A Bit Of Historical Context Re Lithuania

Lithuania’s ill advised collusion with the Zhou regime to harass Russia by attempting to enforce sanctions on certain shipments between the main body of the Russian Federation and the RF’s Kaliningrad Oblast raises a number of historical issues—which also involve matters of international law. Perhaps a bit of background will be useful to readers.

Lithuania—as Lithuanians will remind non-Lithuanians at every opportunity—had a glorious history. Many centuries ago. While Lithuanians were never a large ethnic group, Lithuania, under its Grand Duke, was for a time a substantial state in its own right, within wide but shifting borders that extended at times to the Black Sea. “Lithuania” was more of a geographical designation than a national one—state control over these vast and not so heavily populated regions was nothing like what we experience in modern times. More like the Wild East:

As you can figure out from the map, Lithuania came into increasing conflict with the rising power of the Grand Duchy of Moscow, especially beginning in the 15th century. This led Lithuania to seek an alliance with the more compact and populous Kingdom of Poland. In addition to the Muscovite threat, Lithuania and Poland had a shared enemy in the Teutonic Order, which controlled the territories later known as East Prussia. The heartland of the Teutonic Order—a Germanic outfit—was the area now included in the Kaliningrad Oblast, which later became known as East Prussia. The Polish - Lithuanian alliance culminated in the formation of the Polish - Lithuanian Commonwealth in 1569, and increasing Polonization of areas of Lithuania that included the capital of Wilno (Polish)/Vilnius (Lithuanian). Poland and the Polish nobility became very much the senior partner in this relationship.

With the rise of nationalism in the 19th century the Lithuanians sought a rebirth of an independent Lithuania. The problem they faced was the same problem that Western Ukrainians faced: while Lithuanians predominated in the countryside, the cities were comprised of a mix of Jews, Poles, and Germans—and had done so for centuries. Lithuanians claimed Vilnius as their capital on historical grounds, but Lithuanians made up less than 5% of the population and contributed essentially nothing to the culture of the city, which was Jewish and Polish. Klaipeda (German: Memel), which Lithuanians claimed as their only seaport, was in fact a heavily German city butting up against East Prussia. In the aftermath of WW1 and the rebirth of a Lithuanian state, Poland incorporated Wilno/Vilnius within its own new state, by force, while the Lithuanians managed to seize Klaipeda/Memel.

I won’t go into any sort of detailed history of Lithuanian relations with the very substantial minority populations within Lithuania. These excerpts (History of Vilnius) should give an idea:

During the second half of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century Vilnius also became one of the centres of Jewish, Polish, Lithuanian and Belarusian national rebirths. According to the 1897 Russian census, by mother tongue, 40% of the population was Jewish, 31% Polish, 20% Russian, 4.2% Belarusian and 2.1% Lithuanian.

…

As Russia ceased to be a major player in the area [after WW1], Polish-Lithuanian relations worsened. In demographic terms Vilnius was one of the most Polonized and Russified of Lithuanian cities during 1795-1914 Russian rule, with Lithuanians constituting a mere fraction of the total population: 2% - 2,6% according to Russian (1897), German (1916) and Polish (1919) censuses. The latter two indicated that 50,1% or 56,2% of the inhabitants were Poles, while the Jewish share in the population amounted to 43,5% or 36,1% (they were conducted after a large part of the inhabitants of Vilnius were evacuated to Russia, mostly Voronezh because of war in 1915). The Lithuanians nonetheless have a strong historical claim to the city (former capital of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, the very centre of the formation of medieval Lithuanian state) and refused to recognize any Polish claims to the city and the surrounding area. Lithuanian national activists, for example Mykolas Biržiška and Petras Klimas, supposed Poles and Belarusians in the Vilnius province to be "Slavicized Lithuanians" who, regardless of their individual preferences, must "return to the language of their blood".

Lithuanians took the same approach toward the German inhabitants of Klaipeda/Memel, proclaiming them to be Germanified Lithuanians. Needless to say, neither the Poles, nor the Jews, nor the Germans, nor the Belarussians had any desire to become Lithuanians. Lithuanian policies toward these minorities made for rocky relations with powerful neighboring countries—Germany, Poland, and the USSR—but that didn’t change Lithuanian minds.

Most of these ethnic intramural conflicts came to an end with WW2 and the subsequent Soviet rationalization of borders and ethnic compositions. For the first time in centuries Vilnius was an actual Lithuanian city again (albeit within the USSR and with very large Polish and Russian populations), but the new borders provided by Stalin were quite generous to Lithuania—at the expense of Poland and the Belarussia SSR. One might have hoped that after the Baltic nations regained their independence with the demise of the USSR they would have charted a more tolerant course, but that has not been the case. Latvia and Estonia have enacted repressive measures with regard to their Russia minorities—despite the fact that the Russian population of both amounts to about a quarter of their populations, and both of their capital cities remain heavily—possibly majority—Russian. Lithuania has been more tolerant, but their “insolent prank” against Russia with regard to Kaliningrad shows that old ways die hard.

With that background, here are two Twitter threads that tie some of that background into the present situation.

You don’t have to buy into all of this first thread to realize that it does, in fact, raise some sticky issues with regard to Russia. One wonders whether the Lithuanians really thought this through? What benefit do they seem themselves deriving in the long term? Because in the long term they’ll need to deal with Russia.

The Eurasianist

Something about #Lithuania. The country considers the time under USSR as an illegitimate occupation. Thus, legally, the lands it got under USSR (including its capital Vilnius (Vilnya) are no longer Lithuanian either.

#Russia and #Lithuania signed a treaty in 2004, stating that Russia, as a legal successor to the USSR, recognizes Lithuanian borders as long as there is free access to Kaliningrad. Now Lithuania breached this agreement.

This means #Lithuania will lose Klaipeda region, which was transferred from Germany to USSR according to Potsdam conference, and also they will lose Vilnya, which was transferred from Poland to first Belarus, and only then given to Lithuania by Stalin.

So yeah, after all, perhaps Soviet occupation wasn’t too bad compared to what may happen next to Lithuania.

Clint Ehrlich, a lawyer, frames the issues in more explicitly legal terms in two threads.

First:

Lithuania isn't blockading Kaliningrad.

America is blockading Kaliningrad – one of Russia's major cities – using Lithuania as its proxy.

It's a feckless gesture that pushes us one step closer to nuclear war with Russia. For what?

And please, don't tell me "it's not a blockade, since it only applies to ground transportation."

When the Soviets blockaded Berlin in 1948/49, the U.S. was able to airlift supplies.

Today, the Russians will be able to bring in goods by sea. It's. Still. A. Blockade.

Presumably this makes Neocons in DC feel pumped up. I don’t see any great geopolitical or strategic calculation going into this.

Second:

Clint Ehrlich @ClintEhrlich

The idea that EU sanctions against Russia entitle Lithuania to blockade Kaliningrad is absurd. Lithuania is required to provide rail access to Kaliningrad by a bilateral 1993 treaty with Russia. It can only withdraw with 6 months' notice -- which it hasn't provided.

There are more people in Kaliningrad than in Alaska.

Imagine if Canada cut off rail access to America's northernmost state, at the urging of overseas powers.

How would America respond? Why do we expect Russia to act differently?

The Kaliningrad region has 1M people and is the Westernmost part of Russia.

Yet people are claiming it's no big deal to blockade it, since it's not a "major" area of the country.

This is madness. The kind of madness that risks large wars.

What part of America trawling in these troubled waters makes sense?