article 16

Special to The Japan Times / November 15, 2000
By Richard Humphries

Mikhail Ivanovich Kalinin was not one of history's shining stars. An unpleasant figure, he found favor with Stalin and rose to become Soviet President before dying in 1946. Nonetheless, in the fashion of those times, his surname was lent to two major Russian cities and their accompanying regions. One, Kalinin, reverted with alacrity to Tver, its ancient name, upon the demise of the Soviet Union. The other, Kaliningrad, has proved more resilient. One has to wonder why. And, oddly enough, although a 13-meter high statue of a smiling Kalinin greets travelers near the city' s central train station, he never once visited either the city or the region.

The answer lies in geography and politics. Kaliningrad was for centuries Konigsberg, first a stronghold of the Teutonic Knights, then a Hanseatic port, and eventually the capital of East Prussia. The first Prussian king, Frederick I, was crowned in its castle in 1701. Konigsberg's status as a German cultural center was cemented by the renown of its most famous sons, the philosopher Immanuel Kant and the playwright Friedrich Schiller. Less meritoriously, it was also a center for the Junkers, a landowning caste whose Prussian conservatism came to exemplify German militarism.

World War II ended all this. British bombing raids destroyed much of Konigsberg in 1944. Soviet armies then captured the city and East Prussia in April 1945 after a bitter fight. Thousands of Germans were killed and even more fled before the fall. Stalin demanded East Prussia as compensation for Russian losses and at Potsdam, Britain and America agreed. The dictator subsequently awarded chunks of East Prussia to Russian-dominated Poland and to Soviet Lithuania. The remaining land and city were renamed Kaliningrad. In 1946, it became the Russia' s newest, and at 15,100 square kilometers its smallest, oblast or region.

In the late 1940s, the Germans left in Kaliningrad were expelled en masse. Settlers from elsewhere in the Soviet Union replaced them and today the population of the Kaliningrad Oblast, at roughly 1 million, is 80 percent Russian. Ukrainian, Belarussian, and other minorities make up the rest. Ludmila Putin, the Russian Prime Minister' s wife, is from Kaliningrad.

When the Soviet Union collapsed, Kaliningrad was left stranded on the Baltic Sea coast. Its neighbors, Poland and the newly free Lithuania, no longer took orders from Moscow. Kaliningraders now have to travel some 400 kilometers across independent states to reach other Russian territory.

Despite occasional suggestions that the Kaliningrad enclave (or technically, exclave) be made a fourth Baltic state, Russia remains adamant that the territory will stay Russian. The reasons are both psychological and strategic.

The last decade has been a humiliating one for the ex-superpower. A selective nostalgia has provided some comfort. Thus, while Soviet icons have fallen from grace, the shared memories of World War II struggles are still accorded special reverence. In particular, Russians see the last (leaving aside Finnish border readjustments) remaining conquered territories at the periphery of the old empire as theirs by right of victory, partly compensating for the losses incurred. Those spoils of war are Kaliningrad in the west and the Kurile Islands in the east.

There is a significant difference between the two. The Japanese government has repeatedly, and at the highest levels, insisted upon the return of the Kuriles, which are by any stretch of the imagination of marginal historical importance to Japan. The German government, however, has not requested the return of Kaliningrad, a region of far more cultural and historical significance. To do so would enrage Russia and alarm both Poland and Lithuania. Neither of the latter two has dared to stake any official claims, despite some local sentiment favoring annexation. No one wants to plunge Europe into crisis by reawakening the dark specter of irredentism. Therefore, even any attempt at name changing--either a reversion to Konigsberg or using a new name (Kantgrad and Amber City have been bruited)-- is fraught with suspicious undertones. Kaliningrad remains Kaliningrad.

Russia has logical strategic reasons for retaining the territory as well. Its Baltic fleet is based there at the town of Baltiysk. With the loss of access to ports in Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia, the Russian Navy' s only other Baltic outlet is Saint Petersburg. Additionally, as Poland is now in NATO and Lithuania very much wants to join, Russia sees its military presence in Kaliningrad as vital in maintaining an interest in the region and in minimizing any perceived threats from the West.

Kaliningrad today is very different from the city it was before the war, let alone the graceful 18th century port whose streets Kant once walked. It is not pretty. Since the postwar city was first opened to foreigners in 1991, many elderly ex-residents from Germany have visited in search of vistas to stir faded memories. They have found few catalysts.

In some cities, Gdansk and Warsaw, for example, architects made major attempts during the postwar rebuilding at retaining or otherwise recreating elements of the past. In Kaliningrad City the past was to be denied, so a Stalinist barracks style of architecture prevailed. In one notorious case--thus in 1969 well after the war-- the remains of the old fortress in the city center were blown up rather than rehabilitated. In their place a massive concrete atrocity, the "House of Soviets," was constructed. It was never occupied due to subsidence and flooding in the basement levels. Observers refer to this building variously as "the Monster" or "the ugliest building on Russian soil."

There are exceptions. The city' s main cathedral wasn' t completely destroyed in the war, and is even being rehabilitated. This is likely because Immanuel Kant's tomb is located on the precincts and today, newlyweds place flowers at his grave, hoping for a lifetime of happiness. Of the few other buildings to survive, perhaps the most notable is the old Konigsberg Stock Exchange. There may be some irony in that it is now a casino.

There is a competing vision of Kaliningrad' s future favored by locals and outsiders whose interests are more economic than merely military or geopolitical. That position, which has made some headway, is that the enclave should serve Russia in much the way that Hong Kong does China, as a more advanced capitalist laboratory and profitable conduit for trade. This would take advantage of Kaliningrad' s location in a region of accelerated development.

Attempts to revitalize the local economy have met with limited success. Kaliningrad was declared a "Free Economic Zone" in 1992 with much fanfare and no real result. In 1996, then Russian President Yeltsin signed a law making the enclave a "Special Economic Zone" which made Kaliningrad, at least on paper, a customs tax-fee zone. As with many such endeavors, the devil is in the details. Economic life has improved somewhat but Moscow and Kaliningrad quibble over the degree of autonomy local authorities should enjoy and there are problems with the costs and political restrictions associated with transiting goods across third countries.

Corruption, crime and a high unemployment rate take their toll. The black market is not hard to find as currency traders gather outside banks and in the main markets. These are mostly young men who carry cellular phones and wear shoulder bags to conceal banknotes. They use easily removable clothespins clipped to their shirts to hold bits of cardboard. Written on them are the symbols of available foreign currencies.

More serious is the trade in smuggled synthetic liquor. Some 4 million liters, or 60% of the total liquor trade, is bootlegged into Europe via the enclave. Large quantities of alcohol and other drugs also used by Kaliningraders with concomitant social costs. And the enclave has the highest rate of AIDS in Russia.

Foreign investment there is, particularly from Poland, Germany, and the Scandinavian countries, but investors have to deal with both crime and corruption, often at a very personal level. For example, a few days before I arrived, a Norwegian consulting engineer, staying at a major hotel in the city center, was grabbed outside the lobby one night by two men, bundled into a car, and taken to a locked room somewhere in the city. Under threat of injury, he was compelled by his new mafiya companions to surrender his passport, visa, credit card and pin number. After they left to cash in, he was able attract attention and escape, but immediately ended his business and returned to Norway.

To reiterate, the picture is not entirely bleak. Economically, Kaliningrad does compare favorably with many other regions in Russia. Port facilities are being upgraded and joint ventures with foreign businesses are being formed. In addition, local authorities see good possibilities in tourism. The oblast capital may indeed be unattractive but only 28 kilometers away is the beach resort of Svetlogorsk on the Baltic Sea. Once called Rauschen, and until 1991 reserved for military and Communist Party elites, this is one of the few towns in the enclave to remain intact after World War II. Well-maintained and venerable Germanic-style houses blend perfectly with the majestic pine trees that line the streets. Business is clearly booming, with health spas, hotels and restaurants proliferating.

The most upbeat assessment of Kaliningrad's future I heard came from Roman Bartoszewicz, a Polish consulting firm owner, marine surveyor, and frequent business visitor to Kaliningrad. He said, "There are of course very big problems now but there will be changes. These are happening now. If you come back in ten years you won' t recognize Kaliningrad as it is today. It will be much different and much better."

Monopoly is not a word you would naturally associate with Kaliningrad. Yet, not only does the enclave possess one, it is indeed a "natural" one--amber. Ninety percent of the world' s commercial amber comes from just one location, the open pit amber quarry at Yantarny on Kaliningrad' s Baltic coast.

Amber is the fossilized resin from ancient coniferous forests. Fifty million years ago in northern Europe, those forests were immense. They covered large parts of Scandinavia, the Baltic Sea and North Seas, and elsewhere. As the resin leaked down the sides of trees, it trapped leaves, seeds, leaves, insects, and even--shades of Jurassic Park--small lizards. The forests were eventually buried and the resin hardened. The same process occurred in different geological times in places as diverse as Japan, Myanmar, and the United States.

The color of the substance varied greatly, depending on the tree source, the epoch, the temperature and other factors. Oranges, yellows, blues and whites were just some of the shades. Specimens could be anything from fully transparent to completely opaque.

Amber is one of humanity's earliest worn decorative objects (it can not properly be called a stone). Archaeologists in England have found evidence of worked specimens dating back to the late Paleolithic period, some 10,000 years ago.

Aside from its evident beauty, there was also a widespread ancient belief in amber' s talismanic properties. It was thought capable of preventing disease. One reason for that was its electrostatic properties. The ancient Greeks called amber "elektron" and from that term the word electricity and its cognates were derived.

Beginning in the Bronze Age, well before there was one in spices or silk, there was an international trade in amber. Baltic amber has been found in numerous excavations of ancient sites such as at Mycenae, Troy, and in Egypt. The poet Homer refers to the substance repeatedly in the Odyssey, for example, as in this excerpt from Book XVIII. "And the henchman straightaway bore Eurymachus a golden chain of curious work, strung with amber beads shining like the sun."

By Roman times, trade routes were well established and Baltic amber was particularly prized by Roman society. In his work "Natural History," Pliny the Elder speaks of a Roman knight dispatched northward by the Emperor Nero to locate the source of the valued substance and to return with enough of it to please that mercurial ruler.

Dark Ages turmoil disrupted the trade, but by the 13th century the Teutonic Order controlled the Baltic region and revived the fortunes of. They established a monopoly and a rather severe one. Unauthorized scavenging and digging for amber was punished with death. Smuggling did occur and even continues today with Yantarny' s product.

Many mysteries have been associated with amber, but none has been greater than the fate of the legendary Amber Room. This magnificent chamber was constructed of engraved amber panels and presented as a gift from the Prussian king to Tsar Peter I. It became part of Catherine the Great's summer residence near Saint Petersburg. When the German Army captured that house in 1941, the room was dismantled and its pieces moved to Konigsberg. Sometime in 1945 the panels were moved again before the city fell. They have never been seen again.

Today, there are many museums and workshops in the Baltic region where visitors can see remarkable specimens on display and learn something of amber' s history and mystique. Possibly the best is in Kaliningrad at the Amber Museum, housed in an old city gate that somehow survived the war. Displays from the museum' s huge collection include Catherine the Great's amber jewelry boxes and Amber Room panel recreations, as well as a diorama of the Yantarny quarry.

The museum possesses excellent samples of rarer blue and white amber, valued by modern craftsmen, as well as specimens with trapped animals, called inclusions. These latter pieces are not only prized as adornments but, as literally windows to the past, they generate huge scientific interest. When sold on the open marker, amber with inclusions commands a high premium.

Amber in a variety of worked styles: carved; set in bracelets, rings, and necklaces; or sold as individual polished pieces--is available at the museum ‘s shops and at stalls and stores throughout Baltic Europe.

For many people, wearing amber today is more than just a fashion statement. It is the continuation of an immemorial tradition. (RH)


	Russia' s Baltic Outpost: Kaliningrad's prospects bleak but brightening Special to The Japan Times / November 15, 2000 By Richard Humphries Mikhail Ivanovich Kalinin was not one of history's shining stars. An unpleasant figure, he found favor with Stalin and rose to become Soviet President before dying in 1946. Nonetheless, in the fashion of those times, his surname was lent to two major Russian cities and their accompanying regions. One, Kalinin, reverted with alacrity to Tver, its ancient name, upon the demise of the Soviet Union. The other, Kaliningrad, has proved more resilient. One has to wonder why. And, oddly enough, although a 13-meter high statue of a smiling Kalinin greets travelers near the city' s central train station, he never once visited either the city or the region. The answer lies in geography and politics. Kaliningrad was for centuries Konigsberg, first a stronghold of the Teutonic Knights, then a Hanseatic port, and eventually the capital of East Prussia. The first Prussian king, Frederick I, was crowned in its castle in 1701. Konigsberg's status as a German cultural center was cemented by the renown of its most famous sons, the philosopher Immanuel Kant and the playwright Friedrich Schiller. Less meritoriously, it was also a center for the Junkers, a landowning caste whose Prussian conservatism came to exemplify German militarism. World War II ended all this. British bombing raids destroyed much of Konigsberg in 1944. Soviet armies then captured the city and East Prussia in April 1945 after a bitter fight. Thousands of Germans were killed and even more fled before the fall. Stalin demanded East Prussia as compensation for Russian losses and at Potsdam, Britain and America agreed. The dictator subsequently awarded chunks of East Prussia to Russian-dominated Poland and to Soviet Lithuania. The remaining land and city were renamed Kaliningrad. In 1946, it became the Russia' s newest, and at 15,100 square kilometers its smallest, oblast or region. In the late 1940s, the Germans left in Kaliningrad were expelled en masse. Settlers from elsewhere in the Soviet Union replaced them and today the population of the Kaliningrad Oblast, at roughly 1 million, is 80 percent Russian. Ukrainian, Belarussian, and other minorities make up the rest. Ludmila Putin, the Russian Prime Minister' s wife, is from Kaliningrad. When the Soviet Union collapsed, Kaliningrad was left stranded on the Baltic Sea coast. Its neighbors, Poland and the newly free Lithuania, no longer took orders from Moscow. Kaliningraders now have to travel some 400 kilometers across independent states to reach other Russian territory. Despite occasional suggestions that the Kaliningrad enclave (or technically, exclave) be made a fourth Baltic state, Russia remains adamant that the territory will stay Russian. The reasons are both psychological and strategic. The last decade has been a humiliating one for the ex-superpower. A selective nostalgia has provided some comfort. Thus, while Soviet icons have fallen from grace, the shared memories of World War II struggles are still accorded special reverence. In particular, Russians see the last (leaving aside Finnish border readjustments) remaining conquered territories at the periphery of the old empire as theirs by right of victory, partly compensating for the losses incurred. Those spoils of war are Kaliningrad in the west and the Kurile Islands in the east. There is a significant difference between the two. The Japanese government has repeatedly, and at the highest levels, insisted upon the return of the Kuriles, which are by any stretch of the imagination of marginal historical importance to Japan. The German government, however, has not requested the return of Kaliningrad, a region of far more cultural and historical significance. To do so would enrage Russia and alarm both Poland and Lithuania. Neither of the latter two has dared to stake any official claims, despite some local sentiment favoring annexation. No one wants to plunge Europe into crisis by reawakening the dark specter of irredentism. Therefore, even any attempt at name changing--either a reversion to Konigsberg or using a new name (Kantgrad and Amber City have been bruited)-- is fraught with suspicious undertones. Kaliningrad remains Kaliningrad. Russia has logical strategic reasons for retaining the territory as well. Its Baltic fleet is based there at the town of Baltiysk. With the loss of access to ports in Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia, the Russian Navy' s only other Baltic outlet is Saint Petersburg. Additionally, as Poland is now in NATO and Lithuania very much wants to join, Russia sees its military presence in Kaliningrad as vital in maintaining an interest in the region and in minimizing any perceived threats from the West. Kaliningrad today is very different from the city it was before the war, let alone the graceful 18th century port whose streets Kant once walked. It is not pretty. Since the postwar city was first opened to foreigners in 1991, many elderly ex-residents from Germany have visited in search of vistas to stir faded memories. They have found few catalysts. In some cities, Gdansk and Warsaw, for example, architects made major attempts during the postwar rebuilding at retaining or otherwise recreating elements of the past. In Kaliningrad City the past was to be denied, so a Stalinist barracks style of architecture prevailed. In one notorious case--thus in 1969 well after the war-- the remains of the old fortress in the city center were blown up rather than rehabilitated. In their place a massive concrete atrocity, the "House of Soviets," was constructed. It was never occupied due to subsidence and flooding in the basement levels. Observers refer to this building variously as "the Monster" or "the ugliest building on Russian soil." There are exceptions. The city' s main cathedral wasn' t completely destroyed in the war, and is even being rehabilitated. This is likely because Immanuel Kant's tomb is located on the precincts and today, newlyweds place flowers at his grave, hoping for a lifetime of happiness. Of the few other buildings to survive, perhaps the most notable is the old Konigsberg Stock Exchange. There may be some irony in that it is now a casino. There is a competing vision of Kaliningrad' s future favored by locals and outsiders whose interests are more economic than merely military or geopolitical. That position, which has made some headway, is that the enclave should serve Russia in much the way that Hong Kong does China, as a more advanced capitalist laboratory and profitable conduit for trade. This would take advantage of Kaliningrad' s location in a region of accelerated development. Attempts to revitalize the local economy have met with limited success. Kaliningrad was declared a "Free Economic Zone" in 1992 with much fanfare and no real result. In 1996, then Russian President Yeltsin signed a law making the enclave a "Special Economic Zone" which made Kaliningrad, at least on paper, a customs tax-fee zone. As with many such endeavors, the devil is in the details. Economic life has improved somewhat but Moscow and Kaliningrad quibble over the degree of autonomy local authorities should enjoy and there are problems with the costs and political restrictions associated with transiting goods across third countries. Corruption, crime and a high unemployment rate take their toll. The black market is not hard to find as currency traders gather outside banks and in the main markets. These are mostly young men who carry cellular phones and wear shoulder bags to conceal banknotes. They use easily removable clothespins clipped to their shirts to hold bits of cardboard. Written on them are the symbols of available foreign currencies. More serious is the trade in smuggled synthetic liquor. Some 4 million liters, or 60% of the total liquor trade, is bootlegged into Europe via the enclave. Large quantities of alcohol and other drugs also used by Kaliningraders with concomitant social costs. And the enclave has the highest rate of AIDS in Russia. Foreign investment there is, particularly from Poland, Germany, and the Scandinavian countries, but investors have to deal with both crime and corruption, often at a very personal level. For example, a few days before I arrived, a Norwegian consulting engineer, staying at a major hotel in the city center, was grabbed outside the lobby one night by two men, bundled into a car, and taken to a locked room somewhere in the city. Under threat of injury, he was compelled by his new mafiya companions to surrender his passport, visa, credit card and pin number. After they left to cash in, he was able attract attention and escape, but immediately ended his business and returned to Norway. To reiterate, the picture is not entirely bleak. Economically, Kaliningrad does compare favorably with many other regions in Russia. Port facilities are being upgraded and joint ventures with foreign businesses are being formed. In addition, local authorities see good possibilities in tourism. The oblast capital may indeed be unattractive but only 28 kilometers away is the beach resort of Svetlogorsk on the Baltic Sea. Once called Rauschen, and until 1991 reserved for military and Communist Party elites, this is one of the few towns in the enclave to remain intact after World War II. Well-maintained and venerable Germanic-style houses blend perfectly with the majestic pine trees that line the streets. Business is clearly booming, with health spas, hotels and restaurants proliferating. The most upbeat assessment of Kaliningrad's future I heard came from Roman Bartoszewicz, a Polish consulting firm owner, marine surveyor, and frequent business visitor to Kaliningrad. He said, "There are of course very big problems now but there will be changes. These are happening now. If you come back in ten years you won' t recognize Kaliningrad as it is today. It will be much different and much better." Forever Amber: the yellow (or white or blue) treasure of Kaliningrad Monopoly is not a word you would naturally associate with Kaliningrad. Yet, not only does the enclave possess one, it is indeed a "natural" one--amber. Ninety percent of the world' s commercial amber comes from just one location, the open pit amber quarry at Yantarny on Kaliningrad' s Baltic coast. Amber is the fossilized resin from ancient coniferous forests. Fifty million years ago in northern Europe, those forests were immense. They covered large parts of Scandinavia, the Baltic Sea and North Seas, and elsewhere. As the resin leaked down the sides of trees, it trapped leaves, seeds, leaves, insects, and even--shades of Jurassic Park--small lizards. The forests were eventually buried and the resin hardened. The same process occurred in different geological times in places as diverse as Japan, Myanmar, and the United States. The color of the substance varied greatly, depending on the tree source, the epoch, the temperature and other factors. Oranges, yellows, blues and whites were just some of the shades. Specimens could be anything from fully transparent to completely opaque. Amber is one of humanity's earliest worn decorative objects (it can not properly be called a stone). Archaeologists in England have found evidence of worked specimens dating back to the late Paleolithic period, some 10,000 years ago. Aside from its evident beauty, there was also a widespread ancient belief in amber' s talismanic properties. It was thought capable of preventing disease. One reason for that was its electrostatic properties. The ancient Greeks called amber "elektron" and from that term the word electricity and its cognates were derived. Beginning in the Bronze Age, well before there was one in spices or silk, there was an international trade in amber. Baltic amber has been found in numerous excavations of ancient sites such as at Mycenae, Troy, and in Egypt. The poet Homer refers to the substance repeatedly in the Odyssey, for example, as in this excerpt from Book XVIII. "And the henchman straightaway bore Eurymachus a golden chain of curious work, strung with amber beads shining like the sun." By Roman times, trade routes were well established and Baltic amber was particularly prized by Roman society. In his work "Natural History," Pliny the Elder speaks of a Roman knight dispatched northward by the Emperor Nero to locate the source of the valued substance and to return with enough of it to please that mercurial ruler. Dark Ages turmoil disrupted the trade, but by the 13th century the Teutonic Order controlled the Baltic region and revived the fortunes of. They established a monopoly and a rather severe one. Unauthorized scavenging and digging for amber was punished with death. Smuggling did occur and even continues today with Yantarny' s product. Many mysteries have been associated with amber, but none has been greater than the fate of the legendary Amber Room. This magnificent chamber was constructed of engraved amber panels and presented as a gift from the Prussian king to Tsar Peter I. It became part of Catherine the Great's summer residence near Saint Petersburg. When the German Army captured that house in 1941, the room was dismantled and its pieces moved to Konigsberg. Sometime in 1945 the panels were moved again before the city fell. They have never been seen again. Today, there are many museums and workshops in the Baltic region where visitors can see remarkable specimens on display and learn something of amber' s history and mystique. Possibly the best is in Kaliningrad at the Amber Museum, housed in an old city gate that somehow survived the war. Displays from the museum' s huge collection include Catherine the Great's amber jewelry boxes and Amber Room panel recreations, as well as a diorama of the Yantarny quarry. The museum possesses excellent samples of rarer blue and white amber, valued by modern craftsmen, as well as specimens with trapped animals, called inclusions. These latter pieces are not only prized as adornments but, as literally windows to the past, they generate huge scientific interest. When sold on the open marker, amber with inclusions commands a high premium. Amber in a variety of worked styles: carved; set in bracelets, rings, and necklaces; or sold as individual polished pieces--is available at the museum ‘s shops and at stalls and stores throughout Baltic Europe. For many people, wearing amber today is more than just a fashion statement. It is the continuation of an immemorial tradition. (RH)