So I was researching history of Lithuania during the interwar period and discovered the Kaunas Neumann and Sass trial in the 1930s. Do most Lithuanians know about it?

8 comments

1. It was taught 15 years ago, not sure about now. Most Lithuanians do not know about it.

2. Don’t care tbh

3. It is taught in school, but I don’t think its widely known in public.

4. I remember it being either taught or I learned it myself, but I doubt typical Lithuanian will know about this.

   Also I recalled hearing about Lithuanian government plans to give those nazi germans death penalty, but it was cancelled.

5. Yes! Due to this Neumann-Sass process Lithuania was banned from 1936 Berlin Olympics.

6. Interesting, thanks!

7. I was only taught that hitler visited Klaipėda and that Klaipėda was almost entirely sovereign with a french? governor.

8. No, I have not heard about it anywhere before.

   I think that it is a symptom of the sad state of affairs of a small country that had not had its own voice in the international community for half a century, and even now its voice is very rarely heard. It has been this way in many instances.

   I think that this is part of a bigger problem: that the history of CEE region as a whole is not taught in the Western community.

   For example, the Youtube channel Crash Course has an entire playlist called “European History”. It is a well-produced quality playlist with a lot of good information, but with one caveat: while it is called “European History”, it should rather more accurately be called “The History of Western Europe and Russia” because that is what it is. CEE gets barely a few mentions in the entire course. It is insulting that “European History” contains no history of half the continent. And there will not be a “Eastern European History” or “European History (with CEE included)” playlist like there is a playlist for “Black American History” in the same Youtube channel. For half a century the entire CEE region has been erased from the consciousness of the international community.

   In a way, the West has been complicit in the Soviet Union’s attempts to erase their vassal states as entities, including their histories.

   The one good thing about war in Ukraine is that this event has sparked an interest of the international community in the history of CEE. For example, Timothy Snyder’s lectures on Eastern Europe are relatively popular on Youtube now. CEE is slowly regaining its own voice.

   The video above is about Lithuania, but is not made by a Lithuanian, and it is intended for a global audience. Thus, it is a living example of one country finally having its voice heard in the global community, which is nice to see.