Baltics

Soviet and German occupations, 1940–1991

The June 1940 Soviet invasion of the Baltics was immediately followed by mass repressions, including arrests, executions, and mass deportations by the new Soviet totalitarian regime. The Stalinist central government in Moscow attempted to Sovietize its occupied territories. Between 1940 and 1953, the Soviet central government deported more than 200,000 people from the Baltics to remote locations in the Soviet Union. In addition, at least 75,000 were sent to Gulags. About 10% of the adult Baltic population was deported or sent to labor camps. (See June deportation, Soviet deportations from Estonia, Sovietization of the Baltic states)