered Khiva. In 1881 they took western Turkmenistan. In 1884 the Merv oasis and eastern Turkmenistan were taken. In 1885 expansion south toward Afghanistan was blocked by the British. In 1893-95 they occupied the high Pamirs in the southeast.
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Wikipedia