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The International Commission for the Evaluation of the Crimes of the Nazi and Soviet Occupation Regimes in Lithuania: Successes, Challenges, Perspectives 5

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The International Commission for the Evaluation of the Crimes of the Nazi and Soviet Occupation Regimes in Lithuania: Successes, Challenges, Perspectives 5 Journal of Baltic Studies Vol. 00, No. 00, XXXX 2014, pp. 1–16 THE INTERNATIONAL COMMISSION FOR THE EVALUATION OF THE CRIMES OF THE NAZI AND SOVIET OCCUPATION REGIMES IN LITHUANIA: SUCCESSES, CHALLENGES, PERSPECTIVES 5 Saulius Sužiedelis_ The article summarizes the history of the International Commission for the Evaluation of the Crimes of the Nazi and Soviet Occupation Regimes in Lithuania and outlines the work it has accomplished to date. The author reviews the problems and controversies surrounding the Commission’s research into the 10 post-1940 period of Lithuania’s history and describes the clashing perspectives inherent in the starkly different Lithuanian, Jewish, Western and Soviet wartime narratives. Keywords: Lithuania; World War II; Nazi occupation of Lithuania; Holocaust; Soviet occupation of Lithuania; War crimes; International historical commissions 15 The Commission Established In May 1998 the three Baltic presidents approved the creation of international commissions to investigate the Soviet and Nazi occupations of their respective countries. In Vilnius, the new body took on the cumbersome title of the International Commission for the Evaluation of the Crimes of the Nazi and Soviet 20 Occupation Regimes in Lithuania (henceforth referred to as the Commission).1 This body was formed on the basis of President Valdas Adamkus’s decree of 7 September 1998. The Commission was justified with the argument that “due to the repressive legacy of Soviet rule painful problems of the past, such as the Holocaust and other issues, had never been subjected to uncensored public discussion”. The government 25 Correspondence to: Saulius Sužiedelis,_ History Department, Millersville University of Pennsylvania, Millersville, PA 17551- 0302 Email: [email protected] ISSN 0162-9778 (print)/ISSN 1751-7877 (online) © 2014 Journal of Baltic Studies http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/01629778.2014.937906 2 JOURNAL OF BALTIC STUDIES recognized “that for the sake of future generations such historical issues must be addressed, researched and evaluated in compliance with accepted international standards”.2 The Marxist canons and the highly politicized institutions of history education and research of the Lithuanian SSR not only masked the crimes against humanity carried out by the Soviet regime, but also drastically curtailed any analysis 30 of the Holocaust as a specifically Jewish tragedy which since the 1960s had become one of the central themes in research and commemoration in the West (Staliunas 2010,124–33). Emanuelis Zingeris, the only JewishmemberoftheSeimas,wasnamed chairman of the body. Invitations to join the Commission were issued to a number 35 of Lithuanian, American, German, and Russian scholars and public figures. Of the latter, most had academic credentials but were not necessarily historians. The research was to be accomplished by Lithuanian and foreign experts appointed and hired by the Commission, which would approve the work, disseminate the studies, and draw general conclusions. The makeup of the body was intended to 40 provide international credibility in the search for the truth about Soviet and Nazi crimes. From a juridical and historical point of view the period between 1940 and 1991 comprised an easily understandable and legitimately distinct framework for research. The Commission’s mandate encompassed the years during which crimes were com- 45 mitted as a result of foreign (Nazi and Soviet) aggression, that is, under conditions of occupation. However, since the two totalitarian regimes in question acted for different ideological reasons and employed distinct methods, the Commission established separate sub-commissions during its first meeting on 17 November 1998, one for the evaluation of the Soviet period and another for the assessment of Nazi rule. On 50 several occasions, the Commission reiterated that, as both a practical matter and a point of principle, research on the Nazi and Soviet periods would be treated sepa- rately, in order “to clearly distinguish between the crimes committed by the two occupation regimes and to avoid superficial analogies during their analysis and evalua- tion”.3 Nevertheless, the project came under criticism. The Association of Lithuanian 55 Jews in Israel, as well as other Jewish groups in the West, complained that the very name of the Commission constituted an offensive conflation of Nazism and Communism, a cynical “façade-painting” gambit intended to facilitate Lithuania’s political stature as a candidate for the European Union and NATO.4 On the other hand, some Lithuanian émigrés, suspecting (correctly) that the Commission would 60 address the issue of native collaboration in the Holocaust, insinuated that the President’s initiative was a Jewish-financed plot or, at best, was undertaken as a result of American pressure. An ambitious work plan for the comprehensive study of the history of the loss of statehood and the consequent period of extended foreign occupation was 65 presented in detail at the third meeting of the Commission in Vilnius on 29 August 1999. It comprised an introductory study of the crisis of the late 1930s, especially the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, as well as research on the four distinct periods of foreign rule: the first Soviet occupation of 1940–1941, the German occupation of 1941–1944, the “first phase” of the second Soviet occupation (1944– 70 1953), and the post-Stalin “second phase” of the Soviet period (1953–1990). Eight THE INTERNATIONAL COMMISSION 3 plenum meetings and one Nazi crimes sub-commission meeting were held between 1998 and 2005. During the fourth plenum meeting of the Commission in June 2000 the expert groups and researchers were appointed. Following extensive negotiations, a working arrangement was initiated with representatives from Yad 75 Vashem. Drs. Yitzhak Arad and Dov Levin participated in the Commission’s meetings. Arad served as a member until 2007.5 The Commission’s web-site (www.komisija.lt) contains a comprehensive listing of its work: publications, both print and electronic as well as the formal conclusions of the Commission adopted at meetings, historical documents, accounts of conferences, various 80 reports of the researchers and members of the Commission.6 Publications, Research, Community Outreach The sub-commission on Nazi crimes undertook a number of investigations: anti- Semitism during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries as a “precondition of the Holocaust” (before June 1941); the mass murder of the Jews during the summer and 85 fall of 1941 as well as the role of Lithuanian police battalions in the Holocaust; the genocide in Lithuania’s provinces; the looting of Jewish assets and property; Nazi persecution and murder of non-Jews, including Lithuanians, Poles and Roma; and the fate of Soviet prisoners of war on Lithuanian territory. Further research was to explore the problems of forced labor, the history of the ghettos, and other aspects of the 90 German occupation. Before the suspension of its formal meetings in 2007 (see below), the Commission published three volumes in its series, “The Crimes of the Totalitarian Regimes. The Nazi Occupation”. Another four studies have been posted electronically [Appendix A]. It is important to note that some of the research material originally financed by the Commission has appeared in publications outside the purview of the 95 Commission itself. For example, a considerable part of the most recent substantial study of the Holocaust in Lithuania (Bubnys 2011) was largely the result of such “work product”. In addition to the organization and promulgation of scholarly research, the Commission initiated a series of conferences, as well as Holocaust education and 100 commemoration programs. “The Holocaust in Lithuania in the Focus of Modern History, Education and Justice” conference convened in Vilnius on 23–25 September 2002 was the largest scholarly gathering ever held in the Baltic, bringing together delegates and scholars from Israel (including the recognized authority on the Holocaust, Yehuda Bauer), the United States, Germany, Russia, Ukraine, Poland 105 and other countries. The Commission has initiated a number of agreements with Lithuanian government agencies and higher education institutions, including the military academies and police academies, to facilitate instructional programs on genocide.7 During the past decade the Commission signed agreements for cooperation with the Holocaust Centre Beth Shalom, the International School for Holocaust 110 Studies of Yad Vashem, the Holocaust Martyrs’ and Heroes’ Remembrance Authority (until 2005), the New Jersey Commission on Holocaust Education, and other institutions. In 2002 Lithuania became a member of the Task Force for International Cooperation on Holocaust Education, Remembrance, and Research. 4 JOURNAL OF BALTIC STUDIES The Executive Director of the Commission participates in the annual Task Force 115 meetings. The Commission also cooperates with the National Fund of the Republic of Austria for Victims of National Socialism and the US Holocaust Memorial Museum. From the very beginning, Chairman Zingeris had stressed that exposing the crimes of the totalitarian regimes was an important avenue for promoting civil society and strengthening democratic values. The Commission established a program for schools 120 which embraced teacher training, tolerance education and the construction of a national curriculum emphasizing the period of the occupations. Some 3500 teachers attended conferences and seminars, of whom 223 traveled
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