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From Socialist Appeal, Vol. 5 No. 3, 18 January 1941, p. 1.
Transcribed & marked up by Einde O’Callaghan for the Encyclopaedia of Trotskyism On-Line (ETOL).
Joseph Stalin has again shown that his bread is still buttered on the same side. Down upon, the heads of all the wishful thinkers in London and Washington about a Nazi-Soviet break came the news of a new series of Hitler-Stalin pacts. The most important of them was a sweeping new trade agreement, said to involve the greatest international grain deal in history.
It is probably true that Hitler has not – yet – gotten all he wants from Stalin’s regime in Russia. Indeed, he won’t get that much until he tries moving in with all his horses, his tanks, his planes, and his men. This does not change the essential significance of Stalin’s present course. He is playing along with Hitler and will continue to do so until Hitler’s military predominance is cancelled by events not now foreseeable.
Groping in the fog of Balkan developments, watchers in London and in this country have looked hopefully for signs of developing strain in the relations between Hitler and Stalin. And out of that fog comes now fresh evidence that Stalin is just as firmly hitched to Hitler’s chariot as before. The bluster of the Moscow Pravda and Izvestia about Stalin’s “independent policy” does not conceal the fact that Stalin still “waits” because he does not dare to move in any direction. And while he waits he remains compliant to Hitler.
If the flow of goods from the Soviet Union into Germany has not up until now met Nazi expectations, it is certainly plain that under the new accords this flow will increase.
The Deutsche Allgemeine Zeitung, commenting on the pacts, said that “the Russo-German understanding ... stands, indeed, on the threshold of new and still closer cooperation.” Can this be taken to mean the Balkans? Is Stalin bargaining now on the basis of the revealed weakness of the Italian axis partner? Remarks like this in Nazi newspapers are never aimless. It may even be that it is Hitler who is exploring the possibility of using Stalin to fill the gaps left in his armor by the Italian reverses.
The report that a Soviet trade delegation is en route to Buenos Aires to buy huge quantities of grain awaits confirmation. If it proves to be true, there can be little doubt that Stalin would be buying for Hitler’s account.
In any case, the new Hitler-Stalin pacts make it plain that the Kremlin’s policy still flows from a shuddering fear of Hitler plus no less a fear of internal upheaval. These two factors determine Stalin’s policy. Incidental factors which seem to contradict this from time to time are purely transitory. Stalin always knuckles down in the end.
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Last updated: 16 November 2020