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The occupation of the Baltic states was a period of annexation of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania by the Soviet Union from 1940 until its dissolution in 1991.For a period of several years during World War II, Nazi Germany occupied the Baltic states after it invaded the Soviet Union in 1941.
Kaunas pogrom in German-occupied Lithuania, June 1941. Photograph attributed to Wilhelm Gunsilius. [18]On June 22, 1941, the territory of the Lithuanian SSR was invaded by two advancing German army groups: Army Group North, which took over western and northern Lithuania, and Army Group Centre, which took over most of the Vilnius Region.
This is a list of wars, armed conflicts and rebellions involving Lithuania throughout its history as a kingdom (1251–1263), grand duchy (1236–1251; 1263–1795, although part of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth during 1569–1795) and a modern republic (1918–1940; 1990 – present), including as well the uprisings of the 19th and 20th centuries to recreate Lithuanian statehood.
The Soviet Union began preparations for the occupation and incorporation of these territories. First, it imposed mutual assistance treaties by which the Baltic states agreed to allow military bases for Soviet soldiers within their territory. Further steps were delayed by Winter War with Finland. By spring 1940, the war was over and Soviet Union ...
In Soviet historiography, start of World War II as the Great Patriotic War. 24–25 June 1941 Soviet authorities massacre political prisoners in Rainiai, Lithuania. 25 June 1941 Continuation War breaks out between Finland and Soviet Union. 2 July 1941, General mobilisation is announced in the Soviet Union.
The June Uprising (Lithuanian: Birželio sukilimas) was a brief period in late June 1941 between the first Soviet and the Nazi occupations.. A year prior, on June 15, 1940, the Red Army occupied Lithuania and established the unpopular Lithuanian Soviet Socialist Republic, which silenced its critics and suppressed resistance with political repression and state terrorism. [5]
Latvia followed on 5 October 1939 and Lithuania shortly thereafter, on 10 October 1939. The agreements permitted the Soviet Union to establish military bases on the Baltic states' territory for the duration of the European war, [6] and station 25,000 Soviet soldiers in Estonia, 30,000 in Latvia and 20,000 in Lithuania from October 1939.
During World War II, the previously independent Republic of Lithuania was occupied by the Red Army on 16 June 1940, in conformity with the terms of the 23 August 1939 Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, and established as a puppet state on 21 July. [2] Between 1941 and 1944, the German invasion of the Soviet Union caused its de facto dissolution.