From Prussia To Russia

The Russian exclave of Kaliningrad, a tiny territory that is home to Russia's Baltic fleet and a nuclear-capable missile force, has long been regarded as the 'achilles heel' of NATO's eastern frontline. Cushioned between Lithuania to the north and Poland in the south, the city-region is separated from Putin's ally Belarus by some 100 kms along a wooded corridor called the Suwalki Gap. This would suggest that Kaliningrad is isolated and vulnerable, especially as the war in Ukraine has seen Finland and Sweden join NATO, making the Baltic essentially a NATO lake. But this home to some 1 million Russians remains a powerful militarised hub which, it's alleged, has been responsible for recent hybrid warfare in the region - including GPS-jamming of civilian aircraft and the cutting of undersea communications cables. Some argue that if the Russians could seize the Suwalki Gap, then they could badly disrupt NATO's supply lines to the Baltic states. Yet for many hundreds of years this Russian territorial fortress was German, initially Prussian, and known as Konigsberg, the capital of Germany's easternmost province of East Prussia. Kings had been crowned in the city and the philosopher Immanuel Kant had lived there. After the First World War, East Prussia was separated from Germany by the so-called Danzig Corridor, and removing this obstacle to German national unity was a prime reason why Hitler invaded Poland in 1939. It was near Rastenburg, deep in the Masurian Forest some 90 kms south-east of Konigsberg, that Hitler established his eastern front HQ known as the Wolfsschanze or Wolf's Lair - site of the July 1944 bomb blast that failed to kill the Fuhrer. By that date, however, the Red Army had pushed back German forces in the east and crossed into the German Reich itself. By January 1945 Soviet troops had taken all of East Prussia and were besieging Konigsberg, which Hitler had designated one of his 'fortress' cities - that is, to be held to the last man. Outnumbered and outgunned - the Soviets bombed unopposed from the air and shelled the city from some 250 artillery pieces every kilometre - Konigsberg put up a remarkable defence that lasted until April 9 (80 years ago yesterday) when its commander General Otto Lasch finally surrendered along with 90,000 troops - though not before several of his peace envoys had been killed by their own side, fanatical Nazis who saw surrender as treason. In the event, Hitler ordered Lasch to be hanged in absentia - the general survived the war to write his memoirs. Tens of thousands of the city's civilians died in the siege and Red Army deaths in the East Prussian campaign amounted to over 126,000, 40% more than in the final battle for Berlin. Not surprising then, perhaps, that at Potsdam, at Stalin's request, Konigsberg became part of the USSR, even though both Poland and the Baltic states were then occupied by the Red Army and would remain within the Soviet bloc for the next 45 years. The fact that the city's port was ice-free all year round (unlike other Russian naval bases) clearly made it strategically important for the Soviets. In 1946 the city was renamed Kaliningrad: any remaining Germans were expelled and the territory was repopulated with Russian-speaking Soviet citizens. The dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, following on the earlier independence of Poland and Lithuania, left Kaliningrad as the curious Russian outpost it is today - as beleaguered as its German predecessor at the end of WW2 (current EU sanctions mean the city can only be supplied by sea) but posing both a symbolic and a real threat at the heart of NATO and the EU.

If you think you know about WW1 and WW2, it's time to think again.

www.unknownwarriorspod.co.uk

An Understanding History Podcast