Dirva = Field. [volume] (Cleveland, Ohio) 1915-current, 1948-04-02

combines" alluding to Soviet pro-
misses to furnish them with up-to-
date agricultural machinery.
Rations in the towns are very
small consisting mainly of inferior
and watery black bread, and there
is complicated system of gradua-
ton, the heavy workers receiving
800 grams per day and the home
workers and old people almost no
thing. In the first year of the Rus
slams occupation the country people
were able to supplement the ra-
tions of their friends and relatives
in the towns, but now this has be-
come impossible. The farmers have
no fixed quotas of produce to de-
liver to the state, they have to turn
over the whole harvest. This does
not exempt them from saving their
fields in spring with their own seed,
which they do not have actually, and
what is more, they have also to pro-
vide the new settlers with seed. Ma
turally, they cannot fulfill these de-
mands and that offers a convenient
pretext for deporting and otherwise
victimizing them. The whole bust
ness is merely trick to make them
embrace the collective farm systeem
AS yet there are not many kolk-
hozes in Lithuanian, but the drive
for them is strong, there are meet
ing and lectures every evening all
over the country.
The resistance movement is still
very vigorous in Lithuania, all the
larger forests, and there are many
in the country, are full of guerillas.
The Russians hunt them assiduous-
ly, there is shooting every day and
in the summer of 1916 there was a
regular battle near Shiauliai which
lasted three days and in which the
euerillas were victorious. They help
the country people against the Rus
SLAMS as much as they can and often
execute Soviet functionaries and To-
cal communists who have been cruel
to the Lithuanians q 1t is not an
exaggeration to say that the first
set of presidents of the local Com
munal Executive Committees, the
of the Soviet power
in the country, has already been
liuuidated. Of course, such help is
only of temporary use as the So
viets Immediately send new ones.
In 1947 they even organized special
forces to capture and liquidate the
guerillas, or partisans, as they are
called locally. The forces consisted
of NKVD soldiers and local Commu-
nists and they were even provided
with small tanks. The country is
full of Russian soldiery, mainly NIX
VD men, a little town like Shiauliai
had garrison of over 5000.
Mrs. M. does not know whether
the Soviets are building any fortifi-
cations in the country, but they are
erecting large aerodromes: one for
several hundred planes was under
near Shiauliai and an
,ther at Ezhere, on the Latvian from
,ier. She had heard that similar ones
we're being built all along the Lat
yian frontier. The labor was sup
,lied by people with Mongolian fea-
;ures, speaking language which
nobody could understand. There is
10 doubt that they were deportees
Is their camp was severely isolated
md they worked under armed guard.
They were very ragged and dirty
md apparently half-starved; every
me had a bag tied to his back
With ropes, which they did not PIT
own even while at work.
It appears that the construction
f aerodromes is going on feverish-
Y all over the Soviet Union. A
riend of the Ms, Lithuanian en-
.ineer, who had been deported to
.ussia in 1914, returned in 1947 and
old his friends that he had been
ngaged in building railway from
Siberia to the Manchukuo frontier.
lie had also said that a series of
cry large aerodromes were built at |
egular intervals along a straight
Vest Eastern line through Siberia,
nd even mentioned the names of
he places which Mrs. NJ had un-
ortunately forgotten. German P
)W's and, to smaller extent, slave
abor, had been used as workers and
1any German engineers and spe-
ialists were directing and super
ising the work. This staff, includ-
1g the Lithuanian engineer, had
cen treated very humanity and even
flowed a certain amount of free
ON, probably owing to the location
f the constructions which lay in
ntirely uninhabited and desert vi
mites, bears walking around the
arracks at night. The food had
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