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"Official Soviet sources claimed that the presence of the Soviet military was necessary to strengthen defenses of a weak nation against possible attacks by Nazi Germany." Since they had just signed 2 major treaties, it sounds weird, since these things are usually accompanied by a lot of official hoopla about a new era of cooperation. Is there any way to put something in along the lines of "despite the Pact and Treaty, the Soviet Union maintained some distance from Germany"? Or is it possible that the Lithuania-needed-protection-from-Germany rationale was issued later?
Novickas (
talk)
15:39, 23 July 2009 (UTC)reply
Very interesting observation. No, the "Lithuania-need-protection" rationalle was used immediately (there is a New York Times headline in line of "Soviet Union Proclaimed Defender of the Baltics"). But Russia indeed was very friendly with Germany (later there were even accusations that Lithuanians are not friendly enough to Germany and too friendly with England and United States). My best guess that while Russian and Germany were friends, that did not include the small states in between them. So Germany could attack Lithuania without violating the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact and still maintaining cosy relationship with Russia. Anyway, it was just an excuse.
Renata (
talk)
02:54, 24 July 2009 (UTC)reply
"In February 1940, the Lithuanian government decided to relocate the army units so that they could shield the government while it retreats abroad." Were the army units actually relocated?
Novickas (
talk)
14:58, 25 July 2009 (UTC)reply
There was no ultimatum in 1939 for Lithuania. Because Lithuania received Vilnius, it did not need an ultimatum like Latvia and Estonia.
Renata (
talk)
20:24, 30 July 2009 (UTC)reply
So, you actually gained? Interesting and obvious, but I really did not think that way. I wonder what would happened if Finland made territorial exchanges as the Soviet Union suggested before the
Winter War. Probably the country would be occupied, but after that unpleasent experiense... Who knows.
Peltimikko (
talk)
21:08, 30 July 2009 (UTC)reply
Hello. Overall this is a pretty good article! However therea re some issues that I will outline below.
Prose
Lead sections should be at minimum 2 full paragraphs, see
WP:LEAD. My suggestion is to make the first paragraph more about the background and why it lead to the acceptance, with the second paragraph the implementation and effects.
"Therefore the Soviets followed semi-legal procedures: took control of the government institutions, installed a new puppet government, and announced show elections to the People's Seimas" -does not make sense. Either needs a they before "took control" or a modification of the colon.
"in part as an attempt to buy time against this possibility" -does not make sense (metahpor mixing?) Buy time to prepare for this possibility, perhaps, or "in an attempt to delay this"? I'm not sure exactly what the original source said so I dont want to change the meaning.
"In February 1940, the Lithuanian government decided to relocate the army units so that they could shield the government while it retreats abroad.[19] Although various resolutions were forwarded, nothing tangible was accomplished." The first sentence seems to interrupt the flow of ideas that continues with the second sentence. Also, it's not clear--did the army units move? The "nothing tangible" suggests that they didn't.
"Izvestia published an article warning that it was naive for a small country to attempt neutrality"-- should make it clear in the text that Izvestia is a Soviet newspaper, to clarify.
"Since there had been strong opposition to Smetona's rule, it was interpreted by some Lithuanians as a destruction of presidential power rather than as a loss of independence."--needs a reference at the end of it
"The official fraudulent.[56] results showed a voter turnout of 95.51% and that communist delegates received 99.19% of the votes."--incomplete sentences!
"The Communist Party of Lithuania with some 1,500 members[61] and its youth branch were designated the only legitimate political entities" need commas after lituania and members in order to add proper flow and direction.
Due to the massive amount of info that is crapped into it,
File:Ribbentrop-Molotov.svg is rather useless even at the high resolution it is linked at. Perhaps a redrawing of the map would help, shunting the key into a separate section, like the image here:
[1] I think that would require the original uploader's assistance though.
Uploaded a new map without legend (which is on the description page). Added another map. I am not aware of any other suitable maps/images.
Renata (
talk)
04:28, 27 September 2009 (UTC)reply
File:Antanas Smetona 2.jpg is currently up for deletion--I'd remove it for now and reinstate it if it's kept.
Agh, sorry for the delay. I worked probably like 60 hours this week. I think I am officially brain dead :( I expanded the lead and I hope it meets the criteria. Let me know if anything else needs fixing. Thanks for the patience!
Renata (
talk)
03:41, 4 October 2009 (UTC)reply
Don't worry, I had a couple of real-world issues to address too and have been away for the past three days or so. :) I will try and read through it again and respond later today.
Martin Raybourne (
talk)
20:09, 5 October 2009 (UTC)reply
Alright, I've double-checked and it seems like my main issue (the lead) has been taken care of. The article looks much better, and I am happy to pass as GA. Congrats!
Martin Raybourne (
talk)
00:13, 6 October 2009 (UTC)reply
During several automated bot runs the following external link was found to be unavailable. Please check if the link is in fact down and fix or remove it in that case!
Hello. A blurb for this article has appeared on the front page in the "On this day" section - well done - but I have a slight concern over the phrase above. To my English ears, this doesn't sound quite natural. A quick Google search seems to show that the first few matches featuring this exact phrase are from non-English sources. May I suggest an alternative wording for this lead paragraph to be:
"The Soviets, using a formal pretext, demanded that an unspecified number of Soviet soldiers be allowed to enter the Lithuanian territory [...]"
Normally I would be
bold and change it myself but as it's the lead paragraph of an article with which I have no knowledge, I would be happier to gain agreement here first. Regards,
Careful With That Axe, EugeneHello...07:47, 14 June 2011 (UTC)reply
p.s. The Main Page blurb has already been modified; see discussion
here.