Download Evaluate the view that Soviet foreign policy was dominated by

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, 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, then proceeded to sign a series of international agreements – a policy known
as the ‘United Front’. 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.
By the late 1920s, relations with Germany had begun to sour, 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). This ideological shift mirrored the hardening of
domestic policy, as Stalin 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 Nazis 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 (1933), and the USSR joined the League
of Nations (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. Both nations 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.
The first hint of Stalin's 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.
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. 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.
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, Nazi Germany.