The Anti-Soviet Fighters on SBS and SBS on Demand – The Baltic forests. A quarter in Lithuania, a third in Latvia and almost half in Estonia. This is where, in the 20th century, a drama unfolded behind closed doors: the resistance of a handful of Lithuanian, Latvian and Estonian partisans against the Soviet Union’s stranglehold on their territory at the end of the Second World War.
For ten years, from 1944 to 1953, the fight for freedom by those we call the “Brothers of the Forest” defied the Kremlin, claiming more than 50,000 victims.
In the days of the USSR, they were portrayed as outlaws, bandits driven by villainous motives. But since the Baltic States regained their independence in 1991, monuments have been erected everywhere in their honor. These men and women have come to symbolise the price paid for the right to live free.
Who were these freedom fighters? What was their real life like in the forest? How did they fight, and how were they defeated? How did these men and women, placed by history between the Nazis and the Soviets, escape the general bloodshed of the 20th century?
The Anti-Soviet Fighters on SBS and SBS on Demand – Premiere / Sunday 8 February at 5.30pm (1 Part)
TV Central SBS content HERE
The Anti-Soviet Fighters on SBS and SBS on Demand
