Lithuanian activist front
The Lithuanian Activist Front ( lit. : Lietuvos Aktyvistų Frontas , LAF) was a short-lived organization that on 17 November 1940 by Lithuanian emigrants in response to the Soviet occupation of Lithuania in Berlin was founded. The aim of the organization was the liberation of Lithuania and the restoration of independence.
founding
The organization was founded on November 17, 1940 as a cross-party anti-Soviet and anti-German freedom movement at the instigation of the former Lithuanian military attaché in Berlin Kazys Škirpa . Local LAF groups soon formed in several Lithuanian cities.
The Berlin group around Kazys Škirpa consisted mainly of émigrés and former diplomats in Germany , whose formerly left-wing ideology shifted in the course of time towards National Socialism and a social upheaval in Lithuania in the style of Hitler's seizure of power , while the LAF in the Lithuanian cities maintained their more democratic views. Due to a lack of communication between the group abroad and the groups in Lithuania, no ideological opinion-making took place.
In Kaunas , on April 22, 1941, LAF delegates from Vilnius and Kaunas compiled the cabinet list of a " Provisional Government of Lithuania " ( Laikinoji Vyriausybė ). This should come into play as soon as the German Wehrmacht had expelled the Red Army from Lithuania. Many members of the provisional government as well as other LAF officials were arrested, executed or deported by the Soviets.
The LAF underground cells in Lithuania served the German defense and other Nazi secret services as a basis for intelligence operations and sabotage.
June uprising
The LAF leadership considered a German attack on the Soviet Union to be the right time to proclaim Lithuania's independence, in the hope that both powers would lose sight of little Lithuania in their mutual struggle. On June 22nd, 1941, at the same time as the German attack, the LAF began the June uprising and on June 23rd proclaimed the independence of Lithuania in order to take over government on June 24th. However, a minister could not come, four other members of the government had already been arrested by the Soviet authorities on June 21, and Prime Minister-designate Kazys Škirpa was under house arrest in Berlin . Thus Juozas Ambrazevičius named prime minister.
In the wake of the uprising, there were brutal attacks on Jews nationwide by LAF members and sympathizers, with thousands of victims.
crew
However, negotiations with the Germans about the recognition of Lithuania failed because the Nazi government had no interest in an independent Lithuania. Due to the strong support of the LAF government in the Lithuanian population, the German occupiers refrained from brutal measures. Instead, they built up their own power structures at the same time, thus gradually weakening the LAF. After the LAF government was ousted by the Germans on July 28, 1941, it lost all of its political influence. Since the continuation of their work now seemed increasingly pointless, it dissolved on September 22, 1941. Nevertheless, the LAF continued as an organization. She protested against the occupation of Lithuania and in September sent a corresponding memorandum to Berlin. In the German response of September 26th, the Lithuanian Activist Front was banned; their leadership was arrested and deported to concentration camps. However, many LAF members also received jobs in the civilian population or joined Einsatzkommandos 2, 3 and 9. An auxiliary police force was formed from LAF members and veterans of the Lithuanian army.
controversy
The LAF is said to have persecuted and murdered Jews after June 22, 1941, but before the invasion of the German Wehrmacht. After the German invasion, LAF groups under the guidance of SD-Einsatzgruppe 3 carried out the mass murder of Jews in Kaunas . Thousands of Lithuanian volunteers were publicly killed with iron bars in June, and thousands more were later shot in the old fortress of Kaunas . The head of Einsatzgruppe 3, Karl Jäger, stated: "The actions in Kauen itself, where enough reasonably trained partisans are available, can be viewed as parade shooting, compared to the often enormous difficulties that had to be overcome outside."
There was also discrimination against Jews through various LAF government decrees , Žydų padėties nuostatus (“Regulation of the status of Jews”) is probably the most inglorious example. Critics see these acts as the sole purpose of gaining the sympathy of Germany; others see the LAF government as nothing more than a puppet government of the National Socialists. In any case, the anti-communist nature of the LAF ideology is undisputed.
See also
literature
- Alex Faitelson: In the Jewish resistance . With poems by Sima Faitelson-Jaschunski. Ed. And with historical note vers. by Charlotte Nager. Elster, Baden-Baden [a. a.] 1998, ISBN 3-89151-269-4 .
Individual evidence
- ↑ cf. the series of pictures on Kaunas in the Federal Archives and at the picture agency bpk (department of the Berlin State Library - Prussian Cultural Heritage); z. B. A group of Jewish women is led to execution by members of the Lithuanian Activist Front . ( Page no longer available , search in web archives ) Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. - Mass shooting of Jews by members of the Lithuanian activist front . ( Page no longer available , search in web archives ) Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. - Pogrom in Kovno (Kaunas) from June 23-28, 1941. A young Lithuanian kills Jews with a crowbar . ( Page no longer available , search in web archives ) Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. - Kaunas. Spectators at a public slaughter of Jews by Lithuanian nationalists after the invasion of the German Wehrmacht .
- ↑ so-called "hunter report"; see. Hans-Heinrich Wilhelm: Racial politics and warfare - security police and armed forces in Poland and the Soviet Union . Passau 1991, p. 26.
