Vokietijos Pirmojo pasaulinio karo tikslai rytuose: istorijos ir istoriografijos vingiai

ENThe author of the article focuses his attention of the key question – to what extent is the stereotype that in the period of World War I Germany without reservations sought the annexation of the occupied territories in the East valid? For a lengthy period of time the said thesis had no alternatives in Lithuanian historiography and was not even questioned. The Soviet Russian historiography, on the basis of which its Lithuanian counterpart was developed in the second half of the 20th century, initially based on ideological clichés, did not allow the public opinion to raise any doubts with regard to the proposition that Germany not only in World War I but in general permanently sought the occupation of territories in the East. Eventually, as a result of academic impulses from the West, scholarliness in the Soviet historiography on the issue gradually increased and at least variations in tactics manifested by German political layers with regard to the East started being perceived and recorded. However, the concept of "annexation" of the scholarly derivation was utilized widely and freely, making use of the fact that western historiography did not dispute the manifestations of factual annexation in the German policy of that period. On the whole, Lithuanian inquiries into World War I period during the Soviet era were characterized by absolute stagnation, and from the academic point of view only Abelis Stražas might be singled out. Among Lithuanian researchers in emigration Pranas Čepėnas significantly contributed to the investigation. Only after the restoration of Lithuania’s independence, a quality work by Raimundas Lopata saw daylight; the concept of "annexation" however, was not subjected to a wider consideration therein. The aforesaid researcher made a separate reference to the proposal of Oleg Fedyshyn, American historian of Ukrainian descent, namely to distinguish at least five German conceptions.The aforesaid researcher made a separate reference to the proposal of Oleg Fedyshyn, American historian of Ukrainian descent, namely to distinguish at least five German conceptions with regard to the objectives of the War whose potential during the War was utilized as required by the German ruling classes; annexation was just one among them. As the factual annexation-related manifestations in the German policy were started being recorded only in the second half of 1915, the natural question arises – what was prior to this term? The initial stages of the War are poorly covered in Lithuanian historiography. A more thorough inquiry into the issue reveals that at the moment of the outburst of the War and in its first few weeks German plans in the East could have been defined as aspirations to solve the so-called "Polish question" by means of establishing the satellite state of Poland. At that time the German policy was dominated by the "Polish trend" as distinguished by O. Fedyshyn. The project was to extend Poland in the north-eastern direction including ethnic Lithuania which disagreed with the aspirations of the Lithuanian national movement. However, already in September 1914, with the collapse of the "blitzkrieg" hopes, the role of the "Polish direction" decreased and Germany became more interested in the opportunities offered by other rival conceptions, including that of annexation. [From the publication]