title: Moscow Oblast

text: Moscow Oblast is rich in minerals. Sands from the sediments of different periods (mainly Quaternary and Cretaceous) are of high quality and are widely used in construction. Quartz sand (milled quartz) is used in the glass industry, their production is conducted from the end of 17th century near Lyubertsy. Much of the production is currently halted due to environmental concerns, and only the Yeganovskoye field is being exploited; its silica sand reserves are 33 million tonnes and annual production reaches 675,000 tonnes. Sand and gravel deposits are abundant within the Smolensk-Moscow Upland. Sandstone deposits are developed in Klinsky and Dmitrovsky Districts.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: There are numerous clay deposits within the oblast; fusible clay is excavated in Sergiyev Posad. The Yeldiginskoye field near the village of Sofrino has reserves estimated at 30 million cubic meters; its annual production reaches . Refractory white clay occurs in the eastern region, in the Carboniferous and Jurassic sediments, and is extracted from the 14th century near Gzhel. The largest (Kudinovskoye) deposit is near the town of Elektrougli with the reserves of 3 billion tonnes. Also widespread are loams which are used in brick manufacture and limestones ("white stone"). The famous Myachkovo deposit of carboniferous limestone provided material that went for cladding of such buildings in Moscow as the Bolshoi Theater. The mining in Myachkovo had been stopped and currently, limestone is provided by the quarries of Podolsky, Voskresensky, and Kolomensky Districts. The latter district also provides marble-like limestone.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: Other industrial minerals of Moscow Oblast are dolomite, limestone tuff, and marl; mostly in the southern and eastern parts. Dolomite is used in the cement industry. Its mining is concentrated mainly near Shchyolkovo, the reserves exceed 20 million tonnes and the annual production is about 650 tonnes.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: Phosphates are produced in the Yegorevskoye and Severskoye fields. Meshchera and Verkhnevolzhsk Lowlands are rich in peat. The largest mines are "Ryazanovskoe" (840,000 tonnes per year) and "Radovitsky moss" (760,000 tonnes per year), both around Yegoryevsk. There are deposits of brown coal beyond the Oka River, but they have no commercial value. There are also minor deposits of titanium and iron ore in Serpukhovsky and Serebryano-Prudsky Districts.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: Salts of potassium salt are being developed around Serpukhov and Yegoryevsk. There are also numerous mineral springs near Zvenigorod, Klin, and Serpukhov. They include surface springs and reservoirs at the depth of . Deeper, at there is a large sea of salt extending beyond Moscow Oblast. Waters with the salt concentration up to 300 g/L are used in the local food industry and spas.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: The climate of Moscow Oblast is humid continental, with clearly expressed seasonality – short but warm summers and long, cold winters; the continentality increases from northwest to southeast. The period of the average temperature below lasts 130–150 days, beginning in early or mid-November and ending in late March (or very early April). The average annual temperature varies from to . The coldest months are January and February with the average temperature of in the west and in the east. With the arrival of arctic air, the temperature drops to below that may last up to twenty days during the winter, with the temperatures reaching . The minimum temperature of was observed in Naro-Fominsk. Thaws often occur in December and February due to the Atlantic, and rarely the Mediterranean cyclones. The thaws usually last several days, and their total number from November to March can reach fifty. Snow starts accumulating in November, though sometimes in late October or early December, and disappears in mid-April (sometimes in late March). The snow depth is and the soil freezes to . The warmest month is July with the average temperature of in the northwest and in the southeast. The maximum temperature of was recorded in Kolomna during 2010 Northern Hemisphere summer heat waves. The average annual rainfall is , the precipitation is maximal in the northwestern and minimal in the southeastern regions. The summer precipitation is usually , but severe droughts occur once in 25–30 years, with less than of rain over June–August.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: There are more than three hundred rivers with the length above in Moscow Oblast. All rivers are calm and have well-developed valleys and floodplains. They are mostly fed by melting snow and the flood falls on April–May. The water level is low in summer and increases only with heavy rain. The rivers freeze over from late November until mid-April. The only navigable rivers are the Volga, the Oka, and the Moskva River.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: Most rivers belong to the basin of the Volga, which itself only crosses a small part in the north of Moscow Oblast, near the border with Tver Oblast. The second largest river of the region is the Oka. The northern part of Moscow Oblast includes such Volga tributaries as the Shosha, the Lama, the Dubna, the Sestra, and the Yakhroma. On the south flow the tributaries of the Oka, including the Nara, the Protva, and the Lopasnya Rivers. The Moskva River, which almost entirely flows within the oblast, also belongs to the Oka basin. The eastern and northeastern regions, including much of Meschersk Depression, are irrigated by the tributaries of the Klyazma River, which itself is a main tributary of the Oka.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: The Moscow Canal crosses the northern part of Moscow Oblast through the Ikshinskyoe, Klyazminskoye, Pyalovskoye, and Pestovskoye Reservoirs. In the basin of the Moskva River, there are also Ozerninskoye, Mozhayskoye, Istrinskoye, and Ruza Reservoirs, providing Moscow with drinking water.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: There are about 350 lakes in the oblast, almost all are shallow (5–10 m) and many are of glacial origin. The largest are Senezh () and Svyatoe () whereas the deepest () is Lake Glubokoye in Ruzsky District. There are also many marshes, especially within the Meshchersk and Verkhnevolzhsk lowlands.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: The oblast is dominated by relatively infertile podsol soils which require fertilizers for commercial agriculture. On the hills there is more loam and the low-lying areas have more of bog, sandy loam and sand. Chernozem is scarce and occurs only south of the Oka River. Gray forest soils are spread between the Oka, Moskva, and Klyazma Rivers, mostly in Ramensky and Voskresensky Districts. Marshy soils are common in Meshchersk and Verkhnevolzhsk lowlands. Valleys of large rivers are rich in alluvial soils. In general, soils are heavily polluted with chemical fertilizers, pesticides, and household and industrial waste, especially around Moscow, Orekhovo-Zuyevo, Noginsk, and Voskresensk.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: Moscow Oblast lies within the zone of forests and steppes with forests covering over 40% of the region. Coniferous (mainly fir) trees dominate the northern (Verkhnevolzhsk lowlands) and western parts (Mozhaysky, Lotoshinsky, and Shakhovsky Districts). Forests of Meshchora consist primarily of pine; in waterlogged lowlands, there are individual alder forests. Central and eastern regions have coniferous-deciduous forests with the main tree species of spruce, pine, birch, and aspen often mixed with bushes of hazel. To the south lies the subzone of broad-leaved forests of oak, lime, maple and elm. Moscow-Oka Upland is the transition zone which is dominated by spruce, for example, in the upper reaches of the Lopasnya River. Valleys of the Oka are covered in pine forests of the steppe type and the far south regions (Serebryano-Prudsky and partially Serpukhovsky Districts) are cultivated steppes with occasional lime and oak groves.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: The intensive cutting of Moscow region forests in the 18–19th centuries reduced them and changed their species: conifers were replaced by birch and aspen. There is almost no logging nowadays and the forests are being restored, especially around Moscow.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: Swamps are prevalent in the eastern areas, such as Shatursky and Lukhovitsky Districts. The natural floodplain meadows are almost gone. The number of native plant species is reduced, but some foreign species flourish, such as Canadian maple. Endemic species include water caltrop and lady's slipper.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: The mammals of Moscow Oblast include badger, squirrel, beaver, otter, muskrat, stoat, Russian desman, raccoon dog, hedgehog, hare (mountain and European), shrews (common shrew, Eurasian pygmy shrew, lesser white-toothed shrew, Eurasian water shrew, etc.), weasel, fox, moose, wild boar, European mole, brown and black rats, marten, mice and voles (wood mouse, yellow-necked mouse, house mouse, Eurasian harvest mouse, northern birch mouse, bank vole, field vole, tundra vole, European water vole), European mink, deer (roe, red, spotted), hazel and fat dormouse, and European polecat. At the borders there are occasional bears, lynxes and wolves. In the southern areas there are also speckled ground squirrel, dwarf hamster, great jerboa and beech marten. Some areas contain stable populations of imported animals, such as flying squirrel, American mink and Siberian roe deer. In the oblast, there are more than a dozen kinds of bat and moth.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: There are more than 170 species of birds in the area with large numbers of crows, sparrows, ducks, magpies, woodpeckers, thrushes, grouses, bullfinches, nightingales, corncrakes, northern lapwings, white storks, grey herons, seagulls and grebes. Over forty species are being hunted.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: Rivers and lakes of Moscow Oblast are rich in fish, such as ruffe, carp, bream, bass, roaches, Chinese sleeper, perch and pike. There are six species of reptiles: three lizards (slowworm, viviparous lizard and sand lizard) and three snakes (European adder, grass snake and smooth snake). There is evidence for bog turtles in some areas. Amphibians are represented by 11 species including smooth newt, great crested newt, common toad, European green toad, common frog, moor frog, marsh frog, common spadefoot and European fire-bellied toad. Insects are numerous, with bees alone accounting for more than 300 species.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: In Serpukhovsky District, there is the Prioksko-Terrasny Nature Reserve which contains protected wisents. Near Moscow lies Losiny Ostrov National Park of federal significance.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: Ecological situation in the Moscow Oblast is serious. The areas adjacent to Moscow, and industrial zones in the east and south-east regions are heavily polluted. Most contamination originates from emissions from Kashira and Shatura Power Stations and disposal of household and industrial waste. For example, the Timohovskaya dump is one of the largest in Europe; other objects of concern are aging oil storage tanks, and nuclear waste in the Sergiyevo-Posadsky District. Contamination level is highest in Moscow, Voskresensk and Klin, high in Dzerzhinsky, Kolomna, Mytishchi, Podolsk, Serpukhov, Shchyolkovo, and Elektrostal, and low in Prioksko-Terrasny Biosphere Reserve. The major contaminants are formaldehyde and phenol in Moscow; ammonia and hydrogen fluoride


title: Moscow Oblast

text: in Voskresensk; formaldehyde in Klin, Kolomna, Mytishchi and Podolsk, phenol in Serpukhov. The most polluted rivers are Moscow, Oka and Klyazma. In the Moscow area and in major cities (in particular, in Podolsk, Orekhovo-Zuyevo, Serpukhov, Lukhovitsy and Stupino) also heavily polluted are groundwaters.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: The territory of what is now Moscow Oblast had been inhabited for more than twenty thousand years. Numerous mounds and settlements from Iron Age were discovered there. Up to the 9–10th centuries, the Moskva River basin and adjacent lands were inhabited by Finnic peoples. Slavs populated the area only in the 10th century. In mid-12th century, the lands became part of Vladimir-Suzdal Principality. Several important cities were founded around that time, including Volokolamsk (1135), Moscow (1147), Zvenigorod (1152), and Dmitrov (1154). In the first half of the 13th century, the entire Vladimir-Suzdal Principality, including the Moscow area, was conquered by the Mongols.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: In the 13th century, the land around Moscow was part of Grand Duchy of Moscow, which subsequently was the center of the unification of Russian lands, in particular the Mongol raids. In 1380, from Kolomna the prince Dmitry Donskoy led his troops to defeat the Mongols at the Battle of Kulikovo. The southern part of Moscow Oblast was then part of the Principality of Ryazan; it was attached to Moscow only in the 1520.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: In 1708, Moscow Governorate was established by the decree of Peter the Great; the area included most of the present Moscow Oblast. The Battle of Borodino, which decided the outcome of the French invasion of Russia was fought in 1812 near Mozhaysk.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: Industries developed in Moscow Oblast in the 17–19th centuries. They were centered in Bogorodsk, Pavlovsky Posad, and Orekhovo-Zuyevo and were dominated by textile production. The first railway in Russia was constructed in the Moscow Oblast in 1851, connecting Moscow and Saint Petersburg, and in 1862 the line to Nizhny Novgorod was opened.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: In the RSFSR, "Central Industrial Oblast" was established on January 14, 1929. It included the abolished Moscow, Ryazan, Tver, Tula, Vladimir, and Kaluga Governorates. The oblast was divided into ten okrugs and had the administrative center in Moscow. On June 3, 1929, the oblast was renamed "Moscow Oblast" and on July 30, 1930, the division into ten okrugs was abolished.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: Parts of the then bulky "Moscow Oblast" were gradually transferred to other divisions. In particular, twenty-six districts became part of Kalinin Oblast in January 1935, and another seventy-seven districts were separated in September 1937 as Tula and Ryazan Oblasts. Borovsky, , Maloyaroslavetsky, Ugodsko-Zavodsky, and Petushinsky Districts were transferred in 1944 to Kaluga and Vladimir Oblasts.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: In 1941–1942, one of the most significant military operations of World War II – the Battle of Moscow was fought in the Moscow Oblast. Germany reached Solnechnogorsky, Klinsky, Istrinsky, Lobninsky, Khimkinsky, Naro-Fominsky, Volokolamsky, Kolomensky, Kashirsky, Serybryano-Prudsky Districts and others.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: According to the Constitution of Russia, adopted in December 1993, Moscow Oblast is one of the 83 federal subjects of Russia.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: In terms of industrial production, Moscow Oblast is second in Russia, after the city of Moscow. The industry of the Oblast relies on imported raw materials, strong scientific and technological base and highly skilled workforce; it is closely linked with the industry of Moscow.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: Well developed are machinery and metalworking. There are plants for the thermal and nuclear power engineering (ZiO-Podolsk in Podolsk), nuclear fuel (TVEL in Elektrostal), space and missile (Energia in Korolyov, Lavochkin in Khimki, NGO engineering in Reutov, FTSDT "Union" in Dzerzhinsky – development of solid rocket fuel, etc., IBC "Horizon" in Dzerzhinsky – power plants for aircraft, etc.); locomotives (Kolomna factory), metro cars (Metrowagonmash in Mytischi), electric trains (Demikhovsky Engineering Works), cars (SeAZ), buses (Likinsky bus plant in Likino-Dulyovo); agricultural machines, excavators and cranes (Lyubertsy, Dmitrov, Balashikha); stainless steel (Elektrostal), cables (Podolsk), optical devices (Krasnogorsky plant, Lytkarino Optical Glass Factory).


title: Moscow Oblast

text: There are many defense enterprises, such as Russian Center for demonstrations of weapons, military equipment and technology in Krasnoarmeysk; Kamov, Phazotron, Bazalt, NPP Zvezda, MKB Fakel, MKB Raduga, National Research Institute of Aviation Systems, Krasnozavodsk Chemical Plant, Tikhomirov Scientific Research Institute of Instrument Design, Moscow Research Institute "Agat", Dolgoprudnenskoe Scientific Production Plant, and many others.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: Chemical industry of the Oblast produces acids (Shchyolkovo), mineral fertilizers (plants named "Phosphates" and "Mineral fertilizers" in Voskresensk), synthetic fibers (Serpukhov and Klin), plastics (Orekhovo-Zuyevo), varnishes and paints (Sergiyev Posad, Odintsovsky paint factories), pharmaceuticals (Staraya Kupavna). There is a well-developed industry of construction materials with production of cement in Voskresensk and Kolomna (Shchurovsky cement factory), earthenware, porcelain in the Likino-Dulyovo (Dulevo Porcelain Factory) and Verbilki and dry mortar plant in Krasnogorsk.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: Light industry is the oldest in the region; it was started in the 17th century and with 35% contribution was leading the gross industrial production. There is still production of cotton (in Yegoryevsk, Noginsk, Orekhovo-Zuyevo), wool (in Pavlovsky Posad and Pushkino) and jerseys (in Ivanteyevka and Dmitrov). The silk production in Naro-Fominsk had been stopped. Traditional and renowned crafts include Gzhel, Zhostovo painting and Fedoskino miniature. Large foreign investment projects include the plant for manufacturing household appliances (TV sets, washing machines, refrigerators, etc.) by the South Korean company LG built near the village of Dorokhovo.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: In 1999, Moscow Oblast consumed 15.4 billion m of natural gas, 3.32 million tonnes of oil, 2.13 million tonnes of coal and 8.5 billion kWh of electricity. Electricity for the Oblast is provided by the Kashirskaya thermal power plant (TPP, 1910 MW), Dzerzhynskaya TPP No 22 (1300 MW), Thermal Power Plant 27 (1100 MW), Shatura Power Station (1100 MW), Zagorskaya hydroelectric power plant (1200 MW), Elektrogorsk TPP (623 MW) and several smaller plants. Major new energy project in the region is the construction of Zagorsk hydroelectric plant with the capacity of 840 MW. The deficit of energy is provided by powerlines connecting the region with Saint Petersburg, Volga Hydroelectric Station and other energy suppliers.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: Agriculture has a relatively minor role in the economy of the Oblast. Only 25% of land is cultivated and another 15% are used for other activities such as livestock farming. Agriculture is the least developed in the northern, eastern and western border regions. In the southern region, especially south of the Oka River, more than 50% of land is used in agriculture. Horticulture is typical for the southern region with most of the sown area (more than 3/5) occupied by forage crops. Large areas are reserved for grains, especially wheat, barley, oats and rye, and significant role plays potato. Greenhouses are very common and Moskovsky city hosts the largest greenhouse complex in Europe. Also grown are flowers and mushrooms. Livestock farming predominates over the crop, and is primarily aimed at the production of milk and meat. In addition to cattle, commonly bred are pigs and chickens.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: The economic crisis of the 1990s in Russia had severely affected the agriculture of Moscow Oblast. In particular, in the 2000s, as compared with 1970–80s, the grain production has fallen by more than 3 times; potatoes by 2.5 times; vegetables, livestock and poultry by 30%; milk by 2 times and eggs by 4 times.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: Moscow Oblast has a dense transport network, including roads, railways and waterways along the largest rivers, lakes and reservoirs. Land routes are radially diverging from Moscow and crossed by one railway and two highway rings. Neither railways nor roads, built for the most part many years ago, can cope with the steadily mounting traffic flows. About half of the roads are overloaded and three quarters do not meet modern requirements. Insufficient width of the roads and frequent repairs cause traffic jams.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: Moscow Oblast has the highest density of railways in Russia. Eleven major radial lines originate in Moscow and run through the Oblast; the total length of the railways reaches 2,700 km. Almost all railroads are electrified. The largest rail hubs are Orekhovo-Zuyevo and Bekasovo. Regular navigation is carried on the rivers Volga, Oka and Moscow, as well as on the Moscow Canal. Major river ports are in Serpukhov and Kolomna. Also well-developed is pipeline transport. There are two major oil lines, two natural gas rings and numerous radial lines connecting Moscow with the largest gas producing regions of the country.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: Moscow and Moscow Oblast have several international passenger airports, namely Sheremetyevo (with two terminals), Vnukovo, Domodedovo and Ostafyevo. There is also Bykovo Airport, which is used for freight. The largest military airport is Chkalovsky (near Shchyolkovo) which also processes some civilian passenger and cargo flights.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: Moscow Oblast was awarded three Orders of Lenin, on 3 January 1934, 17 December 1956 and 5 December 1966.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: The highest executive organ is the Government of Moscow Oblast. Eighteen ministries act as the executive bodies of state authority. The powers, tasks, functions and competence of the Government are defined by the Charter of the Moscow Region. The Governor of the Moscow Oblast will be elected with the term of 5 years. The Regional Duma of Moscow Oblast was formed on 12 December 1993. It consists of 50 deputies also serving a 5-year term.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: Sergey Shoygu was elected as Governor of Moscow Oblast in April 2012 by the Moscow Oblast Duma. Shoygu left office after only six months with his appointment when he was appointed as Minister of Defence by Vladimir Putin. Andrei Vorobyov was appointed as acting governor and won a full term to the office in the 2013 elections.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: Moscow Oblast has a high density of scientific research institutions, especially related to engineering and military technologies. The latter started developing in the region in 1930–1940s in Zhukovsky (aeronautical engineering), Klimovsk (development of small arms), Reutov (Missile Engineering), Fryazino (microwave electronics) and Korolyov (space technology). They were later joined by famous centers for basic sciences in Troitsk, Chernogolovka (physics and chemistry), Dubna and Protvino (nuclear physics) and Pushchino (biology). Moscow Oblast hosts Mission Control Centers for spacecraft (in Korolyov) and military satellites (Krasnoznamensk), as well as a number of test sites.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: Zorky from Krasnogorsk has become national bandy champions three times. In the 2017–18 season, Zorky is back in Super League, after one season in the second-tier league. Obukhovo is the only location in Russia without a Super League team which has a bandy venue with artificial ice. A plan for artificial ice also existed in Korolyov. However, the project was abandoned. Although an indoor ice hockey-sized arena entered the plans instead, the official reason given was financial problems.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: The 2008 European Speed Skating Championships and the 2016 World Single Distance Speed Skating Championships were held in Kolomna.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: FK Khimki and Saturn Ramenskoye are the most supported clubs that represent the region. The third professional club Znamya Truda is the oldest existing football club in the country founded in 1909.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: Moscow Oblast has numerous therapeutic and recreational facilities located mainly in western, northwestern and northern parts, and also near Moscow. Of great importance for recreation are forests, which occupy over 40% of the region, as well as horticultural activities. The region has the highest number (over 1 million) of dachas with associated individual gardens. Also numerous are manor complexes, such as those in Abramtsevo, Muranovo, Ostafievo, historical towns (Vereya, Volokolamsk, Dmitrov, Zaraysk, Zvenigorod, Istra, Kolomna, Sergiyev Posad, Serpukhov, etc.), monasteries (Trinity Lavra of St. Sergius, Joseph-Volokolamsk Monastery, Savvino-Storozhevsky Monastery, Nikolo-Ugresh monastery, etc.), and museums (Chekhov museum in Melikhovo, Tchaikovsky museum in Klin, Serpukhov Historical and Art Museum, etc.). The oldest surviving building is the Kamenskoye Church.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: After the population decline from 6,693,623 as of the 1989 Census to 6,618,538 in the 2002 Census the population of the oblast grew to 7,095,120 (2010 Census). The average population density, at 147.4 inhabitants/km (2010), is the largest in Russia, due to a high proportion of urban population (80.85% in 2010). The highest density occurs in and around Moscow (Lyubertsy, Balashikha, Khimki, Krasnogorsk, etc.) and the lowest – about 20 people/km – is in the outlying areas of Lotoshinsky, Shakhovskoy, Mozhaysk and Meshchersk lowlands.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: According to a 2012 survey 45.5% of the population of Moscow Oblast adheres to the Russian Orthodox Church, 3% are unaffiliated generic Christians, 2% are Orthodox Christian believers who don't belong to church or belong to non-Russian Orthodox churches, 1% are adherents of Rodnovery (the Slavic folk religious movement) and 1% to Islam. In addition, 29% of the population declares to be "spiritual but not religious", 9% is atheist, and 9.5% follows other religions or did not give an answer to the question.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: Administratively, the oblast is divided into 38 cities/towns under oblast jurisdiction and 36 administrative districts, consisting of 46 towns of district significance, 72 urban-type settlements, and 6,119 rural localities.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: As of 2011, Moscow Oblast is municipally subdivided into 38 urban okrugs and 36 municipal districts, which consist of 114 urban settlements and 193 rural settlements.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: The three largest cities of the oblast are Balashikha (215,494), Khimki (207,425), and Podolsk (186,961). Most other towns have ten to fifty thousand people. The smallest town is Vereya in Naro-Fominsky District with the population of . Among the urban-type settlements, the largest is Nakhabino (36,546) followed by Tomilino (30,605). The oldest populated place in the oblast is Volokolamsk, first mentioned in 1135; slightly younger towns are Zvenigorod (1152), Dmitrov (1154), and Kolomna (1177).


title: Moscow Oblast

text: The most intensive formation of towns occurred in 1938–1940. The youngest towns are Golitsyno and Kubinka. They existed for quite some time, but were granted town status only in 2004. Some recent towns separated from the other towns, such as Yubileyny and Peresvet.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: New projects have been announced at the beginning of the 21st century. One of them is Rublyovo-Arkhangelsk, which is designed for 30,000 inhabitants with high income and is called by the media the "city for millionaires". Another is "Great Domodedovo, south of the Moscow Ring Road, which is designed for 450,000 residents. The new city A101 was designed for 300,000 residents in 2009 and the sale of its land in Leninsky District has already begun; the city's construction is planned to take thirty-five years.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: A part of Moscow Oblast's former territory, mainly to the southwest of the city of Moscow, was merged with the federal city of Moscow on July 1, 2012.


title: Moscow Oblast

text: The housing stock of the oblast is approximately 125 million square meters. Almost all the houses are equipped with water supply, sewerage, gas, central heating and hot water. However, the telephone network is underdeveloped in rural areas. In the competition for the most comfortable city of 2006 in the Moscow Oblast the winner was Kolomna followed by Balashikha (for cities with population over 100,000) and Vidnoye (<100,000) and then by Mytishchi and Noginsk.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: Progressivism in the United States is a political philosophy and reform movement in the United States advocating for policies that are generally considered left-wing, left-wing populist, libertarian socialist, social democratic, and environmentalist. In mainstream American politics, progressives generally advocate for a universal healthcare system, wage equity and labor rights, economic justice, social justice, opposition to the military-industrial complex, corporate regulation, the abolition of capital punishment, and action on climate change.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: It reached its height early in the 20th century. Middle class and reformist in nature, it arose as a response to the vast changes brought by modernization such as the growth of large corporations, pollution and corruption in American politics.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: Historian Alonzo Hamby describes American progressivism as a "political movement that addresses ideas, impulses, and issues stemming from modernization of American society. Emerging at the end of the nineteenth century, it established much of the tone of American politics throughout the first half of the century".


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: In the 21st century, the term is often used to describe proponents of social justice and environmentalism. While the modern progressive movement may be characterized as largely secular in nature, by comparison, the historical progressive movement was to a significant extent rooted in and energized by religion.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: Historians debate the exact contours, but they generally date the Progressive Era in response to the excesses of the Gilded Age from the 1890s to either World War I or the onset of the Great Depression. Many of the core principles of the progressive movement focused on the need for efficiency in all areas of society, and for greater democratic control over public policy. Purification to eliminate waste and corruption was a powerful element as well as the progressives' support of worker compensation, improved child labor laws, minimum wage legislation, a limited workweek, graduated income tax and allowing women the right to vote. Arthur S. Link and Vincent P. De Santis argue that the majority of progressives wanted to purify politics. For some Progressives, purification meant taking the vote away from blacks in the South.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: Many progressives hoped that by regulating large corporations they could liberate human energies from the restrictions imposed by industrial capitalism. Nonetheless, the progressive movement was split over which of the following solutions should be used to regulate corporations.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: Pro-labor progressives such as Samuel Gompers argued that industrial monopolies were unnatural economic institutions which suppressed the competition which was necessary for progress and improvement. United States antitrust law is the body of laws that prohibits anti-competitive behavior (monopoly) and unfair business practices. Presidents such as Theodore Roosevelt and William Howard Taft supported trust-busting. During their presidencies, the otherwise-conservative Taft brought down 90 trusts in four years while Roosevelt took down 44 in seven and a half years in office.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: Progressives such as Benjamin Parke De Witt argued that in a modern economy, large corporations and even monopolies were both inevitable and desirable. With their massive resources and economies of scale, large corporations offered the United States advantages which smaller companies could not offer. However, these large corporations might abuse their great power. The federal government should allow these companies to exist, but otherwise regulate them for the public interest. President Roosevelt generally supported this idea and was later to incorporate it as part of his "New Nationalism".


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: Many progressives such as Louis Brandeis hoped to make American governments better able to serve the people's needs by making governmental operations and services more efficient and rational. Rather than making legal arguments against ten-hour workdays for women, he used "scientific principles" and data produced by social scientists documenting the high costs of long working hours for both individuals and society. The progressives' quest for efficiency was sometimes at odds with the progressives' quest for democracy. Taking power out of the hands of elected officials and placing that power in the hands of professional administrators reduced the voice of the politicians and in turn reduced the voice of the people. Centralized decision-making by trained experts and reduced power for local wards made government less corrupt but more distant and isolated from the people it served. Progressives who emphasized the need for efficiency typically argued that trained independent experts could make better decisions than the local politicians. In his influential "Drift and Mastery" (1914) stressing the "scientific spirit" and "discipline of democracy", Walter Lippmann called for a strong central government guided by experts rather than public opinion.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: One example of progressive reform was the rise of the city manager system in which paid, professional engineers ran the day-to-day affairs of city governments under guidelines established by elected city councils. Many cities created municipal "reference bureaus" which did expert surveys of government departments looking for waste and inefficiency. After in-depth surveys, local and even state governments were reorganized to reduce the number of officials and to eliminate overlapping areas of authority between departments. City governments were reorganized to reduce the power of local ward bosses and to increase the powers of the city council. Governments at every level began developing budgets to help them plan their expenditures rather than spending money haphazardly as needs arose and revenue became available. Governor Frank Lowden of Illinois showed a "passion for efficiency" as he streamlined state government.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: Corruption represented a source of waste and inefficiency in the government. William Simon U'Ren in Oregon, Robert M. La Follette in Wisconsin and others worked to clean up state and local governments by passing laws to weaken the power of machine politicians and political bosses. In Wisconsin, La Follette pushed through an open primary system that stripped party bosses of the power to pick party candidates. The Oregon System included a "Corrupt Practices Act", a public referendum and a state-funded voter's pamphlet, among other reforms which were exported to other states in the Northwest and Midwest. Its high point was in 1912, after which they detoured into a disastrous third party status.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: Early progressive thinkers such as John Dewey and Lester Ward placed a universal and comprehensive system of education at the top of the progressive agenda, reasoning that if a democracy were to be successful, its leaders, the general public, needed a good education. Progressives worked hard to expand and improve public and private education at all levels. They believed that modernization of society necessitated the compulsory education of all children, even if the parents objected. Progressives turned to educational researchers to evaluate the reform agenda by measuring numerous aspects of education, later leading to standardized testing. Many educational reforms and innovations generated during this period continued to influence debates and initiatives in American education for the remainder of the 20th century. One of the most apparent legacies of the Progressive Era left to American education was the perennial drive to reform schools and curricula, often as the product of energetic grass-roots movements in the city.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: Since progressivism was and continues to be "in the eyes of the beholder", progressive education encompasses very diverse and sometimes conflicting directions in educational policy. Such enduring legacies of the Progressive Era continue to interest historians. Progressive Era reformers stressed "object teaching", meeting the needs of particular constituencies within the school district, equal educational opportunity for boys and girls and avoiding corporal punishment.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: David Gamson examines the implementation of progressive reforms in three city school districts—Denver, Colorado, Seattle, Washington and Oakland, California—during 1900–1928. Historians of educational reform during the Progressive Era tend to highlight the fact that many progressive policies and reforms were very different and at times even contradictory. At the school district level, contradictory reform policies were often especially apparent, though there is little evidence of confusion among progressive school leaders in Denver, Seattle and Oakland. District leaders in these cities, including Frank B. Cooper in Seattle and Fred M. Hunter in Oakland, often employed a seemingly contradictory set of reforms. Local progressive educators consciously sought to operate independently of national progressive movements as they preferred reforms that were easy to implement and were encouraged to mix and blend diverse reforms that had been shown to work in other cities.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: The reformers emphasized professionalization and bureaucratization. The old system whereby ward politicians selected school employees was dropped in the case of teachers and replaced by a merit system requiring a college-level education in a normal school (teacher's college). The rapid growth in size and complexity the large urban school systems facilitated stable employment for women teachers and provided senior teachers greater opportunities to mentor younger teachers. By 1900, most women in Providence, Rhode Island, remained as teachers for at least 17.5 years, indicating teaching had become a significant and desirable career path for women.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: Progressives set up training programs to ensure that welfare and charity work would be undertaken by trained professionals rather than warm-hearted amateurs.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: Jane Addams of Chicago's Hull House typified the leadership of residential, community centers operated by social workers and volunteers and located in inner city slums. The purpose of the settlement houses was to raise the standard of living of urbanites by providing adult education and cultural enrichment programs.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: During this era of massive reformation among all social aspects, elimination of prostitution was vital for the progressives, especially the women.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: Child labor laws were designed to prevent the overuse of children in the newly emerging industries. The goal of these laws was to give working class children the opportunity to go to school and mature more institutionally, thereby liberating the potential of humanity and encouraging the advancement of humanity. Factory owners generally did not want this progression because of lost workers. Parents relied on the income of children to keep the family solvent. Progressives enacted state amd federal laws against child labor, but these were overturned by the US Supreme Court. A proposed constitutional amendment was opposed by business and Catholics; it passed Congress but was never ratified by enough states. Child labor was finally outlawed by the New Deal in the 1930s.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: Labor unions grew steadily until 1916, then expanded fast during the war. In 1919, a wave of major strikes alienated the middle class and the strikes were lost which alienated the workers. In the 1920s, the unions were in the doldrums. In 1924, they supported Robert M. La Follette's Progressive Party, but he only carried his base in Wisconsin. The American Federation of Labor under Samuel Gompers after 1907 began supporting the Democrats, who promised more favorable judges as the Republicans appointed pro-business judges. Theodore Roosevelt and his third party also supported such goals as the eight-hour work day, improved safety and health conditions in factories, workers' compensation laws and minimum wage laws for women.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: Most progressives, especially in rural areas, adopted the cause of prohibition. They saw the saloon as political corruption incarnate and bewailed the damage done to women and children. They believed the consumption of alcohol limited mankind's potential for advancement. Progressives achieved success first with state laws then with the enactment of the Eighteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution in 1919. The golden day did not dawn as enforcement was lax, especially in the cities where the law had very limited popular support and where notorious criminal gangs such as the Chicago gang of Al Capone made a crime spree based on illegal sales of liquor in speakeasies. The "experiment" (as President Herbert Hoover called it) also cost the federal and local treasuries large sums of taxes. The 18th amendment was repealed by the Twenty-first Amendment to the United States Constitution in 1933.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: Some progressives sponsored eugenics as a solution to excessively large or under-performing families, hoping that birth control would enable parents to focus their resources on fewer, better children while others, like Margaret Sanger advocated it. Progressive leaders such as Herbert Croly and Walter Lippmann indicated their classical liberal concern over the danger posed to the individual by the practice of eugenics. Progressive politician William Jennings Bryan opposed eugenics on the grounds of his anti-evolution activism.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: Progressives repeatedly warned that illegal voting was corrupting the political system. They especially identified big-city bosses, working with saloon keepers and precinct workers, as the culprits who stuffed the ballot boxes. The solution to purifying the vote included prohibition (designed to close down the saloons), voter registration requirements (designed to end multiple voting), and literacy tests (designed to minimize the number of ignorant voters).


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: All of the Southern states used devices to disenfranchise black voters during the Progressive Era. Typically, the progressive elements in those states pushed for disenfranchisement, often fighting against the conservatism of the Black Belt whites. A major reason given was that whites routinely purchased black votes to control elections, and it was easier to disenfranchise blacks than to go after powerful white men.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: In the Northern states, progressives such as Robert M. La Follette and William Simon U'Ren argued that the average citizen should have more control over his government. The Oregon System of "Initiative, Referendum, and Recall" was exported to many states, including Idaho, Washington and Wisconsin. Many progressives such as George M. Forbes, president of Rochester's Board of Education, hoped to make government in the United States more responsive to the direct voice of the American people, arguing:


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: [W]e are now intensely occupied in forging the tools of democracy, the direct primary, the initiative, the referendum, the recall, the short ballot, commission government. But in our enthusiasm we do not seem to be aware that these tools will be worthless unless they are used by those who are aflame with the sense of brotherhood. [...] The idea [of the social centers movement is] to establish in each community an institution having a direct and vital relation to the welfare of the neighborhood, ward, or district, and also to the city as a whole


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: Philip J. Ethington seconds this high view of direct democracy, saying that "initiatives, referendums, and recalls, along with direct primaries and the direct election of US Senators, were the core achievements of 'direct democracy' by the Progressive generation during the first two decades of the twentieth century".


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: Progressives fought for women's suffrage to purify the elections using supposedly purer female voters. Progressives in the South supported the elimination of supposedly corrupt black voters from the election booth. Historian Michael Perman says that in both Texas and Georgia "disfranchisement was the weapon as well as the rallying cry in the fight for reform". In Virginia, "the drive for disfranchisement had been initiated by men who saw themselves as reformers, even progressives".


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: While the ultimate significance of the progressive movement on today's politics is still up for debate, Alonzo L. Hamby asks:


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: What were the central themes that emerged from the cacophony [of progressivism]? Democracy or elitism? Social justice or social control? Small entrepreneurship or concentrated capitalism? And what was the impact of American foreign policy? Were the progressives isolationists or interventionists? Imperialists or advocates of national self-determination? And whatever they were, what was their motivation? Moralistic utopianism? Muddled relativistic pragmatism? Hegemonic capitalism? Not surprisingly many battered scholars began to shout 'no mas!' In 1970, Peter Filene declared that the term 'progressivism' had become meaningless.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: The progressives typically concentrated on city and state government, looking for waste and better ways to provide services as the cities grew rapidly. These changes led to a more structured system, power that had been centralized within the legislature would now be more locally focused. The changes were made to the system to effectively make legal processes, market transactions, bureaucratic administration and democracy easier to manage, putting them under the classification of "Municipal Administration". There was also a change in authority for this system as it was believed that the authority that was not properly organized had now given authority to professionals, experts and bureaucrats for these services. These changes led to a more solid type of municipal administration compared to the old system that was underdeveloped and poorly constructed.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: The progressives mobilized concerned middle class voters as well as newspapers and magazines to identify problems and concentrate reform sentiment on specific problems. Many Protestants focused on the saloon as the power base for corruption as well as violence and family disruption, so they tried to get rid of the entire saloon system through prohibition. Others such as Jane Addams in Chicago promoted settlement houses. Early municipal reformers included Hazen S. Pingree (mayor of Detroit in the 1890s) and Tom L. Johnson in Cleveland, Ohio. In 1901, Johnson won election as mayor of Cleveland on a platform of just taxation, home rule for Ohio cities and a 3-cent streetcar fare. Columbia University President Seth Low was elected mayor of New York City in 1901 on a reform ticket.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: During the term of the progressive President Theodore Roosevelt (1901–1909) and influenced by the ideas of philosopher-scientists such as George Perkins Marsh, William John McGee, John Muir, John Wesley Powell and Lester Frank Ward, the largest government-funded conservation-related projects in United States history were undertaken.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: On March 14, 1903, President Roosevelt created the first National Bird Preserve, the beginning of the Wildlife Refuge system, on Pelican Island, Florida. In all, by 1909, the Roosevelt administration had created an unprecedented 42 million acres (170,000 km) of United States National Forests, 53 National Wildlife Refuges and 18 areas of "special interest" such as the Grand Canyon.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: In addition, Roosevelt approved the Newlands Reclamation Act of 1902 which gave subsidies for irrigation in 13 (eventually 20) Western states. Another conservation-oriented bill was the Antiquities Act of 1906 that protected large areas of land by allowing the president to declare areas meriting protection to be national monuments. The Inland Waterways Commission was appointed by Roosevelt on March 14, 1907, to study the river systems of the United States, including the development of water power, flood control and land reclamation.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: In the early 20th century, politicians of the Democratic and Republican parties, Lincoln–Roosevelt League Republicans (in California) and Theodore Roosevelt's Progressive ("Bull Moose") Party all pursued environmental, political and economic reforms. Chief among these aims was the pursuit of trust busting, the breaking up very large monopolies and support for labor unions, public health programs, decreased corruption in politics and environmental conservation.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: The progressive movement enlisted support from both major parties and from minor parties as well. One leader, the Democratic William Jennings Bryan, had won both the Democratic Party and the Populist Party nominations in 1896. At the time, the great majority of other major leaders had been opposed to populism. When Roosevelt left the Republican Party in 1912, he took with him many of the intellectual leaders of progressivism, but very few political leaders. The Republican Party then became notably more committed to business-oriented and efficiency-oriented progressivism, typified by Herbert Hoover and William Howard Taft.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: The foundation of the progressive tendency was indirectly linked to the unique philosophy of pragmatism which was primarily developed by John Dewey and William James.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: Equally significant to progressive-era reform were the crusading journalists known as muckrakers. These journalists publicized to middle class readers economic privilege, political corruption and social injustice. Their articles appeared in "McClure's Magazine" and other reform periodicals. Some muckrakers focused on corporate abuses. Ida Tarbell exposed the activities of the Standard Oil Company. In "The Shame of the Cities" (1904), Lincoln Steffens dissected corruption in city government. In "Following the Color Line" (1908), Ray Stannard Baker criticized race relations. Other muckrakers assailed the Senate, railroad companies, insurance companies and fraud in patent medicine.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: Novelists criticized corporate injustices. Theodore Dreiser drew harsh portraits of a type of ruthless businessman in "The Financier" (1912) and "The Titan" (1914). In "The Jungle" (1906), Socialist Upton Sinclair repelled readers with descriptions of Chicago's meatpacking plants and his work led to support for remedial food safety legislation.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: Leading intellectuals also shaped the progressive mentality. In "Dynamic Sociology" (1883), Lester Frank Ward laid out the philosophical foundations of the progressive movement and attacked the "laissez-faire" policies advocated by Herbert Spencer and William Graham Sumner. In "The Theory of the Leisure Class" (1899), Thorstein Veblen attacked the "conspicuous consumption" of the wealthy. Educator John Dewey emphasized a child-centered philosophy of pedagogy known as progressive education which affected schoolrooms for three generations.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: Modern progressivism can be seen as encompassing many notable differences from the historical progressivism of the 19th–20th centuries. Some viewpoints of modern progressivism highlight these perceived differences like those of Princeton economics professor Thomas C. Leonard who viewed historical progressivism in "The American Conservative" as being "[a]t a glance, [...] not much here for 21st-century progressives to claim kinship with. Today's progressives emphasize racial equality and minority rights, decry U.S. imperialism, shun biological ideas in social science, and have little use for piety or proselytizing". Ultimately however, both historical progressivism and the modern movement share the notion that the free markets lead to economic inequalities that must be ameliorated in order to best protect the American working class.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: Income inequality in the United States has been on the rise since 1970. Progressives argue that lower union rates, weak policy, globalization and other drivers have caused the gap in income. The rise of income inequality has led progressives to draft legislation including, but not limited to, reforming Wall Street, reforming the tax code, reforming campaign finance, closing loopholes and keeping domestic work.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: Progressives began to demand stronger Wall Street regulation after they perceived deregulation and relaxed enforcement as leading to the financial crisis of 2008. Passing the Dodd-Frank financial regulatory act in 2010 provided increased oversight on financial institutions and the creation of new regulatory agencies, but many progressives argue its broad framework allows for financial institutions to continue to take advantage of consumers and the government. Among others, Bernie Sanders has advocated to reimplement Glass-Steagall for its stricter regulation and to break up the banks because of financial institutions' market share being concentrated in a select few 'too big to fail' corporations.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: In 2009, the Congressional Progressive Caucus (CPC) outlined five key healthcare principles they intended to pass into law. The CPC mandated a nationwide public option, affordable health insurance, insurance market regulations, an employer insurance provision mandate and comprehensive services for children. In March 2010, Congress passed the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act which was intended to increase the affordability and efficiency of the United States healthcare system. Although considered a success by progressives, many argued that it did not go far enough in achieving healthcare reform as exemplified with the Democrats' failure in achieving a national public option. In recent decades, single-payer healthcare has become an important goal in healthcare reform for progressives. In the 2016 Democratic Party primaries, progressive presidential candidate Bernie Sanders raised the issue of a single-payer healthcare system, citing his belief that millions of Americans are still paying too much for health insurance and arguing that millions more don't receive the care they need. In November 2016, an effort was made to implement a single-payer healthcare system in the state of Colorado, known as ColoradoCare (Amendment 69). Senator Sanders held rallies in Colorado in support of Amendment 69 leading up to the vote. Despite high-profile support, Amendment 69 failed to pass, with just 21.23% of voting Colorado residents voting in favor and 78.77% against.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: Adjusted for inflation, the minimum wage peaked in 1968 at around $9.90 an hour in 2020 dollars. Progressives believe that stagnating wages perpetuate income inequality and that raising the minimum wage is a necessary step to combat inequality. If the minimum wage grew at the rate of productivity growth in the United States, it would be $21.72 an hour, nearly three times as much as the current $7.25 an hour. Popular progressives such as Senator Bernie Sanders and Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez have endorsed a federally mandated wage increase to $15 an hour. The movement has already seen success with its implementation in California with the passing of bill to raise the minimum wage $1 every year until reaching $15 an hour in 2021. New York workers are lobbying for similar legislation as many continue to rally for a minimum wage increase as part of the Fight for $15 movement.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: Modern progressives advocate for strong environmental protections and measures to reduce or eliminate pollution. One reason for this is the strong link between economic injustice and adverse environmental conditions as groups that are economically marginalized tend to be disproportionately affected by the harms of pollution and environmental degradation.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: With the rise in popularity of progressives such as Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Bernie Sanders, and Elizabeth Warren, the term "progressive" began to carry greater cultural currency, particularly in the 2016 Democratic primaries. While answering a question from CNN moderator Anderson Cooper regarding her willingness to shift positions during an October 2015 debate, Hillary Clinton referred to herself as a "progressive who likes to get things done", drawing the ire of a number of Sanders supporters and other critics from her left. Questions about the precise meaning of the term have persisted within the Democratic Party and without since the election of Donald Trump in the 2016 United States presidential election, with some candidates using it to indicate their affiliation with the left flank of the party.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: Following the first progressive movement of the early 20th century, two later short-lived parties have also identified as progressive.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: The first political party named the Progressive Party was formed for the 1912 presidential election to elect Theodore Roosevelt. It was formed after Roosevelt lost his bid to become the Republican candidate to William Howard Taft, and became defunct by 1920.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: In 1924, Wisconsin Senator Robert M. La Follette ran for president on the Progressive Party ticket. La Follette won the support of labor unions, Germans and socialists by his crusade. He carried only Wisconsin and the party vanished outside of there. There, it remained a force until the 1940s.


title: Progressivism in the United States

text: A third party was initiated in 1948 by former Vice President Henry A. Wallace as a vehicle for his campaign for president. He saw the two parties as reactionary and war-mongering, and attracted support from left-wing voters who opposed the Cold War policies that had become a national consensus. Most liberals, New Dealers and especially the Congress of Industrial Organizations, denounced the party because in their view it was increasingly controlled by "Communists". It faded away after winning 2% of the vote in 1948.


title: UFC 279

text: UFC 279: Diaz vs. Ferguson was a mixed martial arts event produced by the Ultimate Fighting Championship that took place on September 10, 2022, at the T-Mobile Arena in Paradise, Nevada, part of the Las Vegas Metropolitan Area, United States.


title: UFC 279

text: The promotion originally targeted a UFC Bantamweight Championship bout between current champion Aljamain Sterling and former two-time champion T.J. Dillashaw as the main event, but opted to change plans and move it to UFC 280.


title: UFC 279

text: A welterweight bout between Khamzat Chimaev and former lightweight title challenger (also The Ultimate Fighter 5 lightweight winner) Nate Diaz was originally expected to headline the event. However at the weigh-ins, Chimaev weighed in at 178.5 pounds, 7.5 pounds over the welterweight non-title limit and the bout was cancelled. As a result, the organization opted to shuffle a trio of fights: a new main event featuring Diaz against former interim UFC Lightweight Champion (also welterweight winner) Tony Ferguson, who was originally scheduled to face Li Jingliang in a welterweight bout, was then set. In addition, Chimaev was instead matched up with Kevin Holland, who was originally scheduled to face Daniel Rodriguez at a catchweight of 180 pounds, though the new matchup would be a five round bout (Chimaev wasn't fined due to the new booking). Finally, Rodriguez and Jingliang were matched up at a catchweight of 180 pounds.


title: UFC 279

text: A trio of bouts was originally scheduled for this date, but they were eventually pushed back a week to as the promotion adjusted its schedule in June: lightweight bouts featuring Trey Ogden vs. Daniel Zellhuber and Nikolas Motta vs. Cameron VanCamp; as well as a welterweight bout between Louis Cosce and Trevin Giles.


title: UFC 279

text: A women's strawweight bout between Hannah Cifers and Melissa Martinez was expected to take place at the event. However, Cifers pulled out due to undisclosed reasons and was replaced by Elise Reed.


title: UFC 279

text: A middleweight bout between Jamie Pickett and Denis Tiuliulin was expected to take place at , but it was moved to this card due to Tiuliulin suffering an injury during the week of the fight.


title: UFC 279

text: A heavyweight bout between Shamil Abdurakhimov and Jailton Almeida was expected to take place at the event. However, Abdurakhimov was forced to withdraw due to visa issues and was replaced by Anton Turkalj at a catchweight of 220 pounds.


title: UFC 279

text: The organization usually holds a pre-fight press-conference two days before numbered events, but this edition's was cancelled mid section. All fighters in the last three bouts of the event were expected to participate, however after a lengthy delay, UFC President Dana White showed up only with Holland and Rodriguez. He announced that fighters would be brought in pairs, but cancelled the press-conference after their participation instead for "everybody's safety". He later revealed that an altercation involving four fighters and their teams took place backstage. It initiated with Chimaev and Holland, with Diaz eventually getting involved. The Nevada Athletic Commission (NAC) is expected to investigate the incident and potentially discipline all licensees.


title: UFC 279

text: In addition to Chimaev missing weight, featherweight Hakeem Dawodu and heavyweight Chris Barnett both missed weight as well. Dawodu weighed at 149.5 pounds, 3.5 pounds over the non-title featherweight limit, while Barnett weighed in at 267.5 pounds, 1.5 pounds over the non-title heavyweight limit. Both bouts proceeded at catchweight with Dawodu and Barnett each fined 30% and 20% of their purses, which went to their opponents Julian Erosa and Jake Collier respectively. A women's bantamweight bout between Irene Aldana and women's featherweight winner Macy Chiasson was also changed to a 140-pound catchweight bout, but it was not due to a weight miss.


title: Julien Baker

text: Julien Rose Baker (born September 29, 1995) is an American indie rock singer and guitarist. Her music is noted for its moody quality and confessional lyrical style, as well as frank explorations of issues including spirituality, addiction, mental illness, and human nature.


title: Julien Baker

text: Born and raised in suburban Memphis, Tennessee, Baker released her debut album "Sprained Ankle" (2015) while she was a student at Middle Tennessee State University. The album received critical acclaim and appeared on several 2015 year-end lists. Baker subsequently signed to Matador Records and released her second studio album "Turn Out the Lights" in 2017, to further critical success. Her third album, "Little Oblivions" (2021), embraced a more full-band sound and became Baker's first top 40 album on the Billboard 200 chart.


title: Julien Baker

text: In addition to her solo work, Baker is a member of the indie supergroup boygenius, alongside Phoebe Bridgers and Lucy Dacus. The group's debut eponymous EP was released in October 2018.


title: Julien Baker

text: Baker was born on September 29, 1995 in Germantown, and raised in Bartlett, Tennessee, a suburb of Memphis. Her parents both worked in the field of physical therapy, and she has spoken of being inspired by her father who, after an accident in his twenties resulting in the amputation of his leg, dedicated his life to making experimental prosthetic limbs. Baker's parents separated while she was in elementary school.


title: Julien Baker

text: Baker grew up in a devout Baptist family, and her early exposure to music involved playing at her church. After seeing Green Day on television, she was inspired to explore more alternative music and started listening to bands like My Chemical Romance and Death Cab for Cutie. She subsequently became captivated by the punk, hardcore, metalcore, and screamo scenes, and has said some of her favorite bands were MewithoutYou, Underoath, The Chariot, Norma Jean, and Whitechapel. She struggled with substance abuse as a young teen, but found support in the community surrounding house shows in Memphis, and became inspired by the straight edge punk subculture. While in high school in 2010, Baker co-founded the band the Star Killers, who renamed themselves Forrister in 2015.


title: Julien Baker

text: Baker attended Arlington High School and then Middle Tennessee State University, where she had a campus job in the A/V department and initially studied audio engineering, before switching to literature and secondary education. She eventually left school to tour full-time after the release of "Sprained Ankle", but returned to campus in the fall of 2019 to complete her degree in literature.


title: Julien Baker

text: During her first year at MTSU, Baker began writing songs on her own, often utilizing the university practice rooms that stayed open late at night. She wrote what would become "Sprained Ankle" in her dorm room and recorded it on free studio time that a friend of hers had gotten from an internship, and she’s said that she never thought the EP would be heard by a wide audience; she put it on Bandcamp so that her friends could hear it.


title: Julien Baker

text: It was discovered and picked up by 6131 Records, however, and became the studio album "Sprained Ankle" which was released in October 2015. "Sprained Ankle" ended up topping many 2015 year-end lists, and its success led to features in "The New Yorker" and "The New York Times", with various critics calling it "heartbreaking," "hypnotic," and "striking."


title: Julien Baker

text: In March 2016, Baker gave an NPR Tiny Desk performance, the first of an eventual four appearances at the desk. She also played at that year's South by Southwest and Newport Folk festivals. Her performances from this period have been called "hushed, reverential events," with the audience often remaining quiet and emotional. In 2017 she signed to Matador Records, and released a 7-inch single consisting of the songs "Funeral Pyre" (previously called "Sad Song 11") and "Distant Solar Systems."


title: Julien Baker

text: Her second album, "Turn Out the Lights", was recorded with engineer and producer Calvin Lauber at Ardent Studios in Memphis, and released on October 27, 2017 to further acclaim. She spent the following year touring across the U.S. and internationally, performing alongside artists including The National, Father John Misty, Half Waif, Adam Torres, and Lucy Dacus, and appearing on "CBS This Morning" and "The Late Show with Stephen Colbert".


title: Julien Baker

text: Baker has opened for or collaborated with a wide range of artists, including Death Cab for Cutie, Conor Oberst, Paramore and Hayley Williams, The National, The Decemberists, Belle & Sebastian, Frightened Rabbit, The Front Bottoms, Touche Amore, Manchester Orchestra, and Bright Eyes. She has also released covers of various songs including those by Elliott Smith, Radiohead, and Soundgarden.


title: Julien Baker

text: In 2018, Baker formed the rock supergroup Boygenius with fellow indie singer-songwriters Phoebe Bridgers and Lucy Dacus, both of whom she had toured with previously. The group released three songs in August of that year and subsequently announced an eponymous EP, "Boygenius", which was released on October 26, 2018 to widespread critical acclaim. The band spent that November touring the U.S., and performed "Me & My Dog" on "Late Night with Seth Meyers". The trio has continued to collaborate on each other’s solo work since the release of their EP, lending backing vocals to two songs from Bridgers’ Grammy-nominated "Punisher" and “Favor” from Baker’s "Little Oblivions", as well as Hayley Williams' "Petals for Armor" single "Roses/Lotus/Violet/Iris."


title: Julien Baker

text: In 2019, Baker put out two 7-inch singles. The first, released in June, featured songs "Red Door" and "Conversation Piece," and the second in October featured "Tokyo" and "Sucker Punch" as part of the Sub Pop singles series. All four songs had a slightly more produced sound than her previous work and were received very positively.


title: Julien Baker

text: On October 21, 2020, Baker announced her third studio album, "Little Oblivions", accompanied by the lead single "Faith Healer" and an essay by poet Hanif Abdurraqib. "Little Oblivions" was released February 26, 2021, and was preceded by additional singles "Hardline" and "Favor." It was written mostly over the course of 2019, a difficult and formative year for Baker as she had to cancel various tour dates, struggled with her sobriety and mental health, and eventually returned to school to finish her degree at MTSU. In January, she appeared on "The Late Show with Stephen Colbert", performing "Faith Healer."


title: Julien Baker

text: Baker is known for her deeply personal, confessional songwriting, and her music has been categorized as a mix of indie rock, indie folk, alternative, and emo. The sparse arrangements on her “fragile, gentle” 2015 debut, "Sprained Ankle", feature only her voice and guitar, and her stage performances often consist of her alone, utilizing a loop pedal. 2017's "Turn Out the Lights" saw the addition of occasional violin as well as "organs and cavernous-sounding production." Baker experimented with a more full-band sound for her 2021 release "Little Oblivions", and has commented on feeling limited by her own expectations to adhere to her established style. The album newly features drums, bass, keyboards, mandolin, and banjo, all played by Baker on the recording. On tour for the album, she has played with a full band and featured new, multi-instrument arrangements of her previous work, describing the band's sound as "post-rock."


title: Julien Baker

text: Baker’s writing is infused with religious themes, and is often noted for its physical imagery. Hope, redemption, love, addiction, shame, self-loathing, and direct appeals to God are all prominent motifs throughout her work. Her music often features frank explorations of addiction and sobriety, and she has been open in discussing her experiences with substance abuse and mental illness.


title: Julien Baker

text: Baker is a lesbian, and her fraught experiences with organized Christianity inform much of her work. She came out to her parents at age 17, after years of being closeted and watching friends get sent to conversion therapy or kicked out of their homes. However, she found her family was “radically accepting.” She previously referred to herself as a Christian socialist, but has spoken on how being constantly labelled the "sober queer Christian" early in her career was damaging to her understanding of her identity, and led to her questioning and reevaluating many foundational aspects of her life. She has since discussed the ever-changing nature of her relationship to faith, saying she is no longer interested in labeling her beliefs so rigidly and that she is trying to adopt a less dichotomous worldview than the one she was raised with, calling the realization "freeing."


title: Julien Baker

text: Baker has a deep appreciation for literature and has said that she "love[s] school". She has contributed essays to literary magazines and been known to enjoy discussing philosophy, history, theology, and her hopes of possibly continuing her academic pursuits or becoming a teacher. Interviewers have often remarked on her kind, playful nature and Southern politeness as striking in contrast to the weight of the themes she explores in her music.


title: 2021–22 A.C. Milan season

text: The 2021–22 season was the 123rd season in the existence of A.C. Milan and the club's 39th consecutive season (110th overall) in the top flight of Italian football. In addition to the domestic league, Milan participated in this season's editions of the Coppa Italia and UEFA Champions League. It marked Milan's return to Europe's premier knockout competition for the first time since the 2013–14 season.


title: 2021–22 A.C. Milan season

text: Milan secured their 19th Italian league title on the last match day of the season, with a club-record tally of 86 points. It was their first league title since the 2010–11 season.


title: Irish Republican Army (1919–1922)

text: The Irish Republican Army (IRA; ) was an Irish republican revolutionary paramilitary organisation. The ancestor of many groups also known as the Irish Republican Army, and distinguished from them as the "Old IRA", it was descended from the Irish Volunteers, an organisation established on 25 November 1913 that staged the Easter Rising in April 1916. In 1919, the Irish Republic that had been proclaimed during the Easter Rising was formally established by an elected assembly (Dáil Éireann), and the Irish Volunteers were recognised by Dáil Éireann as its legitimate army. Thereafter, the IRA waged a guerrilla campaign against the British occupation of Ireland in the 1919–1921 Irish War of Independence.


title: Irish Republican Army (1919–1922)

text: Following the signing in 1921 of the Anglo-Irish Treaty, which ended the War of Independence, a split occurred within the IRA. Members who supported the treaty formed the nucleus of the Irish National Army. However, the majority of the IRA was opposed to the treaty. The anti-treaty IRA fought a civil war against the Free State Army in 1922–23, with the intention of creating a fully independent all-Ireland republic. Having lost the civil war, this group remained in existence, with the intention of overthrowing the governments of both the Irish Free State and Northern Ireland and achieving the Irish Republic proclaimed in 1916.


title: Irish Republican Army (1919–1922)

text: The Irish Volunteers, founded in 1913, staged the Easter Rising, which aimed at ending British rule in Ireland, in 1916. Following the suppression of the Rising, thousands of Volunteers were imprisoned or interned, leading to the break-up of the organisation. It was reorganised in 1917 following the release of first the internees and then the prisoners. At the army convention held in Dublin in October 1917, Éamon de Valera was elected president, Michael Collins Director for Organisation and Cathal Brugha Chairman of the Resident Executive, which in effect made him Chief of Staff.


title: Irish Republican Army (1919–1922)

text: Following the success of Sinn Féin in the general election of 1918 and the setting up of the First Dáil (the legislature of the Irish Republic), Volunteers commenced military action against the Royal Irish Constabulary (RIC), the paramilitary police force in Ireland, and subsequently against the British Army. It began with the Soloheadbeg Ambush, when members of the Third Tipperary Brigade led by Séumas Robinson, Seán Treacy, Dan Breen and Seán Hogan, seized a quantity of gelignite, killing two RIC constables in the process.


title: Irish Republican Army (1919–1922)

text: The Dáil leadership worried that the Volunteers would not accept its authority, given that, under their own constitution, they were bound to obey "their" own executive and no other body. In August 1919, Brugha proposed to the Dáil that the Volunteers be asked to swear allegiance to the Dáil, but one commentator states that another year passed before the movement took an oath of allegiance to the Irish Republic and its government in "August 1920". In sharp contrast, a contemporary in the struggle for Irish independence notes that by late 1919, the term "Irish Republican Army (IRA)" was replacing "Volunteers" in everyday usage. This change is attributed to the Volunteers, having accepted the authority of the Dáil, being referred to as the "army of the Irish Republic", popularly known as the "Irish Republican Army".


title: Irish Republican Army (1919–1922)

text: A power struggle continued between Brugha and Collins, both cabinet ministers, over who had the greater influence. Brugha was nominally the superior as Minister for Defence, but Collins's power base came from his position as Director of Organisation of the IRA and from his membership on the Supreme Council of the Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB). De Valera resented Collins's clear power and influence, which he saw as coming more from the secretive IRB than from his position as a Teachta Dála (TD) and minister in the Aireacht. Brugha and de Valera both urged the IRA to undertake larger, more conventional military actions for the propaganda effect but were ignored by Collins and Mulcahy. Brugha at one stage proposed the assassination of the entire British cabinet. This was also discounted due to its presumed negative effect on British public opinion. Moreover, many members of the Dáil, notably Arthur Griffith, did not approve of IRA violence and would have preferred a campaign of passive resistance to the British rule. The Dáil belatedly accepted responsibility for IRA actions in April 1921, just three months before the end of the Irish War of Independence.


title: Irish Republican Army (1919–1922)

text: In practice, the IRA was commanded by Collins, with Richard Mulcahy as second in command. These men were able to issue orders and directives to IRA guerrilla units around the country and at times to send arms and organisers to specific areas. However, because of the localised and irregular character of the war, they were only able to exert limited control over local IRA commanders such as Tom Barry, Liam Lynch in Cork and Seán Mac Eoin in Longford.


title: Irish Republican Army (1919–1922)

text: The IRA claimed a total strength of 70,000, but only about 3,000 were actively engaged in fighting against the Crown. The IRA distrusted those Irishmen who had fought in the British Army during the First World War as potential informers, but there were a number of exceptions such as Emmet Dalton, Tom Barry and Martin Doyle. The IRA divided its members into three classes, namely "unreliable", "reliable" and "active". The "unreliable" members were those who were nominally IRA members but did not do very much for the struggle, "reliable" members played a supporting role in the war while occasionally fighting and the "active" men those who were engaged in full-time fighting. Of the IRA brigades only about one to two-thirds were considered to be "reliable" while those considered "active" were even smaller. A disproportionate number of the "active" IRA men were teachers, medical students, shoemakers and bootmakers; those engaged in building trades like painters, carpenters and bricklayers; draper's assistants and creamery workers. The Canadian historian Peter Hart wrote "...the guerrillas were disproportionately skilled, trained and urban". Farmers and fishermen tended to be underrepresented in the IRA. Those Irishmen engaged in white-collar trades or working as skilled labourers were much more likely to be involved in cultural nationalist groups like the Gaelic League than farmers or fishermen, and thus to have a stronger sense of Irish nationalism. Furthermore, the authority of the Crown tended to be stronger in towns and cities than in the countryside. Thus, those engaged in Irish nationalist activities in urban areas were much more likely to come into conflict with the Crown, leading to a greater chance of radicalisation. Finally, the British tactic of blowing up the homes of IRA members had the effect of discouraging many farmers from joining the struggle as the destruction of the family farm could easily reduce a farmer and his family to destitution. Of the "active" IRA members, three-quarters were in their late teens or early 20s and only 5% of the "active" men were in the age range of 40 or older. The "active" members were overwhelmingly single men with only 4% being married or engaged in a relationship. The life of an "active" IRA man with the stress of living on the run and constantly being in hiding tended to attract single men who could adjust to this lifestyle far more easily than a man in a relationship. Furthermore, the IRA preferred to recruit single men as it was found that singles could devote themselves more wholeheartedly to the struggle.


title: Irish Republican Army (1919–1922)

text: Women were active in the republican movement, but almost no women fought with the IRA whose "active" members were almost entirely male. The IRA was not a sectarian group and went out of its way to proclaim it was open to all Irishmen, but its membership was largely Catholic with virtually no Protestants serving as "active" IRA men. Hart wrote that in his study of the IRA membership that he found only three Protestants serving as "active" IRA men between 1919 and 1921. Of the 917 IRA men convicted by British courts under the Defence of the Realm Act in 1919, only one was a Protestant. The majority of those serving in the IRA were practising Catholics, but there was a large minority of "pagans" as atheists or non-practising Catholics who were known in Ireland. The majority of the IRA men serving in metropolitan Britain were permanent residents with very few sent over from Ireland. The majority of the IRA men operating in Britain were Irish-born, but there was a substantial minority who were British-born, something that made them especially insistent on asserting their Irish identity.


title: Irish Republican Army (1919–1922)

text: The IRA fought a guerrilla war against the Crown forces in Ireland from 1919 to July 1921. The most intense period of the war was from November 1920 onwards. The IRA campaign can broadly be split into three phases. The first, in 1919, involved the re-organisation of the Irish Volunteers as a guerrilla army and only sporadic attacks. Organisers such as Ernie O'Malley were sent around the country to set up viable guerrilla units. On paper, there were 100,000 or so Volunteers enrolled after the conscription crisis of 1918. However, only about 15,000 of these participated in the guerrilla war. In 1919, Collins, the IRA's Director of Intelligence, organised the "Squad"—an assassination unit based in Dublin that killed police involved in intelligence work (the Irish playwright Brendan Behan's father Stephen Behan was a member of the Squad). Typical of Collins's sardonic sense of humour, the Squad was often referred to as his "Twelve Apostles". In addition, there were some arms raids on RIC barracks. By the end of 1919, four Dublin Metropolitan Police and 11 RIC men had been killed. The RIC abandoned most of their smaller rural barracks in late 1919. Around 400 of these were burned in a co-ordinated IRA operation around the country in April 1920.


title: Irish Republican Army (1919–1922)

text: The second phase of the IRA campaign, roughly from January to July 1920, involved attacks on the fortified police barracks located in the towns. Between January and June 1920, 16 of these were destroyed and 29 badly damaged. Several events of late 1920 greatly escalated the conflict. Firstly, the British declared martial law in parts of the country—allowing for internment and executions of IRA men. Secondly, they deployed paramilitary forces, the Black and Tans and Auxiliary Division, and more British Army personnel into the country. Thus, the third phase of the war (roughly August 1920 – July 1921) involved the IRA taking on a greatly expanded British force, moving away from attacking well-defended barracks and instead using ambush tactics. To this end the IRA was re-organised into "flying columns"—permanent guerrilla units, usually about 20 strong, although sometimes larger. In rural areas, the flying columns usually had bases in remote mountainous areas.


title: Irish Republican Army (1919–1922)

text: The most high-profile violence of the war took place in Dublin in November 1920 and is still known as Bloody Sunday. In the early hours of the morning, Collins' "Squad" killed 14 British spies. In reprisal, that afternoon, British forces opened fire on a football crowd at Croke Park, killing 14 civilians. Towards the end of the day, two prominent Republicans and a friend of theirs were arrested and killed by Crown Forces.


title: Irish Republican Army (1919–1922)

text: While most areas of the country saw some violence in 1919–1921, the brunt of the war was fought in Dublin and the southern province of Munster. In Munster, the IRA carried out a significant number of successful actions against British troops, for instance, the ambushing and killing of 16 of 18 Auxiliaries by Tom Barry's column at Kilmicheal in West Cork in November 1920, or Liam Lynch's men killing 13 British soldiers near Millstreet early in the next year. At the Crossbarry Ambush in March 1921, 100 or so of Barry's men fought a sizeable engagement with a British column of 1,200, escaping from the British encircling manoeuvre. In Dublin, the "Squad" and elements of the IRA Dublin Brigade were amalgamated into the "Active Service Unit", under Oscar Traynor, which tried to carry out at least three attacks on British troops a day. Usually, these consisted of shooting or grenade attacks on British patrols. Outside Dublin and Munster, there were only isolated areas of intense activity. For instance, the County Longford IRA under Seán Mac Eoin carried out a number of well-planned ambushes and successfully defended the village of Ballinalee against Black and Tan reprisals in a three-hour gun battle. In County Mayo, large-scale guerrilla action did not break out until spring 1921, when two British forces were ambushed at Carrowkennedy and Tourmakeady. Elsewhere, fighting was more sporadic and less intense.


title: Irish Republican Army (1919–1922)

text: In Belfast, the war had a character all of its own. The city had a Protestant and unionist majority and IRA actions were responded to with reprisals against the Catholic population, including killings (such as the McMahon killings) and the burning of many homes – as on Belfast's Bloody Sunday. The IRA in Belfast and the North generally, although involved in protecting the Catholic community from loyalists and state forces, undertook a retaliatory arson campaign against factories and commercial premises. The violence in Belfast alone, which continued until October 1922 (long after the truce in the rest of the country), claimed the lives of between 400 and 500 people.


title: Irish Republican Army (1919–1922)

text: In April 1921, the IRA was again reorganised, in line with the Dáil's endorsement of its actions, along the lines of a regular army. Divisions were created based on region, with commanders being given responsibility, in theory, for large geographical areas. In practice, this had little effect on the localised nature of the guerrilla warfare.


title: Irish Republican Army (1919–1922)

text: In May 1921, the IRA in Dublin attacked and burned the Custom House. The action was a serious setback as five members were killed and eighty captured.


title: Irish Republican Army (1919–1922)

text: By the end of the war in July 1921, the IRA was hard-pressed by the deployment of more British troops into the most active areas and a chronic shortage of arms and ammunition. It has been estimated that the IRA had only about 3,000 rifles (mostly captured from the British) during the war, with a larger number of shotguns and pistols. An ambitious plan to buy arms from Italy in 1921 collapsed when the money did not reach the arms dealers. Towards the end of the war, some Thompson submachine guns were imported from the United States; however 450 of these were intercepted by the American authorities and the remainder only reached Ireland shortly before the Truce.


title: Irish Republican Army (1919–1922)

text: By June 1921, Collins' assessment was that the IRA was within weeks, possibly even days, of collapse. It had few weapons or ammunition left. Moreover, almost 5,000 IRA men had been imprisoned or interned and over 500 killed. Collins and Mulcahy estimated that the number of effective guerrilla fighters was down to 2,000–3,000. However, in the summer of 1921, the war was abruptly ended.


title: Irish Republican Army (1919–1922)

text: The British recruited hundreds of World War I veterans into the RIC and sent them to Ireland. Because there was initially a shortage of RIC uniforms, the veterans at first wore a combination of dark green RIC uniforms and khaki British Army uniforms, which inspired the nickname "Black and Tans". The brutality of the Black and Tans is now well-known, although the greatest violence attributed to the Crown's forces was often that of the Auxiliary Division of the Constabulary. One of the strongest critics of the Black and Tans was King George V who in May 1921 told Lady Margery Greenwood that "he hated the idea of the Black and Tans."


title: Irish Republican Army (1919–1922)

text: The IRA was also involved in the destruction of many stately homes in Munster. The Church of Ireland Gazette recorded numerous instances of Unionists and Loyalists being shot, burnt or forced from their homes during the early 1920s. In County Cork between 1920 and 1923 the IRA shot over 200 civilians of whom over 70 (or 36%) were Protestants: five times the percentage of Protestants in the civilian population. This was due to the historical inclination of Protestants towards loyalty to the United Kingdom. A convention of Irish Protestant Churches in Dublin in May 1922 signed a resolution placing "on record" that "hostility to Protestants by reason of their religion has been almost, if not wholly, unknown in the twenty-six counties in which Protestants are in the minority."


title: Irish Republican Army (1919–1922)

text: Many historic buildings in Ireland were destroyed during the war, most famously the Custom House in Dublin, which was disastrously attacked on de Valera's insistence, to the horror of the more militarily experienced Collins. As he feared, the destruction proved a pyrrhic victory for the Republic, with so many IRA men killed or captured that the IRA in Dublin suffered a severe blow.


title: Irish Republican Army (1919–1922)

text: This was also a period of social upheaval in Ireland, with frequent strikes as well as other manifestations of class conflict. In this regard, the IRA acted to a large degree as an agent of social control and stability, driven by the need to preserve cross-class unity in the national struggle, and on occasion being used to break strikes.


title: Irish Republican Army (1919–1922)

text: Assessments of the effectiveness of the IRA's campaign vary. They were never in a position to engage in conventional warfare. The political, military and financial costs of remaining in Ireland were higher than the British government was prepared to pay and this in a sense forced them into negotiations with the Irish political leaders. According to historian Michael Hopkinson, the guerrilla warfare "was often courageous and effective". Historian David Fitzpatrick observes, "The guerrilla fighters...were vastly outnumbered by the forces of the Crown... The success of the Irish Volunteers in surviving so long is therefore noteworthy."


title: Irish Republican Army (1919–1922)

text: David Lloyd George, the British Prime Minister, at the time, found himself under increasing pressure (both internationally and from within the British Isles) to try to salvage something from the situation. This was a complete reversal on his earlier position. He had consistently referred to the IRA as a "murder gang" up until then. An unexpected olive branch came from King George V, who, in a speech in Belfast called for reconciliation on all sides, changed the mood and enabled the British and Irish Republican governments to agree to a truce. The Truce was agreed on 11 July 1921. On 8 July, de Valera met General Nevil Macready, the British commander in chief in Ireland and agreed terms. The IRA was to retain its arms and the British Army was to remain in barracks for the duration of peace negotiations. Many IRA officers interpreted the truce only as a temporary break in fighting. They continued to recruit and train volunteers, with the result that the IRA had increased its number to over 72,000 men by early 1922.


title: Irish Republican Army (1919–1922)

text: Negotiations on an Anglo-Irish Treaty took place in late 1921 in London. The Irish delegation was led by Arthur Griffith and Michael Collins.


title: Irish Republican Army (1919–1922)

text: The most contentious areas of the Treaty for the IRA were abolition of the Irish Republic declared in 1919, the status of the Irish Free State as a dominion in the British Commonwealth and the British retention of the so-called Treaty Ports on Ireland's south coast. These issues were the cause of a split in the IRA and ultimately, the Irish Civil War.


title: Irish Republican Army (1919–1922)

text: Under the Government of Ireland Act 1920, Ireland was partitioned, creating Northern Ireland and Southern Ireland. Under the terms of the Anglo-Irish agreement of 6 December 1921, which ended the war (1919–21), Northern Ireland was given the option of withdrawing from the new state, the Irish Free State, and remaining part of the United Kingdom. The Northern Ireland parliament chose to do that. An Irish Boundary Commission was then set up to review the border.


title: Irish Republican Army (1919–1922)

text: Irish leaders expected that it would so reduce Northern Ireland's size, by transferring nationalist areas to the Irish Free State, as to make it economically unviable. Partition was not by itself the key breaking point between pro- and anti-Treaty campaigners; both sides expected the Boundary Commission to greatly reduce Northern Ireland. Moreover, Michael Collins was planning a clandestine guerrilla campaign against the Northern state using the IRA. In early 1922, he sent IRA units to the border areas and sent arms to northern units. It was only afterwards, when partition was confirmed, that a united Ireland became the preserve of anti-Treaty Republicans.


title: Irish Republican Army (1919–1922)

text: The IRA leadership was deeply divided over the decision by the Dáil to ratify the Treaty. Despite the fact that Michael Collins – the de facto leader of the IRA – had negotiated the Treaty, many IRA officers were against it. Of the General Headquarters (GHQ) staff, nine members were in favour of the Treaty while four opposed it. The majority of the IRA rank-and-file were against the Treaty; in January–June 1922, their discontent developed into open defiance of the elected civilian Provisional government of Ireland.


title: Irish Republican Army (1919–1922)

text: Both sides agreed that the IRA's allegiance was to the (elected) Dáil of the Irish Republic, but the anti-Treaty side argued that the decision of the Dáil to accept the Treaty (and set aside the Irish Republic) meant that the IRA no longer owed that body its allegiance. They called for the IRA to withdraw from the authority of the Dáil and to entrust the IRA Executive with control over the army. On 16 January, the first IRA division – the 2nd Southern Division led by Ernie O'Malley – repudiated the authority of the GHQ. A month later, on 18 February, Liam Forde, O/C of the IRA Mid-Limerick Brigade, issued a proclamation stating that: "We no longer recognise the authority of the present head of the army, and renew our allegiance to the existing Irish Republic". This was the first unit of the IRA to break with the pro-Treaty government.


title: Irish Republican Army (1919–1922)

text: On 22 March, Rory O'Connor held what was to become an infamous press conference and declared that the IRA would no longer obey the Dáil as (he said) it had violated its Oath to uphold the Irish Republic. He went on to say that "we repudiate the Dáil ... We will set up an Executive which will issue orders to the IRA all over the country." In reply to the question on whether this meant they intended to create a military dictatorship, O'Connor said: "You can take it that way if you like."


title: Irish Republican Army (1919–1922)

text: On 28 March, the (anti-Treaty) IRA Executive issued statement stating that Minister of Defence (Richard Mulcahy) and the Chief-of-Staff (Eoin O'Duffy) no longer exercised any control over the IRA. In addition, it ordered an end to the recruitment to the new military and police forces of the Provisional Government. Furthermore, it instructed all IRA units to reaffirm their allegiance to the Irish Republic on 2 April.


title: Irish Republican Army (1919–1922)

text: The pro-treaty IRA soon became the nucleus of the new (regular) Irish National Army created by Collins and Richard Mulcahy. British pressure, and tensions between the pro- and anti-Treaty factions of the IRA, led to a bloody civil war, ending in the defeat of the anti-Treaty faction. On 24 May 1923, Frank Aiken, the (anti-treaty) IRA Chief-of-Staff, called a cease-fire. Many left political activity altogether, but a minority continued to insist that the new Irish Free State, created by the "illegitimate" Treaty, was an illegitimate state. They asserted that their "IRA Army Executive" was the real government of a still-existing Irish Republic. The IRA of the Civil War and subsequent organisations that have used the name claim lineage from that group, which is covered in full at Irish Republican Army (1922–1969).