Historian says Putin’s Russia lacks Soviet power and ambitions

Russia under Vladimir Putin has neither the ambitions nor the power of the Soviet Union, historian Nerijus Šepetys told LRT’s Savaitė programme, according to LRT.

August 23 is one of Lithuania’s most important historical dates. On that day in 1939, Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union signed the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact and its secret protocols, determining the fate of the Baltic states, including Lithuania. The country was placed within the sphere of interest of major powers, and occupation followed soon afterwards.

Fifty years later, in 1989, people across the Baltic states marked the anniversary of the pact by joining hands in the Baltic Way human chain and demanding the right to decide their own future.

The date has acquired another meaning today, as war is taking place in Europe and international discussions again focus on power politics, spheres of influence and the future of Ukraine. This has raised questions about whether the world is returning to a system in which major powers can negotiate the fate of smaller countries.

Šepetys, a professor at Vilnius University’s Faculty of History, discussed the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, which changed the fate of the Baltic states and Europe, and the possibility of such events being repeated.

One of the pact’s secret protocols was signed on August 23, 1939. Under it, Lithuania was placed in Germany’s sphere of interest. Five weeks later, on September 28, Lithuania was transferred to the Soviet sphere under the German-Soviet Treaty of Friendship and Borders.

Šepetys said the main target of both the German-Soviet Non-Aggression Treaty and the later Treaty of Friendship and Borders was not Lithuania or the Baltic states, but Poland.

Both Germany and the Soviet Union wanted a German-Polish war to break out, although they had different expectations about its outcome. Germany was preparing to attack Poland and needed the Soviet Union not to intervene or obstruct the conflict.

The Soviet Union, meanwhile, wanted a general war in Europe that would allow it to arrive at the final stage as the force liberating everyone, Šepetys said. That objective did not disappear. At the time, however, the Soviet Union did not share a border with Lithuania.

According to the historian, Moscow wanted Lithuania not simply for its own sake, but for strategic reasons. The exchange of spheres of interest left the areas mainly inhabited by Poles under German control, while the Soviet Union also viewed Lithuania as necessary for a future military route through East Prussia to Berlin.