10:50
In the 1930s, the two countries least likely to reach an agreement seemed to be the USSR and Germany. Well, I think China and Japan too, but we're not talking about them now. The Soviet Union spent the second half of the 1930s doing everything it could to isolate Germany, trying to create alliances against it. They also opposed its territorial expansion and condemned its state ideology. Meanwhile, in Germany, the new leadership constantly condemned communism and criticized the Soviet Union. However, in 1939, just weeks before the start of World War II, Berlin and Moscow signed the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact -a non-aggression treaty
that increased trade between them and secretly divided Eastern Europe. But given the extreme hostility these two nations felt towards each other, the question arises: why did they reach an agreement? Why did Germany and the Soviet Union sign the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, especially when war between them seemed inevitable even then? So, after the election, the small fire and the laws that followed, and the death of the president, Germany found itself under new leadership. And this leadership sincerely hated communists, both domestic and foreign. And in the Soviet Union, the feelings were mutual. Although it was a bit unfortunate, because he and previous German governments got along well and used each other to reduce their international isolation. The USSR
helped Germany circumvent the restrictions of the Treaty of Versailles, and Germany facilitated the USSR's industrialization efforts. However, when the Western powers relaxed the restrictions imposed on the defeated Germans, Berlin turned to the West, leaving the USSR without a single friend in Europe. With the arrival of new people, relations quickly deteriorated, and the USSR rushed to find friends elsewhere to reduce the potential threat from Germany. The problem was that the USSR was not very popular, well, practically nowhere.
Many of its neighbors in Eastern Europe existed only because they had broken free from Russian rule after World War I. Most of them believed that the Soviet Union had plans for their territory or, at least, wanted to overthrow their governments in favor of a communist one. Not to mention the fact that the USSR had invaded Poland in the previous decade, which the Poles remembered very well, and therefore they were not supporters of the Soviet regime. And other major powers also did not have a very favorable attitude towards communism or the states that professed it. So what were Maxim Litvinov, the Soviet People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs, believed that the best way to guarantee the security of the Soviet Union was a policy of collective security,
which, in Moscow's view, implied that the USSR, the Western powers, the Little Entente, and the Baltic states would agree that an attack on one of them would be considered an attack on all. And although Western hostility to the communists in Moscow was obvious, international events had somewhat shifted the balance of power, making the French at least more inclined to cooperate with the Soviet Union. The two main changes were: first, the Great Depression, which hit France particularly hard in the 1930s, and although the situation in Britain was also not improving, it had been dire there for over a decade. The second change was that Italy, led by a man in a fez, was rapidly moving away from the Western bloc towards Germany.
Given the changes in Germany, the French sought to improve their relations with Moscow. After signing the non-aggression pact, negotiations for an alliance between them were nearing completion when the French Foreign Minister was assassinated in 1934. His successor was a staunch anti-communist, so he made efforts to dilute the terms of the alliance to the point that it became virtually toothless. While all this was happening, the French were holding unofficial discussions with the Germans, which deeply upset the Soviet side. The French, however, found themselves in a difficult position because, although they wanted to strengthen their security by threatening the Germans with a second front in the East, a strong alliance with the USSR risked alienating
the British and Poles. There were also fears that an agreement with the Soviet Union could lead to France being drawn into an unwanted war or to the spread of communism within the country itself. In Britain, relations with Moscow remained largely unchanged, and, except for a few moments of reconciliation, the British deeply distrusted Soviet power; Many in the British government believed that the USSR, led by the autocratic Stalin, who had brutally overthrown the previous regime and soon helped occupy the newly formed Poland, was a much greater threat than the Austrian with the brush mustache who, although a dictator, had not yet managed to destroy so many people. So in 1937, when the French and the Soviets returned to discussing strengthening their
pact, the British argued that it would anger the Germans and might actually push Europe into the very war the French were so desperately trying to avoid. And when Stalin soon after began purging the leadership of the Soviet army, their surviving French colleagues decided that the Soviet army would not be much help anyway, so it was better to just let the alliance die. Over the next few years, Germany's behavior at least partially softened the attitude of Great Britain and France towards the USSR, and many there began to see the Germans as the greatest threat to European peace. During the Munich Crisis in late 1938, Britain and France gave the Sudetenland, part of Czechoslovakia, to the Germans, hoping to quell their thirst for expansion. While this was
happening, the Soviet Union promised Czechoslovakia unwavering military support if it wished to resist. The problem was that he couldn't get there without going through Poland or Romania, neither of which was willing to make their countries so vulnerable by allowing hundreds of thousands of Soviet soldiers to enter, especially the former, since its leaders had themselves encroached on parts of Prague's territory. The Czechs did not want to resist without the French, who, in turn, did not believe they were ready for war. Importantly, they were also unaware of the Soviet mobilization that had begun in preparation for conflict with Germany during the crisis, and Paris did not want to fight without the British, who, in turn, sought more time to rearm, so
nothing happened. The Czechs very reluctantly agreed to the Allied surrender, and the Sudetenland was surrendered. The following year, Czechoslovakia was occupied and divided, and the Soviet leadership's opinion of Western powers plummeted. So, by early 1939, Britain and France were already convinced that Germany was the greatest threat to peace on the continent, and believed that Poland would be next. However, this was not the case, and the Republic of Lithuania became the next country to receive an ultimatum from Germany, which forced its government to hand over this territory. The USSR now viewed Lithuania as part of its legitimate sphere of influence, and the idea of a potential German advance further east was of considerable concern. Therefore, despite numerous
doubts, the USSR again tried to conclude a military alliance with Great Britain and France. However, unlike last time, the USSR refused to accept any ambiguity and demanded that the three conclude a defense pact that would oblige them to go to war if war was declared against any of them, or if it attacked Finland, the Baltic states, Poland, or Romania. He also demanded that they agree not to accept or discuss any border changes in Eastern Europe without the consent of the other parties. France was satisfied with almost everything except guarantees for the Baltic states, in which it had no particular interest. The British tried to play tricks, hoping to get what they wanted-that the USSR would take the brunt of the war with Germany, giving
little or nothing in return. London demanded that the USSR provide unilateral guarantees of Polish independence before joining any alliance. Moscow refused, believing that Great Britain would simply allow them to guarantee Poland's security and then leave it alone to fight the Germans, which, to be fair, was a valid fear. The British also wanted to extend these guarantees to Belgium, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg, which the USSR did not like very much. In addition, the London government refused to agree to anything unless Poland Because Britain seriously feared that through an alliance with the Soviet Union, the Poles might defect to the Germans. And, of course, the Poles would never allow Soviet troops to cross their borders. First of all,
because letting them in seemed much easier than expelling them after the end of any war. Therefore, any Soviet- Western alliance was effectively considered dead. Of course, in parallel with this, the British began negotiations with the Germans to reach a military and political agreement. These were low-level, semi-official conversations about how the parties could avoid war. But as soon as rumors of these discussions became public, the government distanced itself from any potential agreement with Germany. Not surprisingly, the Soviet side was dissatisfied with these negotiations, and since the West now seemed hopeless, there was only one option left for the USSR's security: an agreement with Germany.
Litvinov was dismissed Foreign Minister and replaced with Vyacheslav Molotov in order to improve relations with Berlin. The Germans became much more lenient because they understood that if Britain and France still helped Poland, it would mean a new blockade, and therefore Germany would have to import food and raw materials from the USSR to compensate for the loss of international trade. In August 1939, the parties signed an economic agreement under which Soviet surplus raw materials were exchanged for industrial and military equipment. And shortly after that, the parties signed a non-aggression pact for a period of 10 years. It is important to remember that neither side trusted the other, and both were well aware that
they would soon find themselves at war. The fact is that Stalin in the USSR believed that the Germans would have to wait until Britain and France were defeated, which they believed would take a long time, giving the Soviets time to rearm and rebuild their newly purged army. Of course, the most shameful part of this pact was the secret protocols that divided Poland and Eastern Europe between them. For the Germans, this meant that they could avoid accidentally drawing the USSR into any future conflict by seizing territory that the Soviets considered theirs by right. And for the Soviets, it provided land, people, and industry with which to build an army for the inevitable war. As you know, immediately after the signing of this agreement, the Germans invaded Poland, and
World War II began for real. The Soviet Union soon invaded Poland as well, but because Germany had advanced so far and so quickly, the Germans agreed to give Lithuania to the Soviets as compensation for allowing them to leave that part of Poland. In the short term, this pact was extremely beneficial for both sides, because without Soviet fuel and food, the Germans would have had a hard time fighting the war against Britain. And the USSR now had a cover for expansion without Western interference, an opportunity it seized in 1940. In addition, as Germany's most important trading partner, he could make a lot of money and also obtain certain concessions, which he did by occupying Bessarabia and Bukovina, although the Germans agreed to only the first of these in the pact.
But the Germans were quite busy at the time, so they couldn't do anything about it. Of course, they wouldn't stay busy forever, and the pact was broken in 1941, prompting the Soviet Union to form an alliance with Britain, which is what they had been hoping for all along. I hope you enjoyed this episode, special thanks to my patrons: James Bizenet, Sky Chappell, Katoitzka, Gustav Swan, Anthony Beckett, Michael Holbert, Lester Diamond, Wyatt Hawkeye, The McWoppa, Alex Schwinn, Marvin Cassell, Respectable Level of Chaos, Andy McGehee, Robert K. Perkins, Castle Bravo, Captain Sci-Dog, Commune Yoon, Paul G., The Flying Dutchman, Rod D.
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