The Hajj and Socialist Revolution 173tap into the “middle merchantry,” getting them to organize a “broad, public
campaign” to encourage hajj travel through the USSR. They had tried this
already with a merchant named Akhub Abdulrasulev, paying him handsomely
to agitate among Muslims and use his connections to Chinese merchants to
pressure Chinese officials to side with the Soviets. Chinese officials were sus-
ceptible to bribes, and easily swayed, and this strategy had yielded some success
already, enough to upset the British. Klidzin urged Sovtorgflot to take action
immediately to help the Soviets in their “desperate struggle with the British
over the pilgrimage.” The time was right, and if the fleet acted quickly, it could
expect several thousand Kashgar pilgrims to take Soviet routes. Klidzin took a
long-range view—noting that “in the East personal trust plays a big role,” he
argued that the treatment of the first year’s group of pilgrims would determine
Sovtorgflot’s success with hajj transport in the future. With this in mind, he
urged Sovtorgflot to order Soviet officials across the country and aboard steam-
ships to treat pilgrims “with care.” He also urged it to resolve the issue of hard
currency and valuables and announce the fleet’s rates for return transport.
Finally, he urged the fleet to assign an official to send its director, Suslin, back
to China to escort the pilgrims on their round-trip journey, which was to begin
in early May.^54 In spite of all this, the Soviet consul in Kashgar reported
that, based on the lan (the local currency)-ruble exchange rate set by the Com-
missariat of Finance and the State Bank, Kashgar pilgrims could not afford
Sovtorgflot tickets and were opting for the less expensive British steamers from
India.^55
At the same time, Sovtorgflot itself was struggling to manage the complex
logistics and timing of the hajj as the season approached. Officials approached
the NKID’s Near Eastern Division to ask about travel logistics in the new age of
British colonialism and Saudi rule along the old routes. They were unclear as to
whether they needed entry visas to the Hejaz for pilgrims in Jeddah or in Port
Said.^56 Sovtorgflot and NKID officials worked hard over the spring of 1927 to
make the hajj transport campaign a success. The NKID found Soviet citizens
who spoke the many languages pilgrims spoke, and sent them to Odessa to
work as pilgrim guides. Sovtorgflot worked with the railroads to staff them
with interpreter-guides on trains carrying pilgrims, to assist them on the week-
long train journey from Central Asia to the Black Sea.^57
If Sovtorgflot’s motives were mainly economic, NKID officials placed great
stock in the political potential of Soviet hajj patronage. This is clear from a
report by an NKID official named Nazarev, based in Kushka. In a report to the
NKID in Moscow in March 1927, Nazarev offered a fascinating analysis of what