Account for the changing nature of Soviet foreign policy in the years
between 1917 and 1941.
Soviet foreign policy changed many times in the period between 1917 and 1941,
partly for ideological reasons and partly for practical ones.
Immediately following the Revolution, the Bolsheviks largely ignored foreign
policy, believing that revolutions would soon sweep Europe. By the time it became
clear this would not take place (since the communist uprisings in Germany and
Hungary were crushed in 1918), Russia’s new leaders were preoccupied with the
Civil War. It was only when the war had been won that they turned their thoughts to
forging better relations with their neighbours, in the hope of maintaining the peace
and fostering trade and investment. This was not an easy task, since Western
governments were reluctant to recognise the USSR.
To mollify international opinion, the Bolsheviks toned down their revolutionary
rhetoric, ordered all communist parties around the world to end their hostility to the
socialist parties in their respective countries, then signed a series of international
agreements – mainly with Germany, the other European nation that was
diplomatically isolated during this period. These agreements included the Treaty of
Rapallo (1922), which re-established diplomatic relations with Germany, and the
Treaty of Berlin (1926), under which Russia and Germany promised to remain neutral
in the event of an attack on the other by a third power. This policy was known as the
United Front, because it was an attempt to foster cooperation with Russia’s
neighbours.
By the late 1920s, relations with Germany had soured, and both nations looked
elsewhere for allies. The policy had also failed to end Russia’s diplomatic isolation,
so Stalin set the nation in a new direction, renewing support for Marxist revolutionary
movements around the world (ironically, the very policy he had attacked during his
rise to power). The key factor prompting this change of heart was the Wall Street
crash (1929) and the ensuing Great Depression. With unemployment soaring in the
West, Stalin became convinced that revolutions would follow. This ideological shift
also mirrored the hardening of Stalin’s domestic policy, as he introduced the policies
of collectivization and central planning. Communist parties were now ordered to end
all cooperation with other leftist groups, whom they branded ‘social fascists’. The
result was disastrous. The German Communist Party directed its opposition to the
Social Democrats rather than the Nazis, allowing the latter to become the largest party
in Germany. Within four years, Hitler had become leader and the Communist Party
was banned.
Stalin now realised his mistake, and switched his foreign policy yet again. He
immediately began seeking better relations with the Western nations, in the hope of
ending Russia’s diplomatic isolation. In consequence, the United States recognised
Russia for the first time since the Revolution (in 1933), and the USSR joined the
League of Nations (in 1934). Stalin also signed treaties of alliance with France and
Czechoslovakia (in 1935), and ordered the various international communist parties to
form a Popular Front with all anti-fascist groups in Europe.
Unfortunately, Stalin’s attempts to woo Britain and France into an alliance against
Germany failed – partly for ideological reasons and partly because it would have been
difficult for these two nations to align themselves with Russia while Stalin was
murdering millions of his own people. Both stood by while Germany reoccupied the
Rhineland, then invaded Austria in 1938. When Hitler began making demands on
Czechoslovakia, Stalin tried to get France to make a stand – enforcing Russia’s 1935
treaty to defend Czechoslovakia. However, France was not willing to contemplate a
war with Germany at that stage. At the Munich Conference in 1938, France and
Britain gave Hitler what he wanted – control of the border regions of Czechoslovakia.
Stalin saw this as an act of betrayal, and began to think that his only option might be
to sign a non-aggression pact with Germany.
The first hint of his intentions came in April 1939, when he replaced the proWestern Litvinov with Molotov as foreign minister. The Germans responded by
offering Russia large tracts of land in Eastern Europe in return for Russian neutrality
in their coming war with Poland. For Stalin, this was an attractive proposition, since it
gave him breathing space to build up his forces and recover from the purge of the Red
Army. It also gave him a buffer zone against future German aggression.
When Britain and France were unable to make an acceptable counter-offer, Stalin
decided they were not serious about an alliance. In August 1939, he accepted the
German offer and signed a ten-year Non-Aggression Pact (the so-called ‘Nazi-Soviet
Pact’). The Pact contained a secret protocol which divided Poland into Russian and
German sectors and ceded Finland, Estonia and Bessarabia to Russia.
On September 1, 1939, Germany invaded Poland. Two and a half weeks later – once
the Polish army had been defeated – the Red Army did likewise. Germany and Russia
formally agreed to partition Poland and eliminate it as a state. Russia also attacked
Finland the Baltic States, and in response was expelled from the League of Nations.
Even before the ink had dried on the pact, and before the blood had dried in the
streets of Warsaw, Stalin began preparing for the attack he knew would come from
Germany. This time, though, he was without allies. The best he could hope for was to
lull Hitler into believing Russia was no threat to him, thereby delaying for as long as
possible the inevitable attack on the USSR. That attack came in June 1941, heralding
the beginning of what the Russians called the Great Patriotic War.
And so by 1941, Russian foreign policy had chopped and changed many times –
from the mild pragmatism of the United Front, to the ideology-driven war against the
‘social fascists’, to the desperate pragmatism of the Popular Front, to the cynicism of
the Nazi-Soviet Pact. It was this inconsistency, more than anything, which isolated the
USSR during the period, and which left it vulnerable to an attack by its greatest
enemy – Germany.