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DMITRY ASINOVSKY. THE SOVIET UNION, NATIONALISM AND RELIGION IN AFRICA AND THE MIDDLE EAST (19551980) / / The article was written for the bulletin "Russia and the Moslem World."
Keywords: religion, nationalism, Soviet foreign policy, Cold war, decolonization.
Dmitry Asinovsky,
Junior Research Associate, European University, St. Petersburg
Abstract. A change of the Soviet foreign-policy course with a greater orientation to the developing countries of Asia and Africa after Stalin's death has provoked a change of the foreign policy instruments. Along with channeling great resources to study the countries of Asia and Africa, a revision was made of the attitude toward the decolonized regimes actively using nationalism and religion as the ideological foundation. The article turns to the study of the assessments of the role of religion and nationalism in the revolutionary movement in the 1955-1980 period, which were rather paradoxical for Soviet ideology.
The geopolitical conditions of the mid-1950s created a unique situation within whose framework the Soviet Union had to adapt its ideological activity, at least in its part intended for foreign consumption. After Stalin's death a sharp turn has taken place in Soviet foreign policy, the postwar concentration of attention on Europe was expanded and tuned to other regions. In recent years several works have been published showing that in the postwar period under Stalin the Soviet position on the revolutionary movements in developing countries largely depended on the situation in Europe and other places on which agreements were valid and relation with our former allies were rather tense. Moreover, during Stalin's period our readiness to come to terms and conclude agreements with "bourgeois-nationalist regimes"
was very low, be it Sukarno's regime in Indonesia or the young revolutionary regime in Egypt.
A change in the attitude to the international situation after Khrushchev came to power was reflected, above all, in a stand to national-liberation movements and decolonization. From the mid-1950s onwards these processes were regarded as a potential which the Soviet Union should use to advantage. In contrast to Stalin, Khrushchev was not only ready to render aid to revolutionary regimes (primarily revolutionary-oriented), but also give assistance to a broader range of the national forces fighting against colonialist domination. It was in connection with this situation that Soviet representatives were not invited to take part in the Bandung conference, which was very disappointing to the Soviet leadership. Moreover, one of the biggest discussions at the conference was connected with the proposal to adopt a resolution condemning the Soviet Union as one of the colonial powers. This resolution was based on the facts of the preservation by the Soviet Union of Russian imperial gains in Central Asia and the Soviet leading position in one of the two blocs in global confrontation.
The Bandung conference and the emergence of the non-aligned movement following it became a strong motive factor for the Soviet foreign-policy apparatus in order to begin the advance of the Soviet Union in the anti-colonial struggle. However, the position of scientific and social progress adhered to previously did not bring tangible result, as shown by practice. It was during that period that the building of channels of informal cultural diplomacy and a more thorough study of the traditions of the decolonized world began. Institutionally, reforms were started through the reorganization of the All-Union Society of Cultural Ties with Foreign Countries (Russ. abbr. "VOKS") and other bodies. The real "heir" of VOKS was the Union of Soviet Societies of Friendship and Cultural Ties with Foreign Countries (Russ. barb. SSOD). However, if we take exclusively developing countries of the Third World, a more significant role in cultural diplomacy was assigned
to the newly-formed structure - the Soviet Committee of Solidarity of Asian and African Countries set up especially by public organizations of the Asian republics of the U.S.S.R. in 1956. Inasmuch as closer contacts were established with traditionally Muslim regions, it was only natural that among the mediators should have been representatives of Central Asia and the Caucasus -party functionaries, intellectuals, scientists and scholars, etc. Besides, it should be admitted that the transformation through which Soviet Islam has gone through, makes it possible to speak of certain special Soviet Islamic culture, which represents rather Islamic cultural, but not religious heritage. Thus, Soviet political and cultural emissaries came out as bearers and representatives of Islamic civilization rather than Islam as religion. This idea reflected the position and was supported by the Communist party leadership. Cultural diplomacy openly used the religious parlance and rhetoric, and was represented by the Central Asian Spiritual Board of Muslims and its head Mufti Babakhanov.
Africa has attracted the attention of Soviet foreign policy long before the start of mass decolonization. It was one of the most important regions of the world where many developing countries could be drawn into the orbit of Soviet influence. For Premier Khrushchev Africa represented a new arena for spreading socialist ideals to replace the outgoing colonial influence. At the same time for the European colonial powers. Africa was a region remaining exclusively in their sphere of influence, despite decolonization. On the other hand, for many African revolutionaries and new national leaders the Soviet Union was the alternative road of modernization, not connected with dependence on technologies, resources, and capital of the former metropolitan countries.
This is directly connected with the development of the concept of neocolonialism. New independent African leaders (the first of them was the leader of Ghana Kwame Nkrumah) have successfully applied the Marxist theory to realities of decolonized states. If classical Marxism turns to the subject of social injustice within the system, neocolonialism asserts the presence of growing
injustices born of colonialism within the framework of the postcolonial system. A special ruse, which characterized the postcolonial order of the world from the point of view of the theory of neocolonialism was hidden in the fact that the former colonies were granted formal independence, however real dependence was preserved in the form of economic exploitation in the interests of representatives of the old metropolitan countries. For such political figures like Kwame Nkrumah it was necessary to emphasize that the neocolonialists were guided not so much by their striving for economic benefit, but to a greater extent the desire to retain their power and influence. On the other hand, within the framework of assessments of colonialism and its aftermath the major theoretical investigations asserted the inconvertible essence of cultural and linguistic changes and transformations as one of the most significant factors of the influence of European colonialism on the traditional culture of the Third World countries. At the same time, despite the fact that religion did not hold an important place in neocolonial and other theories close to it, it could well be defined as one of the aspects of cultural neocolonialism. The absolute majority of national-liberation movements avoided religious rhetoric in their ideology Their ideological basis was anti-colonial nationalism. In this sense the revolution in Iran and a new turn of post-colonialism anti-colonialism is an exclusion, which will be examined in greater detail in later chapters. For an earlier period and most national leaders of a broad range from Kame Nkrumah to Hamilcar Cabral religion was not a banner of their movement, but on the contrary a struggle against it often became a major ideological task. Similarly, for nationalists and socialists in the Third world religion symbolized backwardness, which should have been overcome, often irrespective of the cultural sources of religion - be it Christianity or Islam imported from outside, or local religious cults. At the same time most people had a serious attitude to religion, and only a few leaders were ready to take the path of Mustafa Kemal and remove religion from public medium. Thus,
new nationalism of the former independent colonies, in contrast of European socialism, was founded on anti-imperialist feelings and tied to national ride and local traditions. Irrespective of whether new national leaders were or were not ready to include religion in their understanding of the "local" ideology of anti-colonialism of most people, it was present. One can site examples of another type of national leaders, thus, the Indonesian leader Sukarno offered his supporters an original mixture, including Indonesian nationalism not only with elements of socialism, but also of Islam. Another example of an interesting ideological mixture can be given by the ideology of African socialism ("ujamaa"), whose main protagonist was the first President of independent Tanzania Julius Nyerere. Just like Sukarno, he was a deeply religious person till the end of his day. At the same time a confirmed socialist, he did not see an alliance with the Soviet Union as the unique way to establish a just social order. In turn, as to the Soviet Union, such leaders as Sukarno in the 1950s and Nyerere in the 1960s came out as motivating triggers to search for flexible aspects in Soviet ideological export. Gaining sympathies of new regimes with a bent to socialism, but with nationalist (and sometimes religious) elites at the head was one of the key tasks in the foreign policy of Nikita Khrushchev, and even to a greater extent for Brezhnev.
Khrushchev's ideological offensive in Africa can hardly be called successful. Soviet assistance to Kwame Nkrumah in Ghana, Patrice Lumumba in Congo and Ahmed Sekou Toure in Guinee has not given such benefits to the U.S.S.R. A certain disappointment, however, did not mean a return to Stalin's unbelief in the revolutionary transformation of backward regions. Almost a decade later Brezhnev's foreign-policy trio (Gromyko, Gecko and Andropov made a comeback to Africa. Modern investigations show that Soviet policy directed to Equatorial and South Africa in the 1970s was a result of a combination of a number of factors. An open confrontation with China for leadership in the socialist camp, disintegration of the dictatorial regime in Portugal, and at the same time U.S. collapse in Southeast
Asia, the brothers Castro pressure for whom Africa was always an important testing ground and springboard where it was possible to manifest the independence of Cuba's foreign policy. However, from the ideological point of view the crucial factor was the mass turn of African revolutionaries to left ideology. For the Soviet Union it looked as a historic opportunity which should not have been missed. Turning the new leaders of the former Portuguese Empire in Africa to Marxism-Leninism has created a state of euphoria in the Soviet foreign-policy bloc. Now the Soviet Union had business not with Nyerere or Nkrumah with their unique African socialism, but with leaders of a new type, representing Marxist-Leninist ideals among the newly-free African peoples, such as Agostinho Neto in Angola, or Samora Machel in Mozambique.
Another region where changes influenced the formation of an optimistic view on the ideological prospects of Soviet foreign policy toward developing countries was the Middle East. After the defeat of the coalition headed by the United Arab Republic in the 6-day war the impasse of the Pan-Arabic project became ever clearer. Despite the fact that the President of Egypt Anvar Sadat, who replaced President Nasser, did not justify the hopes of the Soviet foreign-policy bloc, another part of the unlucky project -Syria headed by Hafez al-Assad proved a more promising direction. Syria became the key partner of the U.S.S.R. in the Middle East, as it adhered to the nationalist Baathist ideology. The situation in its neighbor Iraq was still more favorable from the Soviet point of view. Despite the fact that the friendly regime of Abdel Karim Kassim's regime was overthrown in 1963, by 1970 the Iraqi communists were able to get a whole number of high government posts. Iraq's example proved very important for the emergence of positive expectations in the U.S.S.R. concerning developing countries with nationalist regimes. Arab nationalism and pan-Arabism itself was criticized by Soviet analysts after Nasser's death, which made it look like African nationalist projects.
The left-wing ideological trend in the Middle East has become stronger after the withdrawal of the last units of the British armed forces from Aden and decolonization of South Yemen. The newly-formed People's Democratic Republic has become an important factor for the Soviet Union's involvement in conflicts in the region of the African Horn. In this context it was not only ideology, but also questions of military-strategic and geopolitical planning that have played a major role. The struggle for spreading socialist ideology and new military and naval bases has prompted the Soviet Union to render support to the left-wing radical uprising in the Oman province of Dhofar and later the new revolutionary regime of Mengistu in Ethiopia. The revolution in Ethiopia proved such spectacular event for the Soviet foreign-policy bloc, that even allied relations with the Somalia regime and the presence of the naval base in that region did not stop the Soviet support of Ethiopia in the Ogaden conflict with Somalia. In this case ideology was more important than short-term geopolitical advantages - Mengistu's regime was not only socialist, but was even ready to adapt the Soviet model and turn it into a theoretical base of Marxism-Leninism. It seemed to become a complete success, which anticipated the future global proliferation of Soviet ideology.
However, if we turn back to religion, we should understand how it was connected with geostrategic and ideological confrontation within the framework of the Cold war in developing countries. By the 1970s the political potential of religion seemed to be part of history rather than a real ideological background. Not a single of the said revolutions or transformations used religion as part of political game. Most political analysts regarded religion as ideology preceding nationalism, the anti-colonial foundation around which local nationalism was formed. Religion (especially Islam in the Middle East) does not seem to have the potential to become an anti-people, universal political ideology, one that it will be in some regions and countries by the end of the 1970s. However, religion has indeed proved an important factor in
societies which passed through the period of radical transformation. Not a single revolutionary movement was religious, but at the same time was not openly anti-religious. Even the very ardent supporters of Marxism-Leninism were not ready to come out against mass religiousness of the societies they headed - be they Muslim countries like Iraq, or Christian like Ethiopia.
Soviet scholars of the Orient and Africa, as well as experts on religion, analyzing the obtaining situation explained why religion has retained its role in societies which took the road of progress, and also find the language and ideological approaches to describe this phenomenon and reacting to it. Within the framework of classical Marxism-Leninism no problems have arisen to explain the existence of the backward majority - revolution and liberation struggle was a prerogative of the conscious vanguard of society. The contradiction in Asia and Africa boiled down to the fact that religious leaders often participated in revolutionary movements, although they did not head them. Thus, the task facing Soviet researchers was to study the real significance of the influence of religion on the social thinking of the Eastern peoples and the new essence, which took traditional religious forms in order to reveal the main specific features of ideological struggle in developing countries.
The downtrodden peoples of the Third World have awoken from the terrible slumber of colonialism lasting for centuries, and this process was closely connected with national and social liberation. Having awoken from the age-old sleep the peoples of the developing countries needed ideological support and, naturally, they turned to religion as the most familiar ideological instrument. Consequently, the significance and influence of religion in developing countries was directly connected with an upsurge of anti-imperialist national ideology in the colonial period. Colonialism was presented as an exclusive historical period when different classes of colonial society joined in struggle against the invaders.
In the confrontation with colonialists the Indians, Iranians, Afghans, Arabs and other peoples of the downtrodden East tried to oppose the alien invaders with the help of their languages, traditions, unique way of life, in which religion played an important role.
Along with the development of petty-bourgeois nationalism and local progressive-minded movements Oriental intellectuals (Jamaluddin al-Afghani, Mohammed Abdo, and their followers) proclaimed the need for religious reform. The interpretation of their ideas by Soviet researchers presupposed return to religious chastity, which could oppose the ideology of colonialists, and at the same time could make religion compatible with bourgeois achievements of the modern world. Another aspect of religion touched in analysis is that Western culture and ideology were taken in societies of the developing countries as materialistic, whereas reformed religion could bolster up the spiritual force of the Orient.
In the view of Soviet experts, religion in the liberated countries of Asia and Africa was of great importance as part of the national myth largely due to the fact that a greater part of the borders of newly-formed states were drawn on maps by colonialists, and there could hardly be one decolonized state demographically close to tribal or ethnic homogeneity. Thus, reformed and "nationalized" religion could become a uniting factor for these new disunited communities. Among such examples we come across in Soviet literature is Chad of the period of the presidency of Ngart F. Tombalbaye where religion was proclaimed part of progress; Zaire under Mobutu, where "Africanization" of Christianity was used for reducing the influence of the European clergy and the Catholic church as a whole, concentrating religious belief within the framework of state national ideology; Uganda under Idi Amin Dada, who, despite his adoption of Islam, issued a decree on the deportation of all foreign clergymen in order "to Ugandize" religion. Similarly, Nyerere's policy in Tanzania during that period was described as nationalist.
His "Utopian African socialism" did not exclude religion from state ideology and, in contrast to Mobutu and Amin, Nyerere never used reprisals against clergymen. Moreover, he offered them to become allies of the government in the transformation of Tanzanian society: "The state in Africa has enough opportunities to suppress clerical opposition and complete the process of separation of church from the state. In Zaire suppression and separation successfully proceeded under nationalist slogans. In both cases these processes will probably end with the creation of syncretic religious Christhood national ideology, which is necessary for national self-identification and development of a unified strong state."
In any case, these quotations and descriptions confirm the importance which religion had in the assessments of Soviet experts. Despite the fact that religion did not play a considerable role in the socialist transformation of certain regions of the Third World in the 1970s, it was a major factor of the formation of local nationalism and that was why the socialist triumph in new regions and more thorough establishment of Marxist-Leninist doctrines in the already revolutionized countries were impossible without the determination of the role of religion in revolutionary processes. Nationalism in developing countries in works by experts was closely connected with religious roots due to a special situation in the colonial period. In this connection analysts time and again turned to Lenin's words about a dual essence of religion and the need to assess the political nature of one or another religious movement through the prism of forces, which this movement includes in itself, and the role which these forces play under certain socio-political circumstances. Indeed, religion, according to Lenin, could be used by the reactionary forces, but at the same time it could play the role similar to that it played in the antifeudal movements in Europe - the role close to be to progressive and even revolutionary one. The task facing a well-educated Marxist researcher is to investigate thoroughly enough the role played by religion. Even the Soviet anti-religious propaganda
called not to compare religion to anti-communism, despite the fact that religion could play a progressive role in society." One of Khrushchev's political figures Bobojan Gafurov who held the post of Director of the Institute of Oriental Studies wrote the following: "V. Lenin emphasized that a search of reasons, specificities, and concrete details of political and protest movements with religious elements normal for all peoples at a definite stage is a necessary element in order to find new ways to enlarge and broaden antiimperialist struggle. To refuse from analyzing these issues Lenin regarded as an attempt to avoid preparations for the transformation of national movement into social revolution."
However, one of the key features of the progressive role of religion is its temporary stay in this sphere. We shall not find a work or an analytical note which would uphold the position and the potential of long-term preservation of religion in the ideology or consciousness of revolutionary societies of the Third World. The development of the socio-economic situation and the consciousness of backward popular masses has eventually had brought the developing countries to the only true path of scientific perception of reality and, consequently, atheism.
However, reality has introduced definite corrections in this idealistic concept which was circulated by a number of Soviet experts. Religion not only preserved its significance within the framework of revolutionary reality of Asian and African countries, but moreover began to acquire greater political significance. Here, one could talk of the role of Islam - religion having a political component from its very inception, which seemed to return its political prestige, a period during which the transformation of the role of religion in revolutions took place.
In one of the collections published by the Institute of Scientific Atheism in 1978 there was a review of the book by Pierre Bigot entitled "The Church and Revolution in the Third World." Its author claims that mankind is faced with the choice between consumer society and society of management. The author of the review asks whether the Third World has a potential for a
revolution of another type. Several months later the Iranian revolution answered this question.
Notes
1. Westad. The Global Cold W ar. P. 51-67.
2. Ibid., P. 67-72.
3. For more details see T. Alison, The Soviet Union and the Strategy of Non-alignment in the Third World. Cambridge. Cambridge University Press. 1998.
4 For more information about the VOKS reform and SSOD formation see Gould-Davies N. The Logic of Soviet Cultural Diplomacy / / Diplomatic History - 2003. - Vol. 27. No 2 - P. 193-214; S. Mikkonen. Changing Dynamics: From International Exchanges to Transnational Musical Networks. // Reconsidering Stagnation in the Brezhnev Eta. Ideology and Exchange / Lexington Books. 2016. P. 163-184.
5. Kirasirova. "Sons of Muslims." P. 108-124; 123-124.
6. See: Khalid A. Islam after Communism: Religion and Politics in Central Asia. Berkley: University of California Press. 2007.
7. Kirasirova. "Sons of Muslims." P. 124-126.
8. Ibid., P. 12-129.
9. Zubok A. A Failed Empire. P. 247-248.
10. Westad. The Global Cold War. P. 88-116.
11. Mkrumah K. Neo-Colonialism: the Last Stage of Imperialism. London: Nelson. 1965. P. IX-XX.
12. Fanon F. The Wretched of the Earth. New York: Grove Press. 1963. P. 148-205; Ngugi wa Thiong'o. Decolonizing the Mind: The Politics of Language in African Literature. London: J. Currey 1986. P. 1-33.
13. Westad. The Global Cold War. P. 95.
14. For more details about the imperial roots of European imperialism see: Nationalizing empires // Budapest: Central European University Press. 2015.
15. Davidson A. The U.S.S.R. and Africa (1918-1960). Documented history of relations. Moscow. Institute of Oriental Studies RAS. 2002. P. 162-304.
16. Westad O.A. Moscow and the Angolan Crisis. 1974-1976: A New Pattern of Intervention. Cold War International History Bulletin 8(9). P. 20-22; Westad the Global Cold War. P. 207-249; Zubok. A Failed Empire. P. 249-254.
17. Westad. The Global Cold War. P. 250.
18. See: Sagadeyev A.V. Problems of National Philosophy in Ideology of Arab Nationalism / / Modern Ideological Problems in Asian and African Countries. Moscow. Nauka Publishers. 1970. P. 35.
19 For more details about Yemen see Kelly B. Arabia, the Gulf and the West. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson. 1980. Thorough investigation of the revolt in Dhofar and Soviet participation can be found in Takriti A.R. Monsoon Revolution: Republican, Sultans and Empires in Oman. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 2913. P. 164-171.
2°. Westad The Global Cold War, P. 273-279.
21 See: Keddle N.R. Pan-Islam as Proto-Nationalism // The Journal of Modern History - March 1969 - Vol. 41 - No 1 - P. 17-28.
22. Polonskaya L.R. Litman A.D. Religion and Social Thought of Peoples of India // Modern ideological Problems Religion and Social Thought of Peoples of India / / Modern Ideological Problems in Asian and African Countries. Moscow. Nauka Publishers. 1970.
23. Druzhbinsky V. Teplukhin. Historical Experience of Social Transformations in Third World Countries and Religion. Moscow. INION RAS. 1978. P. 3.
24 Polonskaya, Litman. Religiya i obshhestvennaya mysl [Religion and Social Thought]. P. 88.
25 Ibid., P. 52-53.
26. Druzhbinsky, Teplukhin. Istorichesky opyr sotsialnykh preobrazovanii [Historical Experience of Social Transformations]. P. 48.
27 Ibid., P. 52-53.
28. Velikovich L.I. Religiya i obshchestvennaya mysl narodov Vostoka [Religion in Modern Ideological Struggle]. Moscow. Moskovsky rabochy Publishers. 1981. P. 13-15.
29. Religiya i obshchstvennaya mysl narodov Vostoka [Religion and Social Thinking of People of the East]. Moscow. Nauka Publishers. 1971. P. 13-15.
30. Druzhbinsky, Teplukhin Istoruchesky opyt sotsialykh preobrazovanii [Historical Experience of Social Transformations]. P. 55.
31. Radygin A.A. Review of P. Bigot's Book "The Church and Revolution in the Third World" / / Religion and Modern Soviet Problems. Institute of Scientific Atheism. 1976, P. 172-183.
