Russia at war 1941-1945

One diplomat told me it had all been "rather like a Marx Brothers' film." Molotov's English was limited to three words: "Yes", "no", and "second front". At dinner one night, Molotov remarked on the extraordinary patriotic fervour of the Russian people as

displayed in this war—a fervour the depth of which had even surprised the government.

"The Old Adam coming out, what?" Churchill growled. Molotov took some trouble to explain that this was not only Russian patriotism, but also Soviet patriotism, not quite the same thing. There was also this record of Molotov's first impression of Churchill: "A very strong man—very strong." Then, as an afterthought: "Unfortunately, he'll never make a good communist." But the best stories about Molotov demanding his bedroom key, and the Russian search for bombs under his bed, the revolver on his bedside table, and the special way of making his bed, so that he could jump out in a hurry in case of anything, are told by Churchill himself. (Op. cit., vol. 4, p. 201.)]

As Hopkins wrote to Winant after Molotov's visit was over:

Molotov's visit went extremely well. He and the President got along famously and I am sure that we at least bridged one more gap between ourselves and Russia. There is still a long way to go, but it must be done if there is ever to be any real peace in the world. We simply cannot organise the world between the British and ourselves

without bringing in the Russians as equal partners. [As for the Second Front] I have a feeling that some of the British are holding back a bit, but all in all it is moving as well as could be expected.

[Sherwood, op. cit., pp. 582-3.]

It was largely as a result of the Molotov visit to Washington that a new Lend-Lease

agreement—or rather, a wider agreement on what was called the "principles of mutual aid against aggression"—was signed by Cordell Hull and Litvinov, the Soviet

Ambassador, on June 11.

In Moscow it was decided to make immense political capital out of Molotov's visits to London and Washington. A special meeting of the Supreme Soviet at the Kremlin was

called on June 18 to ratify the Anglo-Soviet Alliance. But for fully a week before that the Soviet press had built up the Molotov visits to the West as an event of the most far-reaching importance.

Molotov, flying in a fast British bomber high over Scandinavia, returned from London on June 13; but already on June 11 the Soviet press had published the full text of the Anglo-Soviet agreement, as well as the famous "Second Front" communiqué. On the 13th, it published the text of the Soviet-American agreement. The papers that day were, by

Russian standards, spectacular. Over the front page of Pravda was splashed a photograph showing Eden and Molotov signing the alliance, with a pussy-face Maisky on one side

and a cigar-chewing Churchill on the other. Here also were the text of the Soviet-

American agreement, the text of warm bread-and-butter letters from Molotov to

Churchill, Eden, Roosevelt and Cordell Hull; the text of Roosevelt's cable to Stalin thanking him for having sent Molotov to Washington on his "most satisfactory" visit, and Stalin's cable of thanks to Roosevelt, and so on. In his cables to both Churchill and Roosevelt, Molotov specifically referred to the "Second Front in 1942". Page two of Pravda prominently announced the decision of the Soviet Union and Canada to exchange diplomatic representatives. Such a display was enough to make any Soviet citizen

extremely ally-conscious. In its editorial Pravda wrote that day:

At countless meetings throughout the country the workers, kolkhoz-niki,

intellectuals, soldiers, officers and political workers of the Red Army are expressing the greatest conviction that the strengthening of these bonds [between the Big

Three] will hasten final victory... 1942 must become the year of the enemy's final rout. Our Soviet people have reacted with great satisfaction to the complete

understanding concerning the urgent tasks for the creation of a Second Front in