Belarus History

Europe Belarus  Belarus History

Belarus developed under the influence of Kievan Rus and Eastern Orthodox Christendom. When Kiev succumbed to Mongol invasion in the 13th century, Belarus came under Lithuanian hegemony. Lithuania and Poland merged under one crown in 1569. Belarus lost its relative importance after this union and came more heavily under Polish rule. Following the partitions of Poland in 1772, 1793, and 1795, Russia tucked Belarus into its empire.

After the Union of 1569, part of the Belarusian population converted to Roman Catholicism. In 1596, many that maintained the Eastern Orthodox practices joined into an ecclesiastical union with Rome under the Uniate or Greek Catholic Church. In 1839, Uniates were coerced to readopt Eastern Orthodoxy.

The Jewish presence in Belarus dates back to at least the 14th century when they were welcomed by Polish King Casimir. They congregated primarily in small towns and cities. By the 19th century, the Jewish population constituted between one-third and two-thirds of most Belarusian cities.

Russian overlords suppressed Belarusian culture and essentially colonized it. National consciousness finally developed in the 19th century. The failure of Russian arms in the Japanese War of 1905 allowed Belarusians to regain the right of cultural self-expression and to publish in their native language. The fall of tsarism during the 1917 Russian Revolution permitted the creation of a Belarusian state that soon met its demise as the Soviets and Poland contested Belarusian territory. By the terms of the 1921 Treaty of Riga, the Belarusian homeland was divided, the western portion going to Poland and the eastern to the Soviet Union. The eastern portion suffered through the state terrorism of collectivization and purges directed by Stalin during the 1930s. The Soviets attacked all signs of nationalism and reimposed the Russian language on the populace.

The opposing armies of World War II devastated Belarus during the war, annihilating over two million people, a fourth of its population. The Soviets regained ascendancy over both halves of Belarus after the war. They condemned thousands of suspected Nazi collaborators to Siberian exile and reasserted their control of the nation. Through the end of the 1980s, Belarus served as a buffer for Russia against the infiltration of western ideas.

The 1986 Chernobyl disaster affected Belarus more than any other state in eastern Europe. Seventy percent of the radioactive fallout precipitated on Belarus, primarily along its southern border. A third of its territory is classified as uninhabitable under international public health standards, yet millions still live there. Official response was notably lamentable and criticism of governmental culpability was silenced. Thousands continue to suffer death and disease from the incident and Belarus continues to need international assistance in coping with the results of the disaster.

Belarus gained its independence in 1991 but continues to suffer under the most despotic and repressive leadership found in any of the former Soviet states. The ruling elite of the Soviet period never lost their positions nor influence and the authority of the state police never diminished. All popular protest has been crushed and opposition leaders flee or disappear. Though elected in 1994, Alyaksandr Lukashenka rules as a despot. The economy is run centrally, the state police exert great power, and the media is censored. The regime is bolstered by the rural and elderly population who desires stability above all. The country is politically isolated from most of its neighbors by its reactionary policies. Still, it has sought financial alignment with Russia on whom it is entirely dependent to fulfill its energy needs and who buys 70% of its exports. Belarus and Russia signed a treaty on a two-state union in 1999 envisioning greater political economic integration but the treaty is not actively being implemented.

On the boundary between competing ideologies and nations, the Belarusian population has suffered catastrophic losses. The pre-World War II population of Belarus was 10 million. It was not until the end of the 1980s that it regained its prewar level. The current population is estimated at 10.3 million. The largest city is the capital of Minsk at 1.7 million. Other large cities are Gomel 517,000, Vitebsk 373,000, Mogilev 364,000, Grodno 292,000, Brest 284,000, and Bobruysk 224,000.

Belarusians are ethnically Slavic in the following proportions: 78% Belarusian, 13% Russian, 4% Polish, 3% Ukrainian, 2% other ancestry. Eastern Orthodoxy is the primary religion for 80% of the population. The rest are Roman Catholic, Protestant, Jewish, and Muslim.

Websites

 * Belarus History


 * Historical Timeline of Belarus