Russia at war 1941-1945

military alliance was about to be signed by Germany, Italy and Japan, an alliance which, the Germans claimed, was directed against the United States. Molotov reacted sharply to this piece of news, demanding full information on the treaty, and also pressed the

Germans for more details on their activities in Rumania and Finland. A few days later the Germans informed Molotov that they were sending a "military mission" to Rumania, which produced from him the rejoinder: "How many troops does that represent?"

Relations were becoming severely strained between Berlin and Moscow, and on October

13, Ribbentrop sent a long, wordy and perhaps deliberately vague letter to Stalin,

prophesying the early collapse of England and proposing that Molotov come to Berlin,

"where the Führer could explain personally his views regarding the future moulding of relations between our two countries". He significantly added in an underlined passage that "it appears to be the mission of the Four Powers (the Soviet Union, Germany, Italy and Japan) to adopt a long-range policy ... through the delimitation of their interests on a world scale".

It was obviously necessary for the Russians to try to find out what the Germans were up to next, and the invitation to Berlin was accepted. But there is nothing to show that they were genuinely interested in sharing the British lion's skin—anyway the lion was still alive—or in joining in any German-Italian-Japanese alliance against the United States.

What they were worried about, above all, were the Balkans and Finland.

As we know from the German documents published since the war, Ribbentrop, during his first Berlin meeting with Molotov, harped above all on the imminent collapse of the

British Empire, and suggested that, in the share-out of this Empire, the Russians might be interested in extending their "sphere of influence" to the south, particularly towards the Persian Gulf. Molotov was not impressed, any more than he was by Hitler's harangue, in the afternoon, about a "common drive towards an access to the ocean", implying that the Russians might perhaps be interested in India. Instead, Molotov fired question upon

question at Hitler. "No foreign visitor," Schmidt, Hitler's interpreter later recalled, "had ever spoken to him in this way in my presence." Molotov wanted precise answers to his questions about the New Order in Europe and Asia, and, above all, about German

machinations in Finland, Rumania, Bulgaria and Turkey—areas in which the Russians

were directly interested. On the pretext that there might soon be a British air-raid, Hitler, completely taken aback by Molotov's manner, broke off the discussion until the next day.

When they met again on the 13th, Molotov once more showed no interest in the share-out of the British Empire, but argued, instead, that the German-Italian guarantee to Rumania was directed against the Soviet Union, and, since the Germans were unwilling to

"revoke" it, Russia would be willing to give a similar guarantee to Bulgaria, a suggestion which Hitler took very badly. Bulgaria, the Führer said, had not asked for such a

guarantee and, in any case, he would have to consult Mussolini on the subject. Again, thoroughly displeased with his troublesome and impertinent visitor, Hitler broke off the talk on the same pretext as on the previous night. He did not attend the gala banquet Molotov gave that night at the Soviet Embassy. This banquet—at which "friendly" toasts were exchanged by Molotov and Ribbentrop—was interrupted by an air-raid warning,

soon to be followed by the drone of planes, and the guests scattered to shelters,

Ribbentrop rushing Molotov to the near-by shelter of the German Foreign Office. While they were there, Ribbentrop pulled out of his pocket the draft of an agreement which, in effect, transformed the Three-Power Pact into a Four-Power Pact; under this, Germany, Italy and Japan recognised the present frontiers of the Soviet Union; while, according to the secret protocols defining each country's "territorial aspirations", the Soviet Union was to expand "in the direction of the Indian Ocean".

Again, the infuriating Molotov was not interested; and kept on returning instead to

questions like Finland, Rumania and Hungary, and German plans for Bulgaria,

Yugoslavia, Greece and Turkey; he also continued to insist on the preservation of

Swedish neutrality.

Ribbentrop, more and more exasperated, declared that Molotov had not answered the fundamental question; which was whether the Soviet Union would "co-operate in the great liquidation of the British Empire". Finally, Molotov could not resist it: "If you are so sure that Britain is finished, then why are we in this shelter? "

[ Stalin was to tell Churchill about this parting shot in August 1942. Churchill, The Second World War, vol. III, p. 586.]