The Second World War had been a disaster for the Baltic States. Within five years, three republics experienced a chain of consecutive occupations by the regimes that viciously targeted specific parts of local demographics in hopes of eradicating politically active citizens and dismantling the backbone of movements willing to fight to preserve the states' sovereignty. While many states across Europe experienced similar treatment in the early 40-s, the case of the Baltic States differs from that of the Western European states. Being forcefully subjugated and partially devoured by the USSR, the Baltic States' traumatic experience did not end with the fall of Berlin in 1945. Since the Soviets viewed the republics as the land they owned, all three states had to face the ideological cleansing conducted by the Soviets, who were not entertained by the idea that Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania may preserve their independent identities. The Soviet repressions remain one of the darkest chapters in the Baltic States' history, and the aftermath of these repressions still echoes as a transgenerational trauma that unites the three states, providing a common ground for an unprecedented sense of solidarity. Now, let's talk about Estonia's experience throughout the 40s.
A commemorative stamp dedicated to the deportations
As we all know, the Baltic States were annexed by the Soviet Union in 1940 by the provisions of the secret protocols of the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact. This annexation officially started the reign of terror on the Estonian land. The Soviet NKGB service received detailed instructions on which parts of the republic's population must be repressed first. The elaborate plan for conducting the deportations of 1941 is referred to as the "Serov Instructions" since it was signed by Ivan Serov, Deputy People's Commissar for State Security of the Soviet Union (2). Among the prioritized targets were members of the government and high-ranking officials, military leaders, heads of the banks, and those who contributed to defeating the Soviets back in 1920. By liquidating and forcefully replacing those figures with pro-Soviet puppets, the regime expected to take control over all the essential state institutions and force the remaining population to comply.
Ivan Serov, the architect of the 1941 Deportations
Within the first wave of deportations taking place in May-June 1941, the Soviets forcefully relocated over ten thousand Estonian citizens to distant settlements in Siberia (3). Among the people deported were women and children since the Soviet tactics included deporting the entire families of those who were viewed as potential threats to the communist regime. Keep in mind that the deportations were intended to be permanent, with those affected losing any hope of ever returning. And while this part is already heartbreaking enough, it was not even a fraction of the suffering that the victims of deportations had to face since the Soviets had zero regard for these people's survival. The Soviets used railroad carts meant for cattle to transport people for thousands and thousands of kilometres. Many had succumbed to death before reaching their final destination (4).
Body Memory 2011. A stop-motion movie directed by Ülo Pikkov is a powerful metaphor for how transgenerational traumas are preserved in the memory of the older generations that pass them on. The original animation is dedicated to the Deportations of 1940-41
The atrocities committed during WW2 remain some of the worst manifestations of human brutality, and the consequences of those crimes remain a burden that is hard to neglect. The Baltic States' experience between 1939 and 1945 was horrible as the states were devastated by the war, occupational regimes proceeded to exterminate anyone they deemed undesired, and the population was forcefully mobilized by the opposing powers and forced to fight against their former neighbors (5). While you can learn more about that period by visiting countless local museums, one of the most illustrative reminders of the Soviet terrors is the "In Memoriam" plaque of Stenbock House in Tallinn. It has a simple design consisting of a list of former Estonian government members and heads of the state arrested by the Soviets in 1940 and executed between 1941 and 1944. Only the selected few from that list survived long enough to witness the end of WW2.
In Memoriam plaque
But what happened to Estonia after the war? You would not expect the suffering to end, would you? Where one war ended, the other one began, and the early stage of the Cold War was characterized by the so-called Stalinization and Sovetization of the Eastern Block. These states fell under Soviet influence at the end of WW2. Ivan Serov, the architect of the 1941 Deportations, took an active part in creating the special services that protected the puppet regimes and terrorized those who opposed the communist government in what was the German Democratic Republic and Poland. However, since the Baltic States were viewed as parts of the USSR, they received harsher treatment from the Soviets, who intended to completely integrate the states into their new "anti-imperialistic" empire.
It is important to mention that starting from the Soviet annexation of 1940, many citizens, who knew that the Soviets would target them, armed up and left to seek refuge in the forests across all the Baltic States. The Forest Brothers movement was a substantial instrument in opposing the Soviet occupation after 1944 by targeting KGB officers, police officers, and pro-Soviet activists while conducting local raids (6). According to different estimates, over ten thousand people joined the movement in Estonia, and the most active part of this resistance occurred between 1944 and 1953 (7). That was when armed clashes commonly took place across Estonian territory, forcing the Soviets to dispatch a significant number of troops in hopes of taking control over the region.
Estonian Forest Brothers
The fierce resistance of the locals and the insufficient pace of collectivization, represented by the centralized campaign of replacing farms owned by individuals with the collective ones controlled by the state, made the Soviet leadership realize that they were not welcomed in this land. As a response, the Soviets started preparations for something they were skilled at: eliminating the remaining elites and crushing the backbone of resistance with brutal power and the rule of terror. The scale of the prepared operation exceeded the deportations of 1941 when over ten thousand Estonians were forced to abandon their home and sent to a distant land. By February 28, 1949, operation "Прибой" (Coastal Surf) was approved by the highest governmental institutions of the USSR. The inevitable tragedy was less than a month away (8).
The March Deportations
In the early morning of March 25, 1949, thousands of families in Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania heard the knocking on their doors. On the opposite side of those doors, they were awaited by the officers of MGB, local policemen, and loyal Soviet activists. They were given less than an hour to pack their belongings in their suitcases before being transported to the nearest railroad stations, which became the starting points of their Siberian exile (9). The list of people selected to be deported included over 29 thousand families, mainly consisting of those who were deemed kulaks, individuals wealthy enough to own a farm and hire labor, collaborators, those who were suspected of helping the Forest Brothers movement, and nationalists, those who refused to accept the Soviet ideology or those whose actions may have been interpreted as anti-Soviet (10). In reality, anyone could appear on the list since elderly people, pregnant women, and young kids were among the deportees.
Freight train cars used to transport deportees
By deporting tens of thousands of people, the Soviets successfully implemented their tactics of using terror as the main driving force behind collectivization. The rates of collectivization skyrocketed in Latvia and Estonia (11). The reduced number of individual farms made it harder for the Forest Brothers to obtain provision and other support from the sympathizers, effectively forcing them to stop resisting in an armed way. Just like this, within three days between March 25 and 28, Estonia lost over seven thousand families.
Soviet deportations
As stated before, due to the scale and ruthlessness of deportations, the collective memory of the Baltic States preserved this episode as one of the darkest chapters in recent history. According to some estimates, out of 90 thousand deportees from the three Baltic Republics, more than 2 thousand children perished within a year (12). The harsh conditions of surviving in the new settlement faced by the victims of the deportations resulted in high mortality. The slight improvements that followed Khrushchev's reforms and the dismantling of Stalin's cult of personality barely alleviated the impact of the repressions. The Soviet bureaucracy prevented the families from returning home while the state redistributed their previously owned farmland. Retrospective justice was never served, especially to those who had never managed to return from this cruel exile.
And while hundreds of thousands of people from the Baltics suffered from the Soviet atrocities, some of the Soviet activists received state awards for conducting the deportations. Among them was Captain Pēteris Reinholds (12). While the Soviets conducted operation "Priboi" in full secrecy and the state censorship never mentioned it, the "Pravda" newspaper from August 25, 1949, published a list of officers granted state awards without explaining their achievements. Keep an eye on the right row, he's listed under №50.
"Pravda" newspaper 25 August 1949
To this day, the March deportations remembrance remains an essential part of Estonian memory politics. Monuments to the Soviet deportation victims appear all around the state, with the biggest one being opened in 2018 near Tallinn. On March 25, special ceremonies will be conducted in many cities across Estonia. Thousands of candles will be lit on Independence Square in Tallinn to commemorate those who became the victims of Soviet repression.
References:
(1) Britannica (n.d.) Soviet occupation. Retrieved from: https://www.britannica.com/place/Baltic-states/Soviet-occupation
(2) The State Archives of Latvia (n.d.) The Deportation of June 14, 1941 in Latvia. Retrieved from: https://www.archiv.org.lv/dep1941/agram1.php?param=1
(3) ERR (2023) Victims of June 1941 deportations commemorated in Tallinn. Retrieved from:
(4) The Estonian World (2020) The victims of Soviet deportations remembered in Estonia https://estonianworld.com/life/25-march-victims-soviet-deportations-remembered-estonia/
(5) Bubnys, Arūnas, Matthew Kott, and Ülle Kraft, 'The Baltic States: Auxiliaries and Waffen-SS soldiers from Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania', in Jochen Böhler, and Robert Gerwarth (eds), The Waffen-SS: A European History (Oxford, 2016),
(6) Georgian, E. (2017) A brief history of the Forest Brothers. Retrieved from: https://theculturetrip.com/europe/lithuania/articles/a-brief-history-of-the-forest-brothers
(7) Laar, M. (1992) War in the Woods: Estonia's Struggle for Survival, 1944-1956. Compass Press, 1992
(8) Rahi-Tamm, Aigi; Kahar, Andres (2009). "The Deportation Operation "Priboi" in 1949" In Hiio, Toomas; Maripuu, Meelis; Paavle, Indrek (eds.). Estonia Since 1944: Report of the Estonian International Commission for the Investigation of Crimes Against Humanity. Tallinn: Estonian International Commission for the Investigation of Crimes Against Humanity. pp. 361–384.
(9) Strods, H., & Kott, M. (2002). The File on Operation "Priboi": A Re-Assessment of the Mass Deportations of 1949. Journal of Baltic Studies, 33(1), 1–36
(10) Meelis Saueauk (2020). The March Deportation attempted to intimidate and ultimately Sovietise the Baltics. Retrieved from: https://communistcrimes.org/en/march-deportation-attempted-intimidate-and-ultimately-sovietise-baltics
(11) Misiunas, R.; Taagepera, R. (1993). The Baltic States: Years of Dependence 1940–1990 (revised ed.). University of California Press. p. 102
(12) Strods, H. (1998) The USSR MGB's Top Secret Operation "Priboi" ('Surf') for the Deportation of Population from the Baltic Countries, February 25; August 23 1949. Retrieved from: http://lpra.vip.lv/priboi.htm
Images
Stamp: https://postmargid.erm.ee/?fbclid=IwAR3vJkkWwD0v47lTjUdnd8KiRZjpXQ1-FrN2WhVW12LU4lkMN5UT3Ov2rqo
In Memoriam plaque: https://riigikantselei.ee/en/stenbock-house
Estonian Forest Brothers: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Eesti_metsavennad.jpg
Soviet Deportations: https://estonianworld.com/life/25-march-victims-soviet-deportations-remembered-estonia/
Pravda newspaper 1949: https://electro.nekrasovka.ru/books/6168108/pages/1
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