Society and the Soviet Army in Lithuania 1939–1940. Political and Social Aspects

Abstract

Abstract. The article analyses the direct and indirect impact on Lithuanian society of the Soviet military garrisons established by the Mutual Assistance Treaty of 1939 with the USSR. It is written that the official (public) and unofficial (private) attitudes towards the presence of the Red Army bases in Lithuania were different. The deep perception of the garrisons’ potential threat to the sovereignty of the state was denied by official reports of the Lithuanian government. As a result of this and other circumstances mentioned in the article, the majority of the Lithuanian population accepted the fact of Soviet garrison deployment in Lithuania as an undesirable, but non-threatening circumstance resulting from the bilateral relations between Lithuania and the USSR. The article describes the practices of formal and informal communication and relations of the civilian population with the Soviet military garrisons, which had significant consequences for the public perception of the political processes of the summer of 1940 in Lithuania.