Hocemo li po stotinu puta da vrtimo jedno isto?
Staljin je ponudio cehoslovackom predsedniku da Crvena armija udje na teritoriju Cehoslovacke, a Ceski predsednik je birajuci izmedju dva zla - izmedju nacisticke i boljsevicke okupacije - izabrao ono sto je smatrao za manje zlo - dakle nemacku okupaciju.
Inace za svo vreme rata, u Ceskoj nije postojao nikakav jak pokret otpora, jer su Cesi znali da ce cak i u slucaju Hitlerove pobede Ceska opet biti drzava (doduse bez Sudetske oblasti).
Pregovori izmedju Engleske, Francuske i SSSR-a 1939. su zapeli najvise znog toga sto Rumunija i narocito Poljska nisu htele ni da cuju da Crvena armija stupi na njihovo tlo, jer, kao sto se kasnije pokazalo u slucaju Estonije, Letonije i Litvanije, ulazak Crvene armije je znacio okupaciju, dovodjenje komunista na vlast i otimanje teritorije i pripajanje SSSR-u.
Situacija nije bila ni malo prosta kako to lepi Bora pokusava da predstavi.
Kao prvo, u Francuskoj su se svake godine smenjivali premijeri i vlade, desnicari su se plasili ne samo uspona komunista u Francuskoj, vec i boljsevizacije drugih drzava u Evropi. S druge strane hteli su isto kao i Englezi da izbegnu da provociraju Hitlera, a i nisu hteli ni da se Musolini vise priblizi Hitleru.
I u Engleskoj je unutar vlade i samog Forin Ofisa postojala podela na one koji su bili za i protiv sklapanja saveza sa SSSR-om. Recimo, Cercil je bio vise sklon za savez sa SSSR-om, takodje i donji dom parlamenta (House of Commons) ali sto je najvaznije i veci deo javnosti (isto kao u Francuskoj) su bili za pakt sa SSSR-om, jer je izgledalo da Rumunija i Poljska ne bi izdrzale duze od 3 nedelje rata sa Nemcima.
Evo i jedne brosure, iz koje sam dole izvukao najzanimljivije citate:
https://www.webdepot.umontreal.ca/Usager...honest.pdf
In August the French and British finally sent missions to Moscow to conclude a military agreement against Nazi Germany. But the talks quickly stalled over the passage of the Red Army across Poland and Romania to meet the enemy. On 23 August the Soviet government signed instead a non-aggression pact with Nazi Germany. A week later the German army invaded Poland.
Poland, fearing the USSR more than Nazi Germany, would be pushed into the arms of Hitler while French relations with Great Britain would also suffer.'
While Potemkin warned that too much interest in staff talks might be counterproductive, the Soviet government was impatient to see a ratification of the mutual assistance pact, delayed by Laval, and a start to military talks. Soviet efforts could not have come at a worse time.
French national elections took place in May 1936 in an atmosphere of deepening political acrimony between right and left. The Popular Front of Communists, Socialists and Radicals won the elections and formed a government under Leon Blum, but frightened
the French right, which feared the spread of communism. Such fears made a deepening of Franco-Soviet relations impossible, although the German occupation of the Rhineland in March 1936 led to ratification of the mutual assistance pact. The USSR was far away and had no borders with Germany.
For the right, the Soviet Union was pushing Europe toward war and preparing the way for world revolution.
Girshfeld conceded that the lack of a common Soviet-German border impeded Franco-Soviet military cooperation, but unless the French and Soviet staffs met to discuss common defence issues, there could be no serious cooperation between them.
The French govern- ment feared provoking Germany: would staff talks have to wait until Hitler was ready to attack? The unfortunate answer to this question became only too apparent three years later.
At the same time Robert Coulondre arrived in Moscow as the new French ambassador. In his first audience with Litvinov on 10 November, he complained about communist propaganda in France. The position of the Radicals was critical, and they were running scared of communism. Litvinov gave assurances and in fact did not care a jot about French communists. He observed to Coulondre that France and the USSR had a common interest in safeguarding the peace against Nazi Germany. Hitler sought to disrupt this unity of purpose by whipping up fears of communism. Would France play into Nazi hands? Coulondre did not report his reply, but Litvinov's plea would have fallen on deaf ears in any case.
Ideological fears were the mainstay of opposition to closer Franco-Soviet military ties. The growth of the French Communist Party and the Spanish civil war frightened the grande bourgeoisie and the general staff. General A. J. Georges, deputy chief of staff, thought the mutual assistance pact should be abandoned altogether. He feared the progress of communism in France and the possibility of a general strike.Georges' colleagues, Generals P.-H. Gerodias and M.-E. Debeney, considered the Soviet pact a dupe's game for which the dead Barthou was responsible.
Daladier calculated that France could do without Soviet support, but not without the British. The British government had had trouble 'swallowing' the mutual assistance pact; it would choke on a military agreement.
At the end of May Stalin authorised a devastating purge of the Soviet high command. Tukhachevsky and other senior commanders were executed after a drum-head trial in early June. Daladier and Gamelin had a pretext to block staff talks, and the Blum government fell on 21 June. But Daladier never had any intention of agreement to a Soviet military alliance.
The failure of Franco-Soviet staff talks in 1937 was a prelude to the Anglo-Franco- Soviet negotiations in 1939. The same questions were on the table: passage of the Red Army across Poland and Romania, fear of provoking Germany or driving Poland into the arms of Hitler, hostility from the Baltic states, among other factors.
The abortive talks in 1937 left a bad after-taste. For the French general staff the Stalinist purge of old bolsheviks was hardly troubling, but the 'decapitation' of the Soviet high command-either because the Soviet government was riddled with traitors or with madmen, who had turned on their best generals - gave cause for concern, quite apart from the splendid pretext it offered to block staff conversations. The French general staff continued to fear communist infiltration in the army, so much so that the deputy chief of staff, Colson, recommended against the attendance of French enlisted men at a concert of the Red Army choir.
Fear of the 'Red danger' and 'hatred of socialist revolution' dominated the French political agenda to the point where France had lost sight of its vital national interests. The French government sought no deepening of the mutual assistance pact, its only value being a hindrance to a Soviet-German rapprochement. Indeed,
the right considered undesirable the defeat of fascism at the expense of increased Soviet influence in Europe.
As the Czech crisis intensified in early September 1938, Litvinov hoped to obtain at the League of Nations a condemnation of the Nazi threat to peace; he sought to put political pressure on Bucharest to permit Red Army passage across Romania to reinforce Czechoslovakia. The Soviet general staff 'advised the French that 30
combat-ready infantry divisions were deployed on its western frontier. As for Poland, it appeared to have one foot in the German camp: in May the Polish ambassador in Paris told Georges Bonnet, the French foreign minister, that the Polish army 'would not budge' to support France should it go to the assistance of Czecho- slovakia in the event of German aggression.
The Polish government regarded the USSR as 'enemy No. 1', and would resist any Red Army attempt to cross its territory to aid Czechoslovakia. Colonel Beck, the Polish foreign minister, considered the Czech state 'unviable' and subverted by bolshevism. Polish officials held old grudges against the Czechs, who had been too friendly with the USSR. If Germany was to have the Sudetenland, said Beck in September, Poland would have the Czech district of Teschen-by force if necessary.
The British government, especially Chamberlain, was more optimistic. It was normal that Germany should dominate central Europe, other- wise there would be war every 15 or 20 years, said Lord Halifax, then foreign secretary, to Maisky, the Soviet ambassador in London. Why should Great Britain risk war to save the USSR? 'Why indeed?' asked foreign minister Bonnet.
For Litvinov this was a difficult time. By early 1939 the Stalinist purges had decimated Narkomindel. 'How can I conduct foreign policy', he said to Naggiar in a fit of ill humour, 'with the Lubyanka across the way?' Litvinov feared seeing his last day there. In March Payart found Litvinov very tense because of criticism in Moscow of his policies, but he carried on. Common wisdom in the diplomatic community was that Litvinov's days were numbered. Voroshilov, for one, was said to favour a Soviet-German rapprochement; but
Stalin opposed it. Among Litvinov's few surviving colleagues were Potemkin, Surits and Maisky. Were they spared to keep open the option of Soviet-Western cooperation against Nazism? Or was it simply a tyrant's whimsy?
On 18 March Litvinov proposed the calling of a six-power conference in Bucharest to discuss the 'possibilities of common action' against further Nazi aggression. Halifax replied to Maisky that a conference would be premature, but he had another idea: a four power declaration by the British, French, Soviet and Polish governments. Would the Soviet government agree to this proposal? Litvinov replied favourably on 22 March. British policy was scarcely a sea change; London was only inviting consultationa bout what might be done later.
But this was still too much for Beck, who rejected the British proposal. The Polish decision was no surprise to the French government, which trusted the Poles no more than did the Soviet. The French secretary-general, Leger, thought Beck 'entirely cynical and false' and just looking for an excuse 'to tuck in closer to Germany'.
Leon Noel, the French ambassador in Warsaw, noted in January 1939 that many Poles feared the Nazis less than the Soviet Union; forced to a choice, they would collaborate with Germany rather than accept aid from the USSR. Noel reported the comment of the Soviet military attache, who observed that the Poles would let themselves be crushed rather than accept Soviet aid. Counselling patience, Noel said the Poles would have to be coaxed along.
Cadogan recommended that Litvinov's proposal should be rejected, and it was-with 'disdain', Corbin would say later. Cadogan's weather vane was twisted also; and when Vansittart pressed to have the USSR included in a collateral matter, Cadogan exploded in his diary that Vansittart was an 'ass'! Cadogan was irritated by an interfering
predecessor but, personal rivalries aside,
the Foreign Office was more divided than the country on the matter of an alliance with the USSR. The debate over Anglo-Soviet cooperation was heated and continued throughout April. The problem of Romania and Poland-but especially Poland-came up repeatedly. The British ambassador, Kennard, warned that pressure on Poland to cooperate would only make matters worse.
Once the USSR became a full member of an anti-German coalition, the Polish government would fear relegation to a secondary role. Moreover, the extraordinary publicity in the press and on radio about a possible agreement with the USSR made Polish opinion anxious and played into the hands of Nazi propagandists exploiting fears of bolshevism.
The French sought to reassure Moscow. Bonnet-'in a state of complete prostration' - told Surits that an Anglo-Franco-Soviet accord to support Poland and Romania was essential. Daladier railed against the Poles who would lead their country 'to ruin'; Gamelin went to see Surits, kepi in hand, to say that it was not too late to oppose Nazi Germany. But anti-bolshevism still maintained its hold.
The chief of the 2e Bureau said that the USSR would not give help to the West, preferring to watch the 'democracies and totalitarian states ... cut one another's throats which would pave the way for bolshevism in Europe. . .'
Pressure for a Soviet alliance was building up on all sides. Public opinion in Great Britain was vociferous. 'Winston', long a thorn in the side of Tory cabinets, challenged the government in Parliament and in the press. What was going on, why the delay in responding to Soviet proposals, why no pressure on Poland to cooperate? The old hater of bolsheviks was for banding together to 'break Hitler's neck!' The British chiefs of staff also started to press for agreement with the USSR. They knew in early May that the French intended to stand on the defensive on the fortified Maginot line in the event of war between Germany and Poland. The Polish army would quickly be defeated without Soviet support, and if the USSR sided with Germany, Great Britain would face the gravest dangers. Vansittart also returned to the charge and seemed to influence the dawdling Halifax.
The discussions with the French and British dragged on in June and July, haggling over endless wordings of a political agreement. In early July Sargent admitted to Corbin that the British guarantees to Poland and Romania had been a mistake. The Soviet leaders, having thus obtained a measure of security, could hold out for their own terms. And they did: Molotov stuck tenaciously to the basic Soviet position laid out by Litvinov in April. The French and British had to negotiate or their guarantees would be worthless.
Sargent's admission is 'a little late', noted Naggiar; 'to correct this error, Russia's price has to be paid'.
The key issues were over guarantees of the Baltic states, adefinition of 'indirect aggression', and negotiations for a military convention tied to the political agreement.
The British feared giving the Soviet government licence to threaten Baltic independence. The Soviet Union feared German aggression through the Baltic with or without consent.
Meanwhile, the Baltic states looked on nervously. They preferred a year of Nazi occupation to a day of Soviet-which was what worried the Soviet government.
The French government became more impatient and more willing to make concessions to the Soviet point of view, especially on the Baltic issue.
Naggiar worried less about the Baltic states than about the question of Poland and Romania. He reminded Paris repeatedly in July that their cooperation was vital to the success of an Anglo-Franco-Soviet alliance. Naggiar raised the issue of Red Army passage across Poland, as did the French military attache Palasse. If the Polish government did not agree to it there could be no effective eastern front. Poland and Romania could not hold out without Soviet support. And if the eastern front were broken, Germany and Italy could turn all their force against the West. This was not a question of Polish or Romanian security but of French security, quite apart from that of the USSR.
Naggiar correctly identified the problem: neither the French nor British governments were prepared to make the necessary
commitments. Bonnet wanted a political, not a military agreement which would require Polish cooperation.
Poland did not want to
give it, minuted Naggiar, and we did not want to press for it. 'We want a gesture', scribbled Naggiar, 'the Russians want a concrete
agreement involving the assent of Poland and Romania'.
Bonnet felt trapped.
A straight triple alliance would leave Poland and Romania unprotected, but Molotov's insistence on tying political and military agreements together would enable the Soviet government to hold France and Great Britain to ransom.
Not wanting to understand caused mounting frustration in London. The British cabinet, which at first thought the Soviet government was serious about an agreement, though intending to drive a hard bargain, in late July began to wonder.
On 19 July Halifax and Chamberlain expatiated in the Committee on Foreign Policy on how 'humiliating for us' it would be to make further concessions to
Molotov when he would make none of his own. [Halifax]s aid that there should also be borne in mind the effect on Herr Hitler's mind of our going down on our knees to Soviet Russia to implore her assistance. Herr Hitler has a very low opinion of Russia and our action would confirm him in the idea that we were a weak and feeble folk. Considerations of this kind should be taken into account. On the other hand, domestic pressures were building up, a campaign to put Churchill in the cabinet had been underway for some time, and
Chamberlain feared 'considerable trouble' in the House of Commons over delays in concluding an agreement.
In London the deputy chiefs of staff, whom Chamberlain had tried at times to muzzle or ignore, would be muzzled or ignored no longer. We want 'to put on record', they said pointedly, 'certain general observations on the broad question of the use of Polish and Romanian territory by the Russian forces'. Voroshilov could have written the report. It was no time for half-measures, said the deputy chiefs, the 'strongest pressure' should be brought to bear on Poland and Romania; 'the Russians should be given every facility for rendering assistance and putting their maximum weight into the scale on the side of the anti-aggression powers'. If this is not done, the Poles would have no chance against a German attack. The supply of arms and war material is not enough. If the Russians are to collaborate in resisting German aggression against Poland or Romania they can only do so effectively on Polish or Romanian soil; and ... if permission for this were witheld till war breaks out, it would then be too late. The most the Allies could then hope for would be to avenge Poland and Romania and perhaps restore their indepen- dence as a result of the defeat of Germany in a long war.
In Paris Voroshilov's ultimatum and Naggiar's cables prompted the Quai d'Orsay to press the Polish government to accept Red Army passage across Polish territory. The Polish government refused to cooperate. Moscow might think Poland afraid and put up the price of its help.
On 15 August Bonnet summoned the Polish ambassador in Paris, Lukasziewicz, who said Beck would certainly reject out of hand a Soviet demand for passage.
The Soviet side would let us cut our throats, Drax reported, over the question of Red Army passage across Poland. Naggiar signalled that if the Poles did not agree, the talks in Moscow would fail.' The Foreign Office sent instructions to Kennard to support the French, though he had no greater success. 'We have done our best', Kennard said, but the Polish government would not budge. Quite apart from centuries-old national animosities, 'strong internal political reasons' dictated the Polish position.
The Foreign Office sent additional instructions, but Kennard replied that he had already used his best arguments and had decided
'to refrain from further action'.
The Quai d'Orsay directed Noel to try again. On 21 August the French government authorised
Doumenc - though the British never sent similar instructions to Drax - to sign the best agreement he could get with the Soviet Union.
'Too late', minuted Naggiar. On 17 August the Soviet government suggested to Berlin a non-aggression pact with a protocol defining German and Soviet foreign policy interests.
Doumenc saw Voroshilov on the evening of 22 August in a last-ditch attempt to save the situation. The French government, he said, had authorised him to sign an agreement consenting to Red Army passage across Poland. Does the British government concur? asked Voroshilov. Doumenc did not know. What about the Polish and Romanian governments? asked Voroshilov. Doumenc could not say. 'I am persuaded', replied Voroshilov, 'that the Poles would want to participate directly in our talks had they given their consent to the passage of Soviet troops. They would have insisted...', The best the Poles would do was to agree on 23 August that in the event of German aggression some form of Polish-Soviet cooperation would not necessarily be excluded. This is not enough, noted Naggiar. Ribbentrop arrived in Moscow the same day and signed a non-aggression pact in the early hours of the following morning.
In Warsaw Beck was untroubled by the sudden turn in events which simply confirmed his suspicions of the Soviet Union. 'Really not much had changed', Beck told Noel. When Naggiar saw this report, he minuted, 'One cannot imagine anything more insane'. In Paris Daladier thought the German army would march into Poland in a matter of days. He condemned the Poles' 'folly' as much as the
Soviet 'duplicity', though in the latter case he had little room for criticism.
It was not a question of whether Stalin trusted Hitler more than the Anglo-French; Stalin trusted no one. It was a question of buying
time, or of sauve qui peut. His decision was akin to that of the Anglo-French in 1938 not to go to war over Czechoslovakia. This was a
tit-for-tat policy, encouraging the 'crocodile' to stalk other prey. Stalin's policy was perhaps understandable, but it was not that of
Volkogonov's statesman.
In hindsight, Stalin gravely miscalculated; he should have been ready to fight at once because even a French army standing on the defensive would have been a far greater asset than no French army at all, as he would discover in June 1941 when the well-blooded, far more powerful Nazi armies invaded the USSR.
The French and British governments did not doubt the Soviet desire for Franco-Soviet staff talks or for an alliance against Nazi Germany.
They feared it-because of the anticipated growth of Soviet prestige and influence and the spread of communism in the event of a victorious war. They did not foresee that a successful Allied coalition where Polish, French and Romanian armies remained in being would limit the expansion of Soviet influence. The idea was to finesse the Soviet leaders, to benefit from their support but not to pay a price for it. The Chamberlain-Daladier policy was less a mistake than a calculated risk which went wrong. It was a policy driven by anti-bolshevism.
In France and Great Britain the opposite seems true. Anti-communist hysteria during the inter-war years was as strident as it would be after 1945 when it was called the Cold War.
French historians have stressed the decadence and the ideological divisions of French society in the 1930s. Dissident British Tories spoke of the appeasers' 'fatal confusion' between class and national interests.
The American historian F. L. Schuman wrote that the Cold War started after the Bolshevik revolution in 1917, though it was interrupted during the inter-war years by a period of 'coexistence'.' These ideas may be carried a step further. The Cold War did indeed begin in 1917, but there was no interregnum. The mutual mistrust engendered by it did much to prevent Anglo-French pragmatists from banding together with the USSR in 1939 to break Hitler's neck and thus contributed greatly to the origins of World War II.
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