Table Of ContentPariahs, Partners, Predators:
German-Soviet Relations, 1922-1941
Aleksandr M. Nekrich
Edited and translated by Gregory L. Freeze
With a foreword by Adam B. Ulam
ning
Columbia University Press
New York
Columbia University Press
Publishers Since 1893
New York Chichester, West Sussex
Copyright (c) 1997 Columbia University Press
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Nekrich, A. M. (Aleksandr Moiseevich)
Pariahs, partners, predators : German-Soviet relations, 1922-1941
/ Aleksandr M. Nelkzich : translated by Gregory L. Freeze.
. om.
TIneliidac t “Li: ig pl . 1 £. d index.
ISBN 0-231-10676-9 (alk. paper)
1. Germany—Foreign relations—Soviet Union. 2. Soviet Union—
Foreign relations—Germany. 3.e-gxr-ur. I. Title.
DD120.S65N45 1997
327.43047'09'042—dc21 96-29605
CIP
Casebound editions of Columbia University Press books are printed on
AA LI id free naner
Printed in the United States of America
c 10987654321
Contents
FOREWORD Vii
ABBREVIATIONS x
INTRODUCTION XI
Revanchists and Revolutionaries 1
m. German Military Installations inthe USSR 45
bY
WpwW. CPrarotsnserrosa ds 103 63
u
. Conquests and Conflicts 143
N
. Toward the Abyss 207
NOTES 247
BIBLIOGRAPHY 295
INDEX 301
Foreword
Adam B. Ulam
leksandr Nekrich completed this book shortly
Ate his death. A well-known historian in
the Soviet Union, he incurred the Communist
authorities’ disapproval following the publication of his June 22,
1941 (Moscow, 1965). The book illustrated vividly Stalin's culpa-
bility for the Soviet Union's unpreparedness for the German inac-
tion, and hence his responsibility for the Red Army’s catastrophic
defeats during the first phase of the war. Generally accepted by
historians in the West and, after the fall of Communism in Russia,
Nekrich’s thesis was taboo in Brezhnev’s USSR.
Subjected to chicaneries by the regime, and virtually prohibited
from publishing, the author emigrated to the United States in 1976.
Shortly after his arrival here, he joined the staff of the Russian
Research Center of Harvard University. In 1987 Nekrich was grant-
ed the rare distinction of being appointed a Senior Research Fellow
of the University.
His scholarly activity in America was extensive and many sided.
He wrote a great number of learned articles and several books. Two
of the latter deserve special mention. The Punished Peoples (1981)
was a dramatic description of Stalin’s deportation of entire ethnic
groups within the USSR on the pretext of their alleged collabora-
tion with Germany during World War II. Utopia in Power (1986),
VIL Foreword
written with Michel Heller, was a history of the Soviet Union, prob-
ably unparalleled in its grasp of the factors affecting the develop-
ment of Soviet political culture. Both works were translated into
several foreign languages and met with the critical acclaim of the
scholarly community.
With perestroika and glasnost Nekrich’s works could be read and
were praised in his native country. As this is being written, a num-
ber of Russian historians are preparing a collection of essays which
will be published as homage to their erstwhile colleague and friend.
The present book occupied Nekrich’s last years, and he thought of it
as the culmination of his life’s work. No doubt the reader may find
some of the author's conclusions contentious. But no one, I believe,
will question the writer’s scrupulous and imaginative scholarship in
dealing with a complex subject.
Stricken by a deadly ailment, a type of multiple sclerosis, Alek-
sandr Moiseyevich Nekrich died in Cambridge, Massachusetts on
August 31, 1993.
Adam B. Ulam
Cambridge, Mass.
July 1996
Abbreviations
ADAP Akten zur deutschen auswdrtigen Politik
AVP Arkiv vneshnei politiki Rossiiskoi Federatsii
DGFP Documents of German Foreign Policy
FRUS Foreign Relations of the United States, Diplomatic Papers
GARF Gosudarstvennyi arkhiv Rossiiskoi Federatsii
GEFU Gesellschaft fiir die Forderung gewerblichen
Unternehmen
KRO Kontr-razvedyvatel’nyi otdel (Counter-intelligence
Division)
NKVD People’s Commissairate of International Affairs
OGPU (GPU) United State Political Administration
RGAE Rossiiskii gosudarstvennyi arkhiv ekonomiki
RGASA Rossiiskii gosudarstvennyi arkhiv sovetskoi armii
RIsKhIDNI Rossiiskii tsendr dlia khraneniia i izucheniia dokumen-
tov noveishei istorii
Archival Notation
f. fond (Collection)
op. opis’ (register)
d. delo (file)
1., I. list, listy, (folio, folios)
ob. oborot (verso)
Introduction
eneral interest in Soviet-German relations between
‘oe: two world wars, while strong in the postwar
period, sharply declined in the 1970s and 1980s. Of
late, however, interest in this topic, and especially in the origins of
the German attack on the USSR in 1941, has revived. Although
the revival was partly evoked by the fiftieth anniversary of the
attack, of greater importance was the movement for national inde-
pendence in the Baltic states, which quite naturally took a keen
interest in the secret clauses of the German-Soviet pacts that pre-
ceded their annexation by the USSR in 1940. The question of the
authenticity of these documents even appeared on the agenda of
the supreme legislative organs of the Soviet Union; it also became
the subject of numerous books and articles, accompanied by a gush
of documentary publications. This subject has long been treated,
indeed quite exhaustively, in the West; only recently have the most
fundamental sources become generally available to professional his-
torians and a concerned public in the former USSR.
These new documents and analysis had a dramatic impact on the
educated Russian public. As is well known, when Soviet historiog-
raphy had to deal with ideologically sensitive problems, it either
omitted essential facts or distorted them beyond recognition. It also
dismissed foreign sources as either dubious or outright fabrications.
