THIS review of the foreign policy of the Soviet Union would not be complete without some reference to the general outlook and policy of the Bolsheviks in relation to the present world situation as a whole.
Throughout these pages I have endeavoured to show that Soviet foreign policy is governed by definite principles and a strategy related to definite aims. Their policy may be summed up as the preservation and development of the Soviet Union as an independent union of Socialist Soviet Republics and forerunner of world socialism organized on similar lines to those of the Soviet Union. I have also shown the Bolshevik method of estimating the course of history and how they have used it as a guide for their actions. No other governments have their principles, aims, and methods.
This recognition of the independence of view and policy of the leaders of the Soviet Union is as essential for the understanding of the Bolshevik views of the world situation to-day as it is for the understanding of their policy of the yesterdays.
The Bolsheviks regard the war between the Great Powers as an imperialist war for the redivision of the world, i.e. a war between great capitalist Powers who have colonial empires and those capitalist Powers who are seeking to build new empires at the expense of the old. They accordingly denounce the war and proclaim their neutrality and desire for peace and seek to bring the war to an end. This is regarded by the Communists everywhere as the basis for their campaigns.
There are other aspects of this theory and policy which must be taken into account. The Bolsheviks hold the view that every capitalist country, whether at peace or war, is divided against itself because of the conflict of interests between those who own the means whereby the people secure their livelihood and the mass of the workers who are non-owners, or proletarians. They contend that this struggle between classes goes on continuously. Hence, although in the early stages of the war national feelings may be uppermost among the people, sooner or later, from the stress of circumstance, class feelings will supersede national sentiments and produce revolution, as was the case in the Russian and German Empires during the last war. The Bolsheviks would therefore prefer the Soviet Union to remain neutral until social revolution calls them to the side of the country in which the working class comes to power.
Strong as their desire may be to witness such a turn of events, and strive as they may to carry out such a policy, they realize that the Soviet Union exists amidst nations at war. They know that the war has already reached their frontiers and may at any moment roll over them. They are also aware that their neutrality does not rest upon their views of the character of the war but upon a peculiar relation of world forces.
I have already drawn attention to the fact that after the conquest of Manchuria by Japan the latter’s decision to march south against China and the Treaty Ports along the China coast was determined by two considerations. These were the spread of the Chinese national revolution and the absence of a Western Power on the frontier of the Soviet Union ready to strike with her simultaneously at the Bolsheviks. When Hitler’s Germany was ready after she had destroyed the Versailles Treaty and conquered Central Europe the wanted anti-Soviet ally, Japan, was preoccupied with the conquest of China and growing friction with Britain, the U.S.A., and France. Encouraged by their own successes against the Democracies, the Nazis decided to take advantage of the policy history had forced upon Japan and fight the Democracies alongside her. Hence the decision of the Nazis to make war on the Democracies was not determined by the failure of the negotiations between the Bolsheviks and the Democracies. It was really decided by Japan’s preoccupation with China and the Great Powers, the unreadiness of the Democratic Powers for war, and their retreat before the aggressors at all points of compass. The Pact with the Soviet Union determined only the time when the Nazis would strike and not their determination to strike. The course was already set for that decision. The Pact decided the hour for the blow.
That the Bolsheviks understood this development is clear. This is overwhelmingly evident in the Bolshevik press of the period and in Stalin’s speech to the Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union on 10th March, 1939. He then said: ‘After the first imperialist war the victor states, primarily Britain, France, and the U.S.A., had set up a new regime in the relations between countries, the postwar regime of peace. The main props of this regime were the Nine Power Pact in the Far East and the Versailles Treaty and a number of other treaties in Europe. The League of Nations was set up to regulate relations between countries within the framework of this regime on the basis of a united front of States, of collective defence of the security of States. However, three aggressive states, and the new imperialist war launched by them, have upset the entire system of this post-war regime. Japan tore up the Nine Power Pact, and Germany and Italy the Versailles Treaty. In order to have their hands free these states withdrew from the League of Nations. The new imperialist war became a fact.’
Nevertheless, although the course the Nazis were pursuing had become so clear to the Bolsheviks they repeatedly turned down the offers of the Nazis to come to terms. Early in 1938 and again in 1939 the Nazis offered 200,000,000 marks’ credit as part of a trading agreement between Germany and the Soviet Union. On each occasion the Bolsheviks broke off the negotiations and continued with their efforts to secure collective security with the Democratic Powers. More than a month after the speech of Stalin they began the negotiations with Britain and France which broke down in August, 1939.
It has been argued that the Bolsheviks pursued their policy only to raise their price to the Nazis. There are much more potent reasons available. They are anxious to delay as long as possible the spreading of the war in Europe because they realized that it would hasten the day when it would reach their own frontiers. They were also anxious for a defeat of Nazi Germany in order that the threat of war might be permanently removed from the Soviet Union. The fact that the two Powers with whom they wished to make a military pact were two ‘Imperialist Powers’ did not deter them. On the contrary they were prepared to take sides in a war with the imperialists. Indeed one of the strongest criticisms made by the Bolsheviks against the British Government is that the latter refused to make an effective military alliance with them. This was the burden of the speech of Molotov on the occasion of his report to the Supreme Soviet On 31St August, 1939. He then said: ‘The conclusion of a pact of mutual assistance against aggression would have been of value only if Great Britain and France and the Soviet Union had arrived at an agreement as to definite military measures against the attack of an aggressor.’ Here was no objection to the Soviet Union associating in common military action with two Imperialist Powers and waging a defensive war, but bitter complaint because such a collaboration of the Soviets with the two Imperialist Powers had not been established!
The neutrality of the Soviet Union has therefore nothing whatever to do with the ‘war being an imperialist war’. It is based, according to Molotov and the Bolsheviks generally, upon the failure to secure equitable reciprocal military commitments from Britain and France. That failure led to the Soviet Nazi Pact of Neutrality and non-aggression because the Bolsheviks deemed that to pursue the course of ‘collective security’ further would lead them into the position of bearing the brunt of a war which at this stage of history was directed mainly against the Democratic Powers. Such a development they regarded as dangerous in the extreme because of the pronounced unwillingness of the British and French Governments to fight the Nazis and their persistent animus towards the Soviet Union. There loomed before them the possibility of the war being ‘switched’ into a general combination against the Soviet Union and Bolshevism. Such a situation they were determined to avoid. Hence the Soviet Government moved away from the Democratic Powers on to the platform of ‘neutrality’ pending a further change of circumstances which would call the Bolsheviks into action of another kind. The Soviet Government therefore signed the Pact with Nazi-Germany in order to exploit the new relation of the Powers.
Soviet Neutrality is thus not a principle but an expediency in the operation of the larger strategy I have outlined. So also is its emphasis on peace. Peace cannot be an end in itself. The Bolsheviks are not pacifists. Indeed there are wars which the Bolsheviks support. They supported the Republicans in Spain and are supporting the Chinese in their defensive war against the Japanese, the Soviet-Japanese Neutrality Pact notwithstanding. They are preparing for war on a colossal scale. If the Bolsheviks were. convinced that there was no danger or likelihood of their neutrality being shortlived, there would be no need for their fervent efforts to increase the military and naval strength of the Soviet Union. Against whom then are they preparing for war? It should be observed that at no time have the Bolsheviks offered to make a military alliance with Nazi-Germany against Britain. But they did offer such an alliance to Britain, France, and Czecho-Slovakia against Nazi-Germany. The Bolsheviks were invited by the Nazis to join the Tri-partite combination. They refused. These facts should make it clear that the Bolsheviks do not wish to see a triumphant Nazi Colossus astride all Europe. But they are deeply suspicious of the willingness of any of the protagonists now fighting against the Axis Powers to pursue the complete defeat of Nazism and Fascism if such an outcome involves Germany and Italy in social revolution. This suspicion is founded on their own experience in the early years of the Russian Revolution, the strength of the ‘Quislings’ in every country attacked by the Nazis’ and the strength of the ‘switch the war’ movement in Britain and the U.S.A. They therefore build up their own power to pursue their independent course.
The Bolsheviks are conscious that the Soviet Union is in a most unique and powerful position. The enemies on its doorsteps in the East and West are preoccupied with wars of their own making. The Bolsheviks have secured during this period of preoccupation every advantageous strategical position they could occupy in anticipation of these enemies subsequently turning to attack the Soviet Union. They consider time is on their side. Their industrial and military power is growing daily without any of it being exhausted in actual warfare. They watch the distribution of the forces of the belligerents and the Nazi armies drawing farther and farther away from their bases. Their sentinels stand at their frontier posts watching for any infringement of their territory while their leaders in the Kremlin keep their eyes on the changing relations of world forces. They believe they can afford to wait while the forces of capitalism become deeper and deeper involved in mortal conflict. This process they are convinced is preparing the economic and social basis of a new wave of social revolution. How ready they are to extend the frontiers of the revolution the first months of the war in Europe provided ample evidence in what I have called the ‘revolutionary prelude’ to the period of neutrality.
It can be safely concluded, therefore, that there are two conditions in which we can say with confidence that the Red Army will march into war. The first has been specifically stated repeatedly by Stalin and Molotov. Should it happen in the progress of the war, that any Power attacks the interests of the Soviet Union, the Red Army will march. This they have made abundantly clear and we have seen repeatedly in the history of the war how Nazi Germany has struggled to avoid taking up this challenge until she has settled accounts with her Western foes. The latest exhibition of her reluctance to take up this challenge is seen in their attempt to by-pass Turkey in the Eastward drive to which I have referred in an early chapter.
The second set of circumstances which would call the Red Army into action would be the development of a social revolution, especially in Germany. Then the Bolsheviks would march as they marched into Poland. They would regard such a development as the beginning of the new wave of social revolution which they would aid to their utmost. There would be no ambiguity about their war aims or their peace aims. They would consist of a United States of Europe composed of Socialist Soviet Republics based upon the people. Such an eventuality they would much prefer but they know that the choice between these possibilities is not theirs to make. They know they can only make history with the materials which history provides.
It is a striking thing that the Fascist Powers, conscious as they are both of the aims of the Bolsheviks and the principles governing Soviet policy, have not permitted their hatred of them to govern their own policy. Basing themselves upon their confidence in their own power to prevent social revolution within their frontiers they have deferred their intended attack upon the Soviet Union. They have recognized fully her new frontiers, legalized in a treaty or Pact the neutrality of the Soviet Union and seized whatever advantages it has to offer them in order to beat their rivals upon whom they had immediately decided to make war.
The democratic Powers have acted otherwise. Hating Bolshevism possibly more than they hate Fascism they entered reluctantly into war with the Fascist states with a totally unrealistic policy in relation to the Soviet Union. Having refused an alliance which was offered them by the Bolsheviks they leave all the advantages that could be secured from the Soviet Union’s neutrality to be exploited by the Fascists. The realistic policy for this country is as obvious as it is real. It is for our government, whatever its political complexion, to face the facts. The principal enemies are the Fascist Powers. It is they and not the Bolsheviks who are waging war upon us and threatening our destruction. We need allies as never before. All the principles of political and military strategy demand of our government that it makes the fullest possible use of every circumstance to impede the efforts of the Fascist Powers; to use the ‘neutrality’ of other Powers whatever their political complexion and ultimate aims may be, against the principal enemy; where possible to transform the neutrality of other countries into open military support of our determination to destroy Nazism and all it stands for. Such a policy is not being pursued, especially in our relations with the Soviet Union. It should be pursued.
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