Views of Western countries on the 1926 coup d’état in Lithuania

Abstract

The analysis and evaluation of the 17 December 1926 coup d’état in Lithuanian historical scholarship to a large extent remain a relevant and controversial problem. The authoritarian regime formed after the coup has received various, yet not always well-grounded, descriptions and evaluations in historical writings. The aim of this article is (without attempting to answer at once all the questions pertaining to this issue) to tackle this problem from a different angle and as if from a distance, namely to analyse the political-diplomatic reaction to the coup d’état in Lithuania of the parties, which were not directly interested (foreign states). On the one hand, the majority of democratic governments in Europe and the US administration had at least reserved and unopposed, if not favourable, view of the events of the 17 December 1926 in Lithuania. On the other hand, public, labour professional organisations and a part of the media in a number of foreign democracies were critical about the unconstitutional change of the government in Lithuania and the dictatorial domestic policy of the government formed on authoritarian grounds. Thirdly, in the eyes of liberal and democratic citizens or societies of the Western Europe the 1926 coup impaired the international prestige of Lithuania since it prompted doubts over the democratic traditions of the young state, the maturity of its social and political culture as well as prospects of maintaining its statehood.