A report on Estonian Soviet Socialist Republic

Location of Estonia (red) within the Soviet Union
According to the 23 August 1939 Nazi-Soviet Pact Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania were divided into German and Soviet "spheres of influence" (German copy)
Location of Estonia (red) within the Soviet Union
People massacred by Soviet NKVD on 8 July 1941 in Tartu, Estonia
Soviet-organized rally in Tallinn, July 1940
Karl Säre with other Estonian Communist Party officials in Tallinn, July 1940
A propaganda poster from the Stalin era. The poster says: "The spirit of the great Lenin and his victorious banner encourage us now in the Patriotic War."
Soviet prison doors on display in the Museum of Occupations, Tallinn, Estonia
1967 Soviet stamp
A reconstruction of a typical Soviet-era living room, in a museum in central Tallinn.
Tram along the Pärnu maantee street in Tallinn on June 26, 1983
The blue-black-white flag of Estonia was raised on Pikk Hermann on February 24, 1989.
Border changes of Estonia after World War II
Johannes Käbin, leader of the Communist Party of Estonia from 1950 to 1978
1941 mugshot of kindral Johan Laidoner after his arrest 1940
Estonian Song Festival in Tallinn in 1980
Plaque on Stenbock House, the seat of the Government of Estonia, commemorating government members killed by Soviet forces

Ethnically based administrative subdivision of the former Soviet Union (Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, USSR) covering the territory of Estonia in 1940–1941 and 1944–1991.

- Estonian Soviet Socialist Republic

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Estonia

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Country in Northern Europe.

Country in Northern Europe.

Bronze Age stone-cist graves
Iron Age artefacts of a hoard from Kumna
Independent counties of Ancient Estonia in the beginning of the 13th century
Medieval Estonia and Livonia after the crusade
Kuressaare Castle in Saaremaa dates back to the 1380s
"Academia Dorpatensis" (now University of Tartu) was founded in 1632 by King Gustavus as the second university in the kingdom of Sweden. After the king's death it became known as "Academia Gustaviana".
Carl Robert Jakobson played a key role in the Estonian national awakening.
Declaration of Independence in Pärnu on 23 February 1918. One of the first images of the Republic.
Estonian armoured train during the Estonian War of Independence
According to the 23 August 1939 Nazi-Soviet Pact "the Baltic States (Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania)" were divided into German and Soviet "spheres of influence" (German copy)
The Red Army troops crossing Soviet-Estonian border in October 1939 after Estonia had been forced to sign the Bases Treaty
The capital Tallinn after bombing by the Soviet Air Force during the war on the Eastern Front in March 1944
Estonian Swedes fleeing the Soviet occupation to Sweden (1944)
The blue-black-white flag of Estonia was raised again on the top of the Pikk Hermann tower on February 24, 1989.
Baltic Way in Estonia
The barn swallow (H. r. rustica) is the national bird of Estonia.
Estonia Endla Nature Reserve 07 Forest
Haanja Nature reserve where violations of Natura 2000 area logging is taking place.
The seat of the Parliament of Estonia in Toompea Castle
Building of the Supreme Court of Estonia in Tartu
US President Barack Obama giving a speech at the Nordea Concert Hall in Tallinn
Foreign ministers of the Nordic and Baltic countries in Riga, 2016
Estonian soldiers during a NATO exercise in 2015
KAPO (Kaitsepolitsei) headquarters in Kassisaba, Kesklinn, Tallinn
An Estonian Patria Pasi XA-180 in Afghanistan
Administrative divisions of Estonia
A proportional representation of Estonia exports, 2019
The central business district of Tallinn
Real GPD per capita development of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania
Estonia's GDP growth from 2000 till 2012
The oil shale industry in Estonia is one of the most developed in the world. In 2012, oil shale supplied 70% of Estonia's total primary energy and accounted for 4% of Estonia's gross domestic product.
Rõuste wind farm in Lääneranna Parish
Graphical depiction of Estonia's product exports in 28 colour-coded categories
Population of Estonia 1960–2019. The changes are largely attributed to Soviet immigration and emigration.
Estonian folk dancers
A Russian Old Believer village with a church on Piirissaar island
Ruhnu stave church, built in 1644, is the oldest surviving wooden building in Estonia
Distribution of Finnic languages in Northern Europe
The University of Tartu is one of the oldest universities in Northern Europe and the highest-ranked university in Estonia. According to the Top Universities website, the University of Tartu ranks 285th in the QS Global World Ranking.
Building of the Estonian Students' Society in Tartu. It is considered to be the first example of Estonian national architecture. The Treaty of Tartu between Finland and Soviet Russia was signed in the building in 1920.
ESTCube-1 is the first Estonian satellite.
The Estonian National Museum in Tartu.
The Estonian Song Festival is UNESCO's Masterpiece of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity.
Arvo Pärt was the world's most performed living composer from 2010 to 2018.
Jaan Kross is the most translated Estonian writer.
A traditional farmhouse built in the Estonian vernacular style
Mulgipuder, a national dish of Estonia made with potatoes, groats, and meat. It is very traditional food in the southern part of Estonia.
Tartu Ski Marathon in 2006

Democratic throughout most of the interwar period, Estonia declared neutrality at the outbreak of World War II, but the country was repeatedly contested, invaded and occupied, first by Stalinist Soviet Union in 1940, then by Nazi Germany in 1941, and ultimately reoccupied in 1944 by, and annexed into, the USSR as an administrative subunit (Estonian SSR).

Soviet Union

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Transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991.

Transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991.

The Soviet Union after World War II
Lenin, Trotsky and Kamenev celebrating the second anniversary of the October Revolution
The Soviet Union after World War II
The Russian famine of 1921–22 killed an estimated 5 million people.
Construction of the bridge through the Kolyma (part of the Road of Bones from Magadan to Jakutsk) by the workers of Dalstroy.
Five Marshals of the Soviet Union in 1935. Only two of them – Budyonny and Voroshilov – survived Great Purge. Blyukher, Yegorov and Tukhachevsky were executed.
The Battle of Stalingrad, considered by many historians as a decisive turning point of World War II.
From left to right, the Soviet General Secretary Joseph Stalin, US President Franklin D. Roosevelt and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill confer in Tehran, 1943.
Map showing greatest territorial extent of the Soviet Union and the states that it dominated politically, economically and militarily in 1960, after the Cuban Revolution of 1959 but before the official Sino-Soviet split of 1961 (total area: c. 35,000,000 km2)
Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev (left) with US President John F. Kennedy in Vienna, 3 June 1961.
Nikolai Podgorny visiting Tampere, Finland on 16 October 1969
Soviet general secretary Leonid Brezhnev and US President Jimmy Carter sign the SALT II arms limitation treaty in Vienna on 18 June 1979
Mikhail Gorbachev in one-to-one discussions with US President Ronald Reagan
The Pan-European Picnic took place in August 1989 on the Hungarian-Austrian border.
T-80 tank on Red Square during the August Coup
Changes in national boundaries after the end of the Cold War
Internally displaced Azerbaijanis from Nagorno-Karabakh, 1993
Country emblems of the Soviet Republics before and after the dissolution of the Soviet Union (note that the Transcaucasian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (fifth in the second row) no longer exists as a political entity of any kind and the emblem is unofficial)
Sukarno and Voroshilov in a state meeting on 1958.
1960s Cuba-Soviet friendship poster with Fidel Castro and Nikita Khrushchev
Soviet stamp 1974 for friendship between USSR and India as both nations shared strong ties, although India was a prominent member of Non-Aligned Movement
Gerald Ford, Andrei Gromyko, Leonid Brezhnev and Henry Kissinger speaking informally at the Vladivostok Summit in 1974
Mikhail Gorbachev and George H. W. Bush signing bilateral documents during Gorbachev's official visit to the United States in 1990
1987 Soviet stamp
Military parade on the Red Square in Moscow, 7 November 1964
The Grand Kremlin Palace, the seat of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union, 1982
Nationalist anti-government riots in Dushanbe, Tajikistan, 1990
A medium-range SS-20 non-ICBM ballistic missile, the deployment of which in the late 1970s launched a new arms race in Europe in which NATO deployed Pershing II missiles in West Germany, among other things
From left to right: Yuri Gagarin, Pavel Popovich, Valentina Tereshkova and Nikita Khrushchev at the Lenin's Mausoleum in 1963
Soyuz rocket at the Baikonur Cosmodrome
The DneproGES, one of many hydroelectric power stations in the Soviet Union
Picking cotton in Armenia in the 1930s
Workers of the Salihorsk potash plant, Belarus, 1968
Volzhsky Avtomobilny Zavod (VAZ) in 1969
Soviet stamp depicting the 30th anniversary of the International Atomic Energy Agency, published in 1987, a year following the Chernobyl nuclear disaster
Soviet stamp showing the orbit of Sputnik 1
Aeroflot's flag during the Soviet era
Population of the Soviet Union (red) and the post-Soviet states (blue) from 1961 to 2009 as well as projection (dotted blue) from 2010 to 2100
Valentina Tereshkova, the first woman in space, visiting the Lviv confectionery, Ukrainian SSR, 1967
Young Pioneers at a Young Pioneer camp in Kazakh SSR
People in Samarkand, Uzbek SSR, 1981
Svaneti man in Mestia, Georgian SSR, 1929
An early Soviet-era poster discouraging unsafe abortion practices
Cover of Bezbozhnik in 1929, magazine of the Society of the Godless. The first five-year plan of the Soviet Union is shown crushing the gods of the Abrahamic religions.
The Cathedral of Christ the Saviour in Moscow during its demolition in 1931
A paranja burning ceremony in the Uzbek SSR as part of Soviet Hujum policies
World War II military deaths in Europe by theater and by year. Nazi Germany suffered 80% of its military deaths in the Eastern Front.
2001 stamp of Moldova shows Yuri Gagarin, the first human in space
People in Donetsk celebrate the Soviet victory over Nazi Germany, 9 May 2018
Soviet singer-songwriter, poet and actor Vladimir Vysotsky in 1979
Valeri Kharlamov represented the Soviet Union at 11 Ice Hockey World Championships, winning eight gold medals, two silvers and one bronze
One of the many impacts of the approach to the environment in the USSR is the Aral Sea (see status in 1989 and 2014)
Landscape near Karabash, Chelyabinsk Oblast, an area that was previously covered with forests until acid rainfall from a nearby copper smelter killed all vegetation
Ethnographic map of the Soviet Union, 1941
Ethnographic map of the Soviet Union, 1970

In 1991, Gorbachev initiated a national referendum—boycotted by the Soviet republics of Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Armenia, Georgia, and Moldova—that resulted in the majority of participating citizens voting in favour of preserving the country as a renewed federation.

Planned and actual divisions of Europe, according to the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, with later adjustments.

Occupation of the Baltic states

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The Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania were invaded and occupied in June 1940 by the Soviet Union, under the leadership of Stalin and auspices of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact that had been signed between Nazi Germany and the USSR immediately before the outbreak of World War II.

The Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania were invaded and occupied in June 1940 by the Soviet Union, under the leadership of Stalin and auspices of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact that had been signed between Nazi Germany and the USSR immediately before the outbreak of World War II.

Planned and actual divisions of Europe, according to the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, with later adjustments.
Soldiers of the Red Army enters the territory of Lithuania during the first Soviet occupation of Lithuania in 1940
Schematics of the Soviet military blockade and invasion of Estonia in 1940. (Russian State Naval Archives)
Einsatzkommando execution in Lithuania
Victims of Soviet NKVD in Tartu, Estonia (1941)
Latvian SS-Legion parade through Riga before deployment to Eastern Front. December 1943
Lithuanian rebels lead the disarmed soldiers of the Red Army in Kaunas
The plan of deportations of the civilian population in Lithuania during the Operation Priboi created by the Soviet MGB.
Antanas Sniečkus, the leader of the Communist Party of Lithuania from 1940 to 1974
Pro-independence Lithuanians demonstrating in Šiauliai, January 1990.
Unarmed Lithuanian citizen standing against a Soviet tank during the January Events.
Monument to Lithuanian victims of Soviet occupation in Gediminas Avenue, Vilnius. 54.68858°N, 25.27056°W
Nils Ušakovs, the first ethnic Russian mayor of Riga in independent Latvia
The Red Army's 16th Rifle Division fighting in the Oryol Oblast in the summer of 1943

However, the Soviet Union never formally acknowledged its presence in the Baltics as an occupation or that it annexed these states and considered the Estonian, Latvian and Lithuanian Soviet Socialist Republics as three of its constituent republics.

Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic

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Independent federal socialist state from 1917 to 1922, and afterwards the largest and most populous of the Soviet socialist republics of the Soviet Union from 1922 to 1991, until becoming a sovereign part of the Soviet Union with priority of Russian laws over Union-level legislation in 1990 and 1991, the last two years of the existence of the USSR.

Independent federal socialist state from 1917 to 1922, and afterwards the largest and most populous of the Soviet socialist republics of the Soviet Union from 1922 to 1991, until becoming a sovereign part of the Soviet Union with priority of Russian laws over Union-level legislation in 1990 and 1991, the last two years of the existence of the USSR.

The Russian SFSR (red) within the Soviet Union (red and light yellow) between 1956 and 1991
The Russian SFSR in 1922
The Russian SFSR (red) within the Soviet Union (red and light yellow) between 1956 and 1991
The Russian SFSR in 1924
The Russian SFSR in 1929
The Russian SFSR in 1936
The Russian SFSR in 1940
Flag adopted by the Russian SFSR national parliament in 1991
Matryoshka doll taken apart

Within the Soviet Union, the RSFSR bordered the Slavic states: Ukrainian SSR (Ukraine), Belarusian SSR (Belarus), the Baltic states: Estonian SSR (Estonia), Latvian SSR (Latvia) and Lithuanian SSR (Lithuania) (Included in USSR in 1940) to its west and the Azerbaijan SSR (Azerbaijan), Georgian SSR (Georgia) and Kazakh SSR (Kazakhstan) to the south in Central Asia.

Map of the Union Republics from 1956 to 1991, as numbered by the Soviet Constitution

Republics of the Soviet Union

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The Republics of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics or the Union Republics were national-based former countries and ethnically based administrative units of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR).

The Republics of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics or the Union Republics were national-based former countries and ethnically based administrative units of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR).

Map of the Union Republics from 1956 to 1991, as numbered by the Soviet Constitution
Country emblems of the Union republics, before and after the dissolution of the Soviet Union. Note that the Transcaucasian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (fifth in the second row) no longer exists as a political entity of any kind, and the emblem is unofficial.
A hall in Bishkek's Soviet-era Lenin Museum decorated with the flags of Soviet Republics
Poster of the unity of the Soviet republics in the late 1930s. All republics, except Russia, are shown with their respective traditional clothes.
Poster of the unity of the Soviet republics in the late 1940s. Note that the map also points out the Karelo-Finnish SSR capital, Petrozavodsk.

The Baltic states assert that their incorporation into the Soviet Union in 1940 (as the Lithuanian, Latvian, and Estonian SSRs) under the provisions of the 1939 Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact was illegal, and that they therefore remained independent countries under Soviet occupation.

Estonian Sovereignty Declaration

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The Estonian Sovereignty Declaration (suveräänsusdeklaratsioon), fully: Declaration on the Sovereignty of the Estonian SSR (Deklaratsioon Eesti NSV suveräänsusest), was issued on November 16, 1988 during the Singing Revolution in Soviet Estonia.

Baltic exilee protest signs from the second half of the 20th century against the Soviet occupation of the Baltic States.

State continuity of the Baltic states

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The three Baltic states – Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania – are held to have continued as legal entities under international law while under Soviet rule and German occupation from 1940 to 1991.

The three Baltic states – Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania – are held to have continued as legal entities under international law while under Soviet rule and German occupation from 1940 to 1991.

Baltic exilee protest signs from the second half of the 20th century against the Soviet occupation of the Baltic States.
Baltic exilee protest signs from the second half of the 20th century against the Soviet occupation of the Baltic States.
Welles declaration, July 23, 1940, establishing U.S. policy of non-recognition of forced incorporation of the Baltic States
The map shows the Western recognition and non-recognition of annexation of the Baltics. Baltic states Soviet Union Warsaw Pact socialist countries Nations that explicitly did not recognize the Soviet occupation of the Baltic states, either de jure or de facto Nations that explicitly did not recognize the Soviet occupation of the Baltic states de jure but recognised the Soviet rule in the Baltics de facto Nations that recognized the incorporation of the Baltic states into the Soviet Union de jure States that have not expressed their position in any way

Most of the countries in the Western Bloc refused to recognise the incorporation of the Baltic states de jure and only recognised the Soviet governments of Estonian SSR, Latvian SSR and Lithuanian SSR de facto or not at all.

Narva

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Municipality and city in Estonia.

Municipality and city in Estonia.

Swedish Lion Monument in Narva
Peter I of Russia pacifies his marauding troops after taking Narva in 1704 by Nikolay Sauerweid, 1859
View of Narva in the 1750s
The Resurrection of Christ Cathedral, Narva (constructed 1890–1896)
A 1929 plan of Narva (including Ivangorod, part of Narva at the time)
The Town Hall, surrounded by Soviet-era apartment blocks, is one of the few buildings which were restored after World War II.
View of Narva in 2014. Ivangorod Fortress, in Russia, lies across the river on the right.
Neighborhoods of Narva
The reconstructed fortress of Narva (to the left) overlooking the Russian fortress of Ivangorod (to the right).

The Russian Federation, however, considers Estonia to be a successor of the Estonian SSR and recognizes the 1945 border between the two former national republics.

Soviet sphere of influence in Central and Eastern Europe with border changes resulting from invasion and military operations of World War II

Military occupations by the Soviet Union

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During World War II, the Soviet Union occupied and annexed several countries effectively handed over by Nazi Germany in the secret Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact of 1939.

During World War II, the Soviet Union occupied and annexed several countries effectively handed over by Nazi Germany in the secret Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact of 1939.

Soviet sphere of influence in Central and Eastern Europe with border changes resulting from invasion and military operations of World War II
Molotov signing a deal between the Soviet Union and the short-lived puppet state Finnish Democratic Republic, which existed on occupied territories during the Winter War.
Map of the Eastern Bloc
Map of Romania after World War II indicating lost territories.
Occupation zones in Austria
The Soviet invasion in late December 1979.

These included the eastern regions of Poland (incorporated into two different SSRs), as well as Latvia (became Latvian SSR), Estonia (became Estonian SSR), Lithuania (became Lithuanian SSR), part of eastern Finland (became Karelo-Finnish SSR) and eastern Romania (became the Moldavian SSR and part of Ukrainian SSR).

Estonian government-in-exile

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The formally declared governmental authority of the Republic of Estonia in exile, existing from 1944 until the reestablishment of Estonian sovereignty over Estonian territory in 1991 and 1992.

The formally declared governmental authority of the Republic of Estonia in exile, existing from 1944 until the reestablishment of Estonian sovereignty over Estonian territory in 1991 and 1992.

Location of Estonia
Jüri Uluots
Location of Estonia

The "People's Riigikogu" met on 21 July, with only one order of business–a resolution declaring Estonia a Soviet republic and petitioning to join the Soviet Union.