Shall Latvians Perish?AN URGENT APPEAL of the LATVIAN NATIONAL COUNCIL to the CIVILIZED WORLD, September 1948

An objection most frequently repeated by the Bolsheviks is the assertion that the Baltic States have been created artificially by the Capitalistic World in order to encircle the Soviet Union. The Baltic Nations are reported as belonging to a Slavonic race and the place assigned to them by Nature is supposed to be within a State of Russians. Balts are said to be void of any culture or other gifts of their own entitling them to independent life in separate states.

These pretexts are not worth more then the rest of the Bolshevik assertions brought forward now and then in order to raise the low spirit of the Russian Nation saying that almost all important inventions (as steam-engines, electric bulbs, wireless telegraph, radio, submarines, airplanes etc.) are ideas of Russian brains that have been stolen and copied by Addison and other capitalistic scientists afterwards.

The Latvians are neither Slavs nor Germans but they belong together with the Lithuanians to the group of Balts which have been characterized by prof. Savory during the debates of the House of Commons on May 23rd, 1947, as „the two magnificent Nordic races, not Slav, not German, but purely Nordic breeds”.

The Latvian und Lithuanian languages are closely related to Sanskrit and they have as little in common with Russian as the other languages which also have descended from the Indo-European root.

As to the form of life, political and economical organization as well as mentality the Latvians not only differ, but they are quite the reverse to the Russians. Prof. A. Schwabe says in his „History of Latvia and his Neighbours”, specifying this difference:

„The Russians are a passive type of mankind. They are an emotional people. Work they regard as an evil that has to be suffered. The Baltic people are active, they are men of will and reason. They regard work as a moral good, and indolence, slovenliness and untidiness as the greatest vices. In contrast to the Russians, who have always had a tendency towards dreaminess and a metaphysical contemplative search for God and the ultimate truths, and who try to find salvation and escape from the harsh realities of life in religious depths or social and political Utopias, the Baltic people are realists and possess a natural talent for organization. 16

Even at the beginning of our era the Roman author Tacitus could write that the Aesti (as the Baltic people were called in those days) cultivated their cereals more diligently than the indolent Germans. Medieval authors have described the Balts as human, peaceful and hospitable people ...

The Baltic people are natural sceptics and individualists, democracy is in the flesh and -blood of the Baltic people. They have a sense for justice and demand respect for the natural rights of every individual. Since time immemorial woman has been man's equal in the Baltic countries. In contrast to the Slav woman, who is the man's slave and meekly submits herself to all his whims, a married Baltic woman is as independent in her sphere of activity as the husband is in his. Her emancipation is not a result of an electoral Reform Bill, it is a feature of the national character, a spiritual patrimony inherited through generations.

Also in respect of culture the Baltic is an area separate from Russia. Even quite outwardly the difference is clearly visible. Both the sacred and profane architecture of the Baltic capitals has followed the West European styles, whereas in Russia from the 10th century Byzantine architecture hat set roots. The Baltic people are either Roman Catholic or Protestant, the Russians Greek Orthodox. The books and newspapers in the Baltic languages are printed in Latin characters whereas the Russians use their own script. With the frontiers between the Baltic States and Russia end also such essential elements of European civilization as Roman Law and Canonic Law. Whilst the Baltic is a province of the Roman Law system, the Russians have had their own system.

Such great streams in European civilization as feudalism, the Italian Renaissance, humanism and all the modern movements in art, literature, economics, sociology and politics have in their ebb and flow washed the Eastern shores of the Baltic Sea, but they never reached Russia, which has always been governed by trends of its own.”

Archaelogical excavations have proved that the Balts have inhabited the present Baltic space since 2000 years before Christ at least, at a time when the Slav races dwelled in the steppes of South Russia. They began to move North-West much later and only during the 8th century after Christ they approached regions inhabited by the Balts and began to harass them. In defence against those Slav marauders the Latvians formed a zone of strong fortifications consisting of more 17 then 150 castles in order to live under their protection an independent life with their own Kings, administration, money, taxation and weight systems and under proper laws. Agriculture with individuals farms, so characteristic to the Latvians, and handicraft were highly developed. The national prosperity, judging by the ample funds of money and jewelery excavated, has been considerable. The civilization of that period was of a purely democratic character with an aboundant folklore and national songs quite free from German or Slav influence.

It is important to note that the fortification zone of those days was congruent with the present Latvian USSR State frontier. That proves that Latvia has never usurped a foot of soil that had not been populated by Latvians since antiquity and if there were a small number of Russians too on Latvian territory, then they were immigrants wo had settled there during the time when Latvia was under Russian domination.

Up to the 18th century, all Muscovite endeavours to conquer the Baltic region, the most vigorous of them being the campaign of Ivan the Terrible at the beginning of the 16th century, failed to succeed. Only at the beginning of the 18th century the Tsar Peter the Great conquered Baltic territory to the North of the river Daugava, with the exception of the Province Latgale. The Duchy of Kurzeme remained independent and became an important political factor in Europe during the reign of Duke Jacob the Great and his son Kazimir. This Duchy had a mighty navy and mercantile marine, colonies in Africa (Gambia) and West India (Tobago) as well as copper mines in Norway. Kurzeme took an active part in European politics and had even supported the King of England with ships and grain during his struggle against Cromwell. The economic and cultural life of the country was flourishing and in Jelgava, the capital of Kurzeme, even a French Opera and ballett were performing. As far as international politics are concerned, the Duchy was of so great a specific weight that William Penn considered her as a possible member of a future European Union (William Penn „An Essay Towards the Present and Future of Europe” 1694).

Only at the end of the 18th century when quite new political constellations had formed in East Europe, at first Latgale and then the Duchy of Kurzeme as well as Poland became victims of the new Russo-Prussian-Austrian Block and had to 18 capitulate before Russia. Napoleon in 1812 re-established the independence of the Duchy of Kurzeme and created a Council of Regency. A French Consulate was opened in Jelgava, the capital of Kurzeme. But in 1813 after Napoleon's retreat Kurzeme was finally occupied by Russia.

From the above mentioned facts, it appears that:

1. the Latvians have nothing in common with the Russians neither in origin or in culture;
2. the Latvians have always belonged to Western Europe as to their mode of living, culture and civilization, and that
3. the Latvians have always led a life independent of Russia excepting only of the period after the Great Northern War when the North of Latvia (Vidzeme) according to the Nystad Peace Treaty in 1721 was annexed to Russia, and after the dismemberment of Poland in 1795 when Kurzeme together with the Polish Kingdom was subject to Russian domination and the Tsar of Russia added to his many titles that of the Duke of Kurzeme. But even then, Vidzeme and Kurzeme, as Russian provinces retained a certain domestic autonomy till on November 18th, 1918, the whole territory inhabited by Latvians was reunited again as an independent Latvian Republic.

That the Latvian State is not a product of conjuncture can be proved by facts. The Latvian Nation has never become reconciled to her oppressors. During the darkest time of oppression, at the end of the age of rationalism, most powerful insurrections took place in Vidzeme (Livonia) in 1771, 1779, and 1784, against the usurpers, but were suppressed by Russian armed forces. And again in the XIX century (1802, 1805, 1830, 1844, 1863, 1899) and in 1904—05 the Latvians by their insurrections proved to the world that they were politically alive ever more than before, and did not lose courage.

The revolt of 1905 was an insurrection on a particularly extensive scale. The whole Latvian Country was aflame of revolution. The local Russian administration was driven away and the authority was taken over by the insurgents. The Russians held only the bigger towns defended by strong garrisons. Victory seamed near, but the Russian Government, being conscious of the gravity of the situation, made use of military forces released at the end of the war with Japan. 19 Strong Russian punitive expeditions crossed Latvia in all directions and the fighters for Latvian freedom had to capitulate in this unequal combat. The Russian revenge was terrible. Everywhere court-martials were set up and they punished the actual or imagined insurgents by shooting or hanging them, by condemning them to forced labour, by corporal punishment, by setting fire to their homes a.s.f. If the offender had fled, fire was set to his belongings. In some cases even relatives of the fugitives were punished. Even on purpose of revenge social buildings were set on fire and destroyed.

The leading insurgents who had managed to escape in time, emigrated. The rest hid and looked for refuge in the woods, creating a strong partisan-movement.

The insurrection of 1905 did cost the Latvians about 2000 dead, not to mention those who had been condemned to forced labour. Having served their sentence, the latter were not permitted to return home, but compelled to settle in Siberia for life.

The revolt was suppressed, but Tsarist Russia did not succeed in effacing the yearning for freedom from the soul of the Latvian nation.

World War I brought heavy trials to the Latvian nation again. As war activities were shifted to the Latvian soil and devastations became enormous, while the Russian government did not care much about the Latvian refugees, Latvians resolved to take the defence of their soil in their own hands. In the beginning the Russian government did not agree, but at the end of 1915 when the situation on the front grew critical and when it seemed that the Germans would force their way for Petrograd, the permission was given to organize Latvian troops (called „Latvian rifle regiments”). Thus two Latvian brigades with 4 regiments in each, the number of men amounting to 32.000, were formed.

Although the Latvian rifle regiments, notwithstanding their heroism and enormous losses caused by the incompetent and even treacherous actions of the Russian army command, were unable to liberate the part of Latvia occupied by the Germans, they braced by their exploits the conviction of Latvian strength and prepared the foundations for Latvian independence.

Left to their own fate, the Latvians formed by their own means powerful welfare organizations to assist their refugees, 20 whose number amounted to 700.000 during World War I. The work with these organizations was a good training for the future Latvian state officials.

In 1917, after the Russian revolution, the Latvians got a chance to take an active part in the political life as well. Country Councils were elected in each province — Kurzeme, Vidzeme and Latgale. In order to have an organization authorized to speak in the name of the whole Latvian Nation a Provisional Latvian National Council was founded in Petrograd in 1917, and this Council met for its first session on December 1st, 1917, at Valka. At this meeting a declaration was adopted, proclaiming that the whole territory inhabited by Latvians should be united into one autonomous national unit whose status, foreign relations and interior regime should be determined by a constitutional assembly and plebiscite. On January 5th, 1918, the Latvian National Council appealing to the self-determination rights of peoples informed the Russian Constitutional Assembly about its resolution to secede from Russia.

The Germans, who occupied at that time the greatest part of Latvia, as well the Bolsheviks were hostile to the idea of a Latvian State and hampered the work of the National Council considerably. Then the Council started its work abroad and did its best to propagate the idea of a Latvian State.

Germany understood that it would not be possible simply to annex the Baltic Provinces, and therefore trying to meet the ideas of the Latvian, Lithuanian and Estonian nations, proposed to create a Baltic Duchy consisting of Latvia and Estonia which had to be joined in a personal union to Germany resp. Prussia.

As it is known, according to treaties! signed on March 3rd, 1917, at Brest-Litovsk and on August 27th, 1918, in Berlin, Moscow had voluntarily renounced the Baltic territories adding part of them to Germany (Kurzeme and the Isles of Estonia) while the decision on the future of the remaining part (Vidzeme and Estonia) was left to the inhabitants themselves. In order to maintain peace and order German police forces were permitted to remain temporarily in Vidzeme and Estonia. By these treaties Germany practically retained the supreme power over the Baltic countries, and she was trying to transform it into a legal status. The Germans persisted on their line till their collapse in autumn 1918 when all their plans were cancelled by the capitulation. 21

The Latvian National Council was opposing those projects by all possible means and solemnly declared in the name of the Latvian nation in July 1917 that the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk was violating the right of self-determination of peoples and therefore, being an act of violence, was not to be considered binding on the Latvian nation, that the Latvian nation was against the annexation by as well as against any personal union with Prussia and that Latvians claimed an indivisible and independent Latvian State, internationally guaranteed.

The Latvian politicians who remained in the provinces under German occupation secretely joined into a Democratic Block, where bourgeois and socialists were working side by side. This Democratic Block also decided in October 1917 to strive for an Independent Democratic Latvian Republic.

By this way all leading Latvian organizations had during 1917/18 declared their claim for a Latvian State uniting all the territory inhabited by Latvians. Therefore it is not true that Latvia became independent in 1918 only by accident as a „cordon sanitaire” or a „barrier state” against Russia, allegedly „artificially” established by the Versailles Treaty. The truth is that Latvia's independence grew organically.

Although Lenin, after seizing authority in Russia, was forced to declare on November 15th, 1917, under the impact of President Wilson's 14 articles that to the various peoples which had belonged till then to the Russian Empire a right of self- determination was granted, he, as has been established by later events, did never mean it seriously and turned the weapons against the newly established republics. In this struggle the new national states Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland were victorious but they had to suffer heavy losses in blood and material.

The independence of those nations was not a gift of the Western capitalists as the Bolsheviks and their satellites claim under the influence of Moscow, but they had fought for it and defended it with weapons in their hands. 22

2. Are the Baltic States without an economical basis?

The next argument the Bolsheviks and Russian imperialists raise against the Baltic States is the fiction that they are unable to exist because they have no mines and no other natural resources and are economically fully dependent on Soviet Russia.

The economical basis for Latvia is her agriculture in which more than 60% of the whole population are employed. And it is an old truth and has been established again by the latest events that the farmer is the most stable factor in the life of a nation.

As soon as Latvia had freed herself from Russian guardianship, its agriculture attained a very high level, leaving Soviet Russia with her kolkhozes and Bolshevist working methods far behind.

The development of Latvian agriculture was furthered in a great measure by the Agrarian Reform achieved during the first years of independence, when humerous farmhands became farm owners. This reform was of a great economical and political importance. When the reform was accomplished, 80% of all Latvian farms were family farms managed by the farmer and his family. These family farms, as has been proved by farther developments, were a solid foundation to the new state. While the Bolsheviks were proletarizing their farmers, transferring them into payed labourers attached to public estates, Latvia went in the other direction by raising the agricultural proletariat to landowners.

This explains the cruelty the Bolsheviks display against the farmers in Latvia ruining them with duties, taxes and corvee in order to turn them out of their individual farms and to establish kolkhozes instead as it has been done in many hundred cases, whilst the farmers themselves have been deported for slave labour to the Soviet Union. What is happening in Latvia now may be considered as the greatest tragedy of peasantry.

The Latvian farmer is an individualist, and he is attached to his soil with all his heart and will sooner perish than forsake it. And, therefore, there is nothing surprising in the fact that in Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia an extensive partisan movement has developed. This movement is supported by all classes of inhabitants, but its core is the persecuted farmer, desperately fighting for his 23 existence, for the liberty of his people and the independence of his State.

As a result of the Agrarian Reform and thanks to the Latvian farmer's zeal and industry, Latvia in a short time became an exporter of agricultural products which were delivered to Great Britain and various other countries of the European Continent. If Europe is undergoing now a heavy food crisis, the reason in a great measure is to be sought in the fact that of all European agricultural countries only Denmark and Sweden are on this side of the Iron Curtain, while the great majority of the agricultural states remain under the Bolshevik yoke and have been entirely cut off from the outside world.

Among Latvian export-items butter stood in the first place. As a matter of comparison, in 1937 the Soviet Union exported 14.600 tons of butter but Latvia 23.400 tons — that is 60% more than Russia did — and held the second place in Europe (just after Denmark). Besides that, Latvia exported timber, flax, bacon, clover seeds, breed cattle, paper and different other produce, and the export balance of the last year before the war was 52 mil. dollars against an import balance of 44 mil. dollars.

These figures show that the Soviet Union played a comparatively small part in the economic life of Latvia and that the Latvian foreign trade was undeniably directed westward. Data published by the League of Nations concerning the world trade in 1938 show that Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania had participated in this trade with 222 mil. dollars or 0,47% and the Soviet Union with 525 mil. dollars or 1,1%. These figures indicate clearly that the three Baltic States with 5,6 mil. inhabitants played in the world trade comparatively a much more important part than the Soviet Union with her 170 mil. inhabitants.

Along with agriculture, industry had been an important factor of Latvian economy and was based for the most part 24 on local row materials. 6000 enterprises employed 120.000 workers and their yearly production amounted to 135 mil. dollars. Manufactured goods were sold on the local market as well as exported.

Building trade had greatly developed especially in connection with the Agrarian Reform. New power-stations, factories, schools, social buildings and dwelling houses were built, modern roads and bridges were constructed. The government paid great attention to the building of modern dwelling- houses in rural districts.

Latvia did not know unemployment. There always has been want of workers for intensified farming, and Latvia imported yearly 50.000 farmhands from Poland and Lithuania.

Social legislation was highly developed. In ratifying Labour Conventions adopted by Conferences of the International Labour Organization, Latvia held the first place. The workers' standard of living was high. Latvia held the first place in the world in milk and meat consumption with an average of 566 kg of milk products and 85 kg of meat yearly per one inhabitant.

The figures showing the difference between the Soviet and Latvian economy are most striking:

As to the size of territory the Soviet Union was 324 times, but as to the number of inhabitants 85 times superior to Latvia. Average production per 1 inhabitant in 1938 (in kg):

The above figures show that the achievements of Latvian economy excel by far those of the Soviet Union. It ought to be considered that the fertility of soil and the natural riches of the Soviet Union are much above 25 those in Latvia. Latvia has scarcely any natural riches. Already under the Tsarist regime Russian production had always been lower than the Latvian. This fact is due to the diligence, education and ability of the Latvian farmer and worker. The Latvian intelligentsia, state and communal institutions had also great merits in organizing and leading the economic life of the country.

According to the official data of Tsarist Russia (1913), Latvia gave her a yearly income of 235 mil. gold Francs, but the administrative expenses necessary for this province amounted to 144,8 mil. Francs only. So Latvia gave Russia a net income of 90,3 mil. gold Francs or 18 mil. dollars yearly.

Consequently even during the Tsarist regime Russia was the gainer and not Latvia, to say nothing of the time of Latvian independence when Latvia proved to the whole world that she had a healthy economy of her own, quite independent from the Soviet Union.

3. Are the Baltic States a hindrance to the Soviet trade with the West?

Just as baseless is the allegation of the Bolsheviks, that independent Latvia with her ice free ports has been a hindrance to Russian trade with the outer world. The circumstance that some Baltic seaports are situated on Estonian, Latvian and Lithuanian territory does by no means imply that thereby an obstacle to Soviet trade has been created. If so, Germany could protest as well against Belgium and the Netherlands and claim the Belgian and Dutch ports.

Since ancient times Latvia has been an important trade and communication mediator between the East and the West. On her rivers and afterwards on her roads a lively traffic was going on from Scandinavia over Latvia to Byzantium, Persia and other Eastern countries. Latvia was always ready to extend the same facilities to the Soviet Union.

The truth ist that Latvia, contrary to the Soviet assertion, did not hinder the transit trade coming from Russia and vice versa, but did everything possible and even impossible in order to ease the Soviet transit operations.

At the end of World War I the gauge of Latvian railway lines was that of West European standards — 1435 mm. 26 In order to give the Russian trains an opportunity to reach Latvian ports without reloading their goods, Latvia adjusted the gauge of her most important transit lines to that of the Russian railroads — 1542 mm. Furthermore, Soviet goods were transported for a rate 75% lower in comparison with that payable for Latvian goods. The Soviet import and export through Latvia was free from any duties. In Liepaja (Libau) a free port was established. To meet the needs of the Soviet Union, the harbour installations were modernized (electrical derricks, cold storage buildings, grain elevators) and warehouses were leased for a trifling price.

On the whole, Latvia did everything possible to enable Soviet goods to pass through their territory quicker and easier than in the Soviet Union herself.

Notwithstanding this obliging attitude the Soviet Union made only insignificant use of these possibilities. It appeared that in economical questions as well as everywhere else Soviet Russia is guided only by political considerations and that she did use transit through Latvia as a political weapon.

The only constant factor was the Soviet Trade Agency in Latvia with its excessive staff of employees that afterwards proved to have been commissioned for other work of widely subversive character.

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• Baltic States, Volume 437: debated on Friday 23 May 1947, 2.42 p.m. — Professor Savory (Queen's University of Belfast) at Parliament. Savory quotes Lenin's collected works, Volume 22, page 13: “If a small or weak nation is not accorded the right to decide the form of its political existence by a free vote — implying the complete withdrawal of the troops of the incorporating or merely strong nation — then the incorporation is an annexation, that is, an arbitrary appropriation of a foreign country, an act of violence...”