Transcaucasian Soviet Federated Socialist Republic

Transcaucasian Soviet Federated Socialist Republic, federation composed of Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia, which was established as part of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) in 1922 and abolished in 1936.

At the end of World War I (1914-1918) three independent countries were established in the South Caucasus (also known as Transcaucasia): Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia. In January 1920 the Allied Powers accorded de facto recognition to them, and treaties delimiting boundaries were signed with Turkey. Although the formal independence of these countries was thereby accepted, they appeared to be under Russian control. In April 1920 the government of Azerbaijan was overthrown by an internal revolution and replaced by a soviet republic. In December of that year a soviet government was established in Armenia. A disturbance in January 1921 caused Russian troops to enter Georgia, where the organization of a soviet republic was announced in March.

On March 12, 1922, the three soviet governments created the Transcaucasian Federation, an independent unit. On December 13, 1922, the first Transcaucasian Congress of Soviets, held in the city of Baku, transformed it into the Transcaucasian Soviet Federated Socialist Republic (TSFSR). On December 30, 1922, it joined the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), becoming one of the four original federated republics of the USSR.

The area of the federated republic was 184,600 sq km (71,300 sq mi). Within it were organized the autonomous oblasts of Nagorno-Karabakh and South Ossetia and the autonomous republics of Naxçıvan, Abkhazia, and Ajaria. In December 1936 the federation was dissolved, largely because of stress arising from its ethnographic complexity, but the three constituents remained in the Soviet Union as individual republics until 1991, when the USSR collapsed. See also Caucasus.