Waffen-SS veterans march in Latvia - The "other" WWII vets

World War II Latvian Vets marching

The Echos of World War II

• Over 55,000 Latvians joined the Waffen SS to fight against Communist Russia for the freedom of their nation.
• Not ever issue is a clear black and white.  There are many shades of gray.  Only two decades earlier World War I Imperial German armies had driven the Russians out of Latvia allowing for an independent nation to be born.  Latvians fighting with the Germans against Russia would not have been viewed by them as a bad thing.  It would have been patriotic. 

(RT News)  -  Up to a thousand Nazi Waffen-SS veterans and their supporters have marched through Latvia’s capital, Riga, in their annual commemorating procession. In response, Latvian anti-fascists came out to “clean up” the route.

The march of the SS veterans started in Vecriga, in Riga’s old town, at 11:00 local time Monday after a religious service. The participants, holding the national flags of Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia, walked through the city to the Monument of Freedom, where they lay flowers. Many veterans wore uniforms of the legion and pre-war uniforms.

Latvian Waffen SS
Sleeve Shield

The use of Nazi and Soviet symbols was forbidden in the parade and the participants were not allowed to veil faces.

The annual march causes controversy among various social groups. Anti-fascist and Jewish organizations, such as the Simon Wiesenthal Center, believe such rallies glorify Nazism.

“These people fought for the victory of the Third Reich, the most genocidal regime in human history,” Efraim Zuroff, director of the Simon Wiesenthal Center office in Jerusalem, told RT in Riga. “Among the people who served in Latvian SS Legion there were those who previously served in area commando, Latvian security police, actively involved in mass murder of Latvian Jews and Jews brought to Latvia to be murdered.”

Zuroff says the participants of the march are often associated with the fight for Latvia’s independence.

“Here they try to create the impression that these people helped bring about independent Latvia,” he said. “There is a direct line from fighting the military service to independent Latvia today. But nothing can be farther from the truth because Nazi Germany had absolutely no intention to give Latvia independence. That is only because the Nazi Germany lost the war that today there is independent democratic Latvia.”

The Waffen-SS march has been held annually on March 16 since 1998, although it is not an official holiday. Latvia’s national day of remembrance for war heroes is on November 11.

Read More . . . .

The Latvian Waffen SS

The legion consisted of two divisions of the Waffen-SS: 15th Waffen Grenadier Division of the SS (1st Latvian) and the 19th Waffen Grenadier Division of the SS (2nd Latvian).

Most Americans do not understand that the entire Russian front in World War II was manned by non-German Waffen SS units and allied armies from Finland down to Romania.  The insane racist policies of the Nazis were not on the minds of the eastern Europeans.  It was a war against Communist Russia.

Waffen-SS foreign volunteers and conscripts 

An elderly Latvian takes part in a ceremony to honor soldiers who fought in a Waffen SS unit during World War II, in Riga, Latvia. (photo credit: AP/Roman Koksarov)

Those "other" World War II vets thought they were fighting
against Communism and for the freedom of their nation.

Get your Latvian Waffen SS Calendar today
jj
January: 
“Defend your Motherland! Fight the Bolsheviks!”

March: 

“Fight bolshevism! Common fight, common victory!” 

August: 

“To Arms! Guard your Motherland, people and family from bolshevism!”

(imhoclub.lv)

Waffen SS vets and their supporters in Latvia

The USA sends tanks and troops to Latvia

Four Simple Foreign Police Rules

.
Bernard Woolley:   What if the Prime Minister insists we help them?
Sir Humphrey Appleby:  Then we follow the four-stage strategy.
Bernard Woolley:  What's that?
Sir Richard Wharton:  Standard Foreign Office response in a time of crisis.
Sir Richard Wharton:  In stage one we say nothing is going to happen.
Sir Humphrey Appleby:  Stage two, we say something may be about to happen, but we should do nothing about it.
Sir Richard Wharton:  In stage three, we say that maybe we should do something about it, but there's nothing we can do.
Sir Humphrey Appleby:  Stage four, we say maybe there was something we could have done, but it's too late now.

From Yes, Prime Minister - A Victory for Democracy

The United States will send four tanks, 12 infantry combat vehicles and 150 troops to Latvia in order to bolster the security of the Baltic nations, a spokesperson for the Latvian Ministry of Defense Kaspars Galkins said Thursday.

The Latvian military official said that a squadron of the US 173rd Airborne Brigade, stationed at a military base in Adazi, will be replaced a same-level unit of the 1st Cavalry US Army Division, consisting of two squadrons, one of them equipped with 12 Bradley infantry combat vehicles and the other one with four Abrams tanks reports the Baltic Review.

The US military will be engaged in training Latvian and other NATO member nations’ troops, Galkins added.

In April, Washington sent troops to Poland, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania to support its NATO allies amid the Ukrainian crisis.

During his September visit to Estonia, US President Barack Obama reassured the Baltic nation with support from Washington over alleged Russian aggressive foreign policy toward Ukraine.

Estonia currently stations over 150 US troops from 173rd Airborne Brigade, with the country’s Defense Ministry also saying the United States will replace them with 1st Cavalry US Army Division personnel, tanks and combat vehicles.



173rd Airborne Brigade in Afghanistan.



Socialist parties defeated in Latvia and Bulgaria

Bulgaria's centre-right GERB emerged as the winner of national elections.

Two Wins For Conservatism

Coming soon to the U.S.?  Center-Right coalitions marched to victory in two different European elections.

Former Bulgarian Prime Minister Boyko Borisov is returning to power after his center-right GERB party won most seats in parliamentary elections but fell short of a majority to govern alone.

With 99 percent of the votes counted from Sunday's election, the Conservative GERB party led with 32.7 percent and the Socialists came second with 15.4 percent, the Central Election Commission announced Monday.

Boyko Borisov
A former Communist, Borisov is now
leader of a center-right party.

 

GERB officials said Monday their party was ready to form a minority government and was seeking the support of other parties but not the Socialists reports ABC News.

 

Borisov said he was prepared to govern the country and left the door open for talks with possible coalition partners. He said the alternative was holding a new election that would cause political uncertainty and financial turmoil for the European Union's poorest nation.

 

Borisov, 55, headed a minority government between 2009, when his party took nearly 40 percent of the vote, until 2013, when he resigned amid sometimes violent protests against poverty, high utility bills and corruption.

 

The nation of 7.3 million is struggling with corruption and a widespread disillusionment with the governing elite. A weak economic recovery is now threatened by a Russian ban on European food imports and a major crisis in the country's fourth-largest bank.

 

Bulgaria belongs to NATO and the 28-nation European Union but many residents feel a strong kinship to Russia.

Latvian Prime Minister's right of center Coalition Wins Majority in Election

Latvia’s ruling coalition keeps Russia-leaning

party at bay in election

A party mainly backed by ethnic Russians won the largest number of votes in Latvia’s parliamentary elections this weekend, but is likely to be shut out of government after fears over a resurgent Kremlin dominated the campaign.

The Harmony party, led by the mayor of Riga, Nil Ushakov, won 23% of the votes in the elections, while the coalition of three current ruling parties had 56% between them.

After the Kremlin’s actions in Ukraine and increased rhetoric about protecting Russians abroad, there have been concerns among the Latvian elite that the country’s large Russian-speaking minority could be used to give Moscow a foothold in the small Baltic state reports the Guardian.

Harmony favours closer ties with Moscow, while maintaining Latvia’s Nato and EU membership, and Ushakov raised eyebrows in Riga with a visit to Moscow recently during which he proclaimed that the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, was “the best option that Latvia can hope for” in the current political climate.

The election result shows that Ushakov’s attempts to reach beyond his traditional ethnic Russian base and appeal to a broader electorate have failed.

The results will give Harmony 25 seats in Latvia’s 100-seat parliament, six fewer than they had before the elections, when they were also the largest single party in parliament. Other parties, however, were reluctant to enter a coalition with what is seen as the “Russian party”.

“Putting the current votes for the coalition in the preliminary results together, it has convincingly acquired a majority,” Latvia’s president, Andris Berzins, said on Sunday in a televised address.

The parties will now have a week in which to enter negotiations, with a similar configuration to the current parliament the most likely outcome.

A third of Latvia’s population is Russian-speaking, but about 280,000 are “non-citizens” of the country, holding special passports that bar them from voting. In order to become citizens, they have to take an exam on Latvian culture and history, a process which Russian rights groups say amounts to discrimination, but Latvian authorities say is necessary given the history of Soviet occupation and forced Russification policies of the past.

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Warning to American Readers

Please do not be frightened.  The Latvian election chart below is typical of democratic nations all over the world from South Korea to Poland to Israel to Australia.

All over the world voters have many different real political parties to choose from on their ballots.  That is called freedom.  While in the U.S. you are only allowed the choice of two corrupt Washington D.C. funded parties.

Don't worry.  Soon you will forget this article ever existed and go back to your dream-world thinking that you live in a democracy.

Seats won by different Latvian political parties.
See more Latvian Parliamentary Election, 2014

Parliament of Latvia