Kaunas & the Lithuania-Poland-Russia Tripoint
Days Eight & Nine - The Baltics - 2024
All the main highlights of Kaunas (the ones that were opened, anyway) followed by a visit to an exceptionally well-blocked border.
Editor’s Comment: The terms “Baltics” and “Baltic” are complicated: geopolitically, the “Baltic states” refer to Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania, the “Baltic region” refers to those states which border the Baltic Sea, and the “Baltic peoples” are those who speak Baltic languages, primarily Latvian and Lithuanian. I apply the term “Baltics” in this travelogue to apply to those states of Baltic region I traveled through, in this case Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland. Additionally, certain characters have been transliterated to be compatible with the fonts used on this website.
1. Lithuanian Aviation Museum
Opened in 1983, the Lithuanian Aviation Museum has over 40 aircrafts exhibited.
After leaving the Hill of Crosses, we made our way to Kaunas. Roughly halfway through the trip, we decided it best to take it easy over the next day and take our time in this city of 295,000.
I’m usually a pretty meticulous planner, but I somehow missed that nearly every museum in Kaunas is closed on Monday. Shuffling the schedule around a bit (ultimately for the better, I think), we decided to take a stroll around the city and knock out some laundry and push visiting two key sites -the 9th Fort and the Devils’ Museum- to the morning.
One of the few museums open on Mondays is the Lithuanian Aviation Museum, so we decided to check that out first. There are a few dozen airframes in various states of repair and, unless you are a Soviet-bloc aviation enthusiast- there isn’t much here to see or learn.
2. View Over Kaunas
Kaunas is the second largest city in Lithuania, and the fourth largest city in the Baltic states.
Moving northward, we made a stop at the Aleksotas Observation Deck for a nice view over the city.
3. Kaunas Castle #1
Built in the 14th century as the first brick castle in Lithuania, Kaunas Castle stood empty and crumbling for nearly 200 years before restoration efforts were made in the early 21st century.
We then made our way down to Kaunas Castle, a once important stronghold for Lithuanian, the Teutonic Order (briefly), and the Swedish. Only one-third of the original structure stands today.
Three more photographs of Kaunas Castle follow.
4. Kaunas Castle #2
5. Kaunas Castle #3
6. Kaunas Castle #4
7. Church of St. George the Martyr
The Church of St. George the Martyr was built between 1492 and 1502.
I took a minute to check out the nearby St. George the Martyr Church, which is a pleasant gothic-style Roman Catholic structure. I suppose I should point out that, unlike Estonia and Latvia where Lutheranism is prominent, Lithuania is plurality Roman Catholic.
8. Vytis Monument
Vytis is the name of the mounted sword and shield-carrying knight who appears on Lithuania’s coat of arms.
Behind Kaunas Castle along the Neris River, you can find this statue which honestly looks amazing considering it was sculpted nearly 100 years ago.
9. Kaunas 9th Fort Museum #1
Built in 1902 as a defensive fort by the Russian Empire, the 9th Fort is perhaps best known today as the site of several Nazi Germany mass murders resulting in the deaths of upwards of 50,000 Jews.
As mentioned previously, many of Kaunas’ best-known and most prominent sites are closed on Monday - this includes the 9th Fort Museum, which is located a fair distance outside the city center.
The 9th Fort has had a varied history since its early 20th century construction. First, it served as a defensive fort of the Russian Empire, the last of nine such emplacements around Kaunas, then on the border of the increasingly bellicose German Empire. Following the independence of Lithuania in 1918, the site served as a prison. When Lithuania was absorbed into the Soviet Union’s “sphere of influence” under the terms of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, it continued as a prison, but for political prisoners awaiting transport to gulags. Following Nazi Germany’s conquest of Lithuania during Operation Barbarossa, the site served as a military garrison, but also a site of mass murder of Kaunas’ Jewish population. Following World War II, the Soviet’s resumed use of the prison until 1948. In 1958, it became a museum.
In 1984, the 32 meter / 105 foot Ninth Fort Memorial was constructed commemorating the victims of the Nazi’s atrocities.
10. Kaunas 9th Fort Museum #2
While originally focusing on Nazi atrocities during World War II, the 9th Fort Museum contains exhibits concerning the Soviet Union’s use of the site as a political prison.
The museum is incredibly expansive and has dozens of rooms covering each of the periods discussed above in incredible detail. I would certainly schedule a couple of hours to make your way through.
11. Kaunas 9th Fort Museum #3
Most of the museum’s exhibits are labeled in English.
12. Kaunas 9th Fort Museum #4
On 29 October 1941, around 9,200 Jews were executed by fewer than a dozen Einsatzkommandos in mass graves pre-dug by Soviet prisoners of war in an event now known as the Kaunas Massacre.
You can explore the old fortresses’ pillboxes, as well as the vast fields where the Nazis carried out thousands of murders.
As mentioned previously, we had to shoehorn this stop in as the site wasn’t opened on Mondays. Having one more stop before making our way to Poland, we headed back downtown to check out the quirky Devils’ Museum.
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13. Devils’ Museum #1
The Devils’ Museum, formally the Zmuidzinavicius Museum, started as a showcase of the artist’s collection of 260 devil sculptures in his former home; it has since grown to over 3,000 artifacts.
I just had to visit the Devils’ Museum, even if this required backtracking into downtown Kaunas. The visit was, thankfully, quick and you can make your way through the museum’s three floors in under an hour if you like. Feel free to leave a devil-themed deposit as the museum takes donations (something this New Jersey Devils fan would have loved to have known in advance!)
Five more photographs of the Devils’ Museum follow.
14. Devils’ Museum #2
15. Devils’ Museum #3
16. Devils’ Museum #4
17. Devils’ Museum #5
18. Devils’ Museum #6
19. Lithuania-Poland-Russia Tripoint #1
The border between Russia’s Kaliningrad Oblast, Poland, and Lithuania is the result of the Yalta Conference (which set modern Poland’s eastern border), the Potsdam Conference (which gave Kaliningrad to the Soviet Union), and a 1950 decision by the leader of the Lithuanian Communist Party to not absorb Kaliningrad so as to not disrupt the state’s ethnic composition.
I just had to stop at the Lithuania-Poland-Russia tripoint on the way to our overnight stop. This location is incredibly fascinating for a variety of reasons, not least of which is that it is the physical manifestation of the partition of this region by the allies near the end of and following World War II. This region was part of the German state of East Prussia until 1945, but practically no remnants of “German-ness” remain here despite over 250,000 Germans having resided in what is now Kaliningrad Oblast (compared to about 5,000 Soviets) in 1945. What happened is honestly one of the least discussed aspects of World War II and a true case of history being written by the victors. As per usual with my history recaps, there’s a lot of detail here so buckle up.
Following World War I in 1918, a decision needed to be made concerning the border of two emerging states - the Second Polish Republic and the Soviet Union. British Foreign Secretary George Nathaniel Curzon recommended a border (known as the Curzon Line) between the future states, relying heavily on ethnography of Polish and non-Polish peoples. The matter of the border was settled in the 1921 Treaty of Riga, which resulted in Poland recognizing Soviet claims over puppet states, particularly Ukraine.
Fast forward to the eve of World War II, and Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union sign the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact, establishing spheres of influence and secretly deciding on how to partition Poland; the Soviets revived the Curzon Line concept, and it was agreed that this is where the Soviet Union’s border would end following the Poland’s conquering.
This treaty was rendered null by Operation Barbarossa and the German invasion of the Soviet Union; however, that did not end the Soviet Union’s claims to the area. During the February 1945 Yalta Conference, Joseph Stalin argued that the Soviet Union should be compensated the territories promised under Molotov-Ribbentrop as compensation for Nazi duplicity and that a new Polish state would be enlarged with territories from the German state east of the Oder-Neisse Line. It was further agreed at the Potsdam Conference that the former German territory of Königsberg would transfer to the Soviet Union, becoming Kaliningrad Oblast (the full reason why Kaliningrad is part of Russia and not Lithuania is a story for another time, perhaps.)
These actions set the stage for the expulsion, flight, or arrest and even death of millions of Germans from lands recovered by the Allies in the years at the end of and following World War II. To help contextualize the scale of this mass movement, in mid-1945 there were about 4.5 million ethnic Germans living east of the Oder-Neisse Line; by 1950, over 3 million were expelled. The vast majority of these peoples migrated to a war-torn divided German state or Austria, putting additional economic strain on those populations. Extrajudicial reprisals for Nazi actions during the war against these peoples by subsuming Allied citizens were also, unfortunately, common.
So, to recap: by the dawn of the 1950s, Poland had absorbed significant territory that was not ethnically Polish, the Soviet Union had absorbed territory that was predominantly German, and the Western powers had formally recognized the Soviet’s absorption of puppeted states, such as Lithuania and Ukraine. As we see in Ukraine, revanchism is alive and well and who knows how future generations will interpret these post-war Allied measures?
So what does this have to do with the small column sitting in a field? Well, this monument is -if nothing else- a physical manifestation of deals brokered by world powers to settle the futures of millions of people without their input. It is no major surprise, then, the monument is now surrounded in razor wire, the result of a political game played some 70 years prior.
20. Lithuania-Poland-Russia Tripoint #2
In the span of three years, the Russian-controlled area surrounding the monument went from a de facto open border, to being blocked off with metal barricades, to now being completely surrounded with razor wire.
21. Lithuania-Poland-Russia Tripoint #3
A razor wire fence is now erected along the entire 210 kilometer / 130 mile Poland-Russia border.
22. Lithuania-Poland-Russia Tripoint #4
Had I looked at the super tiny print at the very bottom of the English language section of this sign board nearby to the monument, I would know that photography of Russian Federation territory was prohibited. Well, it’s done now.
After a late lunch at the lovely dumpling restaurant Matrioszka in Goldap, we made our way to our overnight stop in Gizycko. I will say this is a truly beautiful part of Europe and I really wish I had more time to explore its undulating fields and backroads.
