Historical Facts

East Turkestan Republic
East Turkestan in modern Xinjiang has nothing to do historically with West Tujue or East Tujue. The term “East Turkestan” was first used by Russian scholars in the eighteenth century to describe the Central Asian areas belonging to China.

The Central Asian region proper was called West Turkestan – the area of Central Asia that later belonged to Russia. Such is the origin of the modern concept of “East Turkestan.”

Thus “East Turkestan” refers neither to an ethnic group nor to a country; hence it has no ethnic or national historical foundation.

In the early morning hours of November 7, 1944, Moslem Turks in China’s far northwestern province of Xinjiang attacked the Chinese garrison stationed in Yining, the principal city of the Ili valley near Sino-Soviet border.

Despite the fact that Moslem rebels were, at the outset vastly outnumbered by the Chinese troops they quickly gained effectively control of the city and within days had succeeded in forcing the Chinese into the confines of their main headquarters, the local airfield barrack, and a temple on the outskirts of the town.

Secure in their expectation of ultimate victory the Moslems declared the establishment of the East Turkestan Republic in November 12, 1944.

This new Moslem state’s declared objectives were to establish freedom and democracy for Islamic peoples of the Turk’s ancient homeland and to oust all Chinese from the whole of what they referred to as Turkestan, the Chinese province of Xinjiang.

By 1945, the military forces of the East Turkestan Republic had successfully driven Chinese troops from all towns and border posts in the three north westernmost districts of the province.

The troops pushed as far east as the Manas Rivers and were poised for an advance that would have taken them to the very gates of the provincial capital itself.

Hurried diplomatic activity and a personal appeal to the Moslems by Chiang Kai-shek led to negotiations between representatives of the independent three districts and the Chinese central government, which resulted in a peace agreement, signed by both sides in 1946.

The provisions of the Peace Agreement of 1946 – which might have led to real reform on the local level – were not fully implemented.

A major reason for this was the interference on civil government by the local Chinese military establishment on Xinjiang.
East Turkestan Republic