United Baltic Duchy

### Executive Head of Government

Carl Wolmar Jakob von Uexküll - Prime Minister of Baltic Germany (the Islands of Saaremaa and Hiiumaa)
Siim Kallas - Prime Minister of Estonia
Krišjānis Kariņš - Prime Minister of Latvia
Einars Repše - Prime Minister of Courland

### Governing Body

Parliament of the Latvian, Estonian and Baltic Knighthoods

### National Status

Puppet State

The United Baltic Duchy is a nation located in Eastern Europe in the Baltic States of Latvia and Estonia.

## History

During World War I the German Imperial Army had occupied the Courland Governorate of the Russian Empire by the autumn of 1915. The front stabilised along the line Riga–Daugavpils–Baranovichi.

Following the February Revolution of 1917 in Russia, the Russian Provisional Government declared the establishment of the Autonomous Governorate of Estonia on 12 April [O.S. 30 March] 1917, amalgamating the former Russian Governorate of Estonia and the northern portion of the Governorate of Livonia. After the October Revolution later in the same year, the elected Estonian Provincial Assembly declared itself the sovereign power in Estonia on 28 November 1917. On 24 February 1918, a day before the arrival of German troops, the Estonian Salvation Committee of the Provincial Assembly issued the Estonian Declaration of Independence. The Western Allies recognized the Republic of Estonia *de facto* in May 1918.

The term 'Grand Duchy of Livonia' refers to the Livonia region, which made up most of the young United Baltic Duchy.

The Latvian Provisional National Council was constituted on the basis of the law of self-government which the Russian Provisional Government granted to Latvia on 5 July 1917. The Latvian Provisional National Council first met on 16 November 1917 in Valka. On 30 November 1917, the Council declared an autonomous Latvian province within ethnographic boundaries, and a formal independent Latvian republic was declared on 15 January 1918.

After the Russian Revolution, German troops had started advancing from Courland, and by the end of February 1918 the German military administered the territories of Estonia that had declared independence and the Russian Governorate of Livonia. With the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk on 3 March 1918, Bolshevist Russia accepted the loss of the Courland Governorate, and by agreements concluded in Berlin on 27 August 1918, the loss of the Autonomous Governorate of Estonia and the Governorate of Livonia.

As a parallel political movement under the German military administration, Baltic Germans began forming provincial councils between September 1917 and March 1918.

On 8 March 1918, the local Baltic German-dominated '**Kurländische Landesrat'** declared the restoration of Duchy of Courland ('**Herzogtum Kurland'**), which was formally recognised by Kaiser Wilhelm on 15 March 1918. On 12 April 1918, a Provincial Assembly ('**Vereinigter Landesrat'**) composed of 35 Baltic Germans, 13 Estonians, and 11 Latvians passed a resolution calling upon the German Emperor to recognize the Baltic provinces as a monarchy and make them a German protectorate.

The United Baltic Duchy was nominally recognized as a sovereign state by emperor Wilhelm II only on 22 September 1918,[*citation needed*] half a year after Soviet Russia had formally relinquished all authority over former Russian Imperial Baltic governorates to Germany in the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk. On 5 November 1918, a temporary Regency Council ('**Regentschaftsrat'**) for the new state led by Baron Adolf Pilar von Pilchau was formed on a joint basis from the two local Land Councils.

The capital of the new state was to be Riga. It was to be a confederation of seven cantons: '**Kurland'** (Courland), Riga, '**Lettgallen'** (Latgale), '**Südlivland'** (South Livonia), '**Nordlivland'** (North Livonia), '**Ösel'** (*Saaremaa*), and '**Estland'** (Estonia), the four first cantons thus covering the territory corresponding to today's Latvia and the latter three corresponding to today's Estonia.

The first head of state of the United Baltic Duchy was to be Duke Adolf Friedrich of Mecklenburg, not as a sovereign monarch, but as a subordinate to the German *Kaiser*, similar to other princes of the German Empire. But Adolf Friedrich never assumed office. The appointed Regency Council consisting of four Baltic Germans, three Estonians and three Latvians functioned until 28 November 1918, without any international recognition, except Germany.

In October 1918, the Chancellor of Germany Prince Maximilian of Baden proposed to have the military administration in the Baltic replaced by civilian authority. The new policy was stated in a telegram from the German Foreign Office to the military administration of the Baltic: "The government of the Reich is unanimous in respect of the fundamental change in our policy towards the Baltic countries, namely that in the first instance policy is to be made with the Baltic peoples.

On 18 November 1918, Latvia proclaimed independence. August Winnig, the last representative of the German government, signed an agreement with representatives of the Estonian Provisional Government about handing over power on Estonian territory on 19 November. In Latvia, the Germans formally handed over authority to the Latvian national government headed by *Kārlis Ulmanis* on 7 December 1918.

The '**Baltische Landeswehr'** was formed by the government of the United Baltic Duchy as its national defense force. Upon taking command of the '**Baltische Landeswehr'**, Major Alfred Fletcher, with the backing of the Baltic German land barons, began dismissing native Latvian elements and replacing them with Baltic Germans and '**Reichsdeutsche'** troops. Concurrently, German officers assumed most of the command positions. In his book *Vanguard of Nazism: The Free Corps Movement in Postwar Germany, 1918–1923*, author Robert G. L. Waite notes: "By mid-February 1919, Latvians composed less than one-fifth of their own army". Britain backed down after recognizing the gravity of the military situation, and the White Russian units and the '**Freikorps'** moved on and captured Riga on 22 May 1919.

After the capture of Riga, the '**Freikorps'** were accused of killing 300 Latvians in *Mitau* (*Jelgava*), 200 in *Tuckum* (*Tukums*), 125 in *Dünamünde* (*Daugavgrīva*), and over 3,000 in Riga. After taking part in the capture of Riga, in June 1919 General *von der Goltz* ordered his troops not to advance east against the Red Army, as the Allies had been expecting, but north, against the Estonians. On 19 June 1919, the Iron Division and '**Landeswehr'** units launched an attack to capture areas around *Wenden* (*Cēsis*), the '**Baltische Landeswehr'** continued its advance towards the Estonian coast preparatory for a push on Petrograd. However, the '**Baltische Landeswehr'** was defeated by the 3rd Estonian Division (led by *Ernst Põdder*) and North Latvian Brigade in the Battle of *Cēsis*, 19–23 June 1919.

On the morning of 23 June 1919, the Germans began a general retreat toward Riga. The Allies again insisted that the Germans withdraw their remaining troops from Latvia, and intervened to impose a ceasefire between the Estonians and the '**Freikorps'** when the Estonians were about to march into Riga. Meanwhile, an Allied mission composed of British troops under General Sir Hubert de la Poer Gough had arrived in the Baltic to clear the Germans from the region and organize native armies for the Baltic states.

The defeat of Germany in World War I in November 1918, followed by the defeat in 1919 of the '**Baltische Landeswehr'** and German '**Freikorps'** units of General *Rüdiger von der Goltz* in Latvia by the 3rd Estonian Division and North Latvian Brigade, rendered the United Baltic Duchy irrelevant.

To ensure its return to Latvian control, the '**Baltische Landeswehr'** was placed under British authority. After taking command of the '**Baltische Landeswehr'** in mid-July 1919, Lt Col Harold Alexander (the future Alexander of Tunis), gradually dismissed the Baltic German elements. The Baltic nations of Estonia and Latvia were established as republics.

Võidupüha or Victory Day or the Victory Day in the Battle of Võnnu is a public holiday in Estonia which takes on June 23. The holiday has been celebrated since 1934 and marks the victory of Estonia and neighboring Latvia in the Battle of Cēsis against the Baltische Landeswehr on 23 June 1919.

During the interwar period these countries were sometimes referred to as *limitrophe states* between the two World Wars, from the French, indicating their collectively forming a rim along Bolshevik Russia's, later the Soviet Union's, western border. They were also part of what Clemenceau considered a strategic cordon sanitaire, the entire territory from Finland in the north to Romania in the south, standing between Western Europe and potential Bolshevik territorial ambitions.

Prior to World War II Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania each experienced an authoritarian head of state who had come to power after a bloodless coup: Antanas Smetona in Lithuania (December 1926), Konstantin Päts in Estonia (March 1934), and Kārlis Ulmanis in Latvia (May 1934). Some note that the events in Lithuania differed from its two more northerly neighbors, with Smetona having different motivations as well as securing power 8 years before any such events in Latvia or Estonia took place. Despite considerable political turmoil in Finland no such events took place there. Finland did however get embroiled in a bloody civil war, something that did not happen in the Baltics. Some controversy surrounds the Baltic authoritarian régimes – due to the general stability and rapid economic growth of the period (even if brief), some commenters avoid the label "authoritarian"; others, however, condemn such an "apologetic" attitude, for example in later assessments of Kārlis Ulmanis.

In accordance with a secret protocol within the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact of 1939 that divided Europe into German and Soviet spheres of influence, the Soviet Army entered eastern Poland in September 1939, and then coerced Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania into mutual assistance treaties which granted them the right to establish military bases in these countries. In June 1940, the Red Army occupied all of the territory of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania, and installed new, pro-Soviet governments in all three countries. Following elections (in which only pro-communist candidates were allowed to run), the newly elected parliaments of the three countries formally applied to join the Soviet Union in August 1940 and were incorporated into it as the Estonian, Latvian, and Lithuanian Soviet Socialist Republics.

Repressions, executions and mass deportations followed after that in the Baltics. The Soviet Union attempted to Sovietize its occupied territories, by means such as deportations and instituting the Russian language as the only working language. Between 1940 and 1953, the Soviet government deported more than 200,000 people from the Baltic to remote locations in the Soviet Union. In addition, at least 75,000 were sent to Gulags. About 10% of the adult Baltic population were deported or sent to labor camps. (See June deportation, Soviet deportations from Estonia, Sovietization of the Baltic states)

The Soviet control of the Baltic states was interrupted by Nazi German invasion of this region in 1941. Initially, many Estonians, Latvians, and Lithuanians considered the Germans as liberators. The Baltic countries hoped for the restoration of independence, but instead the Germans established a civil administration, known as the *Reichskommissariat Ostland*.[*citation needed*] During the occupation the Germans carried out ghettoisations and mass killings of the countries' Jewish populations. Over 190,000 Lithuanian Jews, nearly 95% of Lithuania's pre-war Jewish community, and 66,000 Latvian Jews were murdered. The German occupation lasted until late 1944 (in Courland, until early 1945), when the countries were reoccupied by the Red Army and Soviet rule was re-established, with the passive agreement of the United States and Britain (see Yalta Conference and Potsdam Agreement).

The forced collectivisation of agriculture began in 1947, and was completed after the mass deportation in March 1949 (see Operation Priboi). Private farms were confiscated, and farmers were made to join the collective farms. In all three countries, Baltic partisans, known colloquially as the Forest Brothers, Latvian national partisans, and Lithuanian partisans, waged unsuccessful guerrilla warfare against the Soviet occupation for the next eight years in a bid to regain their nations' independence. The armed resistance of the anti-Soviet partisans lasted up to 1953. Although the armed resistance was defeated, the population remained anti-Soviet.

Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia were considered to be under Soviet occupation by the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, NATO, and many other countries and international organizations. During the Cold War, Lithuania and Latvia maintained legations in Washington DC, while Estonia had a mission in New York. Each was staffed initially by diplomats from the last governments before USSR occupation.

In the late 1980s, a massive campaign of civil resistance against Soviet rule, known as the Singing revolution, began. On 23 August 1989, the Baltic Way, a two-million-strong human chain, stretched for 600 km from Tallinn to Vilnius. In the wake of this campaign, Gorbachev's government had privately concluded that the departure of the Baltic republics had become "inevitable". This process contributed to the dissolution of the Soviet Union, setting a precedent for the other Soviet republics to secede from the USSR. Soviet Union recognized the independence of three Baltic states on 6 September 1991. Troops were withdrawn from the region (starting from Lithuania) from August 1993. The last Russian troops were withdrawn from there in August 1994. Skrunda-1, the last Russian military radar in the Baltics, officially suspended operations in August 1998.

All three are today parliamentary democracies, with unicameral parliaments elected by popular vote for four-year terms: Riigikogu in Estonia, Saeima in Latvia and Seimas in Lithuania. In Latvia and Estonia, the president is elected by parliament, while Lithuania has a semi-presidential system whereby the president is elected by popular vote. All are part of the European Union (EU) and members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO).

Each of the three countries has declared itself to be the restoration of the sovereign nation that had existed from 1918 to 1940, emphasizing their contention that Soviet domination over the Baltic states during the Cold War period had been an illegal occupation and annexation.

The same legal interpretation is shared by the United States, the United Kingdom, and most other Western democracies, who held the forcible incorporation of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania into the Soviet Union to be illegal. At least formally, most Western democracies never considered the three Baltic states to be constituent parts of the Soviet Union. Australia was a brief exception to this support of Baltic independence: in 1974, the Labor government of Australia did recognize Soviet dominion, but this decision was reversed by the next Australian Parliament. Other exceptions included Sweden, which was the first Western country, and one of the very few to ever do so, to recognize the incorporation of the Baltic states into the Soviet Union as lawful.

After the Baltic states had restored their independence, integration with Western Europe became a major strategic goal. In 2002, the Baltic governments applied to join the European Union and become members of NATO. All three became NATO members on 29 March 2004, and joined the EU on 1 May 2004. The Baltic states are currently the only former Soviet states to have joined either the Union or the military alliance.

### Blackout

The Blackout has caused a new era of Socialist Insurgencies in Estonia and Latvia who created Socialist Governments which were unstable. The Baltic German Population migrated to the Islands of Saaremaa and Hiiumaa as their homes and they turned them into settlements for the Germans of Baltic German ancestry. The Latvian and Estonian Knighthoods created a anti-communist provisional government on the Islands known as the United Baltic Knighthood States.

The United Baltic Knighthood States and the Communist dictatorships of Latvia and Estonia waged war with each other as they tried to decide the fate of Latvia and Estionia resulting in wars that were devastating.

### German liberation

The German Navy invaded Estonia and Latvia as they then merged them with the United Baltic Knighthood States as they then created a New country known as the United Baltic Duchy. The Duchy had a hard time picking the ruler as Duke Adolf Friedrich of Mecklenburg did not have descendants who were male. The decision for monarch was then revealed to be Charles Wellesley, 9th Duke of Wellington a British Politician and Nobleman who married a Prussian Princess and who retreated to Germany with his family after the crisis in the UK. Charles Wellesley then became Grand Duke Charles Wellesly of the United Baltic Duchy.

## Government

The United Baltic Duchy is a United Semi-Federal Constitutional Monarchy ruled by a Grand Duke who rules as a Constitutional Monarch and has the duties of a ceremonial monarch in which he is in charge of all institutions of the state. The Grand Duke of the United Baltic Duchy has the four titles which are the Duke of Latvia, the Duke of Estonia, the Duke of Baltic Germany and the Duke of Courland. Other than that the monarchy, the government and politics are dominated by four Prime Ministers who represent each of the knighthoods of the Duchy who represent the Duchies of Latvia, Estonia, Baltic Germany and Courland.

### Executive Branch

No discussion of Baltic government can be done without first addressing the elephant in the room - the Four **Baltic Knighthoods**, around which all governmental actions within the United Baltic Duchy revolve themselves.

The Baltic Germans originate from the German conquests of the region during the Northern Crusades, and the formation of a Germanic-ruled state called Terra Mariana. Though established concurrently with the State of the Teutonic Order, it differed in that the colonization of Terra Mariana was far weaker and the state itself far more remote from the rest of the Holy Roman Empire. The German population of the region was sparse and generally composed of noble knights of the Livonian Order. Civil wars in Terra Mariana were frequent, the Church, the Hansa free cities and the Order constantly vied for control over the territory, and to defend their rights and privileges, the nobility began to band themselves into corporations known as the Knighthoods. These corporations were recognized by the Livonian Order and the Archbishopric of Riga and were granted the right to self-governance, they continued to grow in power, gain additional privileges and powers, until, by 1561, Grand Duke Sigismund II Augustus of Lithuania, in the Treaty of Vilnius between Lithuania and the Livonian Confederation, recognized them as the supreme governing authority of the region and granted them the privilege to organize self-government.

A Knighthood is, in the most simple terms, a guild for the nobility. It holds a registry of all noble families which belong to the Knighthood, generally no more than a few hundred of them, it has a legal code and a series of regulations for all members to follow, and it has an autonomous government which deliberates on internal matters of the Knighthood without any interference from the central government. Each Knighthood has an **internal assembly** (*Rittertag*) which elects various officials and appoints numerous honorary offices for the nobles, as well as the **Knighthood Captain** (*Ritterschaftshauptmann*), the top official in the Knighthood. Their main political role is forming **Land Colleges** (*Landratskollegium*), partially legislative, partially executive institutions which are formed in each Canton as well as on a nationwide level. A Land College is a council of 12 noble representatives which fulfills a hybrid role of an upper house and an executive authority. Its task is to review laws and possibly return them to the Landtag, they attend Landtag meetings, and yet at the same time they are unable to propose any laws and instead fulfill the executive duties of the province/state. It also plays the role of the Supreme Court, or, in the case of Cantonal Colleges, the supreme cantonal court. The Landtag has no say in the formation of their respective Land College, only the Grand Duke does in the case of the national Land College.

### Legislative Government

All Baltic provinces are divided into **Cantons** (*Kreise*), and those Cantons are all divided into **Parishes** (*Kirchspiele*). A Parish is on paper the most fundamental administrative unit in the Baltic provinces.Every Parish is led by a **Parish Convention** (*Kirchspielskonvent*), which is composed of all landowners and all estate elders (representatives democratically elected by the estate of a landowner) of the Parish. All noble landowners are required to attend, therefore the Parish Convention is divided equally between landowners and estate elders, and is also a form of direct democracy. The Parish Convention deals with the administrative matters of their Parish, mainly the maintenance of roads, the postal system, the healthcare system, and the election of a parish head (*Kirchspielsvorsteher*), an honorary office usually held by a delegate from the Knighthood. Parishes can also levy their own taxes, although they are unable to levy more than 10 Pfennigs from each inhabitant.

The Parish Convention is also unable to legislate on any issues regarding education. The education system in the Baltic provinces is democratic and controlled by the Lutheran Church rather than the civilian government. Each Parish has a **Parish School Administration** (*Kirchspiels-Schulverwaltung*), which consists of the local Lutheran clergy and all teachers in the parish - this administration autonomously appoints school elders and a church guardian. These administrations receive patronage from the Knighthoods and use it to fund schools in the parish - they are required to construct a school for each 500 people, and all children are required to attend. The Baltic provinces were the first region of the Russian Empire to enforce mandatory universal education, and to this day they are the most literate region in Eastern Europe, the absolute majority of the population are able to read. All Parish school administrations elect representatives to the **Church and School Convent** of their Canton (*Kirchen- und Schulkonvent*), also composed of representatives from the landowners and the Lutheran churches. These Convents act as supervisory bodies to the school system in their respective region, and also raise money for education via landowner donations. Above all them stands the **Regional School Authority** (*Landesschulbehörde*), composed of a representative from each Canton, elected by their respective Landtags, four chief representatives of the Lutheran Church, and hired superintendents.

Each Parish is also home to dozens of **rural communes** (*Landgemeinde*), autonomous peasant collectives made up of villages and single farms which exist outside of any estate. Rural communes practice direct democracy - all land owning citizens in the commune are required to attend the **commune assembly** (*Gemeindeversammlung*). This assembly deliberates on two issues - the election of a **commune committee** (*Gemeindeausschuss*), and the banishment of commune members who have committed crimes or are considered unwelcome for one reason or another. The rural commune has its own police, levies its own taxes, sometimes hires its own soldiers for one reason or another, and helps maintain the autonomous school provided by the Parish School Administration for their community. Though they are technically a part of a Parish, rural communes are completely autonomous, do not have to follow Parish laws, do not send delegates to the Parish Convention and instead send delegates directly to the Canton.

## Military

### Army

The **Baltische Landeswehr** (*Baltic Territorial Army*) is the standing army of the United Baltic Duchy and one of the most professional forces within the German sphere. While arguably small in size, all soldiers (most of them ethnic Germans) are trained to become the best of the best. Equipped with elite equipment from Germany and formed by some of the most decorated veterans of the German Army. The Landeswehr has a ministry-like institution in the Ducal government, the "*Landeswehrkommission*", but is staffed by officers from the army. This makes them effectively independent from the government. The Landeswehr is comprised of several ground divisions and has a small navy and air force to safguard its territory. Service is voluntary and in theory open to all Ducal citizens, however the units are segregated into German, Estonian, Latvian and Russian detachments. The Army is equipped with motorboats with guns, guns of all kinds, humvees and steamboats armed with cannons.

## Foreign Relations

The Duchy only has relations with Germany and it's fellow Puppet Regimes in Europe or other German Allies such as Belgium, Holland, Luxembourg, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Finland and the Imperial State of France. Otherwise nobody knows of the nation except other nations in Europe who see it as a German outpost ruled by Baltic Natives.