Interaction between the USSR and Germany in the 1920s and 1930s
The question of the formation and development of Soviet-German relations during the interwar period is not new. However, each new way of conducting international politics reminds us of the peculiarities of these relations. The new situation forces us to pay attention to the formation process of Soviet and German foreign policy priorities and to analyze how political and economic regional processes influenced bilateral cooperation. The 20th century was a landmark period for the development of international relations. This century saw not only regional, European and Asian geopolitical changes but also global geopolitical changes. Global upheavals such as World War I, a series of revolutions, and World War II fundamentally changed our understanding of international relations and the place of international politics in interstate exchanges.
This work is devoted to Soviet-German relations from the 1920s – the end of the 1930s. The author considers the issues which are organically included in the general context of the European situation of the interwar period. The most critical normative acts of those years – the Versailles Treaty and the Locarno and Rapallo agreements – are investigated. The influence of the core document of Hitlerism – Mein Kampf – is analyzed. And its influence on the formation and development of foreign policy doctrines of Nazi Germany. The Soviet Union’s position on the Weimar Republic before and after the National Socialists came to power in 1933 is assessed. National Socialists came to power in 1933. The response to the strengthening of revanchist tendencies to solve problems generated by Versailles was the Soviet Union’s search for the best options for the creation of a Europe system of collective security.
The Primary Sources
The Treaty of Versailles 1919
This document is highly valued, but only if it has been read in its original form. The treaty is one of the first attempts to resolve all the conflicts of World War I to avoid similar events in the future. According to the rulings, most of Germany remained in the zone of occupation for the next 15 years. Germany was blamed for supporting an ally who resisted terrorism sponsored by another state. It is less than the guilt of the Allies who supported the sponsor of terrorist strikes. The document is a key to this study because it contains essential points that evoked revanchist sentiments in Germany.
Mein Kampf (A. Hitler)
“Mein Kampf” promotes the critical ideas of Nazism: fierce anti-Semitism, a racist view of the world, and an aggressive foreign policy. The focus on the conquest of “living space” fully reflects the sentiments of the German people. The ideology and hatred described by Hitler became defining for Germany until the end of World War II. It is essential to study this primary source to assess the changes in attitudes in society and the future dictator himself. It is essential to understand how and why so much hatred accumulated in such a man, whether it was only the impact of defeat in World War I or whether there were other factors. This work is attractive because Adolf Hitler begins to construct in the USSR and the Bolsheviks, in particular, an image of the enemy to be conquered. This fact is valuable because it best explains the change in rhetoric between the two states.
The Rappal Treaty of 1922
The Rapallo Treaty meant the end of the RSFSR’s international diplomatic isolation. For Russia, it was the first full-scale treaty and de jure recognition as a state, and for Germany, it was the first equal treaty since Versailles. Thanks to the agreement, the Red Army was able to use the technical achievements of the German military industry and learn the modern organizational methods of the German General Staff. This document is valuable because it is one of the first diplomatic treaties the Soviet Union entered.
The conquest of ruins: The Third Reich and the fall of Rome (J. Hell)
This monograph is attractive because it is written in the comparative genre, drawing parallels between the Third Reich and the Roman Empire. This fact is crucial because it allows us to analyze and examine the cyclicality of history by comparing the two empires. From this work, we can gain valuable insights into the background and reasons for the emergence of states, identify problems, and discuss the failure of these projects. The author does not avoid the Russian Empire, namely, the transformation into a better system of government.
Wartime Pamphlets, Anti-English Metaphors, and the Intensification of Antidemocratic Discourse in Germany after the First World War (T. Pankakoski)
This article establishes the hitherto forgotten link between German anti-English pamphlets of World War I and postwar right-wing, anti-democratic theories by exploring their primary forms of argumentation. In particular, the metaphor of the British as “merchants” or “hagglers” and of the British as a mechanical civilization, as opposed to the organic culture of the Germans, helped shift the debate between the respective discourses of war and democracy. The metaphors were old, but they were deepened by concrete hostility, reinforcing internal constitutional debates and emphasizing the fundamental unsuitability of democracy for Germany.
Woodrow Wilson and David Lloyd George: Uncongenial Allies. (J. Thompson)
This work illustrates the continuing debate in historical scholarship over how quickly Germany managed to become great again after its defeat in World War I. In 1919 American President W. Wilson formulated the U.S. position on Germany – “moderation.” British Prime Minister Lloyd George was suspiciously quick to support him. He did not want to allow French hegemony on the continent and subsequently planned to use Germany, which by that time had gained enough strength, against Soviet Russia. The work is attractive because it allows us to consider the Allied reaction to the victorious German recovery. This work informs us of how the Western Allies deliberately let the USSR get close to Germany to further allow the threat of war with the preservation of a controlled state.
The Third Reich. The birth of an empire. 1920 to 1933 (R. J. Evans)
This book opens Richard Evans’ trilogy on the history of the Third Reich. It tells the story of the difficult time experienced by Germany after World War I when in an atmosphere of political chaos, economic disasters, mass unrest, and ideological polarization of society, the totalitarian Nazi state was born. Initially not a serious political force, in a short time, the Nazis established a one-party dictatorship in Germany. They plunged the country into the most profound moral, social and cultural crisis. The author describes how this happened and tries to answer whether Hitler’s rise to power was inevitable and why throughout the 1920s, the citizens of the free Weimar Republic were increasingly inclined toward the ideals of authoritarianism. In addition, one can learn about Soviet-German relations in their infancy from the monograph, which is useful for analysis and to draw a more complete picture of the European space.
Bibliography
Britannica, T. Editors of Encyclopaedia. “Treaty of Versailles.” Encyclopedia Britannica, Web.
Evans, Richard J. The Third Reich. The birth of empire. 1920 to 1933. Penguin Press, 2002.
Fink, Carole, Axel Frohn, and Jürgen Heideking, eds. Genoa, Rapallo, and European reconstruction in 1922. Cambridge University Press, 2002.
Hell, Jhone. The conquest of ruins: The third Reich and the fall of Rome. University of Chicago Press, 2019.
Hitler, Adolf. Mein Kampf. Good Press, 2021.
Pankakoski, Timo. “Wartime Pamphlets, Anti-English Metaphors, and the Intensification of Antidemocratic Discourse in Germany after the First World War.“ Journal of the History of Ideas 82, no. 2 (2021): 279-304.
Thompson, Jame. Woodrow Wilson and David Lloyd George: Uncongenial allies. In The Palgrave Handbook of Presidents and Prime Ministers from Cleveland and Salisbury to Trump and Johnson (pp. 79-99). Palgrave Macmillan, Cham, 2022.