History of Belarus

Vladimir of Kiev and Princess Rahneda of Polatsk (painting from 1770)

Belarusian history is marked by the lay of the land at the transition region between the Catholic dominated Lithuanian - Polish and orthodox dominated Russian - Ukrainian sphere of influence. This often resulted in changes of rule and occupations by foreign powers. Phases of independence were only of comparatively short duration.

Prehistory and early history

At the end of the last ice age, the area of ​​today's Belarus belonged to eastern Gravettia , then to Epi-Gravettia. To the west belonged the Swidru groups, in the east the groups around the Kostënki finds. For the Middle Stone Age (Mesolithic) we know the Janislawice-K. In the west, the eastern extent of which is not exactly determined.

In the Younger Stone Age (Neolithic) ceramics are said to have spread westward from here to the Baltic regions.

In the late Neolithic the Upper Dneper Culture is known, which is related to the Middle Dneper Culture. Other possible connections exist with the eastern Yamnaya culture. In the Bronze Age, the entire area seems to be more related to the early Baltic bronze.

Early Middle Ages

Little is known about the early history of Belarus. It can be assumed that the territory of the country was inhabited by Slavs . The territory of Belarus was repeatedly crossed by Vikings in the early Middle Ages . They founded the empire of the Kievan Rus in what is now the Ukrainian city of Kiev , which also increasingly gained influence over what is now Belarus. In 988, the Kiev Grand Duke Vladimir the Great initiated the Christianization of the Rus , with which Orthodox Christianity also found its way into what was later to become Belarus. In addition to the Boris stones on the Daugava, the St. Sophia Cathedral in Polotsk testifies to this time, stone construction began in many other cities, and the Cyrillic script was spread.

Around 1000, various independent principalities, which were more or less part of the Kievan Rus, were founded on the territory of Belarus . Some examples of this would be the principalities of Klezk , Kobrin , Mensk , Pinsk , Polatsk , Sluzk or Turow .

Grand Duchy of Lithuania

After the Mongol invasion in Eastern Europe and the destruction of Kievan Rus , the Belarusian ruler of the 13th century had more or less voluntarily to the Grand Duchy of Lithuania connected. The fates of Belarus and Lithuania were now linked for 600 years. Both peoples are called "Lithuanians" in their languages ​​( lietuvis or litwin ). Belarus made up the main part of the national territory at that time.

Over time, the Belarusian language and culture became dominant in the Grand Duchy (see Golden Age (Belarus) ), which is why the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and later Poland-Lithuania saw themselves from now on as the legitimate heirs of the Rus ( magnus dux Littwanie, Samathie et Rusie ) and in the 15th and 16th centuries the Grand Duchy of Moscow competed in the collection of Russian lands .

After the death of Poland's King Casimir III. the great opened up the possibility of marriage in 1385/86 to connect Poland with Lithuania, which was not yet Christianized at the time . The Lithuanian Grand Duke Jogaila was baptized, married in the Union of Krewo with Poland's Queen Hedwig of Anjou , ascended the Polish throne and, as King Władysław II Jagiełło of Poland, founded the ruling house of the Jagiellonians . He left the Grand Duchy of Lithuania to his cousin Vytautas (Polish Witold, 1401 Grand Duke), who ruled it until his death in 1430.

The personal union of Krėva (Krevo) had far-reaching consequences for the Russian Orthodox Church . The status quo was supposed to be maintained, but in the period that followed, the Orthodox minority in eastern Belarus and the Ukraine were worse off than the Catholics .

With the Battle of Tannenberg (July 15, 1410, Belarusian Грунвальд / Grunwald ), in which the troops of the Teutonic Order from Prussia and Livonia were defeated, the borders to the north were finally fortified (the border with East Prussia remained unchanged until 1918 ). This victory was achieved by united Polish and Lithuanian troops, because Poland's King Władysław II Jagiełło and Grand Duke Vytautas acted together.

In the succession battles that followed the deaths of Vytautas and Jogaila (1434), the Polish nobility was able to gradually increase its influence. Since the end of the 15th century, the neighboring Grand Duchy of Moscow played a crucial role for the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. In view of the external threat between the 13th and 15th centuries, the Belarusian territories disintegrated in Lithuania proper and the associated parts of the country. The disadvantaged aristocracy in the peripheral areas hoped for more advantages and power by converting to the Grand Duchy of Moscow. Between 1487 and 1493, at least four royal houses from the eastern provinces of the Grand Duchy of Moscow joined them. At the end of the 1490s, the princes Semjon Belski, Semjon and Ivan Moshaijski and Vasily Schemjatitsch left the Lithuanian association. Again and again there were border conflicts between the two empires. At the end of the war, Lithuania had to cede the areas of Chernihiv , Novgorod-Severs , Gomel , Bryansk , Putivl , Starodub and Mtsensk to Moscow in 1503. A little later, in 1514, armed clashes broke out again between the armed forces of Moscow and Lithuania. During this time, under the leadership of Moscow, an anti-Yagelion alliance was founded with the aim of dividing the Grand Duchy and adding the Belarusian provinces to the Grand Duchy of Moscow. However, the victory that the troops under Konstantin Ostroschki's high command won over the Moscow army in the Battle of Orsha on September 8th held up Moscow's expansion to the west for the time being. Under the impression of the Moscow offensive in the Livonian War (1558–1582 / 83), in which Russia and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania were temporarily the main opponents, Lithuania had to agree to the union of Lublin with Poland in 1569 . This also marked a clear turning point in the history of the (then Lithuanian) Ukraine .

The Ukrainian countries were now directly subordinate to the Kingdom of Poland and the cultural and religious integration of the Ukrainian into the Polish nobility accelerated. A deep rift formed between the privileged Catholic nobility and the Ukrainian lower class who remained Orthodox.

In the following 200 years or so, Lithuania continuously lost its political dominance. Most of the relevant decisions were made in Krakow and Warsaw . But it was a cultural center for the Jews in Eastern Europe with its own schools, a large library and numerous yeshivots . The most famous figure was Rabbi Elijah Ben Salomon Salman, called the Gaon of Vilna , (1720–1797), who was passionate about traditional Judaism with an emphasis on the study of Torah and Talmud, as well as modern natural sciences.

Russian rule

At the end of the 18th and beginning of the 19th century, the area gradually came under Russian rule through the so-called partitions of Poland . It consisted only of governorates that were centrally ruled from Saint Petersburg and were exposed to strong attempts at Russification , which were directed primarily against the Polish upper class. So the Belarusian dialect was banned. Its use was only legalized again after the revolution of 1905 , but it was still not allowed to be taught in schools. The prohibition of the Latin alphabet was also directed against Polish . As early as 1839 the tsar had banned the United Church in Belarus and the Ukraine in order to reduce the Catholic influence in these areas. Those parts of the population that belonged to this denomination were urged to adopt the Orthodox faith. In 1863/64 there were uprisings against Russian rule under the leadership of Kastus Kalinouski , which were bloodily suppressed.

1918-1920

→ Main articles : Belarusian People's Republic  and Polish-Soviet War

Passport of the Belarusian People's Republic

On February 25, 1918, German troops entered Minsk .

Under German protection, but without the consent of the occupying power, the independence of Belarus was proclaimed for the first time on March 25, 1918. The "Rada", the executive organ of the I Belarusian People's Congress , declared the separation from Soviet Russia and proclaimed the "Free and Independent Belarusian People's Republic " ("Belaruskaja Narodnaja Respublika"), which was neither recognized by the German Reich nor by the Western powers . It only existed for six months until autumn 1918, but historically and in the consciousness of the Belarusians it is considered to be the founding act of their own Belarusian statehood.

In the course of the German November Revolution, the expiry of the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk and the civil war in neighboring Russia, which also encroached on Belarus, the country came under the control of the Communists . During this phase, the Belarusian SSR was proclaimed in Smolensk on January 1, 1919 , and its administration was transferred to Minsk a week later . From the west, under Marshal Józef Piłsudski , Poland tried to bring large parts of Belarus under its control in order to form a state federated with Poland. He wanted to build on the traditions of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania . On February 27, 1919, the Belarusian SSR merged with Lithuania for a few months to form the Lithuanian-Belarusian SSR , which was crushed by Polish troops in July 1919 during the Polish-Soviet War .

Belarus as part of Poland and the Soviet Union, 1939 (before World War II)

In August 1919 Poland occupied a large part of Belarus and also the capital Minsk . This occupation lasted until July 11, 1920. On August 1, 1920, the Belarusian SSR (BSSR) was finally re-established .

In 1920 Poland recognized the BSSR, Belarus was divided between Poland and the BSSR.

Between the world wars (Soviet Union)

Between the First and Second World Wars , the western part of what is now Belarus belonged to Poland, the eastern part to the Belarusian SSR , which was a founding member of the Soviet Union in 1922 .

In response to the rule of the Bolsheviks, the Slutsk uprising occurred in 1920 with the aim of creating an independent Belarusian state.

In Poland, the idea of ​​autonomy for the areas populated by Belarusians, propagated by Piłsudski and the socialists , met with great criticism, especially among the nationalist majority in the Sejm . The National Democrats under Roman Dmowski counted on a Polonization of the non-Polish population of the eastern areas . The result was an ambivalent policy towards the Belarusians : On the one hand, they had their representation in parliament (Hramada, Alliance of National Minorities), their schools and societies. However, these were more strongly discriminated against compared to Eastern Galicia or Volhynia . In the course of the desired Polonization, around 300,000 Poles were settled in western Belarus between 1929 and 1939.

Flag of the Belarusian SSR 1919–1937

Flag of the Belarusian SSR 1937-1940 / 1951

On the Soviet side, the Belarusians initially enjoyed a fairly large degree of autonomy. This was part of the Soviet nationality policy . A quasi-independent republic was established, which was territorially enlarged in 1929 and 1932. Belarusian was recognized as the official language of the republic , along with Russian and Polish . Many Belarusian intellectuals moved from Vilnius ( Vilnius ) to Minsk. However, the Catholic , Orthodox and Jewish clergy were already exposed to persecution under Lenin : not only were religious instruction in schools banned , but churches and synagogues were also closed , new taxes were repeatedly imposed on the churches and clergy were deported to Siberia . Under Stalin , a large part of the Belarusian intelligentsia was persecuted and murdered (see: Kurapaty ). Belarus was not spared from the famine of 1932/33 (" Holodomor "). Nevertheless, the country accepted refugees from the south. The 1930s saw the forced collectivization of agriculture and the industrialization of the Soviet Union .

Second World War

Map of the WSSR 1940 (with Białystok)

On September 17, 1939, Eastern Poland was occupied by the Red Army . In the secret additional protocol of the German-Soviet non-aggression pact , the areas between Slutsch and Bug (i.e. all of Belarus) were added to the Soviet sphere of interest . On October 22, 1939, the election for the so-called "People's Congress of West Belarus" was carried out, together with a referendum in which, according to the official result, 99.9 percent of the population voted to remain with the Soviet Union . On November 2, western Belarus was officially annexed to the Belarusian Soviet Socialist Republic . The Belarusian SSR now included not only ethnically Belarusian areas, but also Białystok , Hrodna and Lida , where Poles and Jews formed the majority in the cities . Shortly after the regions of Polesia , Białystok and Vilnius were "admitted" to the USSR , so-called enemies of the people such as Polish aristocrats , Polish and Jewish entrepreneurs , Belarusian intelligentsia and clergy were deported to Siberia and Kazakhstan . The number of people displaced is estimated at 400,000 to 500,000, but it is difficult to verify.

In the summer of 1941 the German Wehrmacht conquered the country within a few weeks. During the invasion, the Red Army evacuated around 20% of the Belarusian population to Russia and destroyed the food supply. On September 1, 1941, half of the West Belarusian Kresy and the area around Minsk were combined to form the General Commissariat of Belarus, which was headed by Wilhelm Kube . Together with the General Commissariats of Estonia , Latvia and Lithuania , it formed the Reichskommissariat Ostland .

→ Main article : Battle of the cauldrons near Białystok and Minsk

The German invasion brought severe damage. Although many areas of Belarus were initially happy about the Soviet defeat, the Germans quickly disappointed the local population.

Bronze sculpture in the National Memorial of the Republic of Belarus

From 1941 to 1944, the Wehrmacht and SS murdered around two and a half million inhabitants of Belarus - more than a quarter of the population. The German soldiers waged a war of extermination against the civilian population . More than 200 cities and 9,000 villages were destroyed. The German soldiers often drove the villagers into barns and burned them down, as in 1943 in Chatyn (not to be confused with Katyn ). Today this place near Minsk is a memorial for the victims of the Second World War . In Minsk alone, the German occupying forces murdered more than 100,000 residents. The Jewish population of Belarus was almost completely murdered. About eight to nine percent of all European Jews killed came from Belarus. Almost all cities in the country were completely destroyed. The industrial enterprises had declined by 85 percent, the industrial capacity by 95 percent, the crop area by 40 to 50 percent, livestock by 80 percent. There were three million homeless after the end of the war . 25 percent of the Belarusian population perished. Furthermore, a large part of the ethnic Poles (around 300,000) were forcibly resettled in the eastern German territories that were annexed to Poland . Before the Second World War there were ten million people in Belarus. It was not until the end of the 1980s that Belarus' population had returned to pre-war levels.

During the German occupation, the “ Belarusian Central Council ” (Bielaruskaja Centralnaja Rada - BCR) was installed in Belarus , a puppet government that used historic Belarusian state emblems. The chairman of the BCR was Radasłaŭ Astroŭski . This "government" disappeared after the withdrawal of the German Eastern Front in 1944. Other institutions such as the Belarusian Home Guard , the Belarusian Self-Protection Corps , the Belarusian Auxiliary Police , the Belarusian Youth Organization or the Belarusian Self-Help Organization were founded.

The armed resistance movement in Belarus was one of the strongest in Europe . There were over 1000 partisan groups , most of which were communist but also nationalist. In the autumn of 1943 the Red Army recaptured the far east of the country, and in the summer of 1944 the entire country was recaptured.

Post-war period (Soviet Union)

Flag of the Belarusian Soviet Socialist Republic from December 1951

The reconquest by the Red Army in the summer of 1944 was followed by extensive deportations of functionaries from the local administrations and the KPSU . Former prisoners of war who were suspected of being “ideologically contaminated” through their years in German captivity were punished twice.

Josef Stalin's fear of Western influence also had benefits for Belarus, which soon became the preferred target of Soviet industrial policy. This, as well as the ongoing policy of Russification, led to the increased settlement of ethnic Russians, who soon also assumed key positions in politics and culture. In terms of cultural policy , the Belarusian language was clearly disadvantaged, which led to a sharp decline in its use.

Although the SSR as a part of the Soviet republic was not an independent state, like Ukraine it became a founding member of the United Nations at Stalin's instigation . In return, US President Roosevelt was granted the right to appoint two members who were committed to his country, which, however, remained unused.

Radioactive fallout contamination

The country was badly affected by the reactor accident on April 26, 1986 in Chernobyl in neighboring Ukraine , which is only about ten kilometers south of the Belarusian border. After the catastrophic meltdown and explosion , the warning and evacuation of thousands of victims on both sides of the border was carried out far too late. Belarus was hardest hit by the aftermath, as 70% of the fallout fell here; around 22% of the country was contaminated with cesium-137 .

During the Cold War , Belarus was of paramount military importance to the Soviet Union. The Soviet armed forces used the Soviet republic as a deployment and transit country for the anti- NATO units in Central Europe. But Belarus was also one of the most productive Soviet republics economically, and the focus was on the chemical and petrochemical industry as well as mechanical engineering.

In the elections for the Supreme Soviet of Belarus on March 4, 1990, the reform-minded candidate Mikalaj Dzemjanzej (Russian Nikolai Dementei ) prevailed. Full member of the Politburo of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union was Jafrem Sakalou (russ. Efrem Sokolov ). In the course of the collapse of the Soviet Union , the parliament of Belarus declared the former Belarusian Socialist Soviet Republic to be sovereign on July 27, 1990. On April 23, 1991, the President of the Soviet Union, Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev , signed a joint declaration with the highest representatives of nine republics (Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Azerbaijan) in Novo-Ogaryovo on the continuation of the Soviet Union (9 + 1 agreement) . This provided for the signing of a union treaty and a union constitution. On June 4, 1991, the Presidents of the nine Union Republics agreed to change the state name to Union of the Sovereign Soviet Republics. The Council for Mutual Economic Aid (COMECON) was dissolved on June 27, 1991, and the Warsaw Pact on July 1, 1991 . By 1992, around 100,000 Soviet soldiers were stationed in Belarus, around 70 percent of the officers were Russians or Ukrainians. The signing of the new union treaty failed the day before due to the August coup in Moscow against Gorbachev.

Four days after this failed coup, the Supreme Soviet of the Republic of Belarus unanimously passed a declaration on the political and economic independence of Belarus on August 25, 1991, and the Belarusian Communist Party temporarily suspended its activities.

On September 5, 1991, the Congress of People's Deputies (VDK) resolved the end of the Soviet Union and passed a law on the transformation of the centralized Soviet Union into the Commonwealth of Independent States .

Republic of Belarus

Flag of the Republic of Belarus (Republic of Belarus) 1991–1995

Stanislau Schuschkewitsch, first head of state of the Republic of Belarus 1991–1994

Flag of the Republic of Belarus (Republic of Belarus) 1995–2012

Aljaksandr Lukashenka , President of Belarus since 1994

On August 26, 1991, the Republic of Belarus was proclaimed. Five days later, on August 31, 1991, President Mikalay Dzemyanzej resigned. His successor was Stanislau Schuschkewitsch on September 18, 1991 as Chairman of the Supreme Council of the Republic of Belarus (Vjarchouny Sawet) and head of the Belarusian parliament. Shushkevich was thus the first head of state in Belarus.

On December 7, 1991, the presidents Boris Yeltsin ( Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic ), Leonid Kravchuk (Ukraine) and Shushkievich met in a hunting lodge for state guests near Wiskuli, in the Belarusian part of Belaweskaja Pushcha (German: "Belowescher Heide"). There they signed the Belowesch Agreement the next day , which Yegor Gaidar had largely drafted the night before. With that they founded the Community of Slavic States and separated their countries from the Soviet Union. The Belowesch Agreement was the basis for the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) founded on December 21, 1991 with the Alma-Ata Declaration , which was initially formed from 11 of the 15 successor states of the Soviet Union. On December 25, Gorbachev resigned and lowered the Soviet flag over the Kremlin.

On March 20, 1992, the new armed forces of the Republic of Belarus were officially formed. In April 1992 Belarus became the first of the successor states of the Soviet Union to sign the Paris Charter of the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE).

Belarus remained dependent on raw material and energy supplies from Russia even after independence. The continued use of the Russian or Soviet ruble as currency was stopped by Russia in 1992 by no longer providing Belarus with new ruble notes. Belarus introduced its own currency, the Belarus ruble , in June 1992 . Then there was hyper-inflation of over 2200 percent. President Shushkevich tackled economic reforms only hesitantly and was unable to assert himself against the existing influences of the old communists under the government of Vyachazlau Kebitsch in the economy.

On February 3, 1993, parliament lifted the ban on the Communist Party ( CPSU ) imposed in August 1991 by 220 votes to 10, although its property remained state-owned. On July 1, 1993, a vote of no confidence in Parliament President Shushkevich failed because the application failed because of the lack of an absolute majority of the MPs, although 166 of 204 MPs voted for removal. On July 29, 1993, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) granted the economically troubled state a loan of 98 million US dollars.

On January 15, 1994, US President Bill Clinton visited the capital Minsk and assured Belarus of further financial aid amounting to 101 million US dollars, which should contribute to the complete dismantling of the former Soviet ICBMs stationed on Belarusian territory . On April 9, 1994, Belarus joined the CIS Defense Alliance.

On January 26, 1994, Parliamentary President Shushkevich had to resign because the parliament, which was dominated by Communists, expressed its distrust with 209 votes to 36. As his successor, Metschyslau Hryb was elected as the new Speaker of Parliament on January 28, 1994 with 183 against 51 votes . At the same time, Prime Minister Vyachaslau Kebitsch was confirmed in office with 175 votes to 101. On March 15, 1994, a new constitution was passed by parliament, which included the conversion to a presidential system .

On July 20, 1994, Aljaksandr Lukashenka prevailed against Shushkevich and Kebitsch with 44.8 percent of the votes in the first ballot after an election campaign marked by corruption allegations and classified as questionable by the OSCE and the USA and won the runoff against Kebitsch with 80, 1 percent of the vote. On July 20, 1994, Lukashenka was elected the country's first president. The new prime minister was the banker Michail Tschyhir . Lukashenka immediately took action against the press, which was politically and economically oriented towards the West, and repeatedly denounced the financial transfers of political organizations to friendly organizations and media in Belarus. Mostly Western critics often refer to him as "the last dictator in Europe " because of his authoritarian style of government and the rigid repression of oppositionists . Lukashenka strove for reunification with Russia and Ukraine and hoped for faster economic success. Until 1997, 90 percent of the economy remained under state control.

From 1995 onwards, several international treaties were signed with Russia for closer ties and also included the goal of a confederation of states forming the Russian-Belarusian Union , the realization of which has so far been based on a defense community , an economic community and joint political consultations. The use of military facilities and bases in Belarus was concluded with Russia in 1995 for a loan of 25 million euros. The remaining from the Soviet Union 18 intercontinental ballistic missiles of the type RS-12M (NATO Code: SS-25 Sickle) were returned to Russia by the end of the 1996th See: Belarusian Armed Forces

In July 1995, a presidential decree banned opposition newspapers and magazines, and on August 21, 1995 independent trade unions , and textbooks with communist ideology were reintroduced in schools and universities.

In terms of domestic politics, Lukashenka was able to further expand his power and force the breakdown of the separation of powers . Against the opposition of the parliamentary majority and against the mediation efforts of the Russian Prime Minister Viktor Stepanowitsch Tschernomyrdin , the President held a referendum on November 24, 1996, which promised him a considerable increase in power, including the appointment of judges. The chief constitutional judge Tichinja resigned from his office in protest.

As a result of human rights violations and dissonances regarding the country's opening to the market economy, the administration of the European Union imposed an entry ban on the Belarusian government in 1997.

After Russian President Vladimir Putin took office, the climate between Russia and Belarus initially cooled. In 2001 he was confirmed as president in a presumably unconstitutional vote, although his first term had expired. In addition to foreign policy contact with Russia, Lukashenka (as of 2011) gives priority to relations with North Korea , Venezuela , Iran , Sudan and China (until 2003 also with Iraq and until 2011 also with Libya ).

In autumn 2005, Russia and Belarus made further efforts to integrate some ex-Soviet republics and to create joint constitutional acts. In addition to the existing inter-parliamentary assembly and a body of government representatives, a low cross-border budget was agreed. A customs agreement , according to which Russian officials are allowed to control the Belarusian- Polish border, also came into force.

Before the presidential election on March 19, 2006, Lukashenka tightened his crackdown on critics. Belarusian and Russian politicians as well as intellectuals have repeatedly criticized the financial support of market economy-oriented politicians from EU organizations. He won the election with 82.6 percent of the vote and took up his third term.

On May 18, 2006, the European Union decided to freeze the accounts of President Lukashenka and 35 other government officials. On June 19, 2006, the United States also tightened its sanctions against the government, allegedly freezing the assets of the president and nine other members of his administration in American banks at home and abroad. Lukashenka himself stated in an interview with the Berliner Morgenpost that he had "nothing stolen [and] no accounts at foreign banks".

In November 2007, the Belaya Rus party was founded in Belarus . Following the example of the Russian presidential party United Russia, it is intended to support Lukashenka's policies as a mass party and, if necessary, give him the opportunity to mobilize mass rallies in support of him.

The opposition won no seat in parliament either in the parliamentary elections in September 2008 or in the September 2012 election . It was not until the election in September 2016 that two opposition candidates were able to enter parliament.

In the course of the 2010 presidential election in Belarus , there was a mass rally on Independence Square in Minsk , which was violently suppressed.

literature

• Dietrich Beyrau, Rainer Lindner: Handbook of the history of Belarus. Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht Göttingen 2001, ISBN 3-525-36255-2 .
• Thomas M. Bohn, Rayk Einax, Julian Mühlbauer (eds.): Colorful spots in Belarus. Places of remembrance between the Polish-Lithuanian Union and the Russian-Soviet empire . Harrassowitz Wiesbaden 2013, ISBN 978-3-447-10067-0
• Thomas M. Bohn, Victor Shadurski (eds.): A white spot in Europe ... The imagination of Belarus as a contact zone between East and West . Transcript Bielefeld 2011, ISBN 978-3-8376-1897-6 .
• Bernhard Chiari : Everyday life behind the front. Occupation, collaboration and resistance in Belarus 1941–1944 . Droste, Düsseldorf 1998, ISBN 3-7700-1607-6 , (= writings of the Federal Archives , Volume 53, also dissertation at the University of Tübingen 1997 under the title: German occupation in Belarus 1941-1944 ).
• Christian Gerlach : Calculated murders. The German economic and annihilation policy in Belarus 1941 to 1944. Hamburger Edition, Hamburg 2000, ISBN 3-930908-63-8 .
• Bert Hoppe , Imke Hansen, Martin Holler (edit.): The persecution and murder of the European Jews by National Socialist Germany 1933–1945 , Volume 8: Soviet Union with annexed areas , Part 2: General Commissioner Belarus and Reich Commissioner Ukraine . De Gruyter Oldenbourg, Berlin 2015, ISBN 978-3-486-78119-9 .
• Lizaveta Kasmach: Forgotten occupation: Germans and Belarusians in the lands of Ober Ost (1915-17) . In: Canadian Slavonic Papers , Vol. 58 (2017), pp. 321-340.
• Bogdan Musiał : Soviet partisans in Belarus. Oldenbourg, Munich 2004, ISBN 3-486-64588-9 .
• Babette Quinkert: Propaganda and Terror in Belarus 1941–1944: The German "intellectual" warfare against civilians and partisans. Schöningh, Paderborn 2008, ISBN 3-506-76596-5 .
• Uladzimir Sakaloŭski: Belarus and Germany. Intellectual and cultural relationships between 1914 and 1941 . Volume 1: Bibliography . Böhlau, Köln 2000, ISBN 3-412-11299-2 (no other volumes published until 2018).
• Diana Siebert: Peasant Everyday Strategies in the Belarusian SSR (1921–1941). The destruction of the patriarchal family economy Stuttgart 1998, ISBN 978-3-515-07263-2 .
• Diana Siebert: Techniques of rule in the swamp and their ranges. Landscape interventions and social engineering in Polesia from 1914 to 1941 . Harrassowitz Verlag, Wiesbaden, 2019. ISBN 978-3-447-11229-1
• Leonid Smilovitsky: Holocaust in Belorussia 1941–1944. Engl. Barrel from Katastrofia Evreev v Belorusii 1941–1944. Biblioteka Motveya Chernogo, Tel Aviv 2000.
• Timothy Snyder : Bloodlands: Europe between Hitler and Stalin. Beck, Munich 2011, ISBN 978-3-406-62184-0 .
• Heinz Timmermann: Belarus. A dictatorship in the heart of Europe? Federal Institute for Eastern and International Studies , Cologne 1997.

Web links

Commons : History of Belarus  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

• Country entry in the online lexicon on the culture and history of Germans in Eastern Europe

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Jürgen Udolph (1979): On the status of the discussion about the original home of the Slavs. In: Contributions to Name Research , NF 14: pp. 1–25.
2. ↑ J. Bemmann, M. Parczewski (Ed.): Early Slavs in Central Europe. Wachholtz-Verlag, Neumünster 2005.
3. ^ Dietrich Beyrau, Rainer Lindner: Handbook of the history of Belarus. P. 89.
4. ↑ Archived copy ( Memento of the original from December 27, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. 
5. ↑ Eugeniusz Mironowicz: Białoruś. Trio, Warsaw 1999, ISBN 83-85660-82-8 , p. 136.
6. ↑ Alexander Brakel: Under Red Star and Swastika. Baranowicze 1939 to 1944. Western Belarus under Soviet and German occupation . (= Age of World Wars. Volume 5). Ferdinand Schöningh Verlag, Paderborn et al. 2009, ISBN 978-3-506-76784-4 , p. 6
7. ^ Wojciech Roszkowski , Jan Kofman (Ed.): Biographical Dictionary of Central and Eastern Europe in the Twentieth Century. Routledge, Abingdon et al. 2015, ISBN 978-0-7656-1027-0 , pp. 39f.
8. ↑ ^{a b} Helen Fedor: Stalin and Russification. In: Belarus: A Country Study. Library of Congress, 1995, accessed on August 8, 2020 (English): "Stalin ordered sweeping purges and mass deportations of local administrators and members of the CPSU, as well as those who had collaborated with the Nazis in any way, those who had spent the war in slave labor and prison camps in Germany and were now "ideologically contaminated" in Stalin's view, those who were suspected of antiSoviet sentiments, and those who were accused of "bourgeois nationalism." 
9. ^ Bureau of Public Affairs Department Of State. The Office of Electronic Information: The Formation of the United Nations, 1945. Retrieved August 8, 2020 . 
10. ↑ Ivo Mijnssen: The displaced act of liberation. The Belowesch Agreement gave the Soviet Union the fatal blow a quarter of a century ago. In a hunting seat in the jungle, the three Slavic brother countries agreed on a peaceful separation. In: Neue Zürcher Zeitung of December 8, 2016, p. 4.
11. ↑ Michael Thumann : Cheers! To the downfall! On December 8, 1991, Boris Yeltsin dissolved the Soviet Union in a remote hunting palace. In: Die Zeit from December 8, 2016, p. 22.
12. ↑ Berliner Morgenpost: "A comedy is taking place in Russia" ( Memento from September 30, 2007 in the Internet Archive ), January 25, 2007.
13. ↑ NZZ Online: Lukashenko consolidates his power , November 19, 2007.
14. ↑ Opposition in Belarus surprisingly wins parliamentary seat. Deutsche Welle, September 12, 2016, accessed June 9, 2017 . 
15. ↑ Report on the demonstration in Minsk in the evening of the Belarusian presidential elections, December 19, 2010 ( Memento of December 24, 2017 in the Internet Archive )