forgot to mention but book. > during the existence of the soviet union, the top leadership was always predominantly russian. between 1917 and 1989, the politburo, the organizing committee and the secretariat of the cpsu (b) - the central committee (b) - included 132 russians, 17 jews, 6 belarusians, 7 latvians, 5 georgians, two armenians, two ukrainians, two uzbeks, two azerbaijanis, two germans, two poles, one kazakh, one tatar and one finn. in the final years among the soviet army's high command there were no latvians, lithuanians, estonians, georgians, azerbaijanis or representatives of the peoples of central asia among the top commanders of the soviet army. > however, not a few decades passed and latvia was again threatened with an attack by its large eastern neighbor and the loss of its independence. > according to this division, latvia fell into the ussr's "sphere of interest". soon after that, j. stalin also began to solve the "baltic problem", i.e., to prepare for the incorporation of the independent baltic states. > soon after the signing of the molotov-rippentrop pact, the soviet union forced latvia to establish soviet military bases on its territory. latvia signed the relevant agreement (the so-called assistance pact) on october 5, 1939 in moscow. whereas, h. kissinger notes: "stalin did not hesitate to collect his share of the secret protocol. the war with poland was still in full swing when the soviet union offered the three small baltic states a military alliance complete with the right to establish military bases on their territory. left without western support, these republics had no choice but to take this first step towards losing their independence." also quotes from previous book, which is one different from the above quotes:  
Latvia