Germany's Ultimatum to Lithuania

Date: March 20, 1939 • Location: Silute, Lithuania

This milestone marked the outbreak and beginning of this historic period, which spanned 1939.

Germany issued an ultimatum to Lithuania, demanding the return of the Klaipėda Region under threat of invasion.

On 20 March 1939, the German Reich's foreign minister Joachim von Ribbentrop presented an oral ultimatum to Juozas Urbšys, foreign minister of Lithuania. Germany demanded that Lithuania give up the Klaipėda Region, which had been detached from Germany after World War I, or the Wehrmacht would invade Lithuania and the de facto Lithuanian capital Kaunas would be bombed. The Lithuanians had been expecting the demand after years of rising tension between Lithuania and Germany, increasing pro-Nazi propaganda in the region, and continued German expansion. It was issued just five days after the Nazi occupation of Czechoslovakia.