United Baltic Duchy

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Flag of the United Baltic Duchy

The United Baltic Duchy was the short-lived attempt by the Baltic Germans at the end of the First World War in 1918 to found a German-dominated state entity on the territory of what is now Estonia and Latvia .

German Baltic policy in the First World War

Map of the Russian Baltic Sea provinces around 1895

The Baltic Germans living in Germany had been the main propagandists for the annexation of the Baltic States to the German Empire since the beginning of the war . The "Baltic Trust Council", founded by a group of emigrants, developed a lively agitation for the unification of the German Baltic provinces with Germany even before the conquest of Courland . The German claim to rule in the Baltic States was founded historically and ideologically by the earlier rule of the Teutonic Order .

In the Baltic States, one of the main questions was the form of the future organization - as a union of all Baltic states or as satellite states under Saxon , Württemberg or Prussian rulers. Another main question was that of the German settlement of the new areas, as Kurland was seen as the best opportunity for complete “denationalization”, for “Germanization” of a conquered area. It was planned, similar to the "Polish border strip" by settlement of Russian Germans on Russian Krondomänen , church and large estates, in addition to the possessions of the German Baltic aristocracy, the displacement of the Latvians in their own country.

On September 3, 1917, the German army captured the city ​​of Riga, which had previously belonged to Russia . The German occupation policy consisted of a network of security requirements and imperialist claims to rule. As with the provisional Russian government , the attitude of the German occupiers should also be determined by a far-reaching underestimation of the nationality problem. While the Latvian Bolsheviks wanted unification with Soviet Russia , and Latvian social democrats , liberals and conservative peasants were in favor of an independent state, the conservative Latvian People's Party and a large part of the Baltic Germans sought to join the German Empire .

The Baltic German ruling class, however, was closely associated with German occupation policy. She fought not only against the Bolsheviks, but also against the establishment of independent, democratic Baltic states, which officially took place on February 24, 1918 (Estonia) and November 18, 1918 (Latvia). Since they saw themselves as “carriers of the oldest culture in the country”, their relatives wanted to continue to secure leadership. They tried to form a unified Baltic duchy and turned to the German Kaiser with a request for help. Objections from Estonians and Latvians were not taken into account. The government -in-law was undemocratic organized: in the government institutions, the German minority should have more MPs than the Latvians and Estonians together.

In the Peace of Brest-Litovsk on March 3, 1918, Soviet Russia renounced its sovereign rights in Courland and Lithuania, whose future situation was to be resolved by the German Empire and Austria-Hungary in agreement with the local population. Estonia and Livonia , as yet without their own police or other state regulatory authority, remained temporarily occupied by the German police. The "United Provincial Council of Livonia, Estonia, Riga and Ösel", which is under knightly leadership, also decided on April 12, 1918 to ask the German Kaiser to place the Baltic Duchy under the protection of the German Empire. He aimed for a union with Germany in the form of a personal union .

Proclamation of the Duchy

Adolf Friedrich of Mecklenburg (1910)

In Estonia and Latvia, the Supreme Army Command (OHL) considered the Baltic German elite, especially the knighthood, to be the only possible cooperation partner. There was no cooperation with Estonian and Latvian national circles. The knighthood wanted a unified Baltic state separate from Russia under their leadership, which should encompass the previous Baltic Governments . The plan to found an independent Baltic duchy under Adolf Friedrich zu Mecklenburg was developed by the knighthood and was supported by the OHL. An alternative plan to the United Baltic Duchy was to form the governorates of Estonia , Livonia and Courland into an all-Baltic state in the form of a Hohenzollern personal union .

In September 1918 Wilhelm II recognized the independence of the Baltic countries (under German control), and on November 5, 1918, the Duchy of Riga was proclaimed. Adolf Friedrich zu Mecklenburg was to wear the crown of the new "United Baltic Duchy". Until his arrival, he was to be represented as "Reichsverweser" by a 10-member "Regency Council" founded by the knighthood on November 9, 1918 under the leadership of the Livonian Land Marshal , Adolf Pilar von Pilchau .

The settlement projects and the “export of princes” as heads of state, described by the SPD as “romantic nonsense” and “dynastic joke”, were doomed to failure in this time of growing national consciousness of the Latvians, Lithuanians and Estonians. Such plans and the "grotesque competition of the German dynasties" ( Hans Herzfeld ) revealed the illusionary character of the German Ostpolitik of the time and the political hopes of German Baltic leaders.

After the outbreak of the November Revolution in Germany, the General Plenipotentiary for the occupied Baltic States, August Winnig , signed a contract with the Provisional Government of Estonia (EPR) in Riga on November 19, 1918 . Due to this treaty, the EPR took power in the Estonian territory. In Latvia, the Latvian People's Council declared the country 's independence on November 18 . When this state was de facto recognized by the German Reich, the Regency Council ceased its activities on November 28, 1918.

Other similar founding attempts

Towards the end of the First World War, the German Reich tried to establish other puppet governments on the territory of the former Russian Empire in addition to the reigning kingdom of Poland : the Duchy of Courland and Zemgale , the Kingdom of Finland and the Kingdom of Lithuania . Due to the rapid end of the war, these attempts never went beyond the planning phase, just like with the United Baltic Duchy.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Peter Krupnikov: On the Baltic policy of German imperialism from the end of the 19th century to 1917 . In: Boris A. Aisin, Willibald Gutsche (Ed.): Research results on the history of German imperialism before 1917 . Berlin / GDR 1980, p. 223; and Imanuel Geiss : The German Reich and the First World War . Munich / Vienna 1978, p. 103.
  2. ↑ Imanuel Geiss: The German Empire and the First World War . Munich / Vienna 1978, p. 175 and Werner Basler: Germany's policy of annexation in Poland and the Baltic States 1914–1918 . Berlin / GDR 1962, pp. 251 and 324.
  3. ^ Fritz Fischer : Reach for world power. The war policy of imperial Germany 1914/18. Düsseldorf 1964, p. 351f.
  4. ^ Eduard von Rosenberg: For Germanness and Progress in Latvia; Riga 1928
  5. ↑ Toomas Anepaio: The legal development of the Baltic States 1918-1940 . In: Tomasz Giaro (ed.): Modernization through transfer between the world wars . Klostermann Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 2007, ISBN 978-3-465-04017-0 , pp. 7-30, here: pp. 14f.
  6. ↑ Georg von Rauch : History of the Baltic States . DTV, Munich 1990, ISBN 3-423-04297-4 , p. 55.
  7. ↑ Toomas Anepaio: The legal development of the Baltic States 1918-1940 . In: Tomasz Giaro (ed.): Modernization through transfer between the world wars . Klostermann Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 2007, ISBN 978-3-465-04017-0 , pp. 7–30, here: p. 15.
  8. ↑ Bernhard Mann : The Baltic States in German War Target Journalism 1914–1918 . Tübingen 1965, p. 128 f .; Hans-Erich Volkmann: The German Baltic policy between Brest-Litovsk and Compiègne. A contribution to the "war target discussion" , Böhlau, Cologne / Vienna 1970, p. 229.
  9. ^ Gert von Pistohlkors (ed.): German history in Eastern Europe. Baltic countries (=  German history in Eastern Europe , Volume 4), Siedler, Berlin 1994, ISBN 3-88680-214-0 , p. 446; Michael Garleff : The Baltic countries. Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania from the Middle Ages to the present. Pustet, Regensburg 2001, ISBN 3-7917-1770-7 , p. 99.

Web links

Commons : 1918 in Estonia  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files
Commons : 1918 in Latvia  - collection of images, videos and audio files