Crimea within the Russian SFSR (1921–1954) Crimean ASSR (1921–1945) On 18 October 1921, after a successful military campaign by the
Red Army on the
Southern Front of the
Russian Civil War led to the
White Army's
evacuation from Crimea in late 1920, the Crimean Autonomous Socialist Soviet Republic was created within the Russian SFSR by the
Bolsheviks. It was renamed the Crimean Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic on 5 December 1936 by the Eighth Extraordinary
Congress of Soviets of the USSR. There were two unsuccessful attempts to establish
Jewish autonomy in Crimea. The first attempt, conducted by the Soviet government with the support of the
American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee, ended in the creation of the
Jewish Autonomous Oblast in
Birobidzhan, as the Soviet government feared establishing it in Crimea would provoke antisemitic sentiments. The second attempt, by the
Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee between 1943 and 1944, led to the
Night of the Murdered Poets and heightened persecution of Jews as Stalin feared the establishment of a Jewish republic in Crimea with American support. Crimea was under
de facto control of
Nazi Germany from September 1942 to October 1943, administratively incorporated into as .
Alfred Frauenfeld was appointed as General Commissar (although it seems that Frauenfeld spent most of his time in Crimea researching the peninsula's
Gothic heritage and the actual government was in the hands of
Erich von Manstein). During the war, there was also widespread
resistance to the German occupation. In 1944, under the pretext of alleged collaboration of the Crimean Tatars with the Nazi occupation regime, the Soviet government
deported the Crimean Tatar people from Crimea, according to
GKO Order No. 5859ss of
Joseph Stalin and
Lavrentiy Beria. Actual collaboration in the military sense had been rather limited, with a recorded 9,225 Crimean Tatars serving in anti-Soviet
Tatar Legions and other
German formed battalions, but there was in fact a surprisingly high degree of co-operation between the occupation government and the local administration; this has been significantly due to Frauenfeld's unwillingness to implement the policy of brutality towards the local population pursued by
Erich Koch, which led to a series of public conflict between the two men. The constitutional rights of the forcibly-resettled Tatars were restored with a
decree dated September 5, 1967, but they were not allowed to
return until the last days of the Soviet Union.
Crimean Oblast (1945–1954) The Crimean ASSR was converted into the
Crimean Oblast of the Russian SFSR on June 30, 1945, by a
decree of the
Presidium of the Supreme Soviet (published as a
law on June 25, 1946). It was stripped of its autonomous status as a result of the alleged crimes of
Crimean Tatars during
World War II. 90% of toponyms
were changed in 1944–1949 from mostly Crimean Tatar to Russian.
Crimea within the Ukrainian SSR (1954–1992) Crimean Oblast (1954–1991) On 19 February 1954, the oblast was
transferred from the Russian SFSR to the Ukrainian SSR jurisdiction, and to commemorate the 300th anniversary of
Ukraine's union with Russia.
Sevastopol was a
closed city due to its importance as the port of the Soviet
Black Sea Fleet, and was attached to the Crimean Oblast only in 1978.
Crimean ASSR (1991–1992) On 12 February 1991, the status of Crimea Oblast was changed to that of autonomous republic, the
Crimean Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic, by the
Supreme Soviet of the Ukrainian SSR as the result of a state-sanctioned
referendum held on 20 January 1991. 4 months later, on June 19, appropriate changes were made to the Constitution of the Ukrainian SSR. With effect from 6 May 1992, the Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic was transformed into the
Republic of Crimea within
Ukraine. On 21 September 1994 it was renamed the
Autonomous Republic of Crimea by
Verkhovna Rada. This name was used for Crimea (with the exception of the city of
Sevastopol) in the new Ukrainian Constitution of 1996. The status of Sevastopol, due to its strategic importance as the
main base of the Russian Black Sea Fleet, remained disputed between Ukraine and Russia until 1997 when it was
agreed that it should be treated as a "
city with special status" within Ukraine. == Administrative divisions ==