FAR EASTERN REPUBLIC

also called Chita Republic, Russian Dalnevostochnaya Respublika, or Chitinskaya Respublika, nominally independent state formed by Soviet Russia in eastern Siberia in 1920 and absorbed into the Soviet Union in 1922. At the time of the Far Eastern Republic's creation, the Bolsheviks controlled Siberia west of Lake Baikal, while Japan held much of the Pacific coast, including Vladivostok. Lenin therefore ordered the creation of the Far Eastern Republic, centring on the city of Chita, to act as a buffer between Soviet and Japanese holdings. Once Soviet power was firmly established in Siberia, the republic was to be absorbed into the Russian Soviet Federated Socialist Republic. Victories by the local Bolsheviks, pressure from the United States, which was worried about Japanese control of the entire Pacific coast of Asia, and pressure from the increasingly stronger and securer Soviet government forced Japan to evacuate Siberia in 1922. The Far Eastern Republic was then incorporated into the Soviet Union in November 1922.