T he Kaliningrad enclave, a Russian

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1 A scrap of strategic land. With a thousand-year history behind it. Soviet control, never questioned, after the Postdam and Yalta agreements. The worries faced today by those in Poland and the Baltic countries for whom Putin and Schroeder s new gas pipeline is a studied way to deny them and Poland energy resources and transit rights. And if the European Union were to once again move in open order... Kaliningrad, a thorn in Poland s side HISTORY by Fernando Orlandi T he Kaliningrad enclave, a Russian Federation territory wedged between Poland and Lithuania (and with an outlet to the Baltic sea), has over recent months become the centre of a diplomatic dispute between the three States, a test of the continuing difficulties Moscow has in its relationships with Lithuania and Poland, members of NATO and the European Union, almost 15 years from the disappearance of the Soviet Union. But it is also a small test of the European Union s ability to produce a clear policy regarding Moscow. Broadly speaking, the Kaliningrad enclave has dimensions similar to Calabria and a population of around one million inhabitants (995,200 according to the 2002 census). At the beginning of the XIII century, the dukes of Poland supported the military crusades whose goal was to evangelise the pagan inhabitants of Prussia and conquer their lands. To speed up the conquest, Corrado of Masovia invited the monasticmilitary organisation of the Teutonic Knights, granting them the right to possess conquered territory. The Prussians were almost exterminated (to such an extent that the ethnic name no longer indicates the indigenous populations of the regions but instead the later Germanic power). One by one, the Prussian territories were conquered by the Teutonic Knights, who built countless forts and castles in the region extending from Danzig to Narva. In 1255, the king of Bohemia Ottokar II joined a Prussian crusade and on the banks of the Pregel founded a new city, Königsberg (Krolewiec in Polish, Karaliaucius for Lithuanians). Thanks to the arrival of a huge number of German colonies, the city developed rapidly and in Grazia Neri_Bilderberg Contrasto

2 KALININGRAD, A THORN IN POLAND S SIDE 1340 became part of the Hanseatic League, setting itself up as a major centre of trade between western Europe and Russia. Almost two hundred years later, in 1544, it was to be the seat of a university, whose staff included the native Immanuel Kant. Over the centuries, the Prussian territory saw a constant and considerable presence of German population. Following the Treaty of Vienna in 1815, its borders were widened and it began to compete with Austria for dominance over the Germanic Confederation and then to lay down the basis for German unity. With the proclamation of the German Empire, the history of Prussia merged with that of the unified Germany and concluded with the end of the Third Reich. At the end of the Second World War, the counter-offensive of the Red Army in East Prussia was violent and accompanied by huge amounts of destruction and mass flight of civilians fearing Soviet reprisals, just as in Budapest (now recounted by Sándor Márai in his recent book recalling the events, Land, Land!...). The literary critic Lev Kopelev, later dissident who inspired the character of Lev Rubin in Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn s The First Circle, was an officer in the Red Army. Following attempts to oppose the atrocities and violence perpetrated in Prussia, he was condemned to a ten-year term in a labour camp in the Gulag for bourgeois humanism and compassion towards the enemy. Before the arrival of the Soviet troops, Königsberg had been razed to the ground by the devastating bombardment of British air attacks. Already in December 1944, just a few months after the German attack on the USSR, when the survival of the Soviet regime itself was in doubt, Stalin put forward to British foreign minister Anthony Eden projects for the future of East Prussia: territory known as Lithuania Minor was to be annexed by Soviet Lithuania, while the rest should go to Poland as compensation for territory acquired by Moscow. Potsdam At the Yalta Conference of February 1945 the outcome Stalin wanted regarding the eastern front of Poland was adopted. The next summer, at the Postdam Conference, Königsberg was discussed, and it was agreed that: The proposal put forward by the Soviet government has been examined, under which, pending the Peace Treaty to resolve territorial issues definitively, the section of the western front of the USSR adjacent to the Baltic Sea should pass along the line from the eastern shore of the Bay of Danzig to the east, north of Braunsberg- Goldap, to the meeting point of the borders of Lithuania, Poland and East Prussia. The Conference participants, in principle, were not against this proposal, which implied granting the city of Königsberg and its adjacent area to the USSR. The President of the United States and the British prime minister have both declared that they will pledge their support for the Soviet proposal at the upcoming Peace Conference. But the Peace Conference was not held, and the status of the Kaliningrad oblast is still controversial today. According to some legal experts, since the USSR never obtained control by right, just administrative control, the Russian Federation, which declared itself successor State as regards international execution, could not have acquired control of the territory. But no State has advanced claims. Rather, all possible pretenders, with Berlin in first place, have backed Moscow. The Soviet era In the immediate post-war era, under Soviet control, the surviving Germans and Lithuanians were deported from the region, and a massive repopulation plan was put Grazia Neri_AFP 64

3 HISTORY _Königsberg s destiny was decided at the Potsdam Conference. On that occasion no-one, Berlin least of all, raised any objections to the Soviet government s proposal to annex the town and the adjoining region Contrasto_Corbis Königsberg became Kaliningrad on 4 July The town was rebuilt in Soviet style and the territory strongly militarized, as it represented the first line of defense against a possible Western attack into action, involving military personnel and large numbers of Russians from throughout the USSR. On 4 July 1946 came the change of name: Königsberg and its territory became the Kaliningrad oblast, in honour of the deceased Soviet president Mikhail Kalinin. With Orwellian zeal, the past and Germans place-names were wiped out: Tisit became Sovietsk, Gumbinnen was called Gusev, and so on. Soon after, scholars and Soviet propaganda agents began to refer to these lands as part of the Russian heritage. The Izvestiya wrote: The Slavs are once again settling in this ancient Slavic land. With the arrival of the new residents, Königsberg was rebuilt in bleak Soviet style. In the Sixties, as a gesture of good will, the German Federal government proposed financing the reconstruction of the castle that had once stood at the centre of the city. Leonid Brezhnev not only refused, but ordered the removal of the surviving ruins and the construction of a new building on the historic site. So the House of the Soviets came to be built, an architectural monstrosity still there in the city and, among other things, a structure that has never been used. For the entire Soviet period, the Kaliningrad oblast remained a sealed territory, with strong military presence and no access for foreigners: it constituted the first Soviet line of defence against attack from the West and at the same time could be used for offensives. The oblast was also headquarters of the Baltic Fleet and the 11th Armed Guard. Difficult transition Since 1991, this massive military presence has alarmed western analysts and bordering states. As late as 1998, the Polish foreign minister Bronislaw Geremek stated that Kaliningrad constitutes a threat, not only for Poland but also for the security of Europe. Today, the size of the military presence is drastically reduced, and in particular, their infrastructures are increasingly obsolete. The oblast has in fact suffered heavily from the shift from planned to market economy. The concentration of industries of the military-industry complex and the loss of centrally-provided subsidies have meant that the transition has been particularly difficult: in 1998, the governor was obliged 65

4 KALININGRAD, A THORN IN POLAND S SIDE to declare a state of emergency. Throughout the region, there is a high level of corruption and criminality, while AIDS and the use of drugs is spreading. At the beginning of the nineties, precisely because of the region s difficult situation, Boris Eltsin granted Kaliningrad a series of economic concessions, including the status of free economic zone. Even so, the inability of the local administrator to exploit these opportunities, being ostracised by others such as St. Petersburg, along with opposition from some circles in Moscow, all hindered the arrival of foreign capital. The 750 years of Königsberg Relationships with bordering States have not been easy. The Moscovite expectations of obtaining special concessions, which would affect the sovereignty of Warsaw and Vilnus in terms of corridors for transport of military equipment and troops and its controversial use by Moscow s diplomacy, have long poisoned the atmosphere. It is well know that Moscow is displeased by NATO s enlargement to the East and the political role of Warsaw in the region for example, towards Bielorussia and in the Ukraine crisis by support for Viktor Yushenko. With Poland, there have been many moments of a cooling of diplomatic relationships. In 2000, Warsaw expelled nine Russian diplomats, accused of espionage, and Moscow retorted with expulsion of the same number, just as in the Cold War era. In just the last few years, controversies have raged about Moscow s celebration of the 60th anniversary of the victory of the Second World War and the new state of denial characteristic of Vladimir Putin s presidency (for example on the question of Katyn or the Molotov-Ribbentrov Pact, which we covered in issue 4 of east). On 2 July this year, for the 750 year celebrations of Königsberg, the Russian President Vladimir Putin invited German chancellor Gerhard Schröder and French President Jacques Chirac but quite visibly failed to invite their Lithuanian and Polish counterparts, Presidents Valdas Adamkus and Aleksander Kwasniewski. There were immediate reactions. Adamkus stated clearly: It is difficult to understand why _Putin invited both the German Chancellor Schröder and the French President Chirac to Königsberg s 750th anniversary celebrations, but not their Lithuanian and Polish counterparts, respectively Presidents Adamkus and Kwasniewski the 750 th anniversary of Kaliningrad is being celebrated without the neighbours The close and open cooperation of the Kaliningrad region with the states of the Baltic Sea region, in particular Lithuania and Poland, has been declared to be of major importance to the European Union and Russia. In an interview on Polish television, Kwasniewski, who rarely abandons the cold language of diplomacy, was particularly explicit: not only did he criticise Putin for failing to invite his country s representatives and those of Lithuania, instead inviting Chirac and Schröder, but he also accused the then German chancellor of having ties that were too close to the Russian president. Gas and geopolitics The aim of Kwasniewski s criticisms of Schröder became clear some days later, on 8th September, when in the presence of the Russian President and the German chancellor in Berlin a 4 billion agreement was signed. Drawn up between the Russian gas monopolist Gazprom (which will have a 66

5 HISTORY 51 percent holding) and the German companies BASF and E.ON (each with 24.5 percent), the agreement covers construction of a 1200-km long submarine gas pipeline that begins at Vyborg (close to St. Petersburg) and finishes at Greifswald. Its route has been explicitly chosen to deny the Baltic States and Poland energy resources and transit rights. The gas pipeline should be up and running by It will initially transport 27.5 billion cubic meters of gas, rising to 55 billion when fully operational. The agreement will reduce the German dependence on oil, but the International Energy Agency has warned Berlin that it could become too dependent on supply from Moscow. Russia already provides Berlin with 32 percent of its country s energy needs. In Poland, news of the agreement has united government and opposition. The former Lithuanian President Vytautas Landsbergis spoke in drastic terms: The new Russian-German alliance, today termed an energy alliance is a plan for changing the political map of Europe. And he added the warning that Russia could activate an energy block or manipulate supply costs. The fears of the new EU members have been pounced on even by some commentators from Moscow. In the Kommersant, Nataliya Gevorkyan wrote: It has made an offer they couldn t refuse. And this is the end of the history of European joint interests, of the new and old Europe, of Putin s authoritarian regime and the new democracies This is a modern version of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact. Moscow cannot be denied the elegance of the manoeuvre and Germany cannot be denied the ability to take advantage of it Russia has not only drawn up an advantageous agreement, but also punished its former republics, which are oriented towards the West I have no doubt that Russia has set out on a geopolitical project, which will increase its influence in the post-soviet arena. Nataliya Gevorkyan concludes with the observation that while the Kremlin is and will continue to be controlled by its former Soviet security officers, there are risks for Europe, and the agreement is not simply economic but also political. In turn, Kwasniewski has been clear: From the point of view of the European Union of a common EU policy, towards Russia, there s something wrong if a member of the EU, an influential country like Germany, can follow a policy like this over our heads and over those of the EU. Yet again, the EU has acted with little coherence. What has occurred bears out the urgent need to develop a clear policy towards Moscow. 67