My Latvia is a stirring documentary featurette of the illegal Soviet military occupation of the three then-autonomous Baltic states in 1940. This unusual film, made by filmmaker Albert Jekste who worked for the republic of Latvia prior to the Soviet occupation, illuminates communist methods of internal subversion and conquest. It includes rare scenes of Stalin and other Soviet leaders attending closed Kremlin meetings, and examines the criminal background of the Latvian nationals who invited the Soviets into that country and subsequently assumed high communist government posts. The film was funded by the United States Information Service as part of Cold War efforts to alert the American public to the Communist threat.
Latvia is a country in the Baltic region of Northern Europe, one of the three Baltic states. It is bordered by Estonia, Lithuania, Russia, and Belarus, as well as a maritime border to the west with Sweden. Latvia is a democratic parliamentary republic established in 1918. The capital city is Riga, the European Capital of Culture 2014.
In 1944, when Soviet military advances reached the area, heavy fighting took place in Latvia between German and Soviet troops, which ended in another German defeat. In the course of the war, both occupying forces conscripted Latvians into their armies, in this way increasing the loss of the nation’s “live resources”. In 1944, part of the Latvian territory once more came under Soviet control. The Soviets immediately began to reinstate the Soviet system. After the German surrender, it became clear that Soviet forces were there to stay, and Latvian national partisans, soon joined by German collaborators, began to fight against the new occupier.
Anywhere from 120,000 to as many as 300,000 Latvians took refuge from the Soviet army by fleeing to Germany and Sweden. Most sources count 200,000 to 250,000 refugees leaving Latvia, with perhaps as many as 80,000 to 100,000 of them recaptured by the Soviets or, during few months immediately after the end of war,[48] returned by the West. The Soviets reoccupied the country in 1944–45, and further deportations followed as the country was collectivised and Sovieticised.
On 25 March 1949, 43,000 rural residents (“kulaks”) and Latvian patriots (“nationalists”) were deported to Siberia in a sweeping Operation Priboi in all three Baltic states, which was carefully planned and approved in Moscow already on 29 January 1949. Between 136,000 and 190,000 Latvians, depending on the sources, were imprisoned, repressed or deported to Soviet concentration camps (the Gulag) in the post war years, from 1945 to 1952. Some managed to escape arrest and joined the partisans.
Latvia was made to adopt Soviet farming methods. Rural areas were forced into collectivization. An extensive programme to impose bilingualism was initiated in Latvia, limiting the use of Latvian language in official uses in favour of using Russian as the main language. All of the minority schools (Jewish, Polish, Belorussian, Estonian, Lithuanian) were closed down leaving only two media of instructions in the schools: Latvian and Russian. An influx of labourers, administrators, military personnel and their dependants from Russia and other Soviet republics started. By 1959 about 400,000 people arrived from other Soviet republics and the ethnic Latvian population had fallen to 62%.
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This film is part of the Periscope Film LLC archive, one of the largest historic military, transportation, and aviation stock footage collections in the USA. Entirely film backed, this material is available for licensing in 24p HD and 2k. For more information visit http://www.PeriscopeFilm.com
