Zabaykal’sk, Russia

History

It was founded in 1904 as a station (Razyezd 86, i.e. "Passing loop No. 86") on the Chinese Eastern Railway.

Since 1924, a border guard detachment has been stationed there. In the aftermath of the Sino-Soviet conflict (1929) the station was renamed Otpor ("Repulse").

Until the mid-1930s, Razyezd 86 / Otpor had little significance as a station, as all border formalities were done at Matsiyevskaya station (deeper into Russia) and at Manzhouli Railway Station, on the Chinese side of the border. The station was expanded in the mid-1930s, as the railway on the Chinese side had been sold by the USSR to Manchukuo and converted from the 1,520 mm (4 ft 11+27⁄32 in) gauge of the Russian Railways to the 1,435 mm (4 ft 8+1⁄2 in) China Railway; Otpor thus became the last Russian-gauge station. The station became quite important in 1945, as one of the bases of the Soviet invasion of Manchuria, which also saw the rail line on the Chinese side temporary re-converted to Russian gauge. The station's importance continued as the main rail connection between the USSR and the Communist China. On China's request, in 1958 the Soviets changed the name "Otpor" to the neutral Zabaykalsk (i.e., "a city in Transbaikalia", or "a city beyond Lake Baikal").

From the History section of Zabaykalsk on Wikipedia, under CC BY-SA 4.0.