Imagine living with a fear passed down from generation to generation—an unspoken dread that one day, the empire next door might return to crush your life. This isn’t paranoia; it’s history. Poland, Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania don’t fear what Russia might do. They fear what Russia has already done. Over and over again.

In these countries, the image of Russian soldiers marching through your streets isn’t just a scene from the history books. 
It’s a family memory, a scar passed down like an heirloom, and a quiet, ever-present fear that the empire isn’t gone, just waiting to come back.

Today, we’re diving into one of the most tense and deeply layered relationships in Europe: Russia and its northwestern neighbors—Poland and the Baltic states.

The Duel of Two Grand Duchies

To understand why the relationship between Russia, Poland, and the Baltic states is so fraught, we have to go back—to a time before Russia even existed in its modern form. Back when the lands that would become Russia were still fighting to define themselves. Because once upon a time, there wasn’t one dominant Slavic empire. There were two.

The Grand Duchy of Moscow—which would eventually become Russia.
 And the Grand Duchy of Lithuania—which, at its peak in the 15th century, stretched from the Baltic Sea to the Black Sea, encompassing much of what we now call Belarus, Ukraine, and even parts of western Russia.
 At its height, it was the largest state in Europe.

It wasn’t some sleepy Baltic outpost. It was a powerhouse: multicultural, multilingual, and deeply sophisticated. While Moscow was still clawing its way out of Mongol rule, Lithuania had already adopted legal codes, built stone castles, and established one of the most tolerant political systems in medieval Europe.

What turned these two powers into arch enemies wasn’t just land or ambition—it was religion. Lithuania’s elite was Catholic. Moscow’s was Orthodox Christian. And in the medieval world, your faith wasn’t just personal—it was political.

For a thousand years, the center of Orthodox Christianity had been Byzantium—modern-day Turkey. But in the 15th century, it fell to the Ottomans and never recovered. That’s when Moscow stepped in. Its rulers claimed to be the heirs of Byzantium—the Third Rome—the last sacred defender of the true faith. I have a separate video that provides more details.

So, here’s where it gets complicated. The Grand Duchy of Lithuania had the land, the wealth, and the culture. It even controlled Kyiv, the cradle of ancient Rus’. But most of its common people weren’t Catholic—they were Orthodox.
 And while Lithuania’s nobility sought alliances with powerful Catholic kingdoms, they neglected the spiritual identity of their own population. That was a costly mistake.

This was the era of brutal religious wars. Your church defined your identity, your politics, your loyalties. And in a world without the concept of modern citizenship, religion was belonging.

When rulers failed to protect your faith, you started to look elsewhere for someone who would.

That gave Moscow a powerful trump card. It cast itself as the righteous protector of all Orthodox Christians,
 including those living under Lithuanian rule. Which means the Russian tsars felt that it was their sacred duty to save the suffering Orthodox Christians from the unholy Catholic rulers. 

The result was a spiritual tug-of-war that made political conflict between the two grand duchies all but inevitable.

But how did a medieval rivalry between two grand duchies spiral into centuries of conflict—and shape the fears of nations today?

The Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth

The Lithuanian elite eventually forged an alliance with the Kingdom of Poland, forming the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in 1569—one of the largest and most unique political unions in European history. It united Poland and Lithuania under a joint monarchy while preserving much of their autonomy, legal systems, and cultural traditions.

In essence, it was a republic of nobles, a place where the king was elected, powerful families held real political rights, and policy was shaped by debate, not decrees.

But let’s not romanticize it too quickly.

Like all northeastern European states, the Commonwealth faced harsh realities. The climate had worsened during the Little Ice Age, which spanned from the 16th to the 19th centuries. Poor soils, limited navigable rivers, and weak trade infrastructure made the region chronically poorer than Western Europe. When the king’s treasury is empty and the peasants are destitute, the only way to project serious power is through centralized authoritarian rule—the kind that can quickly mobilize society for war.

That’s what Russia understood.

In Moscow, power was sacred, divinely bestowed upon the tsar. If the tsar gave an order, the machinery of the state roared into action. It wasn’t an ideal system, but it worked. And it allowed Moscow to slowly but surely conquer its neighbors.

By contrast, the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth remained radically decentralized. It was a paradise for the nobility—free to elect their king and shape their own destiny. In fact, many Muscovite nobles fled westward to enjoy greater personal freedom and prosperity under this system.

At first, it seemed like the Commonwealth was on top. In 1610, Polish forces entered Moscow and took the Kremlin. 

But that moment didn’t last. Because when the crisis came, the Commonwealth couldn’t respond with unity or force. Its noble democracy lacked the tools to mobilize resources quickly. The political elite still governed as if it were the High Middle Ages—when the climate was warmer, the grain was plentiful, and the markets worked. But those days were gone.

In the end, they didn’t have the resources to hold power. Not in Moscow.
 And, eventually, not even in their own lands. It didn’t happen overnight. But when collapse came, it was brutal, irreversible, and devastating. How did these proud nations become mere provinces of an expanding Russian Empire?

Swallowed by the Empire

By the end of the 18th century, the balance of power had shifted. The once-mighty Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, weakened by internal divisions and external pressure, was carved up like a carcass by its neighbors—Austria, Prussia, and most greedily, Russia.

Poland, Lithuania, and much of the Baltics were absorbed into the expanding Russian Empire. Russian authorities moved quickly to dismantle local institutions, suppress native languages, and impose imperial rule from St. Petersburg. Nobles who once debated kings now bowed to tsars. National identity was reduced to folklore—tolerated only when it stayed politically harmless.

The logic behind Russia’s policy was brutally pragmatic: If the only path to social mobility was through service to the tsar, then the empire’s best minds would be drawn into the system—and would have a stake in its survival. 

To make that happen, education was to be conducted in Russian. Local languages were sidelined, and expressions of national identity were seen as threats to imperial unity.

If you didn’t speak Russian—and didn’t cooperate with the empire—your prospects were dead on arrival.
 And if you actively promoted independence or national consciousness, the outcome was even worse:
 exile, forced labor, or the gallows.

But because this was about more than politics—because it was about identity, and once again, about faith—
the people of Poland and the Baltics never accepted it silently.

Uprisings erupted again and again, each was crushed with brutal efficiency. Tens of thousands were executed, imprisoned, or sent to Siberia.

And yet, the resistance lived on—in underground schools, in banned books, in whispered poems, and in the quiet defiance of memory.

The Soviets Attack

After the Bolshevik Revolution, Poland and the Baltic states finally regained their independence. The newly formed Soviet state tried to reconquer them—but it was too weak and too resource-starved to succeed. So, for a brief moment in history, these nations were left alone.

They became fully sovereign countries, internationally recognized, with their own governments, languages, and cultures. But even in peace, they lived under the shadow of a volcano—quiet for now, but always threatening to erupt.

Throughout the 1920s, the border between the Soviet Union and its western neighbors became a hub for the black market. The Soviet economy was collapsing, and the Bolsheviks couldn’t even provide basic goods. So everything was smuggled in—from French perfume (often made locally in Polish villages) to scientific books.And people made fortunes. Some smuggled soap and sugar. Others smuggled people—guiding desperate souls through dense forests and across rivers, helping them escape from the USSR. I tell the full story of how it all worked in my historical novel, The Prince of the Soviets.

But by the 1930s, the air on the border grew heavy again. It became clear that the Soviet Union wasn’t done. Moscow was preparing for another war.

In 1939, Stalin signed a secret pact with Nazi Germany. Together, they divided Eastern Europe between them. When Germany invaded Poland from the west, the Soviets marched in from the east—claiming they were “protecting” Belarusians and Ukrainians on Polish territory. Then, in 1940—while the world was fixated on the fall of Paris—the Soviet Union moved swiftly to annex the Baltic republics.

It was staged as a voluntary reunion. Moscow installed pro-communist regimes, and once the Soviets had secured their “new territories,” they wasted no time. Deportation trains rolled out. Mass executions began. Anyone who might protest the so-called “liberation from capitalism” was silenced—forever.

In the Soviet Shadow

After World War II, Poland and the Baltic states once again came under Moscow’s control—as territories reshaped to serve the Soviet system.

For Poland, that meant becoming a satellite state: a puppet government, a censored press, and a secret police trained by the KGB. For the Baltics, it was worse—full annexation, forced collectivization, and intense Russification. 

The Baltic states had suffered severe losses during World War II—on the battlefield, in mass purges, and among displaced refugees. The population gaps were filled by migrants from eastern and central Russia.

My own distant relatives were peasants whose village had been destroyed during the Nazi occupation. They had nowhere to return to, so when the chance came to settle on an abandoned farm in Lithuania, they took it and considered themselves lucky. 

This happened across the Baltics. Russian-speaking migrants took jobs in state offices, universities, factories, and farms. But they didn’t see themselves as Lithuanians, Latvians, or Estonians. They were Soviet citizens, and many never bothered to learn the local language or engage with the culture.

This created a mixed population and growing national tension. One part of society wanted to preserve its identity, the other didn’t think identity mattered, as long as Moscow was in charge.

At the same time, it was considered prestigious to live in the Baltic republics. They felt more European, and for some reason, the stores in Tallinn, Riga, and Vilnius were better stocked than those in central Russia.

I remember visiting Vilnius in 1990, during the economic collapse of the USSR. They had mascara in the department store. Three or four types of cheese. Sausages. It was shocking. The empire was clearly living worse than some of its colonies.

As Soviet kids, we had no idea how complicated the relationship between Russia and the Baltic states really was. We were taught they had peacefully joined the USSR. Sure, we knew some people there didn’t like Russians—but it seemed ridiculous. Weren’t we the good guys? Of course we were. Or so we thought.

As for Poland, we knew very little. There were a few Polish adventure books in the children’s library, a popular Polish WWII TV series—Four Tank-Men and a Dog, and Polish fashion magazines people with the right connections somehow got their hands on. That was it.

So when the Soviet Union began to crack, and these nations walked away—slamming the door behind them—we were stunned. We watched the news show people tearing down Soviet monuments and shouting anti-Russian slogans. To us kids, it looked surreal. “Who are these people, and why do they hate us? We never did anything to them.”

The answer we were given was simple: “They’re nationalists. Crazy ones. Maybe even new Nazis.”

It felt like a deep injustice—and a profound ingratitude. ‘We helped them rebuild their cities and industries after the war, and this is how they repay us?’

The Ice Age Mindset That Still Shapes Our Wars

So, where does this all leave us?

Russia—still clinging to an imperial identity. 
Poland and the Baltic states—still defined by the trauma of being conquered. And Ukraine—caught in the middle, fighting not just for its own future, but for the very idea that empire no longer rules this continent.

The Kremlin refuses to accept that smaller nations have the right to choose their own path. In their worldview, only the “big players” matter. Poland and the Baltic states? Not real countries. Just former provinces that forgot their place.

That’s why Putin and his supporters insist that these nations joined NATO only because the United States made them. Because in their version of reality, power is never chosen—it’s taken. And if someone else takes what Russia believes is hers, then war becomes “necessary.”

It’s not a strategic mindset. It’s not even about security. It’s an ancient instinct—resurrected every time a man or a group of men gains control of vast resources through violence. They don’t use that power to serve their people, who barely matter to them. They use it to boost their own status in the eyes of other so-called “important players.”

I have a separate video where I break down how and why this worldview formed. You can check it out if you want to dive deeper.

But here’s the bottom line: If we want a world without war, we need a political architecture where no one—no empire, no leader—has enough unchecked power to keep playing this ancient dominance game. Because it’s not just destructive. It’s outdated.

These are survival instincts from the Ice Age—when status meant survival, and survival meant being the biggest bully. 
But today, the “fittest” shouldn’t be the strongest or the loudest. It should be the wisest.

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