Operation Priboi
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Operation Priboi (Operation Surf) was the code name for the Soviet mass deportations from the Baltic States in March 1949. It was one of the most complex deportation operations engineered by the Soviets in the post war era.[1]
During that operation some 90,000 Estonians, Latvians and Lithuanians were uprooted from their communities and deported to inhospitable areas of the Soviet Union. Stigmatised as enemies of the people, these people were told they would never be permitted to return, and even after Stalin's death in 1953, Soviet bureaucracy made return home difficult.
While portrayed as "de-kulakisation", the operation was intended to break resistance to Soviet occupation and was thus primarily directed at deporting anti-Soviet nationalists, supporters and kin of the Forest Brothers, veterans who served in the German military and relatives of those already held in the Soviet Gulag for alleged anti-Soviet activities.[1]
Due to the astronomically high death rate of deportees during the first few years of their Siberian exile, caused by the failure of Soviet authorities to provided suitable clothing or housing at the destination, whether through neglect or premeditation, some sources consider these deportations an act of genocide.[2][3][4]
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[edit] Decision
In response to the activities of various resistance groups such as the Forest Brothers and their supporters, Alexsandr Mishutin, Procurator of the Latvian SSR wrote a secret report to Moscow on September 21, 1948, in which he reported that "counter-revolutionary" elements -- including "kulaks", underground resistance groups, and other "enemies of the people" -- were rife in Soviet Latvian society. The top secret decision, No. 390-1388ss,[5] was taken by the USSR Council of Ministers on January 29, 1949, approving the deportation of "kulaks", "nationalists", "bandits", their supporters, and their families from Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia. On February 28th, 1949, Viktor Abakumov, the minister of State Security (MGB), signed the USSR MGB order No. 0068 for the preparation and execution of the mass deportations by the USSR MGB Interior Forces under Lieutenant-General Burmak's command. From this additional orders were drafted, USSR MGB order No. 00225 that ordered various branches of the USSR Interior Ministry to assist the MGB, as well as republic level orders, for example the Latvian SSR Council of Ministry decision No. 282ss and 297ss of March 24 (one day before the deportations began) authorizing the confiscation of the properties of the deportees.
[edit] Planning
Due to the immense scale Operation Priboi, which spanned across three Soviet republics, considerable resources were involved. The following command staff were assigned with the task of deporting 30,000 families from the Baltic states:
- Chief of Staff Lieutenant-General Burmak (head of the USSR MGB Interior Forces Chief Administration);
- Lieutenant-General Golovko (head of Interior Forces Baltic District);
- Major-General Leont'ev (commander of Interior Forces stationed in Riga);
- Head of Communications Lieutenant-Colonel Kotov;
- Head of Transportation Lieutenant-Colonel Spektor;
- Quartermaster Colonel Sakharov;
- Colonel Rizhov (special representative of the USSR MGB Interior Forces Chief Administration).
In addition to the troops already stationed in Latvia and Estonia, an additional 8850 soldiers were deployed to Estonia and Latvia from other parts of the Soviet Union to take part in the operation, 4350 to Estonia:
| Additional MGB Interior troops brought into Estonia: | |
| USSR MGB Interior Forces Unit | Nbr of Men |
|---|---|
| 1st Motorised Infantry Division (Moscow), combined unit | 850 |
| 13th Motorised Infantry Division (Leningrad), one regiment | 700 |
| 7th Division (Minsk), one regiment | 1000 |
| Officers' Corp Training School (Sortavala, Karelia) | 400 |
| Security Corps sergeants | 1400 |
| Total | 4,350 |
and 4500 into Latvia:
| Additional MGB Interior troops brought into Latvia: | |
| USSR MGB Interior Forces Unit | Nbr of Men |
|---|---|
| 1st Motorised Infantry Division (Moscow), two regiments | 2,000 |
| 4th Division (Lithuania), one regiment | 1,000 |
| Military Specialised Secondary School (Saratov) | 1,000 |
| Security Corps sergeants | 500 |
| Total | 4,500 |
Telecommunications was a vital component to ensure smooth running of the operation, thus the MGB commandeered all civilian telephone exchanges for the duration. Due to the scope of the operation an extra 2,210 MGB communications personnel were brought in as shown in the table:
| Additional MGB communications personnel brought in for "Priboi": | |
| Radio operators | 812 |
| Field radiomen | 862 |
| Communications officers | 136 |
| Telephone operators | 400 |
| Total | 2,210 |
A total of 8,422 trucks were organised. 5010 civilian trucks were commandeered and the remaining vehicles were military origin, with 1202 imported from the Leningrad Military District 210 from the Byelorussian Military District and 700 MGB Interior Forces vehicles were used as well. Some 1250 tons of fuel was stockpiled for use in the operation. These additional vehicles were stationed just outside the border of the Baltic Republics in advance so as not to raise suspicion and sent in at the start of the operation. The number of vehicles allocated for each republic is shown in the table below:
| Trucks allocated for deportees: | |||
| Republic | Military vehicles | Civilian vehicles | Total |
|---|---|---|---|
| Estonian SSR | 1,202 | 1,956 | 3,158 |
| Latvian SSR | 1,500 | 1,816 | 3,316 |
| Lithuanian SSR | 710 | 1,238 | 1,948 |
| Total | 3,412 | 5,010 | 8,422 |
[edit] Execution
Deportation was to be physically performed by small nine or ten man operative teams of three USSR MGB agents including the leader, two republican MGB Extermination Battalion soldiers and four or five local Communist Party activists who were armed by the MGB.
| Personnel involved: | ||
| Number | Proportion (%) | |
|---|---|---|
| State security personnel | 8,215 | 10.8 |
| USSR MGB Interior Forces troops | 21,206 | 27.8 |
| Republican MGB Extermination Battalion troops | 18,387 | 24.1 |
| Communist Party activists | 28,404 | 37.1 |
| Total | 76,212 | 100.0 |
Additional arms were brought in to ensure that these operative teams were sufficiently armed to carry out this operation against the 30,000 families:
| Additional armaments shipped in for operation: | ||
| Republic | Submachine guns | Rifles |
|---|---|---|
| Estonian SSR | 1,470 | 1,400 |
| Latvian SSR | 2,495 | 500 |
| Lithuanian SSR | 510 | 0 |
| Reserve | 550 | 0 |
| Total | 5,025 | 1,900 |
[edit] Results
Some 72% of the 87,000 deportees were women and children under the age or 16. Kruglov, the USSR Interior Minister, reported to Stalin on May 18 that 2850 were "decrepit solitary old people", 1785 children without parents to support them and 146 invalids.
| Summary of results of Operation "Priboi": | |||
| Republic | Number of families | Absolute number of people | Freight trains used |
|---|---|---|---|
| Estonian SSR | 7,702 | 19,827 | 15 |
| Latvian SSR | 13,537 | 41,811 | 31 |
| Lithuanian SSR | 8,012 | 25,951 | 20 |
| Total | 29,251 | 87,589 | 66 |
| Gender and age of deportees: | ||
| Absolute number | Proportion (%) | |
|---|---|---|
| Men | 25,708 | 27.1 |
| Women | 41,987 | 44.3 |
| Children (16 or under) | 27,084 | 28.6 |
| Total | 94,779 | 100.0 |
[edit] Aftermath
The deportees were required to sign a document upon their arrival, officially designating them with the status of "special settlers" with no right of return to their home ever, with the penalty of twenty years hard labour for attempted escapes. Deportees were not permitted to leave their designated area and were required to report to the local MVD commandant once a month, failure of which was a punishable offense. The following table shows the locations the deportees were sent.
| Location of "special settlements" for deported Balts: | ||||
| Region of USSR | Number of families | Number of people | Average family size | % of total deportees |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Amur Oblast | 2,028 | 5,451 | 2.7 | 5.8 |
| Irkutsk Oblast | 8,475 | 25,834 | 3.0 | 27.3 |
| Krasnoyarsk Krai | 3,671 | 13,823 | 3.8 | 14.6 |
| Novosibirsk Oblast | 2,028 | 5,451 | 2.7 | 5.8 |
| Omsk Oblast | 8,475 | 25,834 | 3.0 | 27.3 |
| Tomsk Oblast | 3,671 | 13,823 | 3.8 | 14.6 |
| Total | 30,630 | 93,779 | 3.1 | 99.0 |
[edit] Awards
By decree of the Presidium of the USSR Supreme Soviet, orders and medals for the successful completion of Operation Priboi were to be granted. 75 people were awarded the Order of the Red Banner, their names published in Pravda on the 25th of August, 1949. On the 26th, Pravda published the names of 17 people awarded the Order of the Great Patriotic War, First Class for courage and heroism displayed during the operation.[6]
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- ^ a b Strods, Heinrihs; Kott, Matthew (2002). "The File on Operation 'Priboi': A Re-Assessment of the Mass Deportations of 1949". Journal of Baltic Studies 33 (1): 1–36. "Erratum" . Journal of Baltic Studies 33 (2): 241.
- ^ Rudolph J. Rummel, Lethal Politics: Soviet Genocide and Mass Murder Since 1917, Transaction Publishers 1990, ISBN 1560008873
- ^ J. Pohl, Stalin’s genocide against the “Repressed Peoples”, Journal of Genocide Research, Volume 2, Number 2, 1 June 2000 , pp. 267-293
- ^ Lauri Mälksoo, Soviet Genocide? Communist Mass Deportations in the Baltic States and International Law, Leiden Journal of International Law (2001), 14: pp757-787 Cambridge University Press
- ^ The title of the deportation order: "O vyselenii s territorii Litvi, Latvii i Èstonii kulakov s sem'iami, semei banditov i natsionalistov, nakhodiashchikhsia na nelegal'nom polozhenii, ubitykh pri vooruzhennykh stolknoveniiakh i osuzhdennykh, legalizovannykh banditov, prodolzhaiushchikh vesti vrazheskuiu rabotu, i ikh semei, a takzhe semei repressirovannykh posobnikov banditov"
- ^ An excellent facsimile of the lists published in Pravda on 25 and 26 August 1949 is reproduced in the 1999 issue of the Yearbook of the Occupation Museum of Latvia
