Grzegorz Braun crushes modern Lithuania. "Small chauvinist German project" [Video]

The contemporary Balto-Litwini are very frequently confused with historical Lithuanians whose descendants are contemporary Poles in Kresach (now the Republic of Lithuania and Belarus). Meanwhile, as the contemporary investigator Ryszard Radzik writes, at least until January in the definition of Litwin there was nothing non-Polish¹. It is besides worth noting the thesis of Robert Danilowicz, who, in his popular-scientific article "The Nations of confusion", stressed that:

‘The word Litwin ceased to be a designation of ethnicity. After all, Kościuszko, Mickiewicz, Piłsudski were expected to be Lithuanians. Lithuania itself was considered 1 of the Polish districts, specified as Pomerania or Mazovia“².

In a akin way, the evolution of the concept of Lithuanian Krzysztof Buchowski relates:

‘Over time, as cultural homogenization and linguistic polonization of the noble state progressed, the concept of Lithuanian began simply to mean regional distinctness within the unified political nation of the Republic. Litwin was a nobleman from Żmuda, Lithuania and Russia White, as was the Coroner – Mazur, Wielkopolska, as well as Rusin from Kiev. According to the then concepts of Coroners and Lithuanians, they referred to themselves as Poles, which did not mean cultural declaration, but only state and state. In the consciousness of the inhabitants of the Republic specified meaning of the word Pole and the multilevelness of national sense persisted long after dissection. Poles from Lithuania were happy to emphasize that they are Lithuanian and besides Polish nationalities – gente Lithhuani, Napoleon’s Naton”³. As the author adds:

‘The Polish-Lithuanian Union in a political sense continued until the end of the 18th century. However, in the next century, despite the deficiency of its own state, the general consciousness of Poles was strengthened by the conviction of the lasting nature of the union of Lithuania and Poland and the territorial integrity of the common but enslaved homeland. On the lands of the erstwhile Republic, cultural unity of the inhabitants was developed, and many traditionally understood Lithuanians discovered a modern national identity – they became Poles”⁴ – says the survey “Lithuanians and Polonizers:myths, common perceptions and stereotypes in Polish-Lithuanian relations in the first half of the 20th century". However, Krzysztof Buchowski emphasizes that the process was almost exclusively covered by the nobility-earth layer and intelligence. However,, in the second half of the 19th century and at the beginning of the 20th century accelerated the process of Polishisation of agrarian population, especially in Vilnius⁵.

Extensive citation of the author mentioned above is justified, that he thoroughly and thoroughly studied the sources utilized in the work on common stereotypes in Polish-Lithuanian relations. Nevertheless, the cognitive value of this survey allows for its wider use, including erstwhile analysing the evolution of the perception of Lithuania and Lithuania for the purposes of considering the Lithuanian lobby in modern Poland. Krzysztof Buchowski established and systematised facts that are besides applicable to the current relations between Poles and Lithuanians. This investigator points out the formation of antagonism related to claims, crystallizing since the 19th century, the fresh Lithuania national movement to the name and past of Lithuania:

‘It should be stressed that, with the emergence of the Lithuanian national movement, they gradually lost their first meaning of the concept that has been utilized for centuries. In the early 20th century, descendants of the erstwhile noble Lithuanians now referred to themselves as Poles [...] On the another hand, representatives of the so-far "Mudish people", now "nationalized", were called Lithuanians, in addition to reserveing the exclusive ownership of the term. Historical Żudź defined Lithuania, claiming besides to another lands of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania’⁶.

It is worth noting that part of the nobility was then referred to as “Historical Lithuanians”, “Mickiewiczian Lithuanians” or “old Catholics”⁷. This was an effort to go beyond the paradigm imposed by modern nationalisms, in which Polishness became incompatible with modern knowing of Lithuanianism. The second grew increasingly markedly in the confrontation with Polish heritage in the historical areas of Lithuania. As Barbara Jundo-Kaliszewska writes:

‘Rejecting the nobility and cultural heritage of bourgeoisie, the Lithuanian community consciously decided to abandon the cultural baggage of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. The emphasis put on the improvement of national culture in peasant form, which became synonymous with the independency of the Lithuanian state and caused the point of gravity to be transferred to linguistic-cultural space"⁸.

In the dispute over the legacy of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, the position of Poles residing in historical Lithuania and the attitude of Novolitovsk nationalism to their national recognition will prove crucial. It seems reasonable to note Barbara Paulko that:

‘Lithuanian nationalism even invented theories about Poles in Lithuania, according to which they are simply Lithuanians speaking Polish”⁹.

The following explanation of Polish presence in Lithuania was formulated by priest Juozas Tumas-Vaižgantas, co-founder of the National advancement Party, who stated that:

‘Vilnius – Lithuania, us – Lithuanians, and local Poles – newcomers”¹⁰. In turn, another activist of the alleged Lithuanian national revival Mykolas Biržiška apriorically qualified all residents of the territory to which the fresh Lithuania national movement aspired, as cultural Lithuanians, stating that the nationality ‘is not a substance of seeing’¹¹.

In summary, the modern "Lithuanianism" is the boom of the 19th/XXth-century separatistism created in the north-eastern areas of pre-opportunity Poland. Modus operandi recalls the modern methods of creating the “Silesian Nation” where the Silesianness confronts artificially with Polishness.

Are Belarusians “real Lithuanians”?

Sometimes, on the margins of discussions about the legacy of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, it is said that it is not the Baltic-Lithuanian but the Belarusians that are "real Lithuanians". Meanwhile, between the Ruthic national Belarusian identity, which is simply a margin among the Belarusians themselves, and the historical Lithuanians themselves, there is no real historical and identity continuity. However, frequently the alleged Belarusian national circles make Belarusians from above from specified characters as Adam Mickiewicz or Tadeusz Kościuszko.

Historical presents in the form of creation with Adam Mickiewicz Belarusian loses meaning erstwhile we scope the crucial quote of the prophet from “Book of Polish Nation and Pilgrimage”:

‘The Lithuanians and Masuria brothers are: do the brethren argue that 1 is named Władysław, the another Witowt? Their name is one: the name of Poles".

Also Tadeusz Kościuszko, who – as prof. Andrzej Walicki pointed out – was a supporter of the Polishization, according to the enlightened ideas of unification of the nation in the image of Jacobine France, all social layers within the limits of 1772, is not suitable for a hero conscious of his expected Belarusianness. On the marketplace in Krakow, the warden made the following declaration: "I, Tadeusz Kościuszko, curse in the face of God to the full Polish nationThat the power entrusted to me in no private oppression will I use, but only to defend the full borders, regain the independency of the Nation and establish universal freedom I will use."

However, modern Belarusians, nevertheless totalitarian russian power prevented them from producing a separate culture and language on a full scale in the 1930s, are not “real Lithuanians”. There is no communication between the WXL and the existing temporarily mainly on paper of the Belarusian People's Republic, or even more so between the WXL and the Belarusian SRR, which as if "created" modern Belarusians. As Ryszard Radzik wrote in the survey “Who Are Belarusians?” in Belarus there is no phenomenon of Belarusian national identity on a wider scale.. It can be concluded, therefore, that in the case of contemporary Belarus, we are dealing with a map drawn, although the real-life contour, which forms the current Belarusian state – the heir to the Belarusian SRR, with its contents, interiors, mainly the Russian-speaking population, recognising the relation with Russia and Russia itself as part of a common civilizational space. The exception is the Poles in Belarus, who are mainly Catholics, frequently due to Catholicism defining their Polishness in the first place under conditions of universal national indifference in Belarus.. It is the local Poles in Belarus, together with the Poles from the neighboring Republic of Lithuania, who are descendants and heirs of the historical Lithuanians.