“We will fight for peace all over the world until the last grenade”. Initial Military Training in Schools of the Lithuanian SSR in the Late Soviet Era

Abstract

In the late Soviet period (1960s-1980s), the public policy of the Soviet Union was mainly based on two ideologemes - internationalism and military patriotism. They were also applied in the education system in the formation of the citizen, the so-called New Soviet Man. It was declared that one of the duties of this New Soviet Man was to ensure world peace, which required not only an internationalist mindset but also good military preparation. In 1968 the Council of Ministers of the USSR adopted a resolution on the introduction of compulsory initial military training in all schools in the USSR. Based on published historical sources (official resolutions, methodological guidelines, articles in the pedagogical press) and 34 qualitative interviews with former Soviet school pupils, the present article not only analyses the aims and principles, content, and methods of patriotic military upbringing and initial military training (IMT), but also presents the authentic experiences of how IMT was implemented in schools of the Lithuanian SSR. As our research shows, IMT in Soviet Lithuania did not run very efficiently. The biggest problem was the lack of qualified military instructors capable of working with children.