On June 14, 1941, the Soviet Union carried out a large-scale deportation of the three Baltic states it occupied (Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia), as well as Poland and Belarus in Eastern Europe. Known as the June Repatriation, the operation was one of the harsh policies imposed by the Soviet Union against the local population during World War II.
Soviet prisoners died in the process of building this road, so it is also called the "Road of Bones"
After the outbreak of World War II, the Soviet Union annexed the three Baltic states in 1940 and occupied eastern Poland, including present-day Belarus and parts of Ukraine. In order to consolidate its rule and purge anti-Soviet forces, the USSR decided to conduct a large-scale expulsion operation. The move was aimed at striking at local nationalist sentiment and eliminating potential threats against Soviet power.
Soviet troops
In the early hours of June 14, 1941, the NKVD of the USSR began a planned mass deportation operation. Thousands of local residents, including men, women and children, were forced to leave their homes and sent to remote areas of Siberia and Central Asia. The operation was wide-ranging and wide-ranging, and many people suffered greatly in the process.
Baltic states: In Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia, large numbers of intellectuals, politicians, military officers, and ordinary citizens were arrested. Many men were held in Siberian labour camps (gulags), while women and children were housed in remote rural areas.
Soviet brutality
Poland and Belarus: In Soviet-occupied eastern Poland and Belarus, large numbers of Poles and Belarusians were expelled. Among the expelled were intellectuals, military officers, landlords and businessmen, accused of being "anti-Soviet" and facing a harsh fate.
The June repatriations had a profound impact on the demographic composition of the three Baltic states and Eastern Europe. The evicted residents lived in harsh conditions, and many died of starvation, disease, and hard labor. According to statistics, only half of the deportees eventually survived and returned home.
Labor prisoners build railways in the Soviet Union
The operation not only took a huge toll but also had a profound impact on the social fabric and national identity of these regions. Evicted families have lost loved ones, communities have been torn apart, and traditional culture and social order have been severely disrupted.
The June 1941 repatriation was part of the Soviet Union's ethnic policy towards Eastern Europe and the Baltic region. This policy of the Soviet Union was aimed at suppressing national independence movements through terror, strengthening the centralization of power, and consolidating its rule over the newly occupied territories. However, this policy of violent expulsion not only failed to achieve its desired goals, but provoked stronger feelings of national resistance and further deepened the antagonism between the Soviet Union and the peoples of these regions.
Stalin in the office in the uniform of the Marshal of the Soviet Union
After the end of the Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet Union, these expelled peoples regained their independence and reflected on and remembered history. Every year, the three Baltic countries commemorate the suffering of their compatriots during the June deportations and remember this painful history.
Soviet prisoners in labor camps
This is one of the important historical reasons why the Baltic states and the countries of Eastern Europe hate, resent, hostile and fear Russia and the Soviet Union so much. The occupation and oppression of the Soviet Union brought deep pain and trauma to these countries, causing them to develop a deep antipathy and wariness towards the Soviet Union and its successor, Russia.
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