page_title: Germany–Soviet Union relations, 1918–1941
section_title: Initial relations after Hitler's election
hierarchical_section_title: Germany–Soviet Union relations, 1918–1941 / The Soviet Union and Nazi Germany before World War II / Initial relations after Hitler's election
caption_attribution_description: English: “Soviet diplomat Maxim Litvinov”. Maxim Litvinov (1876-1951), a Soviet diplomat, statesman and party activist, Communist Party member from 1898, People's Commissar of Foreign Affairs (1930-1939). Русский: «Советский дипломат Максим Максимович Литвинов». Советский дипломат, государственный и партий деятель, член коммунистической партии с 1898 года, народный комиссар иностранных дел СССР (1930—1939) Максим Максимович Литвинов (1876—1951). СССР
context_page_description: German–Soviet Union relations date to the aftermath of the First World War. The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, dictated by Germany ended hostilities between Russia and Germany; it was signed on March 3, 1918. A few months later, the German ambassador to Moscow, Wilhelm von Mirbach, was shot dead by Russian Left Socialist-Revolutionaries in an attempt to incite a new war between Russia and Germany. The entire Soviet embassy under Adolph Joffe was deported from Germany on November 6, 1918, for their active support of the German Revolution. Karl Radek also illegally supported communist subversive activities in Weimar Germany in 1919.
  From the outset, both states sought to overthrow the system that was established by the victors of World War I. Germany, laboring under onerous reparations and stung by the collective responsibility provisions of the Treaty of Versailles, was a defeated nation in turmoil. This and the Russian Civil War made both Germany and the Soviets into international outcasts, and their resulting rapprochement during the interbellum was a natural convergence.
context_section_description: After Adolf Hitler came to power on January 30, 1933, he began the suppression of the Communist Party of Germany. The Nazis took police measures against Soviet trade missions, companies, press representatives, and individual citizens in Germany. They also launched an anti-Soviet propaganda campaign coupled with a lack of good will in diplomatic relations, although the German Foreign Ministry under Konstantin von Neurath (foreign minister from 1932–1938) was vigorously opposed to the impending breakup. The second volume of Hitler's programmatic Mein Kampf (which first appeared in 1926) called for Lebensraum (living space for the German nation) in the east (mentioning Russia specifically), and, in keeping with his world view, portrayed the Communists as Jews (see also Jewish Bolshevism) who were destroying a great nation. This ambition, if implemented, would be a clear danger to the security of the Soviet Union.
  Moscow's reaction to these steps of Berlin was initially restrained, with the exception of several tentative attacks on the new German government in the Soviet press. However, as the heavy-handed anti-Soviet actions of the German government continued unabated, the Soviets unleashed their own propaganda campaign against the Nazis, but by May the possibility of conflict appeared to have receded. The 1931 extension of the Berlin Treaty was ratified in Germany on May 5. In August 1933, Molotov assured German ambassador Herbert von Dirksen that Soviet-German relations would depend exclusively on the attitude of Germany towards the Soviet Union. However, Reichswehr access to the three military training and testing sites (Lipetsk, Kama, and Tomka) was abruptly terminated by the Soviet Union in August–September 1933. Political understanding between the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany was finally broken by the German-Polish Non-Aggression Pact of January 26, 1934 between Nazi Germany and the Second Polish Republic.
  Maxim Litvinov, who had been People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs (Foreign Minister of the USSR) since 1930, considered Nazi Germany to be the greatest threat to the Soviet Union. However, as the Red Army was perceived as not strong enough, and the USSR sought to avoid becoming embroiled in a general European war, he began pursuing a policy of collective security, trying to contain Nazi Germany via cooperation with the League of Nations and the Western Powers. The Soviet attitude towards the League of Nations and international peace had changed. In 1933–34 the Soviet Union was diplomatically recognized for the first time by Spain, the United States, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Romania, and Bulgaria, and ultimately joined the League of Nations in September 1934. It is often argued that the change in Soviet foreign policy happened around 1933–34, and that it was triggered by Hitler's assumption of power. However, the Soviet turn towards the French Third Republic in 1932, discussed above, could also have been a part of the policy change.
  Hermann Rauschning in his 1940 book Hitler Speaks: A Series of Political Conversations With Adolf Hitler on His Real Aims 1934 records Adolf Hitler as speaking of an inescapable battle against both Pan-Slavism and Neo-Slavism. The authenticity of the book is controversial:  some historians, such as Wolfgang Hänel, claim that the book is a fabrication, whereas others, such as Richard Steigmann-Gall, Ian Kershaw and Hugh Trevor-Roper, have avoided using it as a reference due to its questionable authenticity. Rauschning records Hitler as saying of the Slavs:
  We cannot in any way evade the final battle between German race ideals and pan-Slav mass ideals. Here yawns the eternal abyss which no political interests can bridge. We must win the victory of German race-consciousness over the masses eternally fated to serve and obey. We alone can conquer the great continental space, and it will be done by us singly and alone, not through a pact with Moscow. We shall take this struggle upon us. It would open to us the door to permanent mastery of the world. That doesn't mean that I will refuse to wa
caption: Maxim Litvinov considered Nazi Germany to be the greatest threat to the Soviet Union.
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