Josef Stalin

[janvanvurpa]

That's a curious morality you're arguing under... Why not? Because Poland was a sovereign nation, as were Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, and Finland, which Stalin attacked in late 1939.

Yes, the USSR was not ready to fight a major power in 1939. (It was hardly ready in 1941..) But the fact remains that the war started 7 days after the signing of the non-aggression pact between Germany and the USSR, and within a few months the USSR had annexed Eastern Poland, the Baltics and several other territories, as well as starting a war against Finland.

They seemed to be involved pretty damned quickly..

My reading was they the Soviets, under economic attack from the Democracies since 1917, had been negotiating with Britain and France for the establishment of basically a buffer zone between its borders and Nazi Germany---and that would have been essentially the same countries that post war were the old "Warsava Pact". They were demanding that those countries---including Poland---be neutral and that the Red Army could enter those countries if foreign troops entered. In short they wanted to fight on somebody else's soil rather than their territory..
They dod not trust the Democracies will as they had seen how France and Britain and USA did nothing to support the democratically elected government in Spain--indeed they (the Democracies) criminalized support of the legal democratically elected Spanish government... They had seen the West did nothing when Germany began to re-arm, did nothing when the Alscace was grabbed back, nothing when Sudetenland was grabbed, nothing when Czechoslovakia disappeared, nothing when Austria was absorbed...

And of course they read the Nazi fantasy books about superiority of "Aryan" peoples and their "right" to subjugate, kill, exterminate Slavs....

When the West would not negotiate some sort of buffer, in early August, the negotiations were broken off and since the Nazis had been promising a "better deal' the Soviets took the only deal they could...

Virru-virrruuu there is/was no excuse for the barbarity of Stalin and his gang but this "they were all the same" is crazy talk.... The Soviets own mythology did not include phony mystical superiorty of one Nationality and the total dismaissal of the humanity of whole races..... the Nazi's did and they made national Policy based on their "rights " as superior beings...

In the end, the philosophical underpinnings of a regime do count just like in law (law descended from N Germanic/Saxon/English/American) and act may be legal or illegal all depending on what is in the mind of "the perpetrator ".

[jens]

Virru-virrruuu there is/was no excuse for the barbarity of Stalin and his gang but this "they were all the same" is crazy talk.... The Soviets own mythology did not include phony mystical superiorty of one Nationality and the total dismaissal of the humanity of whole races..... the Nazi's did and they made national Policy based on their "rights " as superior beings...

But it could be claimed that their ideology of "mystical superiority" included something else - instead of nationality it was a political ideology, in this case communism. After all, Soviet leaders were keen to speak about "world revolution" and were looking for ways to widen the "sphere of communism" as far as possible.

[janvanvurpa]

But it could be claimed that their ideology of "mystical superiority" included something else - instead of nationality it was a political ideology, in this case communism. After all, Soviet leaders were keen to speak about "world revolution" and were looking for ways to widen the "sphere of communism" as far as possible.

Sorry history disagrees with you..
Not really since before Lenin died had they been doing much about that the spreading the "word'

Indeed the whole Stalinist push was to "bureaucratize the Revolution in the institutions". Trotsky was the one pushing the "safeguard the Soviet Revolution by supporting revolutions in all the other counties" and he and his comrades were either forced out, or simply shot...



Now like my friend Viiiiiruuu-viiiiruuuuu we all have our personal inclinations which color our perceptions of everywhere, and everything and I know personally I have always dispised injustice and hate bureaucrats (living almost 8 years in Sweden really help fine tune the my attitude toward bureaucrats, and think the solution was simple: about 7.62 x 54) so no love for Stalin from me, and I do believe every man is my brother, the basis for "Internationalism" so I admit some sympathy for Trotsky's ideas.

But he lost, the Bureaucrats won....and the old saying came to pass "A Chicken in every pot, and an icepick in every Trot!"...

The Communist mythos was the "inevitability" of violent revolutions being an absolute necessity, ignoring the experience in France in the 1890s where political power was won at the ballot box.

[Malbec]

did nothing when the Alscace was grabbed back,

???

Alsace was one of the last French territories to fall in 1940 as the Germans could not break through the Maginot line and had to breakthrough the Belgian border and attack it from behind. It certainly wasn't grabbed back as part of the buildup to WW2...

When the West would not negotiate some sort of buffer, in early August, the negotiations were broken off and since the Nazis had been promising a "better deal' the Soviets took the only deal they could...

The alliance between the Nazis and the USSR predates many of Nazi Germany's aggressive moves, certainly German tank and submarine crews were training at Soviet bases from the mid-30s.

Virru-virrruuu there is/was no excuse for the barbarity of Stalin and his gang but this "they were all the same" is crazy talk.... The Soviets own mythology did not include phony mystical superiorty of one Nationality and the total dismaissal of the humanity of whole races..... the Nazi's did and they made national Policy based on their "rights " as superior beings...

Soviet concepts of superiority didn't rest on race, they rested on the superiority of their Communist ideology and need to 'liberate' other peoples. You could argue that this was a far more expansionist philosophy, after all there was a limit to how much land Germany could reasonably use and therefore needed to be taken from other people, but if your goal is to liberate workers everywhere there is no limit to how widely the Soviet cause should be spread.

[janvanvurpa]

Saarland, I meant..

[Lousada]

The alliance between the Nazis and the USSR predates many of Nazi Germany's aggressive moves, certainly German tank and submarine crews were training at Soviet bases from the mid-30s.

The German and Soviet armed forces started friendly exchanges already right after the First World War. The western powers were unhappy with Russias premature exit from WWI, and Germany was under the strict rules of the Versailles treaty. This drove the former enemies back together again. Quite a few Germans served in the Russian army between the wars as officer or trainer or adviser. What influence this had on the grander scale of things, I can't tell you, but the contacts and mutual interest were always there.

[Lousada]

Saarland, I meant..

Saarland re-entered the German Reich by an election in 1935. An election which was granted to them in the Versailles treaty....

[janvanvurpa]

Saarland re-entered the German Reich by an election in 1935. An election which was granted to them in the Versailles treaty....

Rhineland Saar land whatever you guys what the fawk?? The POINT is the in the context replying to stuiose wiiiirrrru wiiiiruuu is the Soviets saw the West do nothing at REPEATED gawddamn Nazui aggressive moves. It's all busllshiiiiit now, so whatever, if this damn forum allowed editing like any reasonable place one could correct the slips of the tongue or mind, and the we could correct our slight errors.


Too busy to argue but the point was the Europe teetered on the edge:

The remilitarization of the Rhineland by the German Army took place on 7 March 1936 when German military forces entered the Rhineland. This was significant because it violated the terms of the Locarno Treaties and was the first time since the end of World War I that German troops had been in this region.
Under Articles 42, 43 and 44 of the 1919 Treaty of Versailles—imposed on Germany by the Allies after the Great War—Germany was "forbidden to maintain or construct any fortification either on the Left bank of the Rhine or on the Right bank to the west of a line drawn fifty kilometers to the East of the Rhine". If a violation "in any manner whatsoever" of this Article took place, this "shall be regarded as committing a hostile act...and as calculated to disturb the peace of the world".[1] The Locarno Treaties, signed in 1925 by Germany, France, Italy and Britain, stated that the Rhineland should continue its demilitarized status permanently.[2] Locarno was regarded as important as it was a voluntary German acceptance of the Rhineland's demilitarized status as opposed to the diktat (dictate) of Versailles.[3] Under the terms of Locarno, Britain and Italy guaranteed the Franco-German border and the continued demilitarized status of the Rhineland against a "flagrant violation" without however defining what constituted a "flagrant violation".
Heinz Guderian, a German general interviewed by French officers after the Second World War, claimed: "If you French had intervened in the Rhineland in 1936 we should have been sunk and Hitler would have fallen".[29] Hitler himself said:

The forty-eight hours after the march into the Rhineland were the most nerve-racking in my life. If the French had then marched into the Rhineland we would have had to withdraw with our tails between our legs, for the military resources at our disposal would have been wholly inadequate for even a moderate resistance.[30]

[Malbec]

Rhineland Saar land whatever you guys what the fawk?? The POINT is the in the context replying to stuiose wiiiirrrru wiiiiruuu is the Soviets saw the West do nothing at REPEATED gawddamn Nazui aggressive moves. It's all busllshiiiiit now, so whatever, if this damn forum allowed editing like any reasonable place one could correct the slips of the tongue or mind, and the we could correct our slight errors.

Actually I think the Soviets were playing off both sides against each other, knowing that an alliance with the USSR would be of great value to both the Nazis and UK/France. I agree that their objective was to secure their borders from invasion but I don't think they waited till the UK/France demonstrated a lack of spine in standing up to the Nazis before courting the Germans. The cozy relationship between Germany and the USSR particularly with respect to military training/research on Soviet territory to circumvent the military restrictions placed on Germany via the Versailles treaty is evidence of that.

I still see little evidence that the USSR was planning to take over the whole of central/eastern Europe, noone has offered significant evidence to back that line up.

[Gregor-y]

I'm sure Stalin in 1945 had a lot more flexibility for determining his boundaries than Stalin in 1939. When was the Lublin government set up? That would be a good indicator of when future plans really started. That's assuming Katyn was primarily done for spite.