VILNA’S STORY

Wairarapa Times-Age, 23 September 1939, Page 8

VILNA’S STORY

OCCUPATION BY RUSSIANS. CHANGES SINCE GREAT WAR. Vilna, which has been occupied by the Russians, fell into the hands of the Russians on two occasions after the World War. The story of that time is a curious one. Vilna had been captured by the Germans in 1915 after the most ephemeral resistance, and when Poland and Lithuania emerged as new States after the 1914-18 struggle, the frontier between them was not fixed. At the end of 1919 the provisional frontier handed down by the Supreme Council of the Allies (“the Curzon Line”) excluded Vilna frohi Polish territory. At that time the Russians, with whom the Lithfiahiahs Were at war, had succeeded ;h overrunning j the territory. Three months later the Lithuanians were on the point of capturing the city when the Poles arrived first. Lithuania then made peace with the Russians and her claim to Vilna was recognised by the Soviet — the Poles held it. Soon afterwards the Poles lost not only Vilna but almost the whole of their country, but finally drove the Russians out. Then the Russians, unable to hold Vilna, handed it over to Lithuania. A “rebel” Polish general seized the place in October, 1920, breaking an agreement under which the Poles had recognised Vilha as Lithuanian territory, and that country nevOr ceased to. protest. , It was because of this disappointment that the Lithuanians, imitating Polish methods, seized Memel from Germany. They were forced by HeiT Adolf Hitler to return Memel earlier in this year. Vilna is at the junction of three railways and the confluence of two rivers, and thus obviously a prize in time of war.