A vivid history of the birth of a nation. When the Russian Revolution broke out in October 1917, much of Central Asia was still ruled by autonomous rulers such as the Emir of Bukhara and the Khan of Khiva. By 1920 the khanates had been transformed into People's Republics, and, in 1924, Stalin re-drew the frontiers on ethno-linguistic lines creating, amongst other statelets, the Soviet Socialist Republic of Uzbekistan - the land of the Uzbeks. But the Uzbeks were not the only significant ethnic group within the new Uzbekistan's frontiers. An older people, the Tajiks, formed a considerable part...