Stalin's plan for the Soviet domination of Europe

Covering the Map of the World — The Half-Century Legacy of the Yalta Conference ^ | February 1995 | Richard M. Ebeling

[Tailgunner Joe]

In 1939, Stalin began his play for Soviet domination of Europe. Years earlier, in a secret speech to the Communist Party Central Committee in January 1925, Stalin had laid out the strategy from which he never swerved in foreign policy: "But if war breaks out [in Europe] we shall not be able to sit with folded arms. We shall have to take action, but we shall be the last to do so. And we shall do so in order to throw the decisive weight into the scales, the weight that can turn the scales." Stalin's Marxist-Leninist view was that any war that broke out in Europe would be a war between the imperialist and capitalist nations. The strategy was to deflect any attack against the Soviet Union, and instead allow the capitalist nations to fight each other to exhaustion, at which point the Soviet Army would enter the war and conquer the European continent for the Communist cause.

In August 1939, Stalin put the strategy into practice by signing a nonaggression pact with Hitler, which meant that the war would be fought in the West among Germany, Britain, and France, leaving the Soviet Union safe and secure. In the meantime, the secret protocols of the Nazi-Soviet Pact gave Stalin control over eastern Poland, the Baltic Republics, Bessarabia, and Finland. Stalin's plan was that in 1942, at the latest, the Soviet Army would attack Germany, now that France was finished and England was weak and isolated off the European coast. The only problem was that Hitler double-crossed Stalin first by invading the Soviet Union in June 1941. This did not stop Stalin, after the German defeat at Stalingrad in the winter of 1942-43, however, in proposing a separate peace to Hitler through intermediaries in neutral Sweden, and obviously at the expense of his British and American allies. The only thing that prevented it was the fact that Hitler was unwilling to pay Stalin's price for ending the war on the eastern front. (See the review of Icebreaker: Who Started the Second World War? in Freedom Daily, November 1991.)

[Tailgunner Joe]

Some Soviet apologists actually try to defend the Hitler-Stalin pact by saying that Stalin was forced to side with Hitler by the appeasers Chamberlain and Daladier.

This historical revision completely ignores the fact that the Marxist Stalin was dedicated to the Communist conquest of western Europe from the very beginning.

What, no chair for me? (30th September, 1938)

At the end of the First World War, Poland was reborn as a nation-state out of the collapsed German, Austrian, and Russian Empires. At the peace conference at Versailles, Britain and France had demarcated the eastern border of Poland, and this became known as the Curzon Line. But in 1919, a war broke out between Poland and the new Bolshevik regime in Russia. At first the Poles advanced far into Russia, but the Bolsheviks counterattacked and reached the gates of Warsaw. The Poles then mounted their own successful counteroffensive and pushed the Red Army back, far to the east of the Curzon Line. The battle line became the political frontier when a peace treaty was signed between Poland and Lenin's Bolshevik regime in March 1921.

When Stalin and Hitler divided Poland in 1939, once again erasing it from the map of Europe, the line separating Soviet and Nazi zones of occupation was partly along and partly to the west of the Curzon Line. Stalin insisted throughout his wartime meetings with Churchill and Roosevelt that the Curzon Line was to be the border between Poland and the Soviet Union, not the older frontier according to the peace treaty of 1921.

In this shifting frontier of political control between Poland and the U.S.S.R., no consideration was ever given to the preferences or desires of those living in these lands. But one thing is certain, life for those who fell under Stalin's care in eastern Poland after 1939 was far from idyllic. It is quite doubtful that Roosevelt was right when he claimed that the people in these areas wanted to be part of the Soviet Union. Peasant land was seized, with the peasants forced into collective farms. All private property was nationalized. Tens of thousands of people were executed or sent off into slave labor in the Gulag prison camps. And in a region in which most of the people were either Russian Orthodox or Roman Catholic, religion was abolished and made a punishable offense.

When Adolf Hitler's foreign minister, Joachim von Ribbentrop, came to Moscow on August 23, 1939, to sign the Nazi-Soviet Non-Aggression Pact, Joseph Stalin hosted a late-night supper for his German guests after the signatures had been affixed to the documents. Stalin rose from his chair and gave a toast to Hitler: ". . . a man for whom [I have] always had an extraordinary respect. . . . I know how much the German nation loves its Führer; I should therefore like to drink to his health."

[Tailgunner Joe]

ping

[wyattearp]

I highly recommend the book "Icebreaker", which is mentioned in the article. It details the treachery of Stalin, who was just weeks away from attacking Hitler when Hitler attacked Russia first. It is an outstanding read. Not something that you read about in history class, for some reason...

[anonymoussierra]

Very good Thank you

http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/timeline/ww2time.htm
http://www.euronet.nl/users/wilfried/ww2/ww2.htm
http://www.ibiblio.org/pha
http://www.elknet.pl/acestory/poland.htm
http://www.cyberroad.com/poland/jews_ww2.html
http://www.bellaonline.com/subjects/7315.asp
http://www.cassiopaea.org/cass/coming2.htm
http://www.wargaming.net/tanks/poland.htm
http://www.polandsholocaust.org/intro.html

Please read Thank you all

[Milhous]

The strategy was to deflect any attack against the Soviet Union, and instead allow the capitalist nations to fight each other to exhaustion, at which point the Soviet Army would enter the war and conquer the European continent for the Communist cause.

Ironically, before invading Normandy, the Allies waited for Germany and the Soviet Union to fight each other to exhaustion at Stalingrad.

[Lukasz]

When Stalin and Hitler divided Poland in 1939, once again erasing it from the map of Europe, the line separating Soviet and Nazi zones of occupation was partly along and partly to the west of the Curzon Line. Stalin insisted throughout his wartime meetings with Churchill and Roosevelt that the Curzon Line was to be the border between Poland and the Soviet Union, not the older frontier according to the peace treaty of 1921.

It was even worse, according to the illegal Curzon Line, city of Lvov, populated by vast majority of Poles, was on the Polish side but Stalin seeing FDR’s and Churchill’s completely passive behavior took even Lvov and ignored own proposition of the Curzon line.

[Gucho]

Bump - Thank you.

[jamaksin]

And lest we forget ...

Without the Lend-Lease aid (convoys being protected by the US Navy while the United States was still a declared neutral country) going to the USSR ... including some 200 PBY's (the USSR terminology - GST) originally scheduled to be sent to Pearl Harbor for long-range reconnaissance ... the Germans and Russians might have bled each other to death ...

So it goes ...

[henderson field]

Lend Lease to Russia?
Please don't forget all the fighter planes flown over to Russia by Dave Schilling, Howard Hively and other American pilots of the Eagle Squadron based in England.

[Tailgunner Joe]

In 1940, the Japanese consul general in Harbin, Manchuria, intercepted several messages sent from the Soviet foreign minister, Vyacheslav Molotov, to the Soviet ambassador in Tokyo. In one of these messages, Molotov told his ambassador: "We concluded an 'Agreement with Germany' because a war is required in Europe" between the capitalist nations, to open the door for the future communization of the European continent. Molotov went on to explain that any peace settlement that would end the war between China and Japan "might destroy our work proceeding among the suppressed peoples of Asia, and . . . it would not instigate the Japanese-American war which we desire."

If Japan turned its eyes towards conquest in Southeast Asia — including the U.S.-controlled Philippine Islands — and became embroiled in a war with America, then Moscow could feel secure that the Japanese would not invade Soviet Siberia, as well. And in the chaos that a general war in Asia would create, the breeding ground for communist revolutions would be expanded. To help seal this likelihood, Stalin signed a non-aggression pact with Japan in April 1941.

In July 1941, a month after the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union, FDR's confidant, Harry Hopkins, was in Moscow meeting with Stalin, assuring the Soviet dictator of Roosevelt's intention of supplying the Red Army with as much war materiel as it was possible to provide, with no strings attached. On August 1, FDR told his cabinet that he wanted the aid flowing to Stalin immediately. "The only answer I want to hear is that it is under way," Roosevelt said to them. "Get the planes off with a bang next week."

At that very moment, Stalin's greatest and most successful spy in the Far East, Richard Sorge — who had warned Moscow in early June 1941 that Hitler would attack the Soviet Union during the third week of June, predicting the invasion almost to the day (even though at the time Stalin refused to believe it) — was using his agents to find out if Japan was planning to attack north at Soviet Siberia or south into a collision course with the United States. On October 4, 1941, Sorge, in his last message to Moscow before his arrest by the Japanese police, informed Stalin:

The American issue and the question of the advance to the south are far more important [to the Japanese] than the Northern problem [the Soviet Union]. . . . There will be war with the U.S. this month or next. . . . Japan will attack the United States, then Malaya, Singapore and Sumatra.

Stalin had this information corroborated when Soviet intelligence intercepted a November 27 message from Tokyo to the Japanese ambassador in Berlin, saying that he was to "explain to Hitler that the main Japanese efforts will be concentrated in the south and that we propose to refrain from deliberate operations in the north (i.e., Siberia)."

But even as the American aid was beginning to flow into the Soviet Union to bolster the Red Army in the face of the German attack, Stalin kept this information from his most reliable spy to himself. Better not to warn Roosevelt about Japan's war intentions and better simply to watch the unfolding of the Japanese-American war that he wanted. - LINK

[SamAdams76]

If only Patton was allowed to do things his way.

[skinkinthegrass]

Thanks, very interesting. :)

[jamaksin]

Harry "The Hop" Hopkins ... we know now (from the VENONA project), was Soviet agent "No. 19" - as FDR's alter ego, he was there when Schulz delivered to FDR the 14th-part of the Japanese diplomatic message ... when FDR says "... This means war." Odd that FDR did did not then issue an alert to any of the US military installations.

Also, Hopkins was the Lend-Lease director in the Spring of 1943 ... when tens of tons of nuclear materials (includinf enriched uranium) ... was shipped to the USSR ...

[Petronski]

Ironically, before invading Normandy, the Allies waited for Germany and the Soviet Union to fight each other to exhaustion at Stalingrad.

That was hardly the reason. The Allies needed time to gather the weapons and personnel. Besides, Stalingrad fell Feb 1943, and Overlord launched June 1944.

[Tribune7]

Ironically, before invading Normandy, the Allies waited for Germany and the Soviet Union to fight each other to exhaustion at Stalingrad.

We couldn't have invaded France (or anywhere in Europe) in the fall of 1942.

[Askel5]

good catch, Joe.

[Chgogal]

Thanks!

Excellent sites. Hope all is well with you Anonymoussierra.

[RusIvan]

This historical revision completely ignores the fact that the Marxist Stalin was dedicated to the Communist conquest of western Europe from the very beginning. ==

Accually it was Trotskii who propagated idea to dominate all Europe and whole world. Stalin and his cronies was enemies of Trotskii. They wanted to build socialism in one country - Soviet Union.

[Kozak]

They wanted to build socialism in one country - Soviet Union.

But only until it was strong enough to "expand".

[RusIvan]

But only until it was strong enough to "expand".===

I don't defend Stalin but truth. Stalin and his croies wanted to power Soviet Union alone. For this many facts speak.

Vlad Ryzun the author of "Icebreaker" isn't historian but manipulator. He misinterpreted facts. He ingnored facts which doesn't support his version.
The better read then his book are the diaries of german general Gulder who was the head of Staff of Vermaht before and at beginning WW2.
Gulder never told such thing like "preventive war". He showed all process of preparation of the operation Barbarossa -the plan of attack on Soviet Union. It was implemented 2 years before accual attack on Soviet Union. No prevention just scheduled attack.