The Moldavian Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic (Moldavian/Romanian: Република Аутономэ Советикэ Cочиалистэ Молдовеняскэ, Republica Autonomă Sovietică Socialistă Moldovenească), shortened to Moldavian ASSR or, less frequently, Moldovan ASSR, was an autonomous republic of the Ukrainian SSR between 12 October 1924 and 2 August 1940, encompassing modern Transnistria (now in Moldova) and a number of territories that are now part of Ukraine.

Creation

The creation of the autonomous republic was initiated by a letter signed by Grigore Kotovski, Al. Bădulescu, P. Tkacenko, S. Tinkelman (Timov), A. Nicolau, A. Zalic, I. Dic, T. Diamandescu, T. Chioran, and V. Popovici, all signatories being Bolshevik activists (many of them from Bessarabia). Establishing the republic became a matter of dispute. Soviet commissar of foreign relations Chicherin held that its establishment would be premature and would lead to the "expansion of Romanian chauvinism". On the other hand, Kotovski held that a new republic would spread Communist ideas into neighboring Bessarabia, with a chance that even Romania and the entire Balkan region would be revolutionized. On March 7, 1924, it was cautiously decided to create a Moldavian Autonomous Oblast within the Ukrainian SSR.

While the creation of ethnic-based autonomous republics was a general Soviet policy at that time, with the creation of the Moldavian ASSR, the Soviet Union also hoped to bolster its claim to Bessarabia.

For the Soviets the republic was to be a way for winning over Bessarabians of Romania and the first step towards a revolution in Romania.King, p.54 This purpose is explained in an article of the newspaper Odessa Izvestia in 1924, in which a Russian politician, Vadeev says that "all the oppressed Moldavians from Bessarabia look at the future Republic like at a lighthouse, which spreads the light of freedom and human dignity," as well as in a book published in Moscow, which claimed that "once the economic and cultural growth of Moldova has begun, aristocrat-lead Romania will not be able to maintain its hold on Bessarabia."

Geography

The Moldavian ASSR was created from a territory previously administered as part of the Odessa and Podolia regions of Ukraine. It accounted for 2% of the land and population of the Ukrainian SSR at the time.King, p.52
Initially, the oblast had four districts, all of them having a Moldovan majority:

• Rîbniţa - 48,748 inhabitants, of which 25,387 Moldovans - 52%

• Dubăsari - 57,371 inhabitants, of which 33,600 Moldovans- 58%

• Tiraspol - almost entirely Moldovan

• Ananiv - 45,545 inhabitants, of which 24,249 Moldovans- 53%

On 8 October 1924 the oblast was elevated to the status of autonomous republic and included several other territories, including some with little Moldavian population, such as the Balta district (where the capital was located), which had only 2.52% Moldavians.

The official capital was proclaimed the "temporarily occupied city of Kishinev." Meanwhile, a provisional capital was established in Balta and moved to Tiraspol in 1929, where it remained until the MASSR was integrated into the newly created Moldavian SSR in 1940.

Demographics

thumb|Ethnic composition of MASSR, 1926
MASSR had a mixed Ukrainian (46%) and Moldovan (32%) population, which was estimated at 545,500. Its area was 8,677 km² and included 11 raions on the left bank of Dniester.

According to the 1926 Soviet census, the Republic had a population of 572,339, of which:

Despite this extensive territory allotted to the Moldavian Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic, about 85,000 Moldovans remained in Ukraine outside the territory of MASSR.

History

During the Russian Civil War, the area of the Moldavian ASSR switched hands twelve times between the White Movement, the Red Army, the Cossacks, Ukrainian militias and raving hordes of bandits. After the victory of the Bolsheviks, in 1920, it became part of the Ukrainian SSR.

Romania, and east of it Moldavian ASSR in the USSR

The area was quickly industrialized, and because of the lack of a qualified workforce, a significant migration from other Soviet republics occurred, predominantly Ukrainians and Russians. In particular, in 1928, of 14,300 industrial workers only about 600 were Moldovans.

In 1925 MASSR survived a famine.

In December 1927, the Time Magazine has reported a number of anti-Soviet uprisings among peasants and factory workers in Tiraspol and other cities (Mogilev-Podolskiy, Kamyanets-Podolskiy) of southern Ukrainian SSR. Troops from Moscow were sent to the region and suppressed the unrest, resulting in ca 4000 deaths. The insurrections were at the time completely denied by the official Kremlin press.
Collectivization in the MASSR was even more fast-paced than in Ukraine and was reported to be complete by summer 1931. This was accompanied by the deportation of about 2,000 families to Kazakhstan.

In 1932-1933 another famine, known as Holodomor in Ukraine, occurred, with tens of thousands of peasants dying of starvation. During the famine, thousands of inhabitants tried to escape over Dniester, despite the threat of being shot. The most notable such incident happened near the village Olăneşti on February 23, 1932, when 40 persons were shot. This was reported in European newspapers by survivors. The Soviet side reported this as an escape of "kulak elements subdued by Romanian propaganda."

Creation of the Moldavian ethnicity theory

Ukrainian SSR in 1933, after the Peace of Riga and the consolidation of USSR. Note the rose border line showing the Soviet claim over the former Russian Bessarabia Governorate

The tenet of a separate Moldavian language began to be developed here. It claimed that the Moldavians were a different nation from the Romanians, and that they were "oppressed by Romanian imperialists". After World War II, this would be part of the official ideology of the Communist Party in Soviet Moldova. Still, this is far from the reality as the so-called "Moldavian language" is the same with the Romanian language with differences in accent and some minor differences in vocabulary.

As part of the effort to keep Soviet Moldovans ("Moldavian Socialist culture") far from Romanian influences ("Romanian bourgeois culture"), the traditional Latin script was replaced by a new Cyrillic script. The linguist Leonid Madan was assigned the task of constructing this new language, based on the Moldovan dialects of Transnistria and Bessarabia and new words taken from the Russian language or invented by him.

In 1932, when in the entire Soviet Union there was a trend to move all languages to the Latin script, the Moldovan ethnicity theory was temporarily dropped, and the Latin script and literary Romanian language was introduced in Moldovan schools and public use. Madan's books were removed from libraries and destroyed. This gave Soviets the opportunity to introduce more Communist influence into Romania.

This movement, however, was short lived, and in the second half of the 1940s a new trend of moving languages to the Cyrillic script started in the Soviet Union.

In 1937 Joseph Stalin ordered massive repressions, which resulted in Romanian intellectuals of the Moldavian ASSR being accused of being Romanian spies, removed from their positions and repressed, with a large number of them executed. In 1938 the Cyrillic script was again declared official for the Moldovan language and the Latin script was banned. However, the literary language did not fully return to Madan's creation and remained closer to Romanian. After 1956, Madan's influences were entirely dropped from school books.

This policy remained in effect until 1989. Use of Cyrillic is still enforced in the Moldova's breakaway region of Transnistria, where it is claimed to be returning the language to its "roots."

Disbanding

On June 26, 1940 the Soviet government issued an ultimatum to the Romanian minister in Moscow, demanding Romania to immediately cede Bessarabia and Northern Bukovina.Charles King, The Moldovans: Romania, Russia, and the politics of culture, Hoover Institution Press, Stanford University, 2000. ISBN 0-8179-9792-X. Italy and Germany, which needed a stable Romania and access to its oil fields urged King Carol II to comply. Under duress, with no prospect of aid from France or Britain, Romania ceded those territories. On June 28, Soviet troops crossed the Dniester and occupied Bessarabia, Northern Bukovina, and the Hertza region. Territories where ethnic Ukrainians were the largest ethnic group (parts of Northern Bukovina and parts of Hotin, Akkerman, and Izmail), as well as some adjoining regions with a Romanian majority, such as the Hertza region, were annexed to the Ukrainian SSR. The transfer of Bessarabia's Black Sea and Danube frontage to Ukraine ensured its control by a stable Soviet republic.

On August 2, 1940, the Soviet Union established the Moldovan Soviet Socialist Republic (Moldovan SSR), which consisted of six counties of Bessarabia joined with the western-most part of what had been the MASSR, effectively dissolving it.