This book explores how war made the Lithuanian state and shaped society from the onset of the Great War in 1914 to the last waves of violence in 1923. As the very notion of an independent Lithuania was constructed during the war, violence became an essential part of the formation of Lithuanian state, nation, and identity. War was much more than simply the historical context in which the tectonic change from empire to nation state took place. It transformed people, policies, institutions, and modes of thought in ways that would continue to shape the nation for decades after the conflict subsided. By telling the story of the post-World War I conflict in Lithuania, the book focuses on the juncture between soldiers and civilians rather than the strategies and acts of politicians, generals, or diplomats. Its two main themes are the impact of military, social, and cultural mobilizations on the local population, and different types of violence that were so characteristic of the region throughout the period. The actors in this story are people displaced by war and mobilized for war: refugees, veterans, volunteers, peasant conscripts, prisoners of war, paramilitary fighters, and others who took to guns, not diplomacy, to assert their power. The book tells the story of how their lives were changed by war and how they shaped the society that emerged after war.
This chapter discusses the Polish–Lithuanian War of 1919–20. The war flared in May 1919 when the first open clash took place between Lithuanian and Polish troops. It gradually escalated and lasted until late November 1920 when, in Kaunas, both sides agreed to stop fighting along the demarcation line established by the League of Nations. Yet there was no final peace agreement signed, only a truce. And low-scale paramilitary violence continued unabated in the “neutral zone” along the demarcation line until as late as May 1923. The chapter argues that the war against Poland provided an opportunity for total mobilization of the whole of Lithuanian society. The fact that, during the entire interwar period, the conflict remained open-ended, ensured that the paramilitary structures and military laws that emerged during it would remain in place for much longer.
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