Kārlis Ulmanis- The Husband of Latvia

Originally posted by TheDiplomat would you critisize him not to show any resistance to the Soviet forces?

Well, look what happened to the Hungarians when they resisted. Not a pleasing choice, but the best choice nontheless.

Sure there are middle-aged idealists in Estonia these days talking crap about the Estonian leading politicians who "sold" the people out in 1940. and then speak of some utopian war against the USSR comparing us with Finland in some respect. Well the Baltic Union could have happened but our armies were still weaker than Finland's and any how the union didn't come to be, so we couldn't fight any war.

It wasn't a bad decision for Ulmanis to raise no arms. Estonia caved first anyway and after one falls you aren't going to do much anymore anyway. It wasn't as simple as saying "we'll have war" and that had made you a national hero as Mannerheim for the Finns. These stupid modern day patriots wine and moan, but i don't know, it wasn't 1918-1919. anymore - the USSR was messed up as it always was, but it was not in a civil war this time with a dozen armies + the Baltics against the bolsheviks.


Edited by Kalevipoeg - 14-Jul-2007 at 19:32

Yes, but the initial treaty that allowed Soviet troops to enter the Baltics "for our own protection" was already broken by Stalin after the troops arrived across the border (at least in Estonia) when he brought in more troops than the two countries had agreed upon.

And the June 1940. coup was also breaking everything that was agreed upon. Fake crowds cheering for a revolution against the capitalist national Estonian government of P�ts while comfortably at gun point you appoint a puppet government yourself, didn't leave the people much choice and all of that had nothing to do with the bases treaty of 1939.

Estonia allowed 25,000 Soviet soldiers with certain areas for their bases to enter the country officially for protection, the Soviets broke every rule of the treaty in every way, even using Estonia for bombing raids against Finland.


Edited by Kalevipoeg - 15-Jul-2007 at 06:43

Originally posted by kurt Also, peaceful communist rule must have seemed very appealing after five years of the eastern front in world war two. I've read about a lot of wars, but nothing i've read is as horrible as the Soviet Nazi war.

Certainly not, the pre-war Latvia was pretty poor, but under the SU rule you would think that the life in pre WWII Latvia was like paradise.


Edited by axeman - 18-Jul-2007 at 15:27