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What is forgot here in the west, because it is NOT TAUGHT, is that the Baltic States of Estonia, Latvia & Lithuania, were equal victims of the Poland crime! On 23 August 1939, the Molotov-Ribbentrop (nonaggression) Treaty was signed by two of the bloodiest regimes in modern history, an act that made WW2 inevitable!

While most know how it partitioned Poland like a farm animal, what was equally bad was the raft of secret provisos, including 'spheres of influence'. When Stalin moved in on his allocation of Poland on 17 September 1939, he also 'invited' these countries to sign 'mutual assistance pacts' which gave the Soviet military unrestricted right to establish military bases within. Upon the surrender of France to Germany in June 1940, the Soviet Union used those same troops to aid the full invasion that removed those countries from the map. In the 1+ year prior to Germany's Operation Barbarossa, the Soviet occupiers imprisoned local leaders, killed some and force-exiled large groups to eastern Russia. Their 'friendship' operations were sufficient that, like in the Ukraine, there were many greeting the German Army as liberators.

So it is no wonder that with memories like these AND seeing Russia's CURRENT actions in the Ukraine, they have decided that it is time for these monuments to go!

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A note about the Latvians that didn’t welcome the Germans as liberators.

By July 10, 1941, German armed forces had occupied all of Latvia's territory. Latvia became a part of Nazi Germany's Reichskommissariat Ostland – the Province General of Latvia (Generalbezirk Lettland). Anyone who was disobedient to the German occupation regime as well as those who had co-operated with the Soviet regime were killed or sent to concentration camps. In 1939 Generalplan Ost was drawn up by Nazi Germany covering eastern countries. As regards Latvia, it was determined that the population of around 2,000,000 should be reduced by 50%, those remaining being considered worthy of "Germanisation". Accordingly, Jews, Romani people, communists, army officers, politicians, and other intellectuals all found themselves being rounded up.[30]: 54–56  Further reductions in the civilian population would be achieved through the creation of food shortages, resulting in mass starvation.[30]

Source:wiki

It’s become almost impossible to find how many Russians died in the battles vs German nazis at these memorials. Internet searches are expunging sources except those critical of Russia,