Many of you know that the Lithuanian national anthem begins: Lietuva, tevyne musu, tu didvyriu zeme! "Lithuania, our fatherland, land of heroes..." That heroism was evident in battles against the Tatars in the 14th century, the Teutonic knights in the fifteenth, and in resistance to Russian and Soviet rule in the twentieth. Deportation and almost certain death in Siberia, which claimed hundreds of thousands of brave Lithuanians, Estonians and Latvians during the period of brutal Soviet occupation, did not deter those who were part of the Lithuanian resistance during the late Stalin years and those who took bold steps leading to the restoration of Lithuanian independence on March 11, 1990 and its non-violent defense in the face of Soviet force.
Our distinguished speaker, Dr. Vytautas Landsbergis, indeed is from a lineage of the heroes not only of Lithuania but of the broader battle for human values in the twentieth century. Gabrielius Landsbergis, his paternal grandfather and the father of Lithuanian national theater, was rewarded for his affirmation of national culture with arrest by a repressive tsarist regime. Our speaker's maternal grandfather, Jonas Jablonskis, was also involved in resistance to tsarist rule, and he made a lasting contribution to his country's culture by helping to create its common literary language. Dr. Landsbergis's mother was recognized internationally for her courage in saving the lives of Lithuanian Jews during the Holocaust, and his father dared to lead civil resistance to the Soviet authorities, who otherwise would have destroyed the national architectural treasures of old Vilnius. When the elder Vytautas Landsbergis died at age 100 in 1993, it was in a Lithuania whose independence owed much to the efforts of his son.
In light of our own recent experience with a certain saxophonist, we might well be cynical about political leaders who are even amateur musicians. Lithuania's national identity though is very much connected with its musical traditions. In Vytautas Landsbergis we have an individual trained as a professional musician, whose teaching career in the Vilnius Conservatory and Pedagogical Institute spanned two decades, and who has continued to make significant contributions in the advocacy and study of his national music, especially that of the great Lithuanian artist and composer Mikalojus Ciurlionis. As Professor Landsbergis writes in his newly-published autobiography:
His [that is, Ciurlionis'] artistic genius has captured, and still conveys, the essence and irrepressible strength of the Lithuanian character, and his works challenge all those who engage with them to join in that permanent struggle which is necessary to ensure that a humane spirit is central to public life, whether inside the nation or between nations. What is more, he demands a bold commitment, and a passionate imagination from each of his hearers when he challenges them to fulfill their humanity to the utmost. His independence and creativity of mind constituted a call to individuals and to the nation as a whole.
Vytautas Landsbergis answered that call, often risking his career by pushing the limits of official cultural controls, and then emerging from the relative obscurity of academia to become one of the founding leaders of the independence movement Sajudis in 1988. The brief formal summary of his subsequent political positions--in 1990-1992 President of independent Lithuania and in 1996-2000 Speaker of the Lithuanian Parliament--does not begin to do justice to his accomplishments. Any political leader faces vocal criticism; Dr. Landsbergis has had more than his share since the early 1990s. As he rightly reminds us in his book though, that criticism tends to ignore the historic significance of what he helped to achieve in 1990-91. Lest any of us forget, let me provide a brief assessment.
First, we should remember that the dissolution of the Soviet Union was hastened by the actions of the Baltic countries, especially Lithuania. We can still be inspired by the boldness of Lithuania's reassertion of its independence and defiance of Gorbachev's clumsy efforts to preserve as much as possible of the old system. In all this, Dr. Landsbergis played a critical role. A sympathetic observer drew the following analogy in describing his interaction with Gorbachev:
We must regard Landsbergis as a special case: he could be described as relentless; like a mosquito, he was always on the move, always in sight, always buzzing...and Gorbachev seemed to have no idea how to defend himself against this irritable mosquito, and he didn't like it.
I urge you to read Dr. Landsbergis' book, which provides a stirring account of the ways in which his unyielding defense of the principle of not compromising Lithuania's independence eventually won. This is a story of substantial courage in the face of seemingly overwhelming odds. Some of Lithuania's heroes lost their lives in the brutal attacks by Soviet special forces in 1991, but the policy of measured, peaceful response avoided greater bloodshed and the kind of provocation that might have led to a full-scale military intervention.
These events have a particularly important moral and practical lesson for us in the United States. Ostensibly defenders of Baltic countries' independence following their forcible incorporation in the Soviet Union, in fact the Western powers, in the words of Dr. Landsbergis, "had abandoned them and their cause." He goes on to note, "I have no idea whether western politicians ever had any inkling of the responsibility their countries bore, nor do I know whether the West has begun to understand, even now, the enormity of the crime its democracies committed by leaving the Baltic countries in the wilderness and without succor for forty years..." Strong words, but justified, I would argue, especially when we remember that it was Iceland that first recognized independent Lithuania in 1990, at a time when the Bush administration and other western leaders were still enamored of Gorbachev and seemed as oblivious as he to the realities of the national aspirations of the Baltic nations. Such ignorance and lack of moral backbone has been evident since then in the reluctance of the other Washington to include the Baltic countries in NATO, for fear of upsetting the Russians.
I think most in this room today have a commitment to ensuring that in the future American policy might be different. One way of expressing that commitment is, of course, to lobby in the other Washington, providing, of course, it is possible to figure out whom to lobby in the aftermath of our recent election. A better way, I would argue, is to support the development of Baltic Studies here, as many of you have already so generously done. Our task must be to educate Americans about the Baltic countries and to provide continuing opportunities to learn their languages. For several years now we have been providing a range of good courses and a stimulating series of public events, including bringing to campus the most prominent of the leaders of the independent Baltic countries. The University of Washington is the only place in the United States where all three of those national languages are taught and is one of only two institutions teaching Lithuanian on a regular basis. The effect of lobbying is transitory and subject to the exigencies of political opportunism. The effect of providing a real understanding of the history, culture, and languages of the Baltic countries, which can teach us all by their moral example, will be much more lasting, as those with such education become advisers to people in power and themselves become decision-makers.
I could go on, of course, but you came here tonight to hear Vytautas Landsbergis, whose accomplishments in the cause of Lithuanian independence rank him among his country's many heroes and have earned him a place of distinction among the political leaders of the twentieth century. He exemplifies the ideal expressed in the Lithuanian national anthem that the country's children "work for your [i.e., Lithuania's] sake and the good of all people." It has been my great privilege to introduce him and invite you to hear him speak about "Lithuania on the Threshold of the New Millennium."