Soviet Union, Fascism and Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact - Essay Example

Running Head: SOVIET UNION, FASCISM AND MOLOTOV-RIBBENTROP PACT Soviet Union, Fascism and Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact of the of the Institution] Soviet Union, Fascism and Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact One cannot dismiss entirely the suggestion that Moscow continued to hope for improved German-Soviet relations until 1937 (Haslam, 1997, pp. 785-97). But this was not incompatible with a policy of co-operation with the West. The fact is that, from 1933 onwards, the Soviet government did pursue a policy of collective security which the British and French could have embraced. Thus, the Soviet Union joined the League of Nations in 1934 and in May 1935 signed mutual assistance pacts with France and Czechoslovakia. The Comintern announced a new Popular Front policy, urging European communist parties to ally with liberals, social democrats and anyone who opposed fascism (Rees and Thorpe, 1998, 2). As a member of the League, Moscow participated in the imposition of sanctions on Italy after Mussolini's invasion of Abyssinia in October 1935 (Parker, 1974, pp. 293-332), and called for action against Hitler's invasion of the Rhineland in March 1936. In contrast, following Hitler's election in 1933, Germany withdrew from the League of Nations and began to rearm. Throughout the 1930s, Berlin embarked on an aggressive foreign policy which included marching into the Rhineland, intervening almost immediately in the Spanish Civil War, declaring the Anschluss in March 1938, and threatening invasion of the Czech Sudetenland by September. During this period, the British public also learnt of the persecution of the Jews and other minorities within Germany. What was known about Stalin's purges was equally abhorrent. Yet, much had occurred to suggest to any objective observer of the international situation that Nazi Germany was in fact Britain's greatest threat. Despite this, members of the Conservative Party in particular continued to 'believe Nazis on the whole are more conservative than communists and socialists'. On Aug. 23, 1939 Adolf Hitler and Josef Stalin agreed to what became known as the Nazi-Soviet nonaggression pact. With that, Stalin made World War II possible. Assured that he was protected from Soviet counter-aggression in the East, Hitler invaded Poland a week later, Sept. 1. (Beichman, 1999, 19) The signal that something was up between the two totalitarian powers had come some four months earlier but European chancelleries overlooked it. For on May 3, 1939 came the startling news that the Soviet Foreign Minister Maxim Litvinov had resigned "at his own request." Litvinov, of Jewish origin and strongly anti-Nazi, had been replaced by Vyacheslav Molotov. His ethnic origins would not embarrass Hitler in dealing with communists. Until the official announcement of the Nazi-Soviet pact, few believed such an agreement possible, especially the Communist Party leaders in the United States and the rest of the world - because the Soviet Union had posed as the dedicated leader in the fight against fascism. When Berlin and Moscow announced on Aug. 20, 1939 the signing of a trade treaty and newspaper dispatches began hinting about a further strategic alliance, communist spokesmen denounced such speculation as fascist in inspiration. They had every reason to disbelieve such a story because, after all, the Comintern line the world over was to seek a united front with the democratic West against fascism in the name of "collective security." Ignored was the editorial in Pravda Aug. 21 that the trade treaty "could be a serious step toward a further improvement of relations, not only economic but also political, between the USSR and Germany." But newspaper speculation about the Nazi-Soviet alliance turned out to be correct. From Soviet archives we have now learned that on Aug. 19, 1939, Stalin told the Soviet Politburo that if a world war should follow a Nazi-Soviet pact it would only serve to strengthen Communist Parties in France and Britain. Stalin then accepted Hitler's suggestion that a German delegation headed by Foreign Minister Joachim von Ribbentrop be received in Moscow immediately. Von Ribbentrop and company arrived on Aug. 23 and the next day the pact was announced. Photos show Stalin, champagne glass in hand at the signing in the holy of holies, the Kremlin no less, and looking Von Ribbentrop right in the eye toasting the event with these words: "I know how much Germany loves its Fuhrer. I would therefore like to drink to his health." The effect on communist and fellow-travelling intellectuals in the U.S. and Western Europe was devastating. Stalin toasting Hitler! Impossible; it must be capitalist propaganda! But there were the photographs, the champagne glasses. Die-hard communists quickly recovered, forgetting yesterday's anti-fascist slogans. They applauded the new party line as the Nazis bombed Poland into the dust and applauded even louder on Sept. 17, when the Red Army marched over a prostrate Poland to grab its share of the territorial loot. (Beichman, 1999, 19) And now the communist propaganda machine began issuing new manifestos: Britain and France were engaging in an unconscionable "imperialist" war. All means should be taken to sabotage the war effort by the Western allies. Guiding their efforts was Molotov's statement: "It is not only absurd, it is criminal to wage a war to smash Hitlerism' under the false slogan of a war for democracy." And so Communist Party members did whatever they could to help Hitler win. It has been forgotten, but Stalin had earlier helped Hitler come to power on the sloganised theory, "Nach Hitler, kommen wir" - after Hitler, we communists will take over. Thus the anti-Nazi parties were rebuffed, on Stalin's orders, when in 1932 they appealed to the German Communist Party to form a united front against the Nazis. In other words, Stalin wanted the Nazis in power because in a few years, so he believed, they would be ousted and Germany would eventually fall into his lap. Revisionist historians have been trying to sell a fairy-tale that Communist Party members wanted nothing but good for the working-class. Their demurrer: only a handful were spies for Stalin. But these mainstream historians ignore the ignominious role the Communist Party played during those crucial months of the Nazi-Soviet Pact when France fell in 1940 and Britain stood alone. French Communist Party members sent anonymous letters to soldiers on the Maginot Line detailing the fictitious amours of supposedly adulterous wives. In America the communists fought conscription; communist-controlled CIO unions called strikes against aircraft factories to prevent shipment to France or England of warplanes they had paid for. The Daily Worker called it the "Second Imperialist War," the Soviet dismemberment of Poland an action taken in "the cause of world peace." Earl Browder, Communist Party leader, called FDR "an unlimited military dictator" who had adopted "the techniques of Adolf Hitler." Congress was called the "Hitler Reichstag." (Beichman, 1999, 19) And then overnight the "Second Imperialist War" became a "People's War," when on June 22, 1941, Hitler invaded the USSR - a calamity which Stalin never believed could happen. He who killed off his opponents one by one, or by mass purges, because he trusted no one, put his faith in Adolf Hitler. Twenty million Soviet soldiers and civilians and tens of millions more in the rest of the world lost their lives because of the tragic miscalculations of Josef Stalin. References Arnold Beichman, 1999, A Beautiful Friendship. The Washington Times. Publication. Pg: 19. News World Communications, Inc. Jonathan Haslam, 1997, 'Soviet-German Relations and the Origins of the Second World War: The Jury Is Still Out', Journal of Modern History, 69, pp. 785-97 R.A.C. Parker, 1974, 'Great Britain, France and the Ethiopian Crisis', English Historical Review, 27, pp. 293-332. Tim Rees and Andrew Thorpe 1998, (eds), International Communism and the Communist International 1919-1943 (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1998) Gorodetsky, Grand Delusion, p. 2. Bibliography John M. Thompson, 1996, A Vision Unfulfilled: Russia and the Soviet Union in the Twentieth Century (Lexington/Toronto: D.C. Heath) Sheila Fitzpatrick, 1982, The Russian Revolution (Oxford/New York: Oxford University Press), pp. 3, 157. Stanley G. Payne, 1995, A History of Fascism, 1914-1945 (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press). Significantly, Payne is a historian of Franco's Spain. 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