Quotessence
Home / Topics / Latvia Quotes

Latvia Quotes

Browse 15 quotes about Latvia.

Latvia Quotes

“They worked hard all their lives, what they basically did was, they built a little Ukraine, a little society for themselves here in Brisbane. They did this in all the cities … not a ghetto, it wasn’t inward looking to that extent, but it was inward looking in the sense that it was a place to go—somewhere where you could identify; where you could be understood; go about remembering and preserving your roots. - Walter Sucharsky, 2nd Generation Australian”

WarHistoryHistoricalInterviewsAustraliaMigrantsEstoniaLatviaDisplaced PeoplesWar Torn
Book:Suffering, Redemption and Triumph: The first wave of post-war Australian immigrants 1945-66
Create image

“When you’re talking about the culture, maybe there is something that just permeates sort of thing, you know you pass it on or take it in, without ever being aware of it. - Ivan Pavelić, Croatia”

WarHistoryInterviewsAustraliaMigrantsEstoniaLatviaDisplaced1946War Torn
Book:Suffering, Redemption and Triumph: The first wave of post-war Australian immigrants 1945-66
Create image

“Political calculation and local suffering do not entirely explain the participation in these pogroms. Violence against Jews served to bring the Germans and elements of the local non-Jewish populations closer together. Anger was directed, as the Germans wished, toward the Jews, rather than against collaborators with the Soviet regime as such. People who reacted to the Germans' urging knew that they were pleasing their new masters, whether or not they believed that the Jews were responsible for their own woes. By their actions they were confirming the Nazi worldview. The act of killing Jews as revenge for NKVD executions confirmed the Nazi understanding of the Soviet Union as a Jewish state. Violence against Jews also allowed local Estonians, Latvian, Lithuanians, Ukrainians, Belarusians, and Poles who had themselves cooperated with the Soviet regime to escape any such taint. The idea that only Jews served communists was convenient not just for the occupiers but for some of the occupied as well. Yet this psychic nazification would have been much more difficult without the palpable evidence of Soviet atrocities. The pogroms took place where the Soviets had recently arrived and where Soviet power was recently installed, where for the previous months Soviet organs of coercion had organized arrests, executions, and deportations. They were a joint production, a Nazi edition of a Soviet text. P. 196”

CollaborationHolocaustNaziSoviet UnionWwiiUkraineSecond World WarPolandEastern EuropeEstoniaLithuaniaLatviaBelarusBloodlands
Book:Bloodlands: Europe Between Hitler and Stalin
Create image

“Okupācija ir nenormāla situācija. Tās sekas vēl gadu desmitiem plosa atbrīvotās valsts cilvēkus, un "pareizie" vaino "nepareizos" piedzīvotajās nelaimēs un pastrādātajos noziegumos. [...] Latvija vienu pec otras pārdzīvoja trīs okupācijas, kuru kopējais ilgums - piecdesmit gadi - pārsniedz jebko, kas Eiropā 20. gadsimtā ir pieredzēts, tāpēc jautājums par katra individuālo atbildību un sadarbību ar dažādajiem okupācijas režīmiem ir īpaši sāpīgs. Tikai pēc neatkarības atjaunošanas mēs pilnībā esam ieguvuši brīvību spriest par savu vēsturi un to attīrīt no svešu režīmu iestrādātajiem meliem un propagandas. Noziegumus Latvijā pastrādāja abi režīmi, un vainīgajiem, neatkarīgi no tā, vai viņi darbojās nacistu vai komunistu doktrīnas vārdā, tāpat kā viņu kolaborantiem, kas ir noziegušies pret civiliedzīvotājiem, par savu rīcību ir jāatbild. Noziegumiem pret cilvēci nav noilguma.”

HistoryLatvia
Book:With Dance Shoes in Siberian Snows
Create image

“Although populated, cultivated, ruined and transformed, the basic scenery of Latvia is considerably more ancient than we are, whichever generation we belong to, and in all likelihood, it must have influenced us much more deeply than the other way round. In a sense, our landscape is akin to our language, for we were not the ones who created it, whatever assumptions we may have. Nor is it our possession. Resulting from chains of random coincidence, it has been allotted for our use for a brief stretch of time. And the only thing we can do and should do is to try not to mess it up too badly or lose it altogether.”

LandscapeLatvia
Book:18
Create image

“For two years now, my office has had the honour and the privilege of sponsoring seminars on the functioning of government in this country for Eastern Europeans. These seminars and exchanges have brought together representatives from such nations as Bulgaria, Hungary, the Czech and Slovak Republic, Roumania, Poland, Russia, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia and the Ukraine, all of them anxious to learn what makes a society as diverse as Canada work and how our institutions make it governable.”

YearsTwoCountryGovernmentTogetherNationsOfficeInstitutionsPrivilegeRussiaCanadaTwo YearsRepublicHonourAnxiousDiverseRepresentativesEasternUkrainePolandSeminarsHungaryCzechBulgariaEstoniaLithuaniaLatvia
Author:John Allen Fraser
Create image

“Some kid can say, "Hey, I really want you to play my town in Switzerland, or Sweden, or Latvia," and they could have a fun night at the show. On the other hand, all those kids could have a record that means something to them in a more personal way a couple months down the road. The live band is a really important thing for us, but my focus is on the album now.”

WayWantMeanImportantPlayShowsHandsKidsNightFunRecordsFocusMonthsCoupleBandTownsImportant ThingsAlbumsHeyDown The RoadSwedenSwitzerlandLatviaFun Night
Author:Zachary Cole Smith
Create image

“President Bush Sr. and Secretary Baker, way back when, told Gorbachev, "We are not going to advance NATO into Eastern Europe. We're not going to - we're not going to advance NATO into East Germany, if you allow the unification of Germany." Where is that pledge? Where is the logic behind a military alliance, devised in the time of communism, before the Berlin Wall fell, now being in the Ukraine, in Poland, in Estonia, in Latvia and Lithuania? I don't understand.”

IfsWayPresidentBehindsMilitaryWallEuropeLogicEastCommunismGermanySecretaryEasternPresident BushAlliancesPledgeUkraineBerlinBack WhenNatoPolandBakersEastern EuropeUnificationBerlin WallGorbachevEast GermanyEstoniaWay Back WhenLithuaniaLatvia
Author:Rashid Khalidi
Create image

“In fact, we haven't ever really recalibrated our foreign policy commitments since the end of the Cold War. We still have alliances throughout Asia and across Europe that were devised to tame the Soviet Union, which, last time I checked, ceased to exist more than 20 years ago. Today, of course, we have a commitment to go to nuclear war with Russia in case Russia invades Latvia. To me, that's complete and utter nonsense. There ought to be a reconsideration of our posture in every region of the world.”

WorldYearsStillsWarEndsFactsTodayLastsCoursesCasesHavensPolicyColdOughtCommitmentEuropeYears AgoUnionsNuclearRussiaNonsenseRegionsSovietForeign PolicyLast TimeCold WarAsiaSoviet UnionAlliancesPostureNuclear WarReconsiderationLatvia
Author:Kevin Gutzman
Create image