Kremlin Reforms Stir Nationalist Sentiments in Soviet Baltic Republics

The advent of glasnost has revived nationalist feelings in the Baltic republics of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.

In trying to counter any separatist tendencies that these feelings might engender, the Soviet authorities have acknowledged mistakes made in the Stalin era, and in doing so have bolstered some of the historical arguments made by the Baltic nationalists.

This paradox was much in evidence at a recent conference here in the capital of Estonia, attended by foreign journalists, that dealt with such sensitive topics as the incorporation of the Baltic states into the Soviet Union, in 1940, and the mass deportation of Baltic peoples to Siberia the following year.

In the past, such matters were rarely, if ever, discussed openly. But glasnost, the policy of openness advocated by Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev, has changed all that.

“We’re walking quite boldly on thin ice,” said Ulo Tuulik, an Estonian writer. “In the past, we never spoke about nationality problems.”

But with the late dictator Josef Stalin under increasing official attack for his repressive measures of the 1930s, there is less risk in questioning what he did in the Baltic states in the 1940s.

For Estonian nationalists, the belated acknowledgement of the deportations has only increased their bitterness.

Even so, the Moscow party line still contends that the Kremlin was forced into the Aug. 23, 1939, nonaggression pact with Nazi Germany, which effectively put the Baltic countries under Soviet control.

Without the nonaggression pact, the line goes, the Soviet Union would have been vulnerable to German attack without any help from Britain, France or other Western countries.

The nonaggression pact, which was followed within eight days by Germany’s attack on Poland that led to the start of World War II, gave the Soviet Union a free hand in the Baltic region. Moscow gained control of military bases in all three countries in 1939, then imposed a military occupation the following year.

Soviet-Style Election

Within days, the Soviet occupation authorities arranged for new Communist governments to be chosen in each nation. What happened in Lithuania was typical: A Soviet-style election was held, and the announced results indicated that 99.2% of the voters had cast ballots for the winning Communist ticket. By early August, Lithuania had been incorporated into the Soviet Union as a constituent republic. The same fate befell Latvia and Estonia.

The United States still refuses to recognize the Soviet status of the Baltic republics. As a way of protesting the Soviet action, the U.S. ambassador in Moscow never visits them.

“The Soviet textbooks said very little about all these twists and turns of the situation,” according to a briefing paper issued by the Soviet press agency Novosti and circulated at the conference.

Also brought up at the conference was the mass arrest of Baltic people on June 14, 1941, and their deportation without trial to Siberia.

“It was a severe measure,” the Novosti account said, “but it was also a preventive step against those who were preparing acts of terror. . . . Under the conditions of the Stalin cult, many innocent people also suffered.

“The Stalin cult did tremendous harm to socialist construction in the republic (of Lithuania), especially collectivization. . . . Socialist law and democracy often were quite violated.”

The briefing paper indicated that the detention in Siberia lasted up to 12 years or more, and it added, “After the end of the war, especially after Stalin’s death (in 1953), most of the deportees were allowed to return home.”

There was another wave of arrests and deportations in 1949, in connection with Stalin’s program of collectivizing Baltic farms. In Lithuania alone, about 13,000 people were killed resisting.

In Estonia, 20,702 people were sent to Siberia on March 25, 1949, the Novosti account said, adding that it was once forbidden even to mention this but that glasnost has made it possible to publish the details.

In effect, the authorities in Moscow appear to be acknowledging the validity of some of the claims that have long been made by Baltic nationalists about Soviet repression even as they attempt to justify the harsh measures.

An Impossible Dream

This in turn has stimulated demands for greater autonomy, more cultural freedom and more economic independence, even if political independence is seen as an impossible dream.

Toomas Karjaharm, an Estonian historian, said that perestroika , Gorbachev’s program for restructuring the Soviet economy, “naturally increases national feelings.”

Nikolai Neilands, deputy foreign minister of Latvia, was asked why the Baltic nationalists are now more willing to demonstrate on behalf of their cause, and he replied: “There’s less feeling of fear. . . . It’s natural in a time of perestroika that we have some negative phenomena.”

Glasnost has also focused renewed attention on two other thorny problems in Moscow’s relations with the Baltic republics--language and immigration by Russians and other nationalities.

In Estonia, for example, an estimated 60% of Estonians are fluent in Russian, but only 10% of the non-Estonians can speak Estonian.

Failure of Bilingualism

“Bilingualism is not working satisfactorily,” said Jan Rebane, an Estonian sociologist. He said that instruction in Estonian in Russian-language schools is poor.

Writer Tuulik said the result of the language gap is social separation.

“We just live apart,” he said. “. . . The Russians don’t know the Estonians well enough. . . . Some Russians live here for 30 or 40 years and can’t even say ‘good morning’ in Estonian.”

In Latvia, one out of five persons without Latvian parents can speak the republic’s language, while three of every five Latvians can speak Russian, the link language in the Soviet Union.

“We must solve this problem,” said Juris Goldmanis, a historian and member of the Central Committee of the Latvian Communist Party.

Lithuania has similar difficulties with languages.

Criticism of Immigration

The pressure of immigrant populations is another cause of discontent. In Estonia, the percentage of native Estonians has dropped from 92% in 1939 to an estimated 61%. In Tallinn, the capital, the proportion is approximately 50-50 between Estonians and those who came from elsewhere in the Soviet Union.

Moreover, immigrants tend to be young people who have children, and Estonians tend to have a very low birthrate and a larger share of retirees than in other ethnic communities.

“These changes have not failed to affect the Estonians’ national consciousness and provoked defensive reactions,” the Novosti paper said.

One defensive measure--a refusal to speak Russian--is widely practiced in Tallinn. At a music school in the Old Town, for example, Estonian children sing songs in their native tongue and in English but not in Russian.

Asked if they speak Russian, several children gave blank looks, indicating that they did not even understand the question.

In Latvia, the most recent census figures show that Latvians make up 53.7% of the population, with Russians, Byelorussians and Ukrainians accounting for 40%. Officials said this is because of a low Latvian birthrate rather than any policy of “Russification.”

Measures have been taken to limit immigration. For example, factories that bring workers to Estonia must pay 16,000 rubles per worker, or about $26,000, into a fund used for housing and community facilities. In Latvia, the amount is 11,000 rubles.

Despite the effort to get the region’s problems out into the light, few officials or dissidents believe they can be resolved easily, if at all.

And there are signs of a new, harder line against public displays of nationalist sentiment, displays of the sort that were allowed last summer on the anniversary of the nonaggression pact.

Officials have organized counterdemonstrations to show their loyalty to Moscow, and Estonians have been told they will not be allowed to take to the streets next Wednesday to celebrate the anniversary of what the nationalists observe as independence day.

As a result, discussion has turned to achieving greater economic power for the Baltic region instead of following strict guidelines issued by Moscow authorities.

For Gorbachev and the Politburo, however, this approach only underscores what they consider to be unacceptable separatist views by the irrepressible Baltic nationalists.