[Congressional Record Volume 164, Number 40 (Wednesday, March 7, 2018)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1449-S1450]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                  LITHUANIAN AND ESTONIAN CENTENNIALS

  Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, the Senate Baltic Freedom Caucus has 
been without a Republican cochair.
  This is a critical time to show solidarity with our Baltic allies, 
given Russian aggression against Ukraine starting in 2014, following on 
Russian military intervention in the Republic of Georgia in 2008.
  It is also a significant milestone year for all three Baltic 
countries as they celebrate the 100th anniversary of their statehood. 
As such, it is important that the Baltic Freedom Caucus have its 
leadership in place. I have been a member of the Baltic Freedom Caucus 
for some time, and I have now agreed to be the Republican cochair, 
along with Senator Durbin, who is the longtime Democrat cochair.
  So, in my new capacity as cochair of the Senate Baltic Freedom 
Caucus, I would like to offer congratulations first to the Republic of 
Lithuania, which celebrated 100 years since the establishment of the 
modern Lithuanian state on February 16.
  I say the modern state because Lithuanians trace their country's 
history to 1253. The Grand Duchy of Lithuania controlled a large amount 
of territory from the Baltic Sea to the Black Sea during medieval 
times. It later joined with Poland as the Polish-Lithuanian 
Commonwealth. Then, with the partitions of Poland starting in the 18th 
century, it came under the control of the Russian empire.
  In the wake of World War I and the Bolshevik Revolution, on February 
16, 1918, representatives of the Lithuanian nation signed the Act of 
Independence of Lithuania ``reestablishing an independent state, based 
on democratic principles.'' Lithuania today holds true to those 
principles. This makes it a natural and close ally of the United States 
and other freedom-loving nations. In fact, the Lithuanian Government 
has become a particularly outspoken defender of democratic principles 
in the face of attacks on those principles by its large neighbor, 
Russia.
  I would also like to recognize the Republic of Estonia, which marked 
100 years of statehood on February 24. Like the United States, Estonia 
counts its statehood starting with its declaration of independence. 
Also like the United States, Estonia had to fight a war against an 
empire with a much larger army to secure its independence. Actually, 
Estonia had to fight both the German empire and Bolshevik Russia.
  Germany gave up when it lost World War I, and Soviet Russia was 
pushed back by the new Estonian army, ultimately signing the Treaty of 
Tartu that recognized the independence of Estonia in perpetuity. More 
recently, the Estonian army has fought side by side with the United 
States in Iraq and Afghanistan, and Estonia is one of the few NATO 
allies that meets its commitment to spend 2 percent of GDP on defense.
  I should add that Latvians will celebrate their 100th anniversary of 
statehood in November, so there will be time to congratulate them in 
due course, but I should mention that there are many connections 
between Latvia and Iowa.
  Iowa was partnered with Latvia in a civic education exchange program 
a number of years ago; a prominent Iowan, Chuck Larson, served as 
Ambassador to Latvia from 2008 to 2009; and we have a Latvian-American 
community in Iowa.
  Some people may have a vague notion that the Baltics are breakaway 
Soviet republics, but that is not accurate if you know your history. On 
the eve of World War II, the Soviets and the Nazis signed the Molotov-
Ribbentrop Pact, which contained a secret protocol agreeing to divide 
up several sovereign countries between them. The Nazis were to get 
western Poland, and the Soviets claimed the Baltic countries and 
Finland, eastern Poland, and the part of Romania that is now the 
Republic of Moldova. Then both totalitarian governments proceeded to 
take those territories by force, although the Finns only lost part of 
the Karelia region after repelling the Soviet invasion in the Winter 
War.
  The Soviets organized rigged elections and claimed that the Baltic 
countries voluntarily joined the Soviet Union. However, the United 
States never recognized the annexation of these countries, and we 
continued to maintain diplomatic relations with the three Baltic 
countries throughout the Cold War.
  The Lithuanian Embassy is still in its original location, and during 
the Soviet occupation, the Estonian representative to the United States 
became the longest serving member of the Washington diplomatic corps.
  In 1989, on the 50th anniversary of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, 
citizens of the three Baltic countries formed a human chain connecting 
the capital cities protesting the continued occupation and highlighting 
the history of

[[Page S1450]]

how it came about, which was officially denied by the Soviet regime.
  Vladimir Putin's regime continues to deny that the Baltic countries 
were illegally occupied and to insist that they ceased to be 
independent states when they were annexed in 1940.
  In 2015, a member of the ruling party in Russia even initiated an 
inquiry with the Russian Prosecutor General as to the legality of the 
decision allowing the independence of the Baltic states from the Soviet 
Union in 1991. That decision was declared illegal. Since the entire 50-
year occupation of the Baltic countries was illegal, the legality of a 
decision by a defunct evil empire is hardly relevant. What is relevant 
is that the current regime in Russia is continuing the Soviet legacy of 
rewriting history to fit its agenda. That is a form of political 
warfare.
  Many Americans are now waking up to the fact that the Putin regime is 
bent on undermining Western democracies.
  Well, the Baltic countries have been warning about that for years 
while leaders of our government were cozying up to Putin and playing 
around with reset buttons.
  Estonia was the subject of a massive propaganda campaign combined 
with a cyber attack back in 2007 when it moved a Soviet war memorial to 
a less conspicuous location.
  Estonia's experience of weathering a cyber attack and its strong IT 
sector have made it a cybersecurity expert, and it now hosts the NATO 
Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence.
  What Russia is doing now is out of the same KGB playbook it used 
throughout the Cold War. For instance, the Soviets planted articles in 
newspapers in the 1980s claiming that the United States created AIDS. 
They then got other papers to pick it up and echoed the story via its 
own news agencies. This is exactly what Russia is still doing, only 
with more modern technology.
  We have a lot to learn from all three Baltic countries, where the 
governments, the media, and the citizens are more sophisticated about 
identifying and exposing propaganda campaigns. The best response to 
propaganda is education and exposure--in other words, truth.
  The citizens of the three Baltic countries fought back against Soviet 
distortion of history with historical truth and were able to reclaim 
their independence.
  So today I want to recognize historical truth on the Senate floor and 
congratulate Lithuania and Estonia on their recent statehood 
centennials. I look forward to celebrating the upcoming centennial of 
Latvia in November.
  These bastions of Western civilization and Western values in a tough 
neighborhood are valuable partners in advancing our shared goals of 
securing democracy and the blessings of liberty for our people.

                          ____________________