Political terror in Finland and Baltic States after World War I

Political terror in Finland and Baltic States during 1918–1920 occurred during violent political struggles within the Baltic territory of the Russian Empire disintegrated as a result of World War I and the Russian Revolution. While there were various militant actors in the scene, including German Army and the Russian White Movement from the remnants of the Russian Imperial Army, the major polarization was between "the Reds", or Bolshevik-influenced Communist revolutionaries, who wanted to establish the Soviet powers, and "the Whites" (not to be confused with Russian "Whites"), who wanted to establish independent states based on traditional democracy. Accordingly, the political terror during this period is roughly classified into the "Red Terror" and "White Terror".^[1]

Overview

The four countries, Finland, Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia had similar developments, all of them being the parts of the collapsed Russian Empire territorially close to each other and influenced by similar forces, with the exception of Lithuania, who had an additional conflict with Poland. Of these four, the bloodiest (and best researched) terror was in Finland (see Finnish Civil War § Red and White terror), where about 1,600 were killed in Red Terror and 8,100 killed in White Terror. The least organized political Red/White terror was in Lithuania, where about 100 persons were killed within this framework, mostly by anti-Bolshevik forces.^[a] The Latvian civil war was the second bloodiest conflict in the region: with about 4500–6000 terror victims. In Estonia the numbers were smaller. Tomas Balkelis writes that an apparent imbalance in death tolls, similar in all cases, may be explained by the fact that the victors had more time to carry out the killings, but it may be a more complicated issue.^[1]

Finland

Main article: Finnish Civil War

According to the Finnish War Casualties [fi] database, the losses of "the Reds" (Red Guards), "the Whites", and others in the period may be summarized as follows:^[2]

Death toll in 1918

Death cause	Reds	Whites	Other	Total
Casualties in military actions	5,199	3,414	790	9,403
Executed, murdered	7,370	1,424	926	9,720
Died in prison camps	11,652	4	1,790	13,446
Died after being released from prison camps	607	-	6	613
Disappeared	1,767	46	380	2,193
Other ways of death	443	291	531	1,265
Totals	27,038	5,179	4,423	36,640

Estonia

Soviet Estonian scholar Paul Vihalem [et] gave an estimate of 2,000 victims among the "revolutionaries" (i.e., the Red Estonians),^[3] while the modern Estonian researcher Taavi Minnik suggests the number of 800 victims of the White Terror.^[4]

Latvia

Latvia is estimated to have had a total of 4,500 to 6,000 victims of political terror (about 1,500 to 2,000 from the Red Terror and 3,000 to 4,000 from the White Terror), however, data from several regions, including Latgale, is incomplete.^[1]

Red Terror

A memorial cross in Jelgava marking the burial place of Red Terror victims killed in January, February, and March 1919 at Jelgava Prison.

The main organizer of Red Terror in Latvia was Jūlijs Daniševskis, Deputy Chairman of the Latvian Socialist Soviet Republic and de facto leader of the Soviet Latvian Army.^[5] The campaign targeted primarily Baltic Germans, who accounted for roughly 90% of prisoners, reflecting ideological, social, and ethnic motives rather than actual acts of resistance. Red Terror unfolded in two stages: an initial "chaotic" phase (November 1918–mid-January 1919) with sporadic violence, and a "centralized" phase (mid-January–May 1919), during which revolutionary tribunals, concentration camps, and investigative commissions systematically eliminated perceived enemies. Over 2,000 victims were reported, with an average of 400 per month, even though the Cheka did not operate in the territory of Bolshevik-occupied Latvia as it did in the Russian SFSR.^[6]

The terror was accompanied by xenophobic rhetoric, vilification, with individuals widely labeled as "enemies". Anti-Semitic incidents were relatively rare and generally ideologically motivated rather than organized pogroms. Religious persecution was also widespread: churches were desecrated, and clergy was attacked, although in Catholic Latgale local populations sometimes hid and protected religious figures from Bolshevik violence.^[6]

During their four-and-a-half-month occupation of Riga, the Bolsheviks carried out extensive political repression, including arrests and executions. As anti-Bolshevik forces approached the city in May 1919, the Bolsheviks intensified executions of prisoners. At the Citadel Prison, anti-Bolshevik troops were able to free hostages, but at Riga Central Prison [lv; ru], the Bolsheviks managed to kill 32 prisoners, including members of Baltic German clergy, using bayonets and grenades.^[5]

White Terror

Anti-Bolshevik violence was primarily motivated by revenge rather than ideology.^[6] After joint forces of the Baltische Landeswehr, Iron Division, Latvian troops, and the White Army liberated Riga on May 22, 1919, a wave of reprisals was carried out against suspected Bolshevik supporters. Estimates of the victims vary widely: early official records cited 174, while the Latvian Social Democratic Workers' Party and communists claimed 4,000–5,000. Executions continued until June 1919 when Allied intervention halted them. Approximately 3,000 prisoners of war had fallen into the hands of the Landeswehr and Iron Division, some of whom were executed, while many others were released if vouched for and later joined Colonel Jānis Balodis' Latvian Separate Battalion [lv]. Overall, about 700 people are believed to have been killed in Riga (roughly 450 after tribunal verdicts and 250 without trial) with the largest documented execution occurring on June 5 at Riga Central Prison. The Iron Division and Landeswehr were particularly noted for their brutality, while Balodis' batallion oversaw fewer casualties.^[7]

The execution of 18 Bolsheviks by the German troops near Riga on 26 May 1919, was captured on film by an American motion picture crew. Shown at the Paris Peace Conference, the footage reportedly influenced the Allied decision to withdraw German forces from the Baltic states. Later included in the 1920 documentary Starvation, the sequence drew criticism for its graphic content and contributed to the film's failure, though the execution footage itself survived in Hoover Institution Library and Archives and has since reappeared in historical documentaries, often misidentified as an episode of Russian Civil War.^[8]

See also

• Red Terror (disambiguation)
• White Terror (disambiguation)

Notes

1. The total death toll in Lithuania in this period was much higher due to military actions in the Polish–Lithuanian War and Lithuanian–Soviet War.