The Baltic Question during the Cold War

John Hiden, Vahur Made, David J. Smith

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2008
• eBook ISBN: 9781134197293
• Edition: 1
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: Baltic History
• Index: History

This edited volume presents a comprehensive analysis of the 'Baltic question', which arose within the context of the Cold War, and which has previously received little attention.

This volume brings together a group of international specialists on the international history of northern Europe. It combines country-based chapters with more thematic approaches, highlighting above all the political dimension of the Baltic question, locating it firmly in the context of international politics. It explores the policy decision-making mechanisms which sustained the Western non-recognition of Soviet sovereignty over the Baltic States after 1940 and which eventually led to the legal restoration of the three countries' statehood in 1991. The wider international ramifications of this doctrine of legal continuity are also examined, within the context both of the Cold War and of relations between post-soviet Russia and the enlarging 'Euro-Atlantic area'. The book ends with an examination of how this Cold War legacy continues to shape relations between Russia and the West.

1 Introduction

The Baltic question and the Cold War

John Hiden, Vahur Made and David J. Smith

This book is about the ‘Baltic question’ during the Cold War period and beyond. Yet what exactly was this ‘question’ and what particular challenges did the Baltic region present for international politics during the Cold War era? What were the roots of the Baltic problem? How was it resolved and what is its legacy? These are all issues central to the present volume.

Questions about the fate of the Russian Empire and therefore also the future of the Baltic states in the international system first became acute during the First World War and the ensuing Paris Peace Conference. Testimony to this is found in the discussions held by the Allied Baltic Commission during the Paris Conference. A measure of the difficulties involved is the fact that while the Soviets acknowledged independent Baltic countries in 1920, the Western powers did not follow suit until 1921, indeed 1922 in the case of Lithuania. All three countries duly became members of the League of Nations in 1921.

There is, however, a case for arguing that not until the Second World War and the ensuing Cold War did the ‘Baltic question’ really become a matter of international politics. Key moments in the process were, on the one hand, the Soviet occupation of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania in June 1940 and, on the other hand, Washington’s subsequent refusal—through the Sumner Welles declaration in July of that year—to recognise Moscow’s claim to legal possession of the three Baltic countries. The fate of the Baltic states at once became a function of relations between the superpowers.

Looking back, it is striking how many previous authors have focused on the purely legal aspects of the Baltic question. Central issues have included the non-recognition of the legitimacy of Soviet occupation and to what extent the Baltic countries can lay claim to legal continuity from the pre-occupation period to the present. Of particular note is William Hough’s study of the implications of the annexation of the Baltic states for international legislation. Hough explicitly underlined the importance of the Stimson doctrine and the Sumner Welles declaration on US policy towards the Baltic states, stressing its impact on the stance of many Western European as well as some non-European countries. In much the same vein, Boris Meissner emphasised the importance of the Baltic question for the development of international law.¹

Other scholars following in the footsteps of Hough and Meissner include Robert A. Vitas and Thomas D. Grant. Both have contributed studies of the US policy of non-recognition in its various manifestations (legal, diplomatic, political, economic, etc.) during the Cold War.² Conversely, Edgars Dunsdorfs essayed Australian attempts in 1974 to recognise the Soviet occupation of the Baltic states.³ More recently, Lauri Mälksoo has concentrated on the concept of state continuity in his analysis of Baltic developments.⁴ Specifically, he asked what was most instrumental in the restoration of Baltic independence. Was it the great power struggle during the Cold War or was it the principle of non-recognition and legal continuity? Ultimately, Mälksoo took comfort from his study of the Baltic example that idealism, values and principles are not only possible in international politics but can actually mould political realities.

Closely related to legalistic studies of the Baltic problem are those essays on Baltic diplomatic missions in exile. James T. McHugh and James S. Pacy, for example, produced a highly detailed overview of the fate of the Baltic missions in different countries after 1940.⁵ Such diplomatic missions inevitably also became a favourite topic for memoirs.⁶ Other themes attracting researchers to the Baltic problem include Swedish and Finnish Cold War politics towards Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania and the question of Baltic refugees during and after the Second World War, particularly the repatriation of Baltic military from Sweden in 1945.⁷ Naturally, Soviet terror and Baltic resistance to it have not been ignored.⁸

In the last resort, however, study of the Baltic question during the Cold War period has yet to move very far beyond the legalistic tradition. Political, social and international aspects tend to be subsumed within the legalistic discourse. For this reason, the present volume highlights above all the political dimension to the Baltic question. Specifically, it seeks to locate this question firmly in the context of international politics. As well as examining differing national approaches to Baltic problems, it tries to explore the common ground that existed between certain countries in the matter of non-recognition of Soviet occupation and support for the restoration of independent Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. Furthermore, unlike previous studies, largely concentrating on US policy, Western European attitudes and mindsets are also investigated more fully in this book.

The volume opens by surveying the inter-war period, the better to explain the political background from which the Cold War Baltic question emerged in 1940. Vahur Made analyses British, French and German policies towards the Baltic states during the 1920s and 1930s. He contends that during the inter-war period, none of the leading Western European powers developed clear national interests in the Baltic region or towards the Baltic states. This emphatically cannot be taken to imply disinterest in the Baltic countries on the part of Britain and France, although neither power was willing, or indeed able, to challenge directly the two most powerful states in the region, Germany and the USSR. Only with the defeat of Germany, which manifestly set out during the 1930s to increase its controls over the Baltic countries, did Soviet domination of the region come to be seen by the West European powers as inevitable.

Eero Medijainen’s analysis of US—Baltic relations during the 1920s and 1930s shows that, in contrast to the reasonably consistent policy lines pursued in the capitals of Western Europe, US attitudes towards the Baltic region evidenced pronounced changes of emphasis during the inter-war years. After the First World War, the USA was the last great power to recognise—in 1922—the independence of the Baltic states. In Washington, the concept of a Russia one and indivisible somehow lasted far longer than was the case in European capitals. However, once the USA accorded recognition, it effectively disassociated the Baltic states from the USSR in its geopolitical thinking. Riga emerged as the centre of US intelligence services, where information was gathered on the USSR.

Indeed, many young American diplomats (‘the Riga group’) began their careers in Latvia. Later, after 1934, when the USA recognised the Soviet government, those diplomats transferred to Moscow and some subsequently held leading posts in the Department of State. By July 1940, the acting Secretary of State Sumner Welles felt able to issue a declaration condemning the USSR’s forcible incorporation of the Baltic states, while proclaiming his country’s refusal to recognise the legitimacy of Soviet control of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. This act associated US policy towards the Baltic states with the so-called Stimson doctrine of nonrecognition of forcible seizure of territory. By refusing to regard the Baltic states as legal possessions of the USSR, Washington finally abandoned Wilsonian policies on the Russian problem. Furthermore, the small Baltic countries at Europe’s periphery—with whom the USA had never had deep relations—subsequently became an important element in Washington’s attempt to influence and restrict Moscow’s room for foreign policy manoeuvre.

Jonathan L’hommedieu’s detailed study of the Sumner Welles declaration tackles several questions important for explaining American policy towards the Baltic states after the Second World War. The questions include: Where did the initiative for the Welles’ declaration originate? Who decided to link the declaration to the Stimson doctrine? What was the role of the Baltic diplomatic missions in the USA in drafting the text and influencing the thinking behind the declaration? What was President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s part in this process? To what extent was he aware of the declaration and how did he relate the principles set out in that document to the policies he pursued towards the Soviet Union during the Second World War?

This book also examines in depth the Baltic policies of the USA and USSR during the Cold War. Paul Goble illustrates how the US policy of non-recognition of the Soviet incorporation of the Baltic states fitted into Washington’s wider foreign policy strategies during the Second World War, the Cold War and the subsequent restoration of Baltic independence. Goble’s view is that the policy of non-recognition is still operative, in the sense that America has yet to pronounce its ending. After all, the Russian Federation continues to be reluctant to admit that the Baltic states were forcibly occupied and annexed by the USSR in 1940. Whether Soviet policy on the Baltic question was a reaction to such US pressure or, on the other hand, a successful pursuit of the Kremlin’s own agenda is a question tackled in Konstantin Khudoley’s article.

Turning from a consideration of the positions of the two superpowers on the Baltic question during the Cold War, this book looks at the policies of Western European governments during the same period. Craig Gerrard’s article analyses the position of the United Kingdom, Suzanne Champonnois surveys France’s policy and Kristina Spohr Readman essays the Baltic policies of the former Federal Republic of Germany (FRG). As to those policies, all three chapters uncover continuities between the inter-war and Cold War periods. While Britain, France and the FRG joined the USA in proclaiming the policy of non-recognition of the Soviet incorporation of the Baltic states, West European actions remained more cautious than those taken by the Americans. For example, Baltic representatives in the United Kingdom, France and the FRG were not given the status of formally recognised diplomats that they enjoyed in the USA. Moreover, both London and Paris acceded to some of Moscow’s economic and financial demands: Britain released Baltic gold deposits to the USSR and France accepted the Soviet annexation of Baltic embassy buildings in Paris. The FRG’s stance was perhaps closest to that of the USA, with the Bonn government holding a strict non-recognition line in property-related matters (admittedly partly because Baltic embassy buildings had been left to East Berlin). On the other hand, Germans also refused official diplomatic recognition for Baltic representatives in Bonn. They were allowed to remain mostly in the capacity of technical consultants, handling passport, citizenship and property issues for citizens of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. Still, it is important to emphasise that all major Western European powers continued to recognise the existence of the citizenship of the three Baltic countries, so that the nationals of those countries could travel and represent themselves as citizens of their (independent) homelands.

Following the chapters on specific countries and their policies, this book presents two case studies of different aspects of the Baltic question during the Cold War. In concentrating on the Estonian government-in-exile, Vahur Made asks why this body was created by the Estonian community in the first place, why it was not recognised by the USA and other Western powers (unlike the Estonian diplomatic representatives in the USA) and why the same option was not taken up by the Latvian and Lithuanian communities. Made concludes that the Estonian government-in-exile was largely a project of the Estonian community in Sweden, which felt somewhat overshadowed by the influential North American Estonians, whose position was strengthened by US recognition of the Estonian Consulate General in New York.

Helen Morris and Vahur Made have jointly contributed a chapter dealing with the Baltic issue in the agenda of international organisations during the Cold War. It analyses how the Baltic émigrés and dissidents attempted to bring the fate of their countries to the attention of the world community using the United Nations Organisation, CSCE, Council of Europe, European Parliament and other inter- and supranational forums and institutions. This chapter also explains how these institutions were used to present information about the Soviet-occupied Baltic states to the Western world.

Finally, this book offers two concluding visions, beginning with Kristina Spohr Readman’s discussion of the ‘endgame’ of the Baltic question. Her focus is on the international context of the re-establishment of Estonian, Latvian and Lithuanian independence in 1989–1991. More particularly, she analyses the Baltic issue within the context of German reunification, the breakdown of the Soviet bloc in Eastern Europe and, finally, the demise of the Soviet Union itself. The author explains how the re-emergence of independent Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania on the political map of Europe was seen from various capitals and how it contributed to the re-shaping of post-Cold War geopolitics in Europe.

In the final chapter, David Smith analyses how the principle of legal continuity has informed Baltic approaches to state and nation-building following the restoration of the three countries’ independence in 1991. He also uses issues of present-day Baltic foreign and security policy to illuminate how the Cold War legacy continues to shape relations between Russia and the West.

Finally, the editors wish to express their gratitude to the Estonian Science Foundation and other donors whose help made possible the research for this book, as well as the preparation for its publication.

Notes

1 Boris Meissner. Die Sovjetunion, die baltischen Staaten und das Vökerrecht (The Soviet Union, the Baltic States and the International Law). Köln, 1956. Boris Meissner. Die baltischen Staaten im weltpolitischen und völkerrechtlichen Wandel (The Baltic States in the Transformation of World Politics and International Law). Hamburg: Bibliotheca Baltica, 1995.

2 Robert A. Vitas. The United States and Lithuania: The Stimson Doctrine of Nonrecognition. Westport: Praeger 1990. Thomas D. Grant. United States Practice Relating to the Baltic States, 1940–2000, in Ineta Ziemele (ed.), Baltic Yearbook of International Law. 1, 2001. The Hague: Kluwer Law International. 2002.

3 Edgars Dunsdorfs. The Baltic Dilemma: The Case of the de jure Recognition by Australia of the Incorporation of the Baltic States into the Soviet Union. New York: Robert Spellers and Sons Publishers, 1975.

4 Lauri Mälksoo. Illegal Annexation and State Continuity: The Case of the Incorporation of the Baltic States by the USSR. Leiden/Boston: Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, 2003.

5 James T. McHugh and James S. Pacy. Diplomats without a Country: Baltic Diplomacy, International Law and the Cold War. Westport, London: Greenwood Press, 2001.

6 On Estonia, see: Ernst Jaakson. Eestile, Tallinn: SE & JS, 1995; Anne Velliste. Ernst Jaaksonile, Tallinn: Eesti Entsüklopeediakirjastus, 2000.

7 Per Olof Bergström, Gerd Elmerskog, Åke Finnpers. Ockupationen av Baltikum 40 år (40 Years of Baltic Occupation). Karlstad: Ultrikespolitiska föreningen, 1980. Osvalds Freivlads. Sverige och det baltiska staaternas ockupation (Sweden and the Occupation of the Baltic States) Stockholm: Lettiska Nationella Fonden. Arturs Landsmanis. De misstolkade legionärerna (The Misunderstood Legionaries). Stockholm: Lettiska Nationella Fonden, 1970. Andres Küng. A Dream of Freedom: Four Decades of National Survival versus Russian Imperialism in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. Cardiff: Boreas, 1981. Aleksander Warma. Diplomaadi kroonika (A Chronicle of a Diplomat). Lund: Wallin & Dalholm, 1971. Heikki Roiko-Jokela (ed.). Virallista politiikka—epävirallista kanssakäymistä: Suomen ja Viron suhteiden käännekohtia 1860–1991 (Official Politics—Unofficial Relationships: Turning Points of the Finnish—Estonian Relations 1860–1991). Jyväskylä: Gummerus 1997.

8 US Congress. Report of the select committee to investigate communist aggression and the forced incorporation of the Baltic states into the USSR: third interim report of the Select Committee on Communist Aggression, House of Representatives, eighty-third Congress, second session, under the authority of H. Res. 346 and H. Res. 438. Washington, DC, 1954. US Congress. Communist takeover and occupation of Estonia: special report no. 3 of the Select Committee on Communist Aggression, House of Representatives, eighty-third Congress, second session, under the authority of H. Res. 346 and H. Res. 438. Washington, DC, 1955. US Congress. Communist takeover and occupation of Latvia: special report no. 12 of the Selected Committee on Communist Aggression, House of Representatives, eighty-third Congress, second session, under the authority of H. Res. 346 and H. Res. 438. Washington, DC, 1954. US Congress. Communist takeover and occupation of Lithua...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Notes on contributors
• 1 Introduction: the Baltic question and the Cold War
• 2 The Baltic states and Europe, 1918–1940
• 3 The USA, Soviet Russia and the Baltic states: from recognition to the Cold War
• 4 Roosevelt and the dictators: the origin of the US non-recognition policy of the Soviet annexation of the Baltic states
• 5 The politics of a principle: US non-recognition policy before, during and after the recovery of Baltic independence
• 6 Soviet foreign policy during the Cold War: the Baltic factor
• 7 Britain and the Baltic states: the late 1940s and the early 1990s
• 8 French policy towards the Baltic states, 1939–1991: from abandonment to reunion
• 9 West Germany and the Baltic question during the Cold War
• 10 The Estonian Government-in-Exile: a controversial project of state continuation
• 11 Émigrés, dissidents and international organisations
• 12 Between political rhetoric and Realpolitik calculations: Western diplomacy and the Baltic independence struggle in the Cold War endgame
• 13 The end of the ‘Baltic question’? The Baltic states, Russia and the West in the post-Cold War era