The position was created 11 October 1992, shortly after the outbreak of the
1992-1993 war with Georgia. The first Minister for Defence was
Vladimir Arshba, but due to his injuries, for most of the time his functions were carried out by Deputy Minister for Defence and Chief of the General Staff
Sultan Sosnaliev, who eventually also formally succeeded Arshba on 25 April 2003. Sosnaliev oversaw Abkhazia's successful expulsion of Georgian forces and remained Defence Minister until on 1 July 1996 he resigned to return to his native
Kabardia. Sosnaliev's successor was
Vladimir Mikanba, who held the position during the
May 1998 war in the Gali district and the
October 2001 incursion of Chechen fighters down the Kodori valley. Mikanba was succeeded by
Raul Khajimba, who would go on to become Prime Minister, and who is the current Vice President of Abkhazia. 22 April 2003, when Khajimba became Prime Minister,
Viacheslav Eshba became Minister for Defence. On 8 November 2004, during the height of the crisis following the
2004 Presidential election, a source within the government claimed that Eshba had been replaced by
Mukhamed Kilba, the deputy chief of Khajimba's presidential campaign, but this was denied by Prime Minister
Nodar Khashba. On 25 February 2005, newly elected President
Sergei Bagapsh called on Sultan Sosnaliev to become Defence Minister once more. Sosnaliev agreed and held the office until shortly after his 65th birthday on 8 May 2007 he resigned for personal reasons. On 26 June 2007 then Deputy Defence Minister
Mirab Kishmaria was appointed Sosnaliev's successor. During the
August 2008 war in South Ossetia, he oversaw
the Abkhazian conquest of so-called
Upper Abkhazia, the only part of Abkhazia that had remained under Georgian control since the 1992-1993 war. Kishmaria remained Minister of Defence until 2020 and served for more than 12 years, the longest officeholder since the creation of the position in 1992. == List of people to hold the office ==