Roger Moorhouse - The Devils' Alliance - Hitler's Pact with Stalin, 1939-1941

Given that Ribbentrop evidently considered the war as good as over, he moved seamlessly to the issue of dividing up the spoils of the soon-to-be-defunct British and French empires. Echoing his master, he opined that the time was right for a broad delineation of “spheres of influence” between the Soviet Union, Germany, Italy, and Japan. This phrase doubtless would have piqued Molotov’s interest, but he would have been bemused by what followed. A wise policy, Ribbentrop suggested, was that each power should direct its expansion southwards, thereby avoiding points of possible friction. Thus Italy was already expanding to the southern coast of the Mediterranean in North and East Africa, he explained, Japan was pushing south into the China Sea and the western Pacific, and Germany—having defined her sphere of influence with the USSR—was to seek her Lebensraum in Central Africa. Would the Soviet Union, Ribbentrop wondered aloud, not “also turn to the South” for the “natural outlet to the open sea” that was so important to her? Momentarily confused, Molotov interrupted Ribbentrop’s flow to ask which sea he was referring to. After another lengthy discourse on the benefits of the Nazi-Soviet Pact, the Reich foreign minister asked whether “in the long run the most advantageous access to the sea for Russia could not be found in the direction of the Persian Gulf and the Arabian Sea?” Molotov said nothing and merely stared back at Ribbentrop, as inscrutable as ever.

Unfazed, Ribbentrop pressed on with his monologue, making a brief though rambling foray into the subject of Turkey, a topic he knew was close to Soviet hearts. As a sop to Moscow, he advocated reopening the “straits question” via an Axis-sponsored revision of the Montreux Convention, which since 1936 had regulated military and civilian traffic through the Bosporus and the Dardanelles and recognized Turkish control of both areas. Still, Molotov studiously kept his counsel. Ribbentrop wound up his exposition with an airy summary, dangling the idea of some Soviet alignment with the Tripartite Pact, alongside Germany, Italy, and Japan, and floating the prospect of another visit to Moscow to discuss matters further. Tellingly, however, he stopped short of any specific proposals, restricting himself instead to an outline of “the ideas which the Führer and he had in mind.”

In response, Molotov was as laconic as Ribbentrop had been loquacious, agreeing that an exchange of ideas “might be useful” and asking for clarification on a couple of points: the significance and purpose of the Tripartite Pact and the precise meaning of the phrase “Greater East Asian Sphere,” which had arisen in the preparatory conversations. He was right to query them. But, in response, Ribbentrop was less than enlightening. The phrase “Greater East Asian Sphere,” he admitted, was “new to him, too” and had “not been explained to him either.” So he could offer little explanation beyond the unconvincing assurance that it had “nothing to do with the vital Russian spheres of influence.” Explaining the Tripartite Pact would have done nothing to ease Ribbentrop’s discomfort. Although not explicitly anti-Soviet, the pact—which had been signed by Germany, Italy, and Japan only two weeks before in Berlin—had nonetheless grown out of the Anti-Comintern Pact of 1936, which had been directed against Moscow. The new agreement pledged cooperation between the three powers in the establishment and maintenance of the “new order” in Europe and East Asia, forming the basis of the Axis. Predictably, perhaps, Ribbentrop eased his embarrassment by suggesting that the Soviet party might like to break for a late luncheon.

In the hour or so that Ribbentrop had spoken, Molotov had asked only three brief questions; Dekanozov had said nothing at all. Paul Schmidt believed that Molotov was “keeping his powder dry,” preserving his strength for the main event with Hitler later that day. However, he may also have recognized that he needed to speak to the organ grinder rather than the monkey.

After lunch, Molotov got his chance. Chauffeured into the austere neoclassical courtyard of the new Reich Chancellery, past an honor guard of the SS-Leibstandarte, he was led through vast, polished marble halls, lined by people attired in the myriad uniforms of the Nazi state. Berezhkov suspected that the visitors were deliberately taken by the most circuitous route so as to impress upon them the size and grandeur of the building. When they finally reached the door to Hitler’s office, a last piece of political theatre was enacted: “Two tall blond SS men in black tightly-belted uniforms with skulls on the caps clicked their heels and threw open the tall, almost ceiling-high doors with a single well-practiced gesture. Then, with their backs to the door jambs and their right arms raised, they formed a kind of arch, through which we had to pass to enter Hitler’s office, a vast room that was more like a banqueting hall than an office.”

Seated at his desk, Hitler hesitated for a moment, then rose to greet his visitors. He moved with “small, rapid steps” before stopping in the center of the room and raising his arm in the Nazi salute, “bending his palm unnaturally.” Then, Berezhkov recalled, “still without a word, he came up close and shook each one of us by the hand. His palm was cold and moist to the touch, and his feverish eyes seemed to bore through you like gimlets.” As one of his entourage would later recall, it was Hitler’s habit to silently hold a newcomer’s gaze for a time as a test of mettle, and it seems from this account that he might have tried this method with his Soviet visitors. Molotov, however, was apparently unmoved and later merely noted Hitler’s “surprisingly gracious and friendly manner.”

After the formalities, the small group, joined by Ribbentrop, interpreter Paul Schmidt, and adviser Gustav Hilger, got down to business seated in the armchairs at one end of Hitler’s office. As before, the meeting began with a monologue. Hitler stated his goal of continued “peaceful collaboration” between the Soviet Union and Germany and stressed the “considerable value” that had already accrued to both countries through their connection. However, he added—alluding to the points of friction that had arisen between the two—neither country could expect to get everything it wanted from the relationship, and in war Germany had been compelled to react to events, to “penetrate into territories remote from her and in which she was not basically interested politically or economically.” Consequently, one had to look toward a settlement of European relations after the war, in “such a manner that, at least in the foreseeable future, no new conflict could arise.” To this end, Hitler outlined Germany’s viewpoints, stressing a need for Lebensraum , colonial expansion in Central Africa, and certain raw materials—the supply of which would be safeguarded “under all circumstances”—as well as her determination not to permit unnamed “hostile powers” to establish military bases “in certain areas.”

In response to this catalogue of vagueness, Molotov finally stirred himself. He had eagerly agreed with much of what Hitler had said up to this point, concurring on the need for Germany and the Soviet Union to “stand together” and chiming with his host on the “intolerable and unjust” situation that the “miserable island” of England should own “half the world.” However, he wanted specifics; as Schmidt recalled, “he wanted the i’s dotted.” Taking the initiative, Molotov gave a brief survey of the benefits gleaned by both sides from the German-Soviet agreement, then moved on to the essential business of his visit. He asked Hitler, first of all, if the letter of the pact was still being honored with regard to Finland. Before the Führer could answer, he went on, demanding to know the significance of the Tripartite Pact and what role would the USSR be given in it. And what of Soviet interests in the Balkans and the Black Sea region? The Soviet government would like, he added, to know the precise form of Hitler’s “new order” in Europe and what the boundaries of the so-called Greater East Asian sphere might be. According to Schmidt, “The questions hailed down on Hitler. No foreign visitor had ever spoken to him in this way in my presence.”