In his research, the author gives an answer to a difficult question: why in the fall of 1939 there was no military-political cooperation between the Baltic countries, why Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania chose the path of surrender, and Finland did not follow their example? The author analyzes in detail the internal political situation in the three Baltic states and shows that in the conditions of an authoritarian state, the adoption of foreign policy decisions became the lot of a narrow circle of politicians, which could not but affect foreign policy.