Soviet Republics Rebel
The 15 Soviet republics are pressing for greater autonomy
By Victoria Pope

The Many Regions And Ethnic Groups Of the Soviet Union are calling for enhanced rights. Some of them, especially the Baltic republics of Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania, want all-out independence. Others seek increased autonomy that would wrest some control away from Moscow. Complicating this push for a realignment of power are ethnic clashes in several republics. Such militancy represents a bold challenge. . . .

Read the Full Report (Subscription Required)

The Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact

On the night of Aug. 23, 1939, while Soviet dictator Josef Stalin looked on, the foreign minister of the Soviet Union, Vyacheslav M. Molotov, and the foreign minister of the German Reich, Joachim von Ribbentrop, signed a German-Soviet non-agression pact in Moscow. The published text of the treaty pledged both nations to refrain from aggressive action or attack against the other and to lend no support to a third party should either “become the object of belligerent action” by one.

The pact allowed Adolf Hitler's army to invade Poland on Sept. 1, 1939, without the risk of Soviet military support in defense of its Western neighbor. The invasion marked the start of World War II.

The Molotov-Ribbentrop pact also contained a secret protocol that set forth the details of a Soviet-Nazi plan to carve Eastern Europe into spheres of influence. The secret agreement, which gave most of Poland to the Germans, placed Finland, Bessarabia and the Baltic States of Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia in the Soviet sphere of influence. Soviet troops occupied Bessarabia and the Baltic countries in 1940 and subsequently absorbed them into the U.S.S.R. as republics.

The Soviet Union has only recently admitted to the existence of the secret agreement. In June 1989, the Soviet Congress of Peoples' Deputies created a commission authorized to investigate the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact. In July of that year, a high-ranking Communist, Valentin Falin, said on West German television that there was no doubt the pact included the secret agreement. He also acknowledged that a West German microfilm of the protocol appeared authentic. Soviet officials had earlier dismissed the microfilm as a forgers.

The Soviet admission gave pro-autonomy forces in the Baltic republics substantiation from the Kremlin itself that their countries were illegally annexed. This injected new vigor into the Baltic liberation movement. On the 1989

[1] The U.S.S.R. invaded Finland in November 1939 after Finnish leaders rejected Soviet proposals to alter the Finnish-Soviet border. The Finns were forced to capitulate in March 1940 and surrendered thousands of square miles of territory to the Soviets.

Footnote: 1. The U.S.S.R. invaded Finland in November 1939 after Finnish leaders rejected Soviet proposals to alter the Finnish-Soviet border. The Finns were forced to capitulate in March 1940 and surrendered thousands of square miles of territory to the Soviets.