scholarly journals A landscape of lies: Soviet maps in Estonia

2019 ◽  
Vol 63 ◽  
pp. 08002
Author(s):  
Martti Veldi ◽  
Simon Bell
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Urban Areas ◽  
Soviet Period ◽  
Military Operations ◽  
Military Installations ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Border Zones ◽  
The Baltic ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
The Military

Maps have long been used as ways of understanding the land as a means of defining borders, land ownership, resources, estimating tax-gathering potential and for defensive purposes. Many of the national mapping agencies originated as arms of the military. When a new regime takes over a country it may decide to prepare its own set of maps – not least for defensive purposes – and to restrict who has access to these maps. When the Soviet Union occupied the Baltic States in 1945 – and these became front-line areas during the Cold War, with large areas devoted to military installations and border zones – a whole new set of maps were created. We took a sample of maps of Estonia from the inter-war years and from the period of political and military occupation from 1945-1991. The Soviet army maps became freely available in the post-Soviet period and studying them and comparing them with the older maps reveals the way the land was perceived. Military maps were produced using different projections and scales, especially regarding the topography and other features relevant for military operations. The maps included deliberate mistakes and if publicly available they contained many blank spaces to hide sensitive areas and to pretend they did not exist. We also found that maps played a key role in planning future landscapes – kolkhoz maps showed how Estonia was foreseen as a complete planned system covering the whole country outside urban areas.

scholarly journals Keep out! No entry! Exploring the Soviet military landscape of the coast of Estonia

2019 ◽  
Vol 63 ◽  
pp. 11001 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ann-Leena Miller
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Western World ◽  
Military Installations ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Outer Border ◽  
Local Residents ◽  
Military Control ◽  
The Baltic ◽  
Residential Quarters ◽  
The Military

During the Soviet occupation of 1945-1991, Estonia became a Soviet Republic and was cut off from open contact with the Western world. The Estonian coastline was now the outer border of the Soviet Union and part of the Iron Curtain. On the coast of the Baltic Sea this was less visible than in some places (e.g. the Berlin wall), but the military control was no less restrictive. The coastal areas were under military control and accessible only with special permits – so often the inhabitants had to leave and their homes were taken over by the Soviet military or abandoned. Military installations also marked the Soviet security zone. There was a massive construction programme of artillery defensive positions along the coastline. As the last Soviet troops left Estonia in 1994, the Soviet military installations were left to the Estonian Republic. Most were stripped of anything useful and abandoned. Many of these objects or complexes are still visible in the landscape but most are forgotten and ruined. They are not yet seen as a part of Estonian heritage and are fast disappearing. A study of a section of the NE coast of Estonia has identified a military landscape along with the former closed city of Sillamäe (where uranium was refined). Mapping of the defence structures, assessment of their condition and their visible presence reveals a distinctive military landscape alongside collectivised agriculture, where residential quarters, roads and communications formed a unique complex. Interviews with local residents reveal how the zone and the restrictions were ever present in their lives and generally they are not interested in them or their preservation; younger interviewees with no memory view the remains as curiosities; there is the beginning of interest in them as part of a “dissonant heritage”.

The Handbook of European Defence Policies and Armed Forces

2018 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
National Security ◽  
Armed Forces ◽  
Blind Spot ◽  
Military Operations ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Security Challenges ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
National Defence

The armed forces of Europe have undergone a dramatic transformation since the collapse of the Soviet Union. The Handbook of European Defence Policies and Armed Forces provides the first comprehensive analysis of national security and defence policies, strategies, doctrines, capabilities, and military operations, as well as the alliances and partnerships of European armed forces in response to the security challenges Europe has faced since the end of the cold war. A truly cross-European comparison of the evolution of national defence policies and armed forces remains a notable blind spot in the existing literature. This Handbook aims to fill this gap with fifty-one contributions on European defence and international security from around the world. The six parts focus on: country-based assessments of the evolution of the national defence policies of Europe’s major, medium, and lesser powers since the end of the cold war; the alliances and security partnerships developed by European states to cooperate in the provision of national security; the security challenges faced by European states and their armed forces, ranging from interstate through intra-state and transnational; the national security strategies and doctrines developed in response to these challenges; the military capabilities, and the underlying defence and technological industrial base, brought to bear to support national strategies and doctrines; and, finally, the national or multilateral military operations by European armed forces. The contributions to The Handbook collectively demonstrate the fruitfulness of giving analytical precedence back to the comparative study of national defence policies and armed forces across Europe.

Defining–Redefining Security

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Barry Buzan ◽  
Lene Hansen
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
Use Of Force ◽  
Military Technology ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
The Us ◽  
Political Rivalry ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
The Military ◽  
Strategic Studies

International security studies (ISS) has significantly evolved from its founding core of “golden age” strategic studies. From the onset of the Cold War in the late 1940s through to the 1970s, strategic studies virtually was ISS, and remains a very large part of it. The fact that it continues to stand as the “mainstream” attacked by widening/deepening approaches further speaks to its status as a “core.” This core consists of those literatures whose principal concern is external military threats to the state, and the whole agenda of the use of force which arises from that. This core was originally focused on nuclear weapons and the military-political rivalry between the US and the Soviet Union, but has since adapted its focus to changes in the salience and nature of military threats caused by the end of the Cold War and 9/11. It includes literatures on deterrence, arms racing, arms control and disarmament, grand strategy, wars (and “new wars”), the use of force, nuclear proliferation, military technology, and terrorism. Debates within ISS are structured, either implicitly or explicitly, by five questions: (1) which referent object to adopt, (2) whether to understand security as internally or externally driven, (3) whether to limit it to the military sector or to expand it, (4) what fundamental thinking about (international) politics to adopt, and (5) which epistemology and methodology to choose.

A Utopian Vision? A Modest Proposal to Prevent Nations from Causing Future Wars

1996 ◽  
Vol 24 (3) ◽  
pp. 547-549
Author(s):  
Nicolae Harsanyi
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
Sweet Taste ◽  
The Caucasus ◽  
The Balkans ◽  
Modest Proposal ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Collapse Of Communism ◽  
The Baltic ◽  
The Cold War

I certainly find the present times most engaging: I have had the chance to live through events that will not be neglected by historians—the collapse of communism in Eastern Europe and the subsequent end of the Cold War, the failed Moscow coup and the breathtaking aftermath of undoing “mankind's golden dream” in its very cradle, the Soviet Union. There is so much hope in the air for East Europeans to return to development which was thwarted by decades of imposed socialist dictatorship. The sweet taste of freedom and self-assertion helps people to overcome the economic hardships ravaging the area. From the Baltic to the Balkans, from the Tatra to the Caucasus and beyond, nations, nationalities, and minorities show signs of vitality and righteous affirmation of their own complex existence on territories fragmented by conventional boundaries established with or without their own consent or approval.

scholarly journals Swedish political attitudes towards Baltic independence in the short twentieth century [Kokkuvõte: Rootsi poliitilised hoiakud Balti riikide iseseisvuse suhtes lühikesel 20. sajandil]

2016 ◽  
pp. 397
Author(s):  
Mart Kuldkepp
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
Domestic Politics ◽  
Baltic States ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Baltic ◽  
The Third World ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Second World

This article considers the history of Swedish attitudes towards Baltic independence during the short twentieth century (1914–91), focusing primarily on the years when Baltic independence was gained (1918–20) and regained (1989–91). The former was characterized by Swedish skepticism towards the ability of the Baltic states to retain their independence long-term, considering the inevitable revival of Russian power. Sweden became one of the very few Western countries to officially recognize the incorporation of the Baltic states in the Soviet Union in the Second World War. During the Cold War, Sweden gained a reputation for its policy of activist internationalism and support for democratization in the Third World, but for security-related reasons it ignored breaches of human rights and deficit of democracy in its immediate neighborhood, the Soviet Union and the Baltic republics. However, in 1989–91 the unprecedented decline in Soviet influence, the value-based approach in international relations, feelings of guilt over previous pragmatism, and changes in domestic politics encouraged Sweden to support Baltic independence, and to take on the role of an active manager of the Baltic post-soviet transition.

Sport Under Communism

2013 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert Edelman ◽  
Anke Hilbrenner ◽  
Susan Brownell
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
High Performance ◽  
Olympic Games ◽  
West Germany ◽  
Physical Culture ◽  
Competitive Sport ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
The Military

This article examines sport in the Soviet Union, East Germany, and China. Despite the early Soviet emphasis on mass physical culture, high-performance sport was the priority of these regimes and all three notionally used ‘amateurism’ to enhance national prestige. Having started out as opponents of Olympism, all three at different times came to prioritize winning medals at the Olympic Games. Despite similarities in the organization of sport—the state played a significant role and ties to the military and police were strong in all three countries—there were significant differences between them: China rejected competitive sport for much of the Mao era, whereas sport was one arena in which the GDR outshone West Germany. The article shows that during the Cold War sport was as much an arena of competition between socialist states as it was between the capitalist and communist worlds.

Public Sentiment among the Population of the City of Leningrad and the Leningrad Region in June - August 1941: From Situation Reports of the NKGB of the USSR

2018 ◽  
pp. 1051-1059
Author(s):  
Sergey V. Bogdanov ◽  
◽  
Vladimir G. Ostapyuk ◽  
Natalya A. Zhukova ◽  
◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Soviet Society ◽  
Leningrad Region ◽  
Military Operations ◽  
State Security ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Archival Documents ◽  
The Face ◽  
The Military ◽  
The City

The article considers one aspect of everyday life of the population of Leningrad and the Leningrad region in the first months of the Great Patriotic War, which had been carefully concealed by official Soviet propaganda. Throughout all postwar decades up to the collapse of the Soviet Union, Russian historical science continued to reproduce the myth of absolute unity of the Soviet society and mass patriotic enthusiasm of the working class, kolkhoz peasants and intelligentsia in the face of enemy aggression. And yet archival documents of the state security agencies reveal numerous facts and distinctive features of anti-Soviet manifestations among various socio-professional groups of the population of Leningrad and the Leningrad region in the first months following the German invasion in the Soviet territory. These facts show that the imminent war had a serious impact on the inner world of the inhabitants of the Northern capital of the Soviet Union, exacerbating numerous problems that had accumulated in the Soviet society in the decades before the war. The article mostly draws on the recently declassified situation reports of the People's Commissariat of State Security for the city of Leningrad and the Leningrad region from the Central Archive of the Ministry of Defense. It deals with such occurrences of anti-state sentiment as panic rumors, anti-Soviet agitation, listening to the radio-broadcasts of hostile states, distribution of anti-Soviet leaflets, planning pogroms of local party and state leaders. It analyses key features of anti-Soviet manifestations among urban and rural population. It contains information on the first manifestations of collaboration among those inhabitants of the Leningrad region, who had ended up in the territory occupied by the German troops. It studies mechanics of repressive activities of state security bodies caused by restructuring of Soviet society, while the military operations began.

Reading Evgeny Messner

2018 ◽  
pp. 49-74
Author(s):  
Ofer Fridman
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
Central Place ◽  
Nazi Germany ◽  
Soviet Period ◽  
Short Introduction ◽  
Russian School ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Post Soviet Period

This chapter explores the works of Evgeny Messner, an Imperial Russian émigré officer whose books were prohibited in the USSR due to his strong anti-Communist views. After the Cold War, however, his works have become increasingly popular, taking a more central place within the Russian school of military thinking. After a short introduction of the author and his career, the chapter explores the concept of “Subversion-War” (Myatezhevoyna), developed by Messner during the late 1960s and early 1970s. Due to his anti-Communist views and alliance with the White Movement, and later with Nazi Germany, Messner remained generally unknown in the Soviet Union. In the post-Soviet period, however, Messner’s works have become available to a broader range of military thinkers, and there has been a growing revival of Messner’s concept of subversion-war to analyze the contemporary geopolitical situation and political, military and economic confrontations.

From Nationalism to Nation-Building: Latvian Politics and Minority Policy

2006 ◽  
Vol 34 (4) ◽  
pp. 383-406 ◽  
Author(s):  
David J. Galbreath
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Relative Deprivation ◽  
Minority Group ◽  
Soviet Period ◽  
Baltic States ◽  
Nationalist Movement ◽  
Language And Culture ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
The Status ◽  
The Baltic

With the collapse of the Soviet Union and the subsequent independence of Latvia, a minority group became a majority and a majority group became a minority. This has been the situation for Latvians and Russians after August 1991. The Baltic States led the way towards first autonomy and then independence. The nationalist movement in the Latvian SSR was primarily a minority nationalist movement. Why do minorities mobilise? Gurr finds that minorities rebel for two reasons: relative deprivation and group mobilisation. Relative deprivation answers the question of why and it characterizes the status of the Latvian language and culture vis-à-vis that of Russia during the Soviet period. While relative deprivation has come under considerable criticism because of its inability to explain when a group will mobilise, the notion can be found in the nationalist rhetoric before and since the restoration of Latvian independence. Group mobilisation goes further in explaining when minorities may assert political claims. Considered in terms of changes in the political opportunity structure, the changing politics of glasnost allowed the nationalist movements to mobilise in the Baltic States.

Historical Trends in Moscow and Leningrad Crime

1982 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 40-54
Author(s):  
Louise Shelley
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Urban Areas ◽  
Soviet Period ◽  
Direct Result ◽  
Crime Trends ◽  
Urban Centers ◽  
Historical Trends ◽  
Population Policies ◽  
Criminological Research ◽  
The Soviet Union

AbstractMoscow, Leningrad, and Kiev, the major Soviet cities, presently have lower rates of criminality than other urban areas in the USSR,1 thus defying the generally observed correlation between the level of urbanization and the crime rate.2 The Soviet Union has not always been the exception to this internationally observed phenomenon, for in the period directly after the 1917 revolution these three cities had exceedingly high rates of criminality.3 The crime trends of all three major Soviet cities is not coincidental but, as the author shows, this change is a direct result of government policies intended to make these urban areas showcases of the Soviet state. As a result of this governmental decision, population policies have been introduced in the last fifty years of the Soviet period to insure that only the most "desirable individuals" reside in major urban centers. Consequently, the favored cities have experienced a significant decline in criminality, while the regions not favored by government population policies have suffered measurable increases in criminality. This article will focus on the changes that have occurred in the criminality of the major urban centers of the USSR, in particular, Moscow and Leningrad, in the years since the 1917 revolution. The crime trends of Moscow have been documented in a recent Soviet collection (Comparative Criminological Research in Moscow in 1923 and 1968-1969),4 but evidence also exists from other criminological sources to assert that such a dramatic transformation has occurred in the level of crime of all major Soviet cities.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document