Bat-Ochirin Eldev-Ochir

Bat-Ochirin Eldev-Ochir Бат-Очирын Элдэв-Очир
General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Mongolian People's Party
In office January 30, 1929 – March 13, 1930
Preceded by	Ölziin Badrakh
Succeeded by	Peljidiin Genden
General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Mongolian People's Party
In office June 30, 1932 – July 30, 1932
Preceded by	Zolbingiin Shijee
Succeeded by	Jambyn Lkhümbe
Personal details
Born	1905 Zasagt Province, Mongolia
Died	1937 Moscow, Soviet Union

Bat-Ochirin Eldev-Ochir (Mongolian: Бат-Очирын Элдэв-Очир; 1905–1937) was a prominent political figure in early years of the Mongolian People's Republic who, between 1928 and 1937, was one of three secretaries of the Central Committee of the Mongolian People's Revolutionary Party (MPRP) and who served as the party's First Secretary from 1929 to 1930 and again for a month in 1932. As party leader, Eldev-Ochir pushed for rapid implementation of socialist policies (forced collectivization and property confiscation) during the “Leftist” period of the early 1930s, led persecution of Mongolia's Buddhist Church, and backed Soviet-sponsored purges of counterrevolutionary elements, particularly Buryat-Mongols, during the Lkhümbe affair in 1934-1935. He died in 1937 after being injured in a car accident.

Early life and career

Eldev-Ochir was born in 1905 in Zasagt Province where, from 1922 to 1925, he was leader of the local cell of the Mongolian Revolutionary Youth League (MYRL). By the mid-1920s he had attracted the notice of Comintern agents who were looking to recruit younger, more radical, and preferably “rural” party members to challenge the authority of “old guard” revolutionaries such as Prime Minister Balingiin Tserendorj, Deputy Prime Minister Anandyn Amar, and Party Chairman Tseren-Ochiryn Dambadorj. Eldev-Ochir officially joined the MPRP in 1925, enrolled in the MPRP Party School in Ulaanbaatar, and then went on to attend the Communist University of the Toilers of the East in the USSR, graduating in 1928.^[1]

At the Seventh Party Congress in 1928, Comintern agents (including the American William F. Dunne) orchestrated removal of rightist leaders such as Dambadorj and ensured the election of leftists such as Eldev-Ochir, Peljidiin Genden, and Ölziin Badrakh as secretaries of the party Central Committee. Eldev-Ochir was also elected to the Presidium of the MPRP, despite opposition from MYRL delegates who accused his wife of being “a true feudal” and demanded that he divorce her, which he refused to do.^[2]

Leftist deviation

From 1929 to 1932 Eldev-Ochir supported policies (advocated by the Soviets) that rapidly transitioned the country from the “democratic” to the “socialist” stage of the revolution. Herders were forced onto collective farms, private trade was suppressed, and property of both the nobility and the Buddhist church was seized. One third of Mongolian livestock was decimated.^[3] Over 800 properties belonging to the nobility and the Buddhist church were confiscated and over 700 head of mostly noble households were executed.^[4]

When lamas at Tögsbuyant and Ulaangom monasteries in Uvs Province launched revolts against the government’s policies in March 1930, Eldev-Ochir was hastily appointed head of the Internal Security Directorate and ordered to suppress the uprisings. He and a Soviet trainer commanded the fourth cavalry out of Hovd that swiftly and brutally the lamas and Eldev-Ochir ordered the immediate execution of 30 leaders of the rebellion. During the fighting however Eldev-Ochir's car was overturned and he suffered a neck injury.^[5]

New Turn policy

Although he was party leader, Eldev-Ochir managed to avoid Soviet retribution for the debacle when Moscow ordered a curtailment of socialist policies after more violent uprisings spread across western Mongolia in 1932. While several of his counterparts (including Badrah, Shijee, and Prime Minister Tsengeltiin Jigjidjav) were purged as agents of “Leftist Deviation” in May 1932, Eldev-Ochir and Khorloogiin Choibalsan were portrayed as being the first to voice criticisms of the policies excesses.^[6] As a result, Eldev-Ochir was reelected party secretary (along with Dorjjavin Luvsansharav and Khas-Ochiryn Luvsandorj) in at the Ninth Party Congress 1934 and again in 1937 (this time with Luvsansharav and Banzarjavyn Baasanjav). Genden, who was also closely associated with the leftist debacle, nevertheless managed to be appointed prime minister in 1932 after securing Josef Stalin’s favor.

Lkhümbe Affair

In spring 1933 Prime Minister Genden and Eldev-Ochir consented to the arrest of his fellow party secretary Jambyn Lkhümbe in the wake of spurious allegations that he was head of a Japanese spy ring plotting the overthrow of the revolutionary government. The subsequent investigation, known as the " Lkhümbe Affair," implicated hundreds of Mongolians in the spy ring and resulted in the purge of numerous high ranking politicians and military officers, particularly Buryat-Mongols.

Persecution of the Buddhist Church

In 1935 Eldev-Ochir took charge of an extraordinary commission on religion through which the Central Committee continued its persecution of the Buddhist Church. Laws were adopted and rigerously enforced that broke the authority and independence of the Church: disputes were now settled by public courts, religious administrations were oppressively regulated, services were ordered to be read in Mongolian rather than traditional Tibetan etc. Monasteries that were found to be non-compliant were severely punished or shut down altogether. Eldev-Ochir often attended Saturday meetings at monasteries where he praised revolutionary principals or threatened monasteries with closure.

Purge of Genden

Nevertheless, Stalin was unhappy with the slow pace of the MPRP's war against the lamas and by 1935 it was clear that Genden had lost the Soviet leader's backing. At a plenary meeting of the MPRP in March 1936 Genden was accused of sabotaging Mongol-Soviet relations, stripped of his offices of the prime minister and the foreign minister and sent to the USSR "for medical treatment." Under house arrest at the Black Sea resort town of Foros, Genden was desperate to return to Mongolia and at one point reached out the Eldev-Ochir, who was vacation in nearby Yalta, for assistance. Eldev-Ochir took no action. Genden was executed in November 1937.

Death

Around the same time it is believed that Eldev-Ochir died a premature death. Although details of the last year of his life are scarce, it was originally thought that he was the victim of the large scale Soviet purges that took place in Mongolia between 1932 and 1939. Later information suggested he had died in a Moscow hospital after falling from a moving vehicle during a hunting trip.

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