The Soviet Govern-
ment took an active part in this Conference and sent a
delegation headed by Foreign Minister Molotov.
ment took an active part in this Conference and sent a
delegation headed by Foreign Minister Molotov.
Soviet Union - 1952 - Soviet Civilization
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? SOVIET FOREICH POLICY
"to pull chestnuts out of the fire" for anyone. However,
on April 16, 1939, shortly after the wanton Italian seizure
of Albania on Easter week-end, the Soviet Government
tried again. In the words of Mr. Churchill in his book,
The Gathering Storm, the Soviets "made a formal offer,
the text of which was not published, for the creation of
a united front of mutual assistance between Great Britain,
France and the U. S. S. R. The three Powers, with Poland
added if possible, were furthermore to guarantee those
states in Central and Eastern Europe which lay under
the menace of German aggression. . . .
"The alliance of Britain, France and Russia would
have struck deep alarm into the heart of Germany in
1939, and no one can prove that war might not even then
have been averted. . . . Hitler could afford neither to
embark upon the war on two fronts, which he himself
had so deeply condemned, nor to sustain a check. It was
a pity not to have placed him in this awkward position,
which might well have cost him his life. . . . If Mr. Cham-
berlain on receipt of the Russian offer had replied, 'Yes.
Let us three band together and break Hitler's neck,' or
words to that effect, Parliament would have approved.
Stalin would have understood, and history might have
taken a different course. At least it could not have taken
a worse. . . . Instead there was a long silence while half-
measures and judicious compromises were being pre-
pared. "10
On May 3 Maxim Litvinov resigned as Soviet Foreign
Secretary and the more intransigent V. M. Molotov took
his place. This was clearly a sign that Soviet Russia was
becoming doubtful whether it could rely on the collect-
ive security policy of which Litvinov had been the prime
architect. At the end of May Mr. Molotov repeated
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Stalin's warning that the U. S. S. R. was tired of appease-
ment. Prime Minister Chamberlain, it is true, had en-
tered into active negotiations with the Soviet Union;
but to quote Mr. Churchill again, they "proceeded lan-
guidly. " In June Chamberlain sent a minor official, Mr.
William Strang, to Moscow to carry on talks; and two
months later, on August 11, an Anglo-French military
mission arrived in the U. S. S. R. after a leisurely trip by
boat. Mr. Chamberlain appeared to think there was no
hurry. The hopeful conversations with the Russians
undertaken by this mission finally broke down when the
British and French representatives refused to agree that
the Soviet army would have the right to march into
Poland and the Baltic States to meet a German attack
on those countries or to prevent a Nazi fifth column from
taking control.
The Western negotiators said that since Poland and
the Baltic nations had asserted they would refuse to
allow Soviet troops in under any conditions, it would
not be honorable to bring pressure on these governments
to change their minds. Yet only about a year before the
Anglo-French partnership had considered it perfectly
honorable to submit to Nazi blackmail and to gang up
with Hitler in insisting that Czechoslovakia hand over
a large slice of its territory to Germany. Furthermore,
the League of Nations Covenant itself, in Article XVI,
lent support to the Soviet demand by stating: "The
Members of the League . . . agree that they will take the
necessary steps to afford passage through their territory
to the forces of any of the Members of the League which
are cooperating to protect the covenants of the League. "
I for one have never been convinced that the emis-
saries of Chamberlain and Daladier -- two Prime Minis-
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ters who had repeatedly betrayed the principles of collect-
ive security -- really intended serious business. Light is
thrown upon their attitude by a statement made about
the same time by Sir Nevile Henderson, British Ambas-
sador to Germany and a personal friend of General Her-
mann Goering. In his own book, Failure of a Mission,
Sir Nevile writes that he told Adolf Hitler in August,
1939, that "if an agreement had to be made with Moscow,
for whom communism was now merely the cloak for
intense nationalism and whose ulterior motives seemed
to me highly suspicious, I had rather Germany made it
than ourselves. "11
Certainly Nevile Henderson got his wish. For the
Soviet Government, believing that the Anglo-French
terms for a mutual security pact would gravely endanger
Soviet defenses in case of a Nazi attack, felt compelled
to accept the other alternative: a treaty of non-aggression
with Germany. This was signed on August 23, 1939. The
pact was not an alliance any more than was the non-
aggression agreement with Japan concluded in April of
1941. The Soviet-German treaty gave the U. S. S. R. insur-
ance against having to withstand, under the most serious
military and diplomatic handicaps, a Nazi assault in
1939 and a valuable breathing spell to strengthen
itself for the later invasion. The Soviet-Japanese treaty
protected the rear of the U. S. S. R. during Hitler's mur-
derous attack. Both pacts, even though made with die-
hard Soviet enemies, seemed justified as hard-boiled de-
fensive strategy in the midst of a most threatening inter-
national situation and in view of the terrific struggle the
Soviet Union was facing.
It is widely held that the Soviet-German Non-Aggres-
sion Pact gave Hitler the needed encouragement to
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? SOVIET CIVILIZATIOH
launch his assault on Poland; and that therefore the
Soviets were morally culpable for that crime and the
outbreak of World War II. The actual fact is, however,
that months before the pact was concluded the Nazi dic-
tator had made his decision to march against Poland in
the fall of 1939. Mr. F. H. Hinsley, a Fellow of St. John's
College, Cambridge University, proves this up to the hilt
in his book, Hitler's Strategy, based to a large extent on
documents captured from the German Government.
The author shows that early in April, 1939, Hitler issued
two directives "ordering preparations so to begin that
the attack on Poland could take place at any time after
1 September. "12 And in a secret speech to his Comman-
ders-in-Chief on May 23 he announced his decision to
invade Poland "at the first suitable opportunity. " All
this was before negotiations with Soviet Russia had begun
in earnest.
Regarding Hitler's remarks on May 23, 1939, Mr.
Hinsley writes: "Far more important than the Russian
attitude as a factor in his determination to attack Poland
without delay was the problem of relative power between
Germany and the West. . . . With every month, he was
convinced, Germany's armaments advantage relative to
Poland and the Western Powers would now decline. "13
In another speech, on August 22, to his Commanders-
in-Chief, telling them about the coming treaty with the
U. S. S. R. , Hitler said: "Our economic situation is such
that we cannot hold out more than a few years. . . . We
have no other choice; we must act. . . . Therefore con-
flict is better now. . . . The initiative cannot be allowed
to pass to others. . . . We must accept the risk with reck-
less resolution. . . . We are facing the alternative of strik-
ing now or being destroyed with certainty sooner or
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later. "14 These arguments, Mr. Hinsley points out,
justified the German war against Poland and the danger
of Britain and France becoming involved, regardless of
the Soviet pact. Of course that agreement was helpful
in the general strategy of the Nazis.
On the day on which the Soviet-German Non-Ag-
gression Pact was announced Joseph E. Davies, American
Ambassador to the Soviet Union, wrote Under Secretary
of State Sumner Welles as follows: "The Soviet regime,
in my opinion, diligently and vigorously tried to main-
tain a vigorous common front against the aggressors and
were sincere advocates of the 'indivisibility of peace. '
Litvinov's able battle for peace and democratic ideas at
the League of Nations and the vigorous attitude of the
Soviet Government in being prepared to fight for Czecho-
slovakia were indications of real sincerity of purpose and
a marked degree of highmindedness. Beginning with
Munich, and even before, however, there had been an
accumulation of events which gradually broke down this
attitude on the part of the Soviet Government. . . . The
suspicion continued to grow that Britain and France
were playing a diplomatic game to place the Soviets in
the position where Russia would have to fight Germany
alone. "15
It is significant that Winston Churchill, who since
World War II has wielded such immense influence on
American attitudes toward Soviet Russia, was leader dur-
ing the pre-war years of a minority group in the British
Conservative Party which opposed Chamberlain's foreign
policy. Concerning the issue upon which the Anglo-
French-Soviet negotiations foundered in August, 1939,
Mr. Churchill in essence backed the Soviet position when
he asserted: "It is certain . . . that if Lithuania, Latvia
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? SOVIET CIVILIZATION
and Estonia were invaded by the Nazis or subverted to
the Nazi system by propaganda and intrigue from within,
the whole of Europe would be dragged into war. . . . Why
not then concert in good time, publicly and courageously,
the measures which may render such a fight unneces-
sary? "16 Present Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden and
ex-Prime Minister David Lloyd George shared these
views.
Had Churchill, instead of the faltering Chamberlain,
been the head of England's government in 1938 and 1939,
the chances are that the Western democracies would have
established a solid peace front with the Soviet Union and
that events in Europe would have taken a very different
turn. In any case what the record of international affairs
shows -- and the comments of eminent men far from
sympathetic towards the Soviet system -- is that through-
out the eventful period of 1935-39 the Soviet Union stood
firm for the League Covenant and the principles of col-
lective security outlined therein.
On September 1, 1939, the Nazi armies swept into
Poland. The League of Nations had failed in the main
purpose for which it was established twenty-odd years
before. In 1940 Hitler's blitzkrieg engulfed the Low
Countries and France; in 1941 western Russia. None-
theless, the idea of collective security through a world
organization did not down. And it was specifically in-
cluded in the Polish-Soviet Agreement of 1941 and the
Twenty-Year British-Soviet Pact of 1942. The Four-
Nation Moscow Declaration of October, 1943, stated that
China, Great Britain, the Soviet Union and the United
States "recognize the necessity of establishing at the
earliest practicable date a general international organi-
zation, based on the principle of sovereign equality of
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all peace-loving states, and open to membership by all
such states, large and small, for the maintenance of inter-
national peace and security. "
Such an international organization came into being
in June of 1945 with the creation of the United Nations
at the San Francisco Conference.
The Soviet Govern-
ment took an active part in this Conference and sent a
delegation headed by Foreign Minister Molotov. The
United Nations reaffirmed in its Charter the basic prin-
ciple of collective security and outlined effective measures
to bring it about. In the drawing up of the Charter a
number of disagreements took place between the dif-
ferent delegations. Noteworthy is the fact that Soviet
Russia was willing to compromise, as The New York
Times pointed out in an editorial, on at least ten im-
portant issues in order to assure the prompt and success-
ful establishment of the U. N.
Whatever its differences of opinion with other coun-
tries in the discussions over the U. N. Charter, Soviet
Russia continued to uphold the same principle of col-
lective security for which it had fought in the arenas of
diplomacy during the pre-war years. There was no basic
alteration in its policy; nor was it to be rationally ex-
pected that it would suddenly change from being a peace-
loving nation to a war-loving nation. Rarely do great
peoples reverse their fundamental historical pattern over-
night. Yet today we are asked to believe the far-fetched
story that the Soviet Republic, having vigorously sought
international peace for the first thirty years of its exis-
tence, has become all at once the chief fomenter of war
in the world.
The third major goal in its foreign policy is uni-
versal disarmament, including the abolition of atomic
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weapons and international controls for atomic energy.
The Soviet record on disarmament has been a notable
one. At the Genoa Conference of 1922, the first inter-
national conference which Soviet Russia attended, the
Soviet Foreign Minister, G. V. Chicherin, proposed a
general reduction of armaments. At the meeting of the
Preparatory Commission of the Disarmament Conference
at Geneva in 1927 the Soviet delegate, Maxim Litvinov,
surprised the world by his proposal for general and com-
plete disarmament. But, during the life of the League
of Nations, armaments increased immensely among the
Great Powers instead of diminishing.
After the formation of the United Nations the Soviet
delegation urged, in 1946, a general reduction of arma-
ments and prohibition of the production and utilization
of atomic energy for war purposes. In 1948, when the
cold war was well under way, the Soviet Government put
forward a plan at the U. N. to reduce the armaments and
armed forces of the Great Powers by one-third within a
year. As recently as November, 1951, Soviet Foreign
Minister Vishinsky repeated this proposal at a meeting
of the United Nations in Paris. The Western Powers
treated Mr. Vishinsky's scheme primarily as propaganda;
and, indeed, the tendency of the non-Soviet world from
1917 on has been to sneer at Soviet disarmament pro-
posals as insincere and designed to deceive. This atti-
tude I am convinced is unjustified.
Soviet Russia has upheld the goal of disarmament in
order to lessen international fears and frictions, decrease
the danger of war and save for constructive economic pur-
poses the colossal sums and energies which go into the
manufacture of armaments. The absence of unemploy-
ment and the general stability of its economic system are
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not contingent on the armaments industry, but are based
on socialist ownership and country-wide planning. The
Soviets consider armaments production an economic
waste. Nonetheless, the very real menace of foreign ag-
gression has compelled them to develop a great defense
industry and to maintain a large army. It was fortunate
for America and the rest of the democratic world that
Soviet Russia was so well prepared when Hitler struck
in World War II.
Fourth, the Soviet Union believes in normal, flour-
ishing international trade as beneficial to itself and con-
ducive to peace. Naturally it was never in favor of the
economic and financial boycott imposed upon it by the
capitalist Powers after the First World War. And it has
always considered that substantial trade with the outside
world was an important part of its policy of peaceful
co-existence with the capitalist countries. It has all along
been particularly desirous of having good trade relations
with the United States.
In subscribing to the Atlantic Charter Soviet Russia
went on record with the other signatory nations in stat-
ing: "They will endeavor, with due respect for their
existing obligations, to further the enjoyment by all
states, great or small, victor or vanquished, of access, on
equal terms, to the trade and to the raw materials of the
world which are needed for their economic prosperity.
They desire to bring about the fullest collaboration be-
tween all nations in the economic field, with the object
of securing for all, improved labor standards, economic
advancement and social security. "
It is no choice of Soviet Russia that these interna-
tional economic aims written into the Atlantic Charter
have been so disregarded since the Second World War.
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In fact it has decried from the start the economic conse-
quences of the cold war that have necessarily followed
from the American policy of drastically restricting trade
with the U. S. S. R. and the countries of Eastern Europe.
It has regretted the serious drop in trade between Eastern
and Western Europe. As to American-Soviet business
relations, the Soviet Union stands ready to resume normal
trade on a reciprocal basis at any time. Of course the
Soviets will benefit from such commerce, but the United
States on its part will gain just as much.
Fifth in its peace program, Soviet Russia supports
the self-determination of peoples. Again, the Atlantic
Charter of 1941 sets forth the principles involved, assert-
ing: "Their countries seek no aggrandizement, territorial
or other. They desire to see no territorial changes that
do not accord with the freely expressed wishes of the
peoples concerned. They respect the right of all peoples
to choose the form of government under which they will
live; and they wish to see sovereign rights and self-govern-
ment restored to those who have been forcibly deprived
of them. "
On November 6, 1942, Premier Stalin, speaking of-
ficially for his Government, said that "the program of
action of the Anglo-Soviet-American coalition" for win-
ning the war must include "abolition of racial exclusive-
ness; equality of nations and integrity of their territories;
liberation of enslaved nations and the restoration of their
sovereign rights; the right of every nation to arrange its
affairs as it wishes; economic aid to nations that have
suffered and assistance to them in attaining their material
welfare; restoration of democratic liberties; destruction
of the Hitlerite regime. " While insisting on the sternest
possible attitude toward Hitler and all the Nazi criminals
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who "have turned Europe into a prison of nations,"
Stalin made clear: "It is not our aim to destroy Germany,
for it is impossible to destroy Germany, just as it is im-
possible to destroy Russia, but the Hitlerite State can and
should be destroyed. "
As a member of the United Nations, the Soviet Union
subscribes to the clause in the Charter which gives as one
of the main purposes of the organization, "To develop
friendly relations among nations based on respect for the
principle of equal rights and self-determination of peo-
ples. "17 The Russians are of course keen on the exten-
sion of complete self-determination to the colonial areas
of the world. In the setting up of the United Nations at
San Francisco, the Soviet delegation proposed: "The
basic objectives of the trusteeship system should be to
promote the political, economic and social advancement
of the trust territories and their inhabitants and their
progressive development toward self-government and
self-determination, with active participation of the peo-
ples of these territories having the aim to expedite the
achievement by them of full national independence. "18
The final U. N. draft watered down this statement by
eliminating "with active participation of the peoples of
these territories"; and adding to the phrasing on inde-
pendence the important qualification, "as may be appro-
priate to the particular circumstances of each territory
and its peoples and the freely expressed wishes of the
people concerned, and as may be provided by the terms
of each trusteeship provision. "19 This weakened formula-
tion was adopted with the support of the United States
and under pressure from Great Britain and France, the
two countries still holding large colonial possessions.
The Russians are of the opinion that historically the
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violation of self-determination through foreign interven-
tion has been in general a tool of reaction and imperial-
ism, especially since the Metternich period of the early
nineteenth century. And they point out that the flagrant
military intervention directed against various countries
between the First World War and the Second was clearly
on behalf of old-time imperialist or outright fascist inte-
rests. In the next section I discuss the principle of self-
determination in relation to certain actions of the Soviet
Union since the beginning of the Second World War
in 1939.
2. Does Soviet Russia Wage Aggression?
The principle of self-determination of peoples leads
naturally to the question of whether the Soviet Union
has been guilty of aggression against foreign countries.
The tendency has been in the West to favor self-determ-
ination only so long as it is applied in a way unfavorable
to the U. S. S. R. and the new socialist governments which
have sprung into existence since the defeat of world
fascism. The same sort of people who supported the
widespread imperialist intervention against the Soviet
Republic during its early years today claim that Soviet
Russia is itself imperialistic because during World War
II it took back the Baltic States (Estonia, Latvia and
Lithuania) and Eastern Poland, and because Communist-
led regimes have come into power throughout most of
Eastern Europe and in China.
As to the Baltic provinces and Eastern Poland, we
should recall that these were torn from Russia after the
First World War by means of force and power politics,
which had as their objective the weakening of the Soviet
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Republic and the creation of a "cordon sanitaire," both
to hem it in from a military standpoint and to protect
Europe from its influence. In 1920 the American Gov-
ernment quite rightly protested against this dismember-
ment of Russia and called for the restitution of the old
Russian boundaries, except in regard to Armenia, Fin-
land and ethnic Poland. *
The governments of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania
were first set up in 1918 with the aid of the Kaiser's
armies and in line with the harsh Treaty of Brest-Litovsk
which formalized Germany's conquests and spheres of
influence in Eastern Europe. They were soon recognized
by the Allies, which, for their own obvious reasons,
wished to see these anti-Soviet outposts become perma-
nent. When the American Government finally granted
them recognition in 1922, Secretary of State Charles
Evans Hughes made this significant reservation: "The
United States has consistently maintained that the dis-
turbed conditions of Russian affairs may not be made
the occasion for the alienation of Russian territory, and
this principle is not deemed to be infringed upon by the
recognition at this time of the governments of Estonia,
Latvia and Lithuania. "20 Thus Mr. Hughes qualified his
recognition statement so as to leave the door open for a
future return of these nations to Russia.
The matter of Armenia quickly became an academic
one, since the idea of America's accepting a mandate for
that country rapidly faded away and since a native Com-
munist group gained the upper hand in 1920 and pro-
claimed an Armenian Autonomous Republic linked up
with the U. S. S. R. Finland also became an academic
issue, due to the fact that the Soviet regime under Lenin
? See p. 265.
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recognized the full independence of the Finnish Govern-
ment in 1918.
But why did the American Government later change
its attitude on the right of Russia to the Baltic States
and that part of Poland inhabited principally by Russian
peoples? The reason is perfectly clear. When the U. S.
State Department made its declarations against Russian
dismemberment in 1920 and 1922, it thought that the
Soviet Republic was soon going to collapse. But when
instead Premier Lenin and his colleagues actually con-
solidated their power, Washington shifted its attitude,
not because of the fundamental rights or wrongs of the
question, but because it wanted Soviet socialism to re-
main as weak as possible. In short, the guiding principle
in American policy was that a non-Communist, merely
liberal, Russian regime had a right to the old Tsarist
frontiers, but not a radical, Communist one.
There can be no doubt that economically speaking
the Baltic States, which were conquered by the Tsars
back in the eighteenth century, belong naturally with
Russia and Russia with them. Peter the Great acquired
Estonia and Latvia in 1721 and Catherine the Great
Lithuania in 1795. The only year-round ice-free ports
which Russia had in the west and which were directly
accessible to the Atlantic Ocean were in these territories.
Prior to the First World War almost a third of Russia's
exports and imports went through these outlets to the
sea. The artificial separation of the Baltic States from
the U. S. S. R. in 1918 proved an immense handicap to
the Soviet Union and disrupted the economies of those
three countries themselves.
It became widely believed that between the two
world wars the Baltic nations were beautiful little demo-
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cracies functioning on behalf of liberty. This was far
from true. As Walter Lippmann wrote in 1943, these
three states "some years before the war fell into the hands
of fascist rulers and became the focal points of intrigue
against Russia. Thus the last Lithuanian parliament had
been dissolved in 1927 by a conspiracy of army officers;
the Latvian Republic became fascist in 1934; and Estonia,
though it never went quite that far, fell under strong
fascist influence between 1933 and 1937. "21
In mid-June of 1940, as France and the Low Coun-
tries crumpled under the Nazi blitzkrieg, the Soviet
Government charged that the three Baltic States had
violated their mutual-aid pacts with the U. S. S. R. and
sent in troops to occupy them. This Soviet move, how-
ever hard-boiled in conception and execution, definitely
forestalled'Hitler, who all along had been casting cove-
tous eyes in the direction of these weak and strategically
situated nations. A few weeks after the Soviet military
occupation, newly elected parliaments in Estonia, Latvia
and Lithuania proclaimed their countries Soviet Repub-
lics; and in August the Supreme Soviet officially admitted
them into the U. S. S. R. For the Baltic peoples this was
a logical step, particularly from the economic viewpoint.
For the Soviet Union it was an essential development
from the viewpoint of self-defense against the Nazi threat;
and a justified recovery of lands wrested from the
U. S. S. R. in defiance of historical right.
An even clearer case for the revision of Soviet boun-
daries during the Second World War concerned Eastern
Poland, with its population of around 11,000,000 in 1939
consisting of approximately 5,000,000 Ukrainians, 2,500-
000 Belorussians, 2,500,000 Poles and 1,000,000 Jews.
The regions comprising Eastern Poland, except a small
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? SOVIET CIVILIZATION
southern area known as East Galicia, were all part of the
old Tsarist Empire and were taken away from an ex-
hausted Soviet Russia under the Treaty of Riga in 1921
by the Polish imperialists after their unprovoked war of
aggression against the Socialist Republic. At the time
even the anti-Soviet Allies protested against Poland,
which had also seized the Lithuanian capital, Vilna
(Vilnius), grabbing so much territory that was obviously
non-Polish. In fact, before the Polish-Soviet war broke
out, the Supreme Council of Allied Powers had recom-
mended as a just boundary the so-called Curzon Line,
which was first officially proposed at a meeting in 1919
presided over by America's Under Secretary of State,
Frank L. Polk. The Curzon Line assigned to Soviet
Russia almost all of what later became Eastern Poland.
In September of 1939, as the Polish Government was
collapsing under the impact of Hitler's attack, the Soviet
army marched into Eastern Poland and occupied it.
? SOVIET FOREICH POLICY
"to pull chestnuts out of the fire" for anyone. However,
on April 16, 1939, shortly after the wanton Italian seizure
of Albania on Easter week-end, the Soviet Government
tried again. In the words of Mr. Churchill in his book,
The Gathering Storm, the Soviets "made a formal offer,
the text of which was not published, for the creation of
a united front of mutual assistance between Great Britain,
France and the U. S. S. R. The three Powers, with Poland
added if possible, were furthermore to guarantee those
states in Central and Eastern Europe which lay under
the menace of German aggression. . . .
"The alliance of Britain, France and Russia would
have struck deep alarm into the heart of Germany in
1939, and no one can prove that war might not even then
have been averted. . . . Hitler could afford neither to
embark upon the war on two fronts, which he himself
had so deeply condemned, nor to sustain a check. It was
a pity not to have placed him in this awkward position,
which might well have cost him his life. . . . If Mr. Cham-
berlain on receipt of the Russian offer had replied, 'Yes.
Let us three band together and break Hitler's neck,' or
words to that effect, Parliament would have approved.
Stalin would have understood, and history might have
taken a different course. At least it could not have taken
a worse. . . . Instead there was a long silence while half-
measures and judicious compromises were being pre-
pared. "10
On May 3 Maxim Litvinov resigned as Soviet Foreign
Secretary and the more intransigent V. M. Molotov took
his place. This was clearly a sign that Soviet Russia was
becoming doubtful whether it could rely on the collect-
ive security policy of which Litvinov had been the prime
architect. At the end of May Mr. Molotov repeated
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Stalin's warning that the U. S. S. R. was tired of appease-
ment. Prime Minister Chamberlain, it is true, had en-
tered into active negotiations with the Soviet Union;
but to quote Mr. Churchill again, they "proceeded lan-
guidly. " In June Chamberlain sent a minor official, Mr.
William Strang, to Moscow to carry on talks; and two
months later, on August 11, an Anglo-French military
mission arrived in the U. S. S. R. after a leisurely trip by
boat. Mr. Chamberlain appeared to think there was no
hurry. The hopeful conversations with the Russians
undertaken by this mission finally broke down when the
British and French representatives refused to agree that
the Soviet army would have the right to march into
Poland and the Baltic States to meet a German attack
on those countries or to prevent a Nazi fifth column from
taking control.
The Western negotiators said that since Poland and
the Baltic nations had asserted they would refuse to
allow Soviet troops in under any conditions, it would
not be honorable to bring pressure on these governments
to change their minds. Yet only about a year before the
Anglo-French partnership had considered it perfectly
honorable to submit to Nazi blackmail and to gang up
with Hitler in insisting that Czechoslovakia hand over
a large slice of its territory to Germany. Furthermore,
the League of Nations Covenant itself, in Article XVI,
lent support to the Soviet demand by stating: "The
Members of the League . . . agree that they will take the
necessary steps to afford passage through their territory
to the forces of any of the Members of the League which
are cooperating to protect the covenants of the League. "
I for one have never been convinced that the emis-
saries of Chamberlain and Daladier -- two Prime Minis-
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ters who had repeatedly betrayed the principles of collect-
ive security -- really intended serious business. Light is
thrown upon their attitude by a statement made about
the same time by Sir Nevile Henderson, British Ambas-
sador to Germany and a personal friend of General Her-
mann Goering. In his own book, Failure of a Mission,
Sir Nevile writes that he told Adolf Hitler in August,
1939, that "if an agreement had to be made with Moscow,
for whom communism was now merely the cloak for
intense nationalism and whose ulterior motives seemed
to me highly suspicious, I had rather Germany made it
than ourselves. "11
Certainly Nevile Henderson got his wish. For the
Soviet Government, believing that the Anglo-French
terms for a mutual security pact would gravely endanger
Soviet defenses in case of a Nazi attack, felt compelled
to accept the other alternative: a treaty of non-aggression
with Germany. This was signed on August 23, 1939. The
pact was not an alliance any more than was the non-
aggression agreement with Japan concluded in April of
1941. The Soviet-German treaty gave the U. S. S. R. insur-
ance against having to withstand, under the most serious
military and diplomatic handicaps, a Nazi assault in
1939 and a valuable breathing spell to strengthen
itself for the later invasion. The Soviet-Japanese treaty
protected the rear of the U. S. S. R. during Hitler's mur-
derous attack. Both pacts, even though made with die-
hard Soviet enemies, seemed justified as hard-boiled de-
fensive strategy in the midst of a most threatening inter-
national situation and in view of the terrific struggle the
Soviet Union was facing.
It is widely held that the Soviet-German Non-Aggres-
sion Pact gave Hitler the needed encouragement to
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launch his assault on Poland; and that therefore the
Soviets were morally culpable for that crime and the
outbreak of World War II. The actual fact is, however,
that months before the pact was concluded the Nazi dic-
tator had made his decision to march against Poland in
the fall of 1939. Mr. F. H. Hinsley, a Fellow of St. John's
College, Cambridge University, proves this up to the hilt
in his book, Hitler's Strategy, based to a large extent on
documents captured from the German Government.
The author shows that early in April, 1939, Hitler issued
two directives "ordering preparations so to begin that
the attack on Poland could take place at any time after
1 September. "12 And in a secret speech to his Comman-
ders-in-Chief on May 23 he announced his decision to
invade Poland "at the first suitable opportunity. " All
this was before negotiations with Soviet Russia had begun
in earnest.
Regarding Hitler's remarks on May 23, 1939, Mr.
Hinsley writes: "Far more important than the Russian
attitude as a factor in his determination to attack Poland
without delay was the problem of relative power between
Germany and the West. . . . With every month, he was
convinced, Germany's armaments advantage relative to
Poland and the Western Powers would now decline. "13
In another speech, on August 22, to his Commanders-
in-Chief, telling them about the coming treaty with the
U. S. S. R. , Hitler said: "Our economic situation is such
that we cannot hold out more than a few years. . . . We
have no other choice; we must act. . . . Therefore con-
flict is better now. . . . The initiative cannot be allowed
to pass to others. . . . We must accept the risk with reck-
less resolution. . . . We are facing the alternative of strik-
ing now or being destroyed with certainty sooner or
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? SOVIET FOREIGH POLICY
later. "14 These arguments, Mr. Hinsley points out,
justified the German war against Poland and the danger
of Britain and France becoming involved, regardless of
the Soviet pact. Of course that agreement was helpful
in the general strategy of the Nazis.
On the day on which the Soviet-German Non-Ag-
gression Pact was announced Joseph E. Davies, American
Ambassador to the Soviet Union, wrote Under Secretary
of State Sumner Welles as follows: "The Soviet regime,
in my opinion, diligently and vigorously tried to main-
tain a vigorous common front against the aggressors and
were sincere advocates of the 'indivisibility of peace. '
Litvinov's able battle for peace and democratic ideas at
the League of Nations and the vigorous attitude of the
Soviet Government in being prepared to fight for Czecho-
slovakia were indications of real sincerity of purpose and
a marked degree of highmindedness. Beginning with
Munich, and even before, however, there had been an
accumulation of events which gradually broke down this
attitude on the part of the Soviet Government. . . . The
suspicion continued to grow that Britain and France
were playing a diplomatic game to place the Soviets in
the position where Russia would have to fight Germany
alone. "15
It is significant that Winston Churchill, who since
World War II has wielded such immense influence on
American attitudes toward Soviet Russia, was leader dur-
ing the pre-war years of a minority group in the British
Conservative Party which opposed Chamberlain's foreign
policy. Concerning the issue upon which the Anglo-
French-Soviet negotiations foundered in August, 1939,
Mr. Churchill in essence backed the Soviet position when
he asserted: "It is certain . . . that if Lithuania, Latvia
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? SOVIET CIVILIZATION
and Estonia were invaded by the Nazis or subverted to
the Nazi system by propaganda and intrigue from within,
the whole of Europe would be dragged into war. . . . Why
not then concert in good time, publicly and courageously,
the measures which may render such a fight unneces-
sary? "16 Present Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden and
ex-Prime Minister David Lloyd George shared these
views.
Had Churchill, instead of the faltering Chamberlain,
been the head of England's government in 1938 and 1939,
the chances are that the Western democracies would have
established a solid peace front with the Soviet Union and
that events in Europe would have taken a very different
turn. In any case what the record of international affairs
shows -- and the comments of eminent men far from
sympathetic towards the Soviet system -- is that through-
out the eventful period of 1935-39 the Soviet Union stood
firm for the League Covenant and the principles of col-
lective security outlined therein.
On September 1, 1939, the Nazi armies swept into
Poland. The League of Nations had failed in the main
purpose for which it was established twenty-odd years
before. In 1940 Hitler's blitzkrieg engulfed the Low
Countries and France; in 1941 western Russia. None-
theless, the idea of collective security through a world
organization did not down. And it was specifically in-
cluded in the Polish-Soviet Agreement of 1941 and the
Twenty-Year British-Soviet Pact of 1942. The Four-
Nation Moscow Declaration of October, 1943, stated that
China, Great Britain, the Soviet Union and the United
States "recognize the necessity of establishing at the
earliest practicable date a general international organi-
zation, based on the principle of sovereign equality of
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all peace-loving states, and open to membership by all
such states, large and small, for the maintenance of inter-
national peace and security. "
Such an international organization came into being
in June of 1945 with the creation of the United Nations
at the San Francisco Conference.
The Soviet Govern-
ment took an active part in this Conference and sent a
delegation headed by Foreign Minister Molotov. The
United Nations reaffirmed in its Charter the basic prin-
ciple of collective security and outlined effective measures
to bring it about. In the drawing up of the Charter a
number of disagreements took place between the dif-
ferent delegations. Noteworthy is the fact that Soviet
Russia was willing to compromise, as The New York
Times pointed out in an editorial, on at least ten im-
portant issues in order to assure the prompt and success-
ful establishment of the U. N.
Whatever its differences of opinion with other coun-
tries in the discussions over the U. N. Charter, Soviet
Russia continued to uphold the same principle of col-
lective security for which it had fought in the arenas of
diplomacy during the pre-war years. There was no basic
alteration in its policy; nor was it to be rationally ex-
pected that it would suddenly change from being a peace-
loving nation to a war-loving nation. Rarely do great
peoples reverse their fundamental historical pattern over-
night. Yet today we are asked to believe the far-fetched
story that the Soviet Republic, having vigorously sought
international peace for the first thirty years of its exis-
tence, has become all at once the chief fomenter of war
in the world.
The third major goal in its foreign policy is uni-
versal disarmament, including the abolition of atomic
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? SOVIET CIVILIZATION
weapons and international controls for atomic energy.
The Soviet record on disarmament has been a notable
one. At the Genoa Conference of 1922, the first inter-
national conference which Soviet Russia attended, the
Soviet Foreign Minister, G. V. Chicherin, proposed a
general reduction of armaments. At the meeting of the
Preparatory Commission of the Disarmament Conference
at Geneva in 1927 the Soviet delegate, Maxim Litvinov,
surprised the world by his proposal for general and com-
plete disarmament. But, during the life of the League
of Nations, armaments increased immensely among the
Great Powers instead of diminishing.
After the formation of the United Nations the Soviet
delegation urged, in 1946, a general reduction of arma-
ments and prohibition of the production and utilization
of atomic energy for war purposes. In 1948, when the
cold war was well under way, the Soviet Government put
forward a plan at the U. N. to reduce the armaments and
armed forces of the Great Powers by one-third within a
year. As recently as November, 1951, Soviet Foreign
Minister Vishinsky repeated this proposal at a meeting
of the United Nations in Paris. The Western Powers
treated Mr. Vishinsky's scheme primarily as propaganda;
and, indeed, the tendency of the non-Soviet world from
1917 on has been to sneer at Soviet disarmament pro-
posals as insincere and designed to deceive. This atti-
tude I am convinced is unjustified.
Soviet Russia has upheld the goal of disarmament in
order to lessen international fears and frictions, decrease
the danger of war and save for constructive economic pur-
poses the colossal sums and energies which go into the
manufacture of armaments. The absence of unemploy-
ment and the general stability of its economic system are
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? SOVIET FOREIGH POLICY
not contingent on the armaments industry, but are based
on socialist ownership and country-wide planning. The
Soviets consider armaments production an economic
waste. Nonetheless, the very real menace of foreign ag-
gression has compelled them to develop a great defense
industry and to maintain a large army. It was fortunate
for America and the rest of the democratic world that
Soviet Russia was so well prepared when Hitler struck
in World War II.
Fourth, the Soviet Union believes in normal, flour-
ishing international trade as beneficial to itself and con-
ducive to peace. Naturally it was never in favor of the
economic and financial boycott imposed upon it by the
capitalist Powers after the First World War. And it has
always considered that substantial trade with the outside
world was an important part of its policy of peaceful
co-existence with the capitalist countries. It has all along
been particularly desirous of having good trade relations
with the United States.
In subscribing to the Atlantic Charter Soviet Russia
went on record with the other signatory nations in stat-
ing: "They will endeavor, with due respect for their
existing obligations, to further the enjoyment by all
states, great or small, victor or vanquished, of access, on
equal terms, to the trade and to the raw materials of the
world which are needed for their economic prosperity.
They desire to bring about the fullest collaboration be-
tween all nations in the economic field, with the object
of securing for all, improved labor standards, economic
advancement and social security. "
It is no choice of Soviet Russia that these interna-
tional economic aims written into the Atlantic Charter
have been so disregarded since the Second World War.
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? SOVIET CIVILIZATIOH
In fact it has decried from the start the economic conse-
quences of the cold war that have necessarily followed
from the American policy of drastically restricting trade
with the U. S. S. R. and the countries of Eastern Europe.
It has regretted the serious drop in trade between Eastern
and Western Europe. As to American-Soviet business
relations, the Soviet Union stands ready to resume normal
trade on a reciprocal basis at any time. Of course the
Soviets will benefit from such commerce, but the United
States on its part will gain just as much.
Fifth in its peace program, Soviet Russia supports
the self-determination of peoples. Again, the Atlantic
Charter of 1941 sets forth the principles involved, assert-
ing: "Their countries seek no aggrandizement, territorial
or other. They desire to see no territorial changes that
do not accord with the freely expressed wishes of the
peoples concerned. They respect the right of all peoples
to choose the form of government under which they will
live; and they wish to see sovereign rights and self-govern-
ment restored to those who have been forcibly deprived
of them. "
On November 6, 1942, Premier Stalin, speaking of-
ficially for his Government, said that "the program of
action of the Anglo-Soviet-American coalition" for win-
ning the war must include "abolition of racial exclusive-
ness; equality of nations and integrity of their territories;
liberation of enslaved nations and the restoration of their
sovereign rights; the right of every nation to arrange its
affairs as it wishes; economic aid to nations that have
suffered and assistance to them in attaining their material
welfare; restoration of democratic liberties; destruction
of the Hitlerite regime. " While insisting on the sternest
possible attitude toward Hitler and all the Nazi criminals
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? SOVIET FOREIGH POLICY
who "have turned Europe into a prison of nations,"
Stalin made clear: "It is not our aim to destroy Germany,
for it is impossible to destroy Germany, just as it is im-
possible to destroy Russia, but the Hitlerite State can and
should be destroyed. "
As a member of the United Nations, the Soviet Union
subscribes to the clause in the Charter which gives as one
of the main purposes of the organization, "To develop
friendly relations among nations based on respect for the
principle of equal rights and self-determination of peo-
ples. "17 The Russians are of course keen on the exten-
sion of complete self-determination to the colonial areas
of the world. In the setting up of the United Nations at
San Francisco, the Soviet delegation proposed: "The
basic objectives of the trusteeship system should be to
promote the political, economic and social advancement
of the trust territories and their inhabitants and their
progressive development toward self-government and
self-determination, with active participation of the peo-
ples of these territories having the aim to expedite the
achievement by them of full national independence. "18
The final U. N. draft watered down this statement by
eliminating "with active participation of the peoples of
these territories"; and adding to the phrasing on inde-
pendence the important qualification, "as may be appro-
priate to the particular circumstances of each territory
and its peoples and the freely expressed wishes of the
people concerned, and as may be provided by the terms
of each trusteeship provision. "19 This weakened formula-
tion was adopted with the support of the United States
and under pressure from Great Britain and France, the
two countries still holding large colonial possessions.
The Russians are of the opinion that historically the
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? SOVIET CIVILIZATION
violation of self-determination through foreign interven-
tion has been in general a tool of reaction and imperial-
ism, especially since the Metternich period of the early
nineteenth century. And they point out that the flagrant
military intervention directed against various countries
between the First World War and the Second was clearly
on behalf of old-time imperialist or outright fascist inte-
rests. In the next section I discuss the principle of self-
determination in relation to certain actions of the Soviet
Union since the beginning of the Second World War
in 1939.
2. Does Soviet Russia Wage Aggression?
The principle of self-determination of peoples leads
naturally to the question of whether the Soviet Union
has been guilty of aggression against foreign countries.
The tendency has been in the West to favor self-determ-
ination only so long as it is applied in a way unfavorable
to the U. S. S. R. and the new socialist governments which
have sprung into existence since the defeat of world
fascism. The same sort of people who supported the
widespread imperialist intervention against the Soviet
Republic during its early years today claim that Soviet
Russia is itself imperialistic because during World War
II it took back the Baltic States (Estonia, Latvia and
Lithuania) and Eastern Poland, and because Communist-
led regimes have come into power throughout most of
Eastern Europe and in China.
As to the Baltic provinces and Eastern Poland, we
should recall that these were torn from Russia after the
First World War by means of force and power politics,
which had as their objective the weakening of the Soviet
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? SOVIET FOREIGH POLICY
Republic and the creation of a "cordon sanitaire," both
to hem it in from a military standpoint and to protect
Europe from its influence. In 1920 the American Gov-
ernment quite rightly protested against this dismember-
ment of Russia and called for the restitution of the old
Russian boundaries, except in regard to Armenia, Fin-
land and ethnic Poland. *
The governments of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania
were first set up in 1918 with the aid of the Kaiser's
armies and in line with the harsh Treaty of Brest-Litovsk
which formalized Germany's conquests and spheres of
influence in Eastern Europe. They were soon recognized
by the Allies, which, for their own obvious reasons,
wished to see these anti-Soviet outposts become perma-
nent. When the American Government finally granted
them recognition in 1922, Secretary of State Charles
Evans Hughes made this significant reservation: "The
United States has consistently maintained that the dis-
turbed conditions of Russian affairs may not be made
the occasion for the alienation of Russian territory, and
this principle is not deemed to be infringed upon by the
recognition at this time of the governments of Estonia,
Latvia and Lithuania. "20 Thus Mr. Hughes qualified his
recognition statement so as to leave the door open for a
future return of these nations to Russia.
The matter of Armenia quickly became an academic
one, since the idea of America's accepting a mandate for
that country rapidly faded away and since a native Com-
munist group gained the upper hand in 1920 and pro-
claimed an Armenian Autonomous Republic linked up
with the U. S. S. R. Finland also became an academic
issue, due to the fact that the Soviet regime under Lenin
? See p. 265.
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? SOVIET CIVILIZATIOH
recognized the full independence of the Finnish Govern-
ment in 1918.
But why did the American Government later change
its attitude on the right of Russia to the Baltic States
and that part of Poland inhabited principally by Russian
peoples? The reason is perfectly clear. When the U. S.
State Department made its declarations against Russian
dismemberment in 1920 and 1922, it thought that the
Soviet Republic was soon going to collapse. But when
instead Premier Lenin and his colleagues actually con-
solidated their power, Washington shifted its attitude,
not because of the fundamental rights or wrongs of the
question, but because it wanted Soviet socialism to re-
main as weak as possible. In short, the guiding principle
in American policy was that a non-Communist, merely
liberal, Russian regime had a right to the old Tsarist
frontiers, but not a radical, Communist one.
There can be no doubt that economically speaking
the Baltic States, which were conquered by the Tsars
back in the eighteenth century, belong naturally with
Russia and Russia with them. Peter the Great acquired
Estonia and Latvia in 1721 and Catherine the Great
Lithuania in 1795. The only year-round ice-free ports
which Russia had in the west and which were directly
accessible to the Atlantic Ocean were in these territories.
Prior to the First World War almost a third of Russia's
exports and imports went through these outlets to the
sea. The artificial separation of the Baltic States from
the U. S. S. R. in 1918 proved an immense handicap to
the Soviet Union and disrupted the economies of those
three countries themselves.
It became widely believed that between the two
world wars the Baltic nations were beautiful little demo-
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? SOVIET FOREIGH POLICY
cracies functioning on behalf of liberty. This was far
from true. As Walter Lippmann wrote in 1943, these
three states "some years before the war fell into the hands
of fascist rulers and became the focal points of intrigue
against Russia. Thus the last Lithuanian parliament had
been dissolved in 1927 by a conspiracy of army officers;
the Latvian Republic became fascist in 1934; and Estonia,
though it never went quite that far, fell under strong
fascist influence between 1933 and 1937. "21
In mid-June of 1940, as France and the Low Coun-
tries crumpled under the Nazi blitzkrieg, the Soviet
Government charged that the three Baltic States had
violated their mutual-aid pacts with the U. S. S. R. and
sent in troops to occupy them. This Soviet move, how-
ever hard-boiled in conception and execution, definitely
forestalled'Hitler, who all along had been casting cove-
tous eyes in the direction of these weak and strategically
situated nations. A few weeks after the Soviet military
occupation, newly elected parliaments in Estonia, Latvia
and Lithuania proclaimed their countries Soviet Repub-
lics; and in August the Supreme Soviet officially admitted
them into the U. S. S. R. For the Baltic peoples this was
a logical step, particularly from the economic viewpoint.
For the Soviet Union it was an essential development
from the viewpoint of self-defense against the Nazi threat;
and a justified recovery of lands wrested from the
U. S. S. R. in defiance of historical right.
An even clearer case for the revision of Soviet boun-
daries during the Second World War concerned Eastern
Poland, with its population of around 11,000,000 in 1939
consisting of approximately 5,000,000 Ukrainians, 2,500-
000 Belorussians, 2,500,000 Poles and 1,000,000 Jews.
The regions comprising Eastern Poland, except a small
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? SOVIET CIVILIZATION
southern area known as East Galicia, were all part of the
old Tsarist Empire and were taken away from an ex-
hausted Soviet Russia under the Treaty of Riga in 1921
by the Polish imperialists after their unprovoked war of
aggression against the Socialist Republic. At the time
even the anti-Soviet Allies protested against Poland,
which had also seized the Lithuanian capital, Vilna
(Vilnius), grabbing so much territory that was obviously
non-Polish. In fact, before the Polish-Soviet war broke
out, the Supreme Council of Allied Powers had recom-
mended as a just boundary the so-called Curzon Line,
which was first officially proposed at a meeting in 1919
presided over by America's Under Secretary of State,
Frank L. Polk. The Curzon Line assigned to Soviet
Russia almost all of what later became Eastern Poland.
In September of 1939, as the Polish Government was
collapsing under the impact of Hitler's attack, the Soviet
army marched into Eastern Poland and occupied it.
