The war obliged Stalin to make radical changes in his foreign policy. Before the attack by Nazi Germany he could allow himself to observe the development of events and swim with the tide, choosing between Hitler or the West, but after June 22nd, 1941 he had to take positive action. In this new situation the characteristics of Stalinism were clearly displayed.
To judge by the numerous reminiscences of contemporaries one of the most notable features of Stalin's diplomacy was rudeness. Understandably, however, he was obliged to take his allies into consideration and moderate his temper on the international stage. in his relations with Roosevelt, Stalin was to some extent successful, as he respected the power and strength of the country standing behind the president. However, it often did not seem to be the same with other Americans, or with the British, including the prime minister, with whom he was rude and over familiar.
There are many examples of this kind of conduct. In his memoirs Churchill wrote that, at the time of a lengthy correspondence with Moscow, he was snubbed more than once and only rarely favoured with a kind word. Many of his telegrams were not answered at all or a reply was held up for days, but the prime minister was patient, understanding that patience was the key for any one who had dealings with the Kremlin. Churchill's official biographer, Martin Gilbert, was the first to quote one of the prime minister's telegrams to the British ambassador in Moscow (1942-46), Sir Archibald Clark Kerr, which demonstrated graphically just how far Churchill was stung by the tone of Stalin's messages:
I am getting rather tired of these repeated scoldings, considering that they have never been actuated by anything but cold-blooded self-interest and total disdain of our lives and fortunes. ... At the proper time you might give Stalin a friendly hint of the danger of offending the two Western powers whose war-making strength is growing with every month that passes and who may play a helpful part in the Russian future. Even my own long-suffering patience is not inexhaustible.
Once it came to the point where an indignant Churchill decided on a diplomatic demarche. On October 13th, 1943, in a series of messages, Stalin accused the British Government of intentionally avoiding earlier commitments on deliveries, posing a threat through the attempt to increase the number of British servicemen in the north of the USSR and to recruit Soviet citizens. When he received the letter Churchill could not believe that it was written by Stalin and suggested it was the hand of the bureaucracy at work. Churchill wrote to Roosevelt: The Soviet bureaucracy is convinced that intimidation can achieve anything, but I am sure that it is quite important to show that it is not always and not necessarily so'. On October 18th, summoning the Soviet ambassador, Feodor Gusev, Churchill made a point of handing a message from Stalin back to him. The demarche had an effect, and, after a few days, Stalin actually apologised to the British Foreign Minister, Anthony Eden, in Moscow, declaring that he had had no intention of insulting anyone.
During the war Stalin had to explain' the tone of his messages more than once, and almost always tried to pass off rudeness as frankness or talked his way out of a situation with idiosyncratic jokes and aphorisms. Thus, having accused General Brooke at the Teheran Conference of unfriendliness to the Red Army and received a firm rebuff, Stalin said jokingly, The best friendship begins in misunderstanding'. Sometimes Stalin was deliberately rude. As Western authors have noted, Stalin handled at least three meetings in the same way. He played out the same scenario with Averell Harriman and Beaverbrook in September, 1941, with Eden in December 1941 and with Churchill in August 1942. The first conversation went smoothly and Stalin was careful and correct, but the next day he was openly rude and capricious and behaved insultingly. Discouraged by such a reception the Western participants at the meeting went away puzzled. They could not understand what had brought on the anger of their host. As a result, a sleepless night awaited them, and they went to the third meeting with some apprehension. However, Stalin was courtesy itself, good-natured and humorous, as if nothing had happened.
What was Stalin's aim in acting in this way? The majority of Western authors willingly accept the evidence of those who witnessed Stalin's Performances' and suggest that, if the leader' was not satisfied with his allies' proposals or their reactions to his proposals, he tried to use his anger to overpower them. Judging by the results of the meeting mentioned above Stalin did not obtain immediate benefits. He did indeed succeed in sowing confusion amongst his interlocutors, but this did not make them more compliant and there was a long-term effect. By periodically creating tension during personal meetings and by means of correspondence via ambassadors, Stalin skilfully cultivated a feeling of uncertainty in Western officials about the Soviet position and created the impression that, if they would go some way to meeting his demands, the uncertainty and misunderstanding would disappear by themselves.
The inherent suspicion and secrecy of Stalin's diplomacy came to full flower during the war. For example, Stalin did not believe that Roosevelt's death had been due to natural causes and, in a telegram to Truman persisted in asking for a post-mortem to be carried out on the president's body, in case he had been poisoned. He continually tried to keep his allies in a state of tension. By testing the solidity of the alliance Stalin forced his partners to justify themselves and demonstrate their loyalty to alliance commitments.
Churchill's statement that it was difficult to maintain good relations with Communists as one did not know how to behave with them, shows that such Stalinist diplomacy brought its fruits. By accepting regular protestations of friendship from his allies or obtaining concessions, Stalin weakened the pressure, and the situation normalised itself for a time. During such periods, especially in personal meetings, Stalin simply charmed his interlocutors. It was not by chance that Roosevelt, Churchill and many other official personalities made numerous statements praising the Soviet leader. Such methods were effective as long as the threat from Germany continued, but as soon as that threat lessened, Stalin's caprices and insults achieved the opposite results. We can understand Churchill when, at the end of the war he wrote, not without relief, to the British Charge d'Affaires in Moscow, Frank Roberts, It is no longer desired by us to maintain detailed arguments with the Soviet government about their views and actions'.
Hardly any other diplomacy can compare with Stalin's in the art of creating secrets. Even now large numbers of documents from the war period in the Foreign Ministry archives are inaccessible to researchers.
Built into the system of Stalinism, this diplomacy functioned strictly by its own rules - a caste system, a brutal hierarchy, espionage, the eking out of limited amounts of information, unquestioning execution of orders and no initiative for colleagues outside the limits of their competence. A special uniform for diplomats was even introduced on May 23rd, 1943, which officials at first accepted with great pleasure. The full dress uniform struck foreigners by its vulgarity - shoulder straps, trouser stripes, a dagger, a tall sheepskin hat, and so on. The American diplomat Charles Bohlen found it ridiculous.
There is no doubt that diplomats were kept under strict supervision. We were only able to learn about this when large numbers of MID (Ministry of Foreign Affairs) and NKVD (People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs) documents were declassified, but some facts did not escape the attention of Western politicians. Eden remembers how, when the Russian ambassador, Ivan Maisky came to see him he had to be accompanied by a young man who did not utter a word and just sat and listened throughout their talks. Bohlen remembers how, at his first meeting with Andrei Gromyko, the latter seemed to be afraid to say anything which was unnecessary. Nevertheless despite supervision, two diplomats - Maksim Litvinov and Maisky - were clearly outside the well-co-ordinated 'ensemble' of Stalinist diplomacy. Both were highly educated and spoke several European languages with ease. They were distinguished by their greater sociability and had many friends and acquaintances in the West. This could only annoy Stalin and Molotov, but, for the time being, they were obliged to keep them as ambassadors in the USA and Great Britain.
The war compelled Stalin to return Litvinov to the foreign policy arena, since he was the most suitable person to organise aid to the USSR and mend relations with America. His services in this matter are indisputable, but his influence on Soviet foreign policy was negligible. Stalin and Molotov ignored their ambassador and American politicians, including the president, understood this well. At the time of Molotov's visit to the USA in May-June 1942 Litvinov was rarely invited to meetings and, when the ambassador's presence did become necessary, Molotov would show him ostentatious hostility. It was therefore not surprising that, as soon as a turning point in the war occurred and the situation in the country had improved and Stalin felt more confident, Litvinov was immediately removed from his post (in May 1943). Although he remained formally Deputy People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs, his influence on foreign policy in Moscow was even less than in the USA.
We must give Litvinov his due. He was probably the only diplomat of high rank who allowed himself to criticise the top leadership. Documents from the US State Department show that, before his departure from the USA, Litvinov paid a call on State Secretary Sumner Welles and drew his attention to the fact that Stalin's isolation gave him a distorted idea of the West, which manifested itself in his underestimation of public opinion. Litvinov emphasised the inflexibility of the Soviet system and pointed out the baneful effect of Molotov's control over the People's Commissariat for Foreign Affairs.
A year later, Litvinov met the American diplomat Edgar Snow in Moscow, and not without sarcasm, told him that the People's Commissariat for Foreign Affairs was run by three men (Molotov, Vyshinsky, Dekanosov) and not one of them understood either America, or Britain. Litvinov critically recalled Stalin's injured reaction to the Western press. Litvinov apparently understood the course of events quite well. When, after the war, Averell Harriman asked him what the USA should do to satisfy the Soviet Union, he answered simply and briefly, Nothing'.
Maisky was more careful in his statements. in conversations with English officials and politicians, he did not criticise the top leadership but, on the contrary, emphasised his loyalty and devotion to duty. This did not help him, however, and he was dismissed from this post two months after Litvinov. It is worthy of note that Churchill, in a conversation with Stalin during a visit to Moscow in 1942, called Maisky a good diplomat. The General Secretary agreed but immediately added, He talks too much and can't keep a still tongue in his head'.
Stalin's diplomacy did not require independent-thinking officials who were popular in the country to which they had been posted. They had to be devoted, obedient and discreet. An important circumstance was that the ambassadors to the allied powers were recalled almost simultaneously. What was the motive? It is clear from Foreign Office documents just how confused British diplomats were, though they thought the recall of two well-known ambassadors could not mean anything good.
In a situation where Stalin was actively trying to exert influence on his allies, ambassadors who thought independently became a hindrance and they were replaced by others who distinguished themselves not only by their efficiency but by their personal links with Stalin through their advancement in the service. Litvinov was replaced by a thirty-four-year-old Gromyko, and Maisky by a thirty-eight year old Gusev, both of whom were typical representatives of the Soviet bureaucracy. It would be interesting to have access to Gromyko's notes and reports to understand exactly how Stalin's choice fell on him. Gromyko did not consider it necessary to share his recollections on that matter with his readers in his two-volume memoirs. Thus the fact that Gromyko carefully avoids mentioning Litvinov, although he had, in fact, to work under him in the USA, merits attention. Politicians of the time and contemporary historians have not seen Gromyko as an independent figure, since his opinion never differed from the opinion of the Soviet Government'.
Ambassador Gusev was also extremely unpopular in British circles. Churchill asked Clark Kerr about Gusev and he characterised the newly appointed ambassador as, a rude, inexperienced and bad-mannered fellow'. To a certain degree, the appointments of Gromyko and Gusev reflected Stalin's scornful attitude to the diplomatic service in general. In Stalin's diplomatic practice an ambassador was simply there to provide information and carry out instructions with no independent influence on decision taking. At best an ambassador might be summoned for consultations or to act as an interpreter. Only a narrow circle had the right to take decisions, and Stalin alone controlled all the information. There was much that even Molotov did not know.
Almost all Western writers of memoirs and researchers note the excellence of Stalin's information, which he could use, where necessary, to obscure discussions with his interlocutors. Thus, in May 1945, Harry Hopkins, who had flown into Moscow on a special mission for President Truman, asked Stalin directly, Is the Soviet Union ready to carry out the Yalta Agreement and enter the war in the Far East?' Stalin answered that the Soviet Union always kept its word, and raising his voice, added seriously, Except in cases of extreme necessity'. According to Bohlen's evidence Stalin's interpreter, Pavlov, did not dare to interpret the second part of the sentence. Bohlen as the interpreter on the American side, pointed this out to Pavlov and only then did Pavlov hastily say the whole sentence. In the same conversation Stalin, knowing of Hitler's suicide, declared that in his opinion, Hitler had not died, but was hiding somewhere, and that possibly he had escaped by submarine to Japan. Stalin's motives for the lie are unclear, unless we take into account that the creation of an atmosphere of uncertainty and tension defined the style of his policy.
One important aspect was that, as the war went on, Stalin succeeded in creating the impression among the majority of Westerners who came into contact with him that he was limited in his choice of decisions and was dependent on the Supreme Soviet and the Politburo. It is interesting that, even before there were any regular contacts, the Americans and the British did not entertain any illusions. We may recall the instructions given to Stafford Cripps, the British ambassador to Russia, on his appointment in 1940, in which it was said that Stalin alone was in control of the country's policy.
Analysing the results of his autumn visit to Moscow with Lord Beaverbrook in 1941, Harriman wrote, There can be no doubt that Stalin is the only person we can deal with in foreign affairs. Contact with anyone else is simply a waste of time'. However, living in an atmosphere of suspicion and absence of information, Western officials and politicians yielded to rumours of different kinds. Thus, in July 1941 Cripps seriously considered that a struggle for power between the party and the military was under way, while a British delegation visiting the Soviet Union in August 1942 was unable to decide who really ruled in the USSR. Some suggested that Stalin was the tool of the Politburo. Churchill interpreted a sharp change in Stalin's behaviour as the result of pressure on the leader' from the Soviet of People's Commissars. In a letter to Eden in March 1943 the British prime minister wrote that there seemed to be two Stalins: (a) Stalin himself, personally cordial to me. (b) Stalin in council, a grim thing behind him which we and he have both to reckon with'.
When dealing with the Americans Stalin often referred to the Supreme Soviet as the real power on which everything depended. By way of illustration, in his message of December 30th, 1944, Roosevelt asked Stalin to postpone summoning a provisional Polish government. Not without mockery Stalin answered:
Of course, I quite understand your proposal. The fact is that on December 27th, the Presidium of the USSR Supreme Soviet, in responding to a similar inquiry from the Poles, stated that they were ready to recognise a provisional Polish government as soon as it was formed. This circumstance makes it impossible for me to carry out your wish.
In March 1945 when Stalin needed to show his dissatisfaction with American policy, he again referred to the power of the Supreme Soviet. A conference on the United Nations Organisation Charter began in San Francisco at the end of April. At first Stalin decided not to send Molotov and, in a letter to Roosevelt, justified this action in the following way:
Circumstances have arisen, which make it impossible for Molotov to take part in the conference. I and Mr Molotov very much regret this, but the convocation of a session of the Supreme Soviet, at which the presence of Mr Molotov is absolutely essential, precludes his attendance at the first sessions of the conference.
Bohlen called the reference to the Supreme Soviet a Stalinist gambit'. Curiously, by the end of the war, even Bohlen believed that, in the Soviet Union, Stalin had to consider the situation in the Politburo. When Bohlen wrote his memoirs, he went back to his notes of those years and was greatly surprised that he could have said such a thing.
Stalin also created the illusion that he was always ready to help and would do everything which depended on him personally. It therefore seemed to the majority of Western politicians that it was enough to arrange a meeting with Stalin for a problem to be solved. More than that, Roosevelt, Churchill, Harriman and others mistakenly thought that each knew how to deal with him. Disappointment awaited many of them.
We know that Stalin never travelled to the war zones. Throughout the war he came close to the front line on one occasion only. This unusual event occurred in August 1943 near Rzhev. Nevertheless, he did, in fact, justify his refusals to meet Roosevelt and Churchill by his absences at the front. I have to visit the troops on some or other sector of our front more often than usual'. On one occasion the leader referred to the opinion of all my colleagues', who considered his journey impossible'.
In this way Stalin succeeded in continuously misleading his allies during the war years. To a certain extent this made it easier for the scale and strength of his power to escape Western notice. Some politicians simply lost their sense of reality. As an illustration, take a remarkable speech by Lord Beaverbrook. Speaking in New York in the winter of 1942 Beaverbrook exclaimed emotionally:
Communism under Stalin has won the applause and admiration of all Western nations. Communism under Stalin has provided us with examples of patriotism equal to the finest in the annals of history. Communism under Stalin has produced the best generals in the world. The Persecution of Christianity? Not so. There is no religious persecution. Church doors are open. Racial persecution of minorities? Not at all. Jews live like other men. Political purges? Of course. But it is now clear that those who were shot would have betrayed Russia to her German enemies.
It is important to emphasis! that Western officials and politicians were mostly misled only in relation to the kitchen cabinet' of Stalin's policies (decision-taking mechanisms, the influence of various officials, the meaning of cadre transfers etc.). They understood policy trends and aims quite well and calculated the actions of Stalin with reasonable accuracy. It is doubtful whether he would have been pleased, had he known that Eden had advised his colleagues to treat Stalin like a peasant market trader. You cannot deny the British Foreign Minister's perspicacity; he had a sensitive awareness of Stalin's narrow-minded psychology.
Despite the fact that the leader' led the Allies by the nose, and played out meeting scenarios before them in virtuoso fashion, he never understood the West and never took into account the democratic mechanisms for implementing power, their multiple stages, the presence of an opposition, and the impossibility of taking major political decisions quickly. It seemed suspicious to Stalin that Roosevelt and Churchill, in contrast to himself, were not able to take decisions and act quickly. References to Congress and Parliament did not satisfy him, since he made a comparison with his own Supreme Soviet which had no real power.
Stalin's narrow-minded psychology also showed itself in relations with the Allies. For example, when Eden arrived in the Soviet Union, Maisky on Stalin's instructions tried to give the British minister a briefcase full of money so that he and his accompanying officials would not be embarrassed by any arguments between the two countries over rouble exchange rates while in Russia. Eden has acknowledged that he was dumb-founded at such a large amount of money. Asking Maisky to thank Stalin for his hospitable idea' Eden firmly refused the present'. Stalin very probably decided to repeat the trick' with Joseph Davies, the American ambassador, who was also allowed to buy works of art from Soviet museums for a symbolic payment. Davies made millions in this way and it is therefore not surprising, as Gromyko remembers, that Davies displayed an unfailingly friendly approach to our country', and that he established normal business contacts with Stalin, of whom he invariably spoke respectfully and even warmly'. Stalin had a fondness for drinkers and there were no teetotallers in his close entourage. In conversation with Churchill, Stalin's highest praise for Molotov was, He can drink'. Stalin treated nondrinkers and those who simply drank very little (Cripps, de Gaulle, Tito) cautiously. It was no coincidence in the appointment of Clark Kerr as British ambassador that he never refused a drink. An English historian bears witness, Clark Kerr got so drunk with Vyshinsky that he couldn't remember which film he had been shown after dinner'.
Exhausting night-time film shows were a permanent feature of Stalin's diplomatic protocol. The leader preferred to show Westerners films glorifying himself, and often put on the 1938 propaganda film If War Came Tomorrow ...
Many authors draw attention to Stalin's humour, which was distinctive to the point where it was sometimes impossible to distinguish a joke from an intentional insult. As an illustration, Churchill asked Stalin to send him the music of the new Soviet Russian Anthem so that it could be broadcast before the summary of news from the Soviet-German front. Stalin sent the words and expressed the hope that Churchill would set about learning the new tune and whistling it to members of the Conservative Party'. While Stalin behaved with relative discretion with Roosevelt, he continually teased Churchill throughout the war. During the Teheran Conference Stalin announced over one dinner that it was necessary to shoot around 50,000 German officers and specialists on whom Hitler's power depended. Churchill objected categorically. Trying to ease the situation and emphasise the humorous nature of the Soviet leader's remarks, Roosevelt suggested that 49,000 should be shot, not 50,000. When the US president's son, Elliott, rose in his place to support Stalin, Churchill flared up and walked off into the next room. I had not been there a minute', the prime minister recalled:
... before hands were clapped upon my shoulders from behind, and there was Stalin, with Molotov a his side, both grinning broadly, and eagerly declaring that they were only playing, and that nothing of a serious nature had entered their head. Stalin has a very captivating manner when he chooses to use it, and I never saw him do so to such an extent as at this moment. Although I was not then, and am not now, fully convinced that all was chaff.
We may note another circumstance which, at first sight, may seem immaterial, but played its part in contacts with the Allies at a high level. This concerns the poor professional training of Soviet interpreters. Stalin's principal interpreter for English and German was Pavlov, though he was sometimes replaced by Berezhkov. It is interpreting that, as early as 1940 Count Werner von der Schulenburg, the German ambassador, had written to von Ribbentrop that they translated texts into Russian in the embassy themselves as, we know from experience that Soviet translations are bad and full of inaccuracies'. There was a similar situation with English during the war. British officials have drawn attention to Pavlov's very bad interpreting - his inarticulate speech and poor vocabulary. Doubts arose about the adequacy of his interpreting, but this had no effect on Pavlov's career, since Stalin trusted him. With other interpreters the leader could behave differently. As de Gaulle mentions, at the time of their final meeting Stalin came up to his interpreter, who, in the opinion of the future French president, was interpreting brilliantly, and said, You know too much! I have a great desire to send you to Siberia'.
On private occasions Stalin did not invite interpreters at all - they were replaced by ambassadors or diplomats. Thus at the time of the Harringman and Beaverbrook mission Litvinov was used in the role of interpreter, and he too experienced difficulties in interpreting, Harriman tactfully defined the English of the former People's Commissar as rather neglected'.
Was Stalin's diplomacy competent? Some have suggested that during the war years it was effective, and that, except during the period 1939-41, Stalins and Molotov directed foreign policy competently and behaved wisely' with their allies. Such a viewpoint is not convincingly, since it cannot be justified at all by the post-war realities. In fact, the growth of the USSR's influence as a result of the war is identified with the activity of Soviet diplomacy. No one has yet studied to what extent Stalin's foreign policy promoted the growth of Soviet influence and to what extent it succeeded in easing the people's burden and succeeded in general. There is a mass of testimony that, as a result of Stalin's diplomacy, the sort of image of the Soviet Union which formed in the minds of the Allies was grounded in a feeling of fear. Churchill often considered Stalin's actions as a policy of intimidation. At the end of the war he wrote to Eden, I consider the Russian threat enormous ...' As American authors have shown, Harriman called on the president to counteract Stalin's policies in almost all his telegrams to Roosevelt in the autumn and spring of 1945. He wrote:
We must clearly recognise that the Soviet programme is the establishment of totalitarianism, the end of individual freedom and democracy in our understanding of these words.
The British historian Martin Kitchen considers that the actions of the USSR during the war years stimulated feelings of hostility in the West and Great Britain in particular. Of course, the problem of competence is very complicated and needs new sources. However a diplomacy which cultivates in itself an image of an enemy cannot be considered competent. Moreover, people quickly get tired of such a diplomacy and secrecy sets one's teeth of edge. As a result the West began to incline towards forceful methods in its relations with Stalin and the Cold War' which followed the Second World War was inevitable.