Today, November 11, is a day of remembrance in many parts of the
world, whether it be called Remembrance Day, Veterans’ Day, or
something else. This is usually a commemoration of November 11,
1918, when the Armistice was signed at the end of the First
World War. This may have been the end of the First World War,
but hostilities were not over in Latvia. While the Latvian
Republic was proclaimed a week later on November 18 (the day
celebrated as Latvia’s Independence Day), Latvian territory was
shortly thereafter invaded by both the Red Army and the Baltic
Germans with the support of the remnants of the Russian White
Army, so three different governments were fighting for control
of the same territory. It was on November 11, 1919, when the
Germans and White Russians were finally driven off from Rīga by
the newly formed Latvian army, despite the Latvians being
outnumbered in manpower and vastly outnumbered in terms of
technology (cannons, machine guns and planes). The Soviet
retreat would follow, and ceasefires w