The events presently taking place in the Baltic are so interesting that I am almost prepared to cede my time to Alex Shtromas. Pamiat’ is clearly a less intriguing phenomenon than the issues he has been discussing.

I have been asked to talk about Pamiat’ as a social movement and basically my response is that it is not one. It is not a social movement. Pamiat’ would like very much to be one, but recent events have made clear that the response of ethnic Russians living in the RSFSR to Pamiat’ has been very restrained. We know this due to various polls which have been published in the Soviet press and due to the elections to the USSR Congress of People's Deputies, which showed that Pamiat’ had little support. I suspect that the upcoming elections in March 1990 to the RSFSR Supreme Soviet will also demonstrate the same lack of support for Pamyat'. (They did so, conclusively.)