Characteristics of the world community on the eve of the Second World War. The situation in the world on the eve of the Second World War

International relations on the eve of World War II. The beginning of the war.

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(World economic crisis 1929 and the collapse of the Versailles-Washington system, the militarism of Japan (Emperor Hirohito), the fascism of Italy (Mussolini), the Nazism of Germany (Hitler), the breakdown of the Anglo-French-Soviet negotiations, the non-aggression pact between the USSR and Germany (August 23, 1939), Secret protocols, the beginning of the Second World War (September 01, 1939), Treaty of Friendship and Borders with Germany (September 29, 1939), "expansion of the borders of the USSR (Soviet-Finnish war November 30, 1939 to March 12, 1940), exclusion of the USSR from the League of Nations , "sitting war")

The results of the First World War were formalized at the Paris (Versailles) and Washington conferences, according to which:

- Germany was recognized as the culprit of the war

- demilitarization of the Rhineland

Alsace and Lorraine returned to France

- Germany was losing coal copies of the Saar Basin

Germany recognized the sovereignty of Poland and refused in its favor from Upper Silesia and Pomerania and the rights to the city of Danzig (Gdansk)

Germany recognized the independence of all territories that were part of the former Russian Empire at the beginning of IMV and canceled the Brest Treaty of 1918

Germany lost all its colonies

- the German army was reduced to 100 thousand people, a ban was introduced on the development of a new type of weapon and on its production

- Austro-Hungarian monarchy was abolished

- broke up Ottoman Empire, Turkey has lost its colonies.

At the initiative of the United States, the League of Nations was formed (in 1919) with the goal of protecting world peace, but pacifist hopes were not destined to come true.

The antagonism of the socialist (USSR) and capitalist (England, USA) models, plus the emergence of fascist (Nazi) regimes, put the world at risk of existence.

In 1929, the Great Economic Crisis broke out, which again equalized the levels of development of England, France, the USA and Germany.

But Japan was the first to hatch the idea of ​​"world domination", which in 1931-1933 seized the Chinese territory of Manchuria and made a puppet state of Manchukuo on it.

Japan leaves the League of Nations and in 1937 continues the war against China.

Complicated relations between the Soviet-Chinese border. in 1938-1939 between Soviet and Japanese troops near the Khalkhin-Gol River and Khasan Lake. By the fall of 1939, the Japanese captured most coastal China.

Benito Mussolini

And in Europe fascism rises in italy with the ideological leader B. Mussolini. Italy seeks to seize dominance in the Balkans, in 1928 Mussolini declares Albania an Italian protectorate, and in 1939 occupies its territories. In 1928, Italy seizes Libya, and in 1935 unleashes a war in Ethiopia. Italy leaves the League of Nations in 1937 and becomes a German satellite.

AT January 1933 A. Hitler comes to power in Germany , winning the parliamentary elections (National Socialist Party). Since 1935, Germany begins to violate the terms of the Versailles-Washington peace system: returns the Saarland, restores the mandatory military service and begins the construction of the air force and naval forces. On October 7, 1936, German units crossed bridges over the Rhine (violating the Rhine demilitarized zone).

The axis Berlin - Rome - Tokyo (Germany, Italy, Japan) is being formed.

Why is the League of Nations inactive? The Nazi regimes aggressively perceived the USSR, the capitalist countries (USA, England, France) hoped to destroy the USSR with the help of Hitler and Mussolini.

The USSR came up with a proposal to create a system collective security(Anglo-French-Soviet Union), but the negotiations reached an impasse and then Stalin decides to agree to Hitler's proposal and conclude the Soviet-German Non-Aggression Pact and the Secret Protocols to it (August 23, 1939)

So let's repeat:

Italy - Fascism (Benito Mussolini)

Germany - Nazism (Adolf Hitler)

Reasons for the war:

1. Repartition of the world

2. Germany's desire to take revenge for losing the first world war

3. The desire of the capitalist countries to destroy the USSR

On the eve of the war

On August 23, 1939, a non-aggression pact was signed between the USSR and Germany.

(Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact)

According to secret protocols, the USSR expanded its borders in 4 regions:

1, moved the border away from Leningrad ( Soviet-Finnish war November 30, 39 - March 13, 40) - for this fact, on December 14, 1939, the USSR was expelled from the League of Nations as an aggressor country.

2, annexation of Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia (August 1940)

3, the formation of Moldova as part of the USSR (the territories of Romania - Bessarabia and Northern Bukovina) (August 1940)

4, return of the territories of Western Ukraine and Western Belarus ("Polish" territories). (September 1939)

Beginning of World War II

September 28, 1939 - the German-Soviet Treaty of Friendship and Border was signed.

Calm reigned on the western front.

The Anglo-French troops did not take any action. These events were called in the history of "sitting war"

The US declared its neutrality.

In March 1941, at the initiative of US President F. Roosevelt, the American Congress adopted Law on LEND-LEASE.

On April 9, 1940, Germany occupied Denmark, invaded Norway, then captured Belgium, the Netherlands and France.

Outcome:

1. Germany begins preparations for war against the USSR (the Barbarossa plan was signed by Hitler on December 18, 1940) - blitzkrieg - lightning capture)

2. Ties are being strengthened between Germany, Italy and Japan (they sign the Tripartite Pact).

They are joined by Romania, Hungary, Bulgaria.

3. The European economy worked for Germany.

Pacts on the Eve of World War II November 1st, 2016

Once again, one of my acquaintances raised the issue of the responsibility of the USSR for unleashing the Second World War, and once again I had to listen to the mantras about the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact. Either Ukraine, through some channels, promoted the adoption of a "declaration on the responsibility of the USSR for the outbreak of World War II," or just the stars, sometimes, line up in a certain way, but people regularly experience exacerbations on this topic. And so, as a result, I decided to somehow record information about this here. What follows will be briefly summarized the entire bouquet of bright and smelling pacts, treaties and other agreements that were adopted by the countries of Europe in relation to Germany, which, without particularly hiding its intentions, was laying a foothold for further developments.

July 15, 1933. Pact of Four (Italy, Germany, England, France).

January 26, 1934. Pilsudski-Hitler Pact (Germany, Poland).

German Ambassador Hans-Adolf von Moltke, Polish leader Jozef Pilsudski, German Propaganda Minister Josef Goebbels and Polish Foreign Minister Jozef Beck at a meeting in Warsaw on June 15, 1934, 5 months after the signing of the Non-Aggression Pact between Germany and Poland.

June 18, 1935. Maritime Anglo-German agreement.

November 25, 1936. Anti-Comirtern Pact (Germany, Japan).

Japanese Ambassador to Nazi Germany Viscount Kintomo Musyakoji and Nazi Foreign Minister Joachim von Ribbentrop sign the Anti-Comintern Pact.

September 29, 1938. Munich agreement (England, France, Germany, Italy).

During the signing of the Munich Agreement. From left to right: Chamberlain, Daladier, Hitler, Mussolini and Ciano

... this is especially threatening Soviet Union. After the neutralization of Czechoslovakia, Germany opened the way to the southeast.

September 30, 1938. Anglo-German declaration of friendship and non-aggression (England, Germany).

December 6, 1938. Franco-German Declaration (France, Germany).

the impression was that henceforth German policy would be aimed at combating Bolshevism. The Reich made it clear that he had a desire for expansion in an easterly direction ...

German Foreign Minister Joachim von Ribbentrop, French Foreign Minister J. Bonnet and others

1939 German non-aggression pact against the Baltic countries.

For the Soviets, it must be said that it was vital for the Soviet Union to move as far to the west as possible the starting positions of the German armies, so that the Russians would have time to gather forces from all over their colossal empire. The catastrophes that their armies suffered in 1914 were imprinted in the minds of Russians with red-hot iron ...

Synopsis on the history of Russia

The 18th Congress of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks, held in March 1939, determined that the USSR had entered the period of completing the construction of a socialist society and a gradual transition from socialism to communism. The congress formulated the main economic task: catch up and overtake the main capitalist countries in per capita output. It took 10-15 years to solve this problem. At the congress, the plan for the third five-year plan (1938-1942) was considered and approved.

The decisions of the congress were met with enthusiasm. New enterprises were put into operation, much attention was paid to increasing the activity of the masses. However, the moral and psychological state of society remained contradictory. One side, Soviet people they were proud of their labor successes, which were constantly reported by the mass media, believed in a bright distant future, and on the other hand, mass repressions gave rise to a sense of fear and uncertainty about the future. In addition, a number of harsh measures were taken to strengthen labor and production discipline. So, in 1940, the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR issued decrees on the transition to an eight-hour working day, a seven-day working week and on the prohibition of unauthorized departure of workers from enterprises and institutions, on the prohibition of unauthorized departure from work of tractor drivers and combine operators working in machine and tractor stations for which absenteeism and leaving the enterprise without the permission of the administration were criminalized. Thus, the state actually attached workers and employees to the enterprise. Production rates were increased, prices were reduced, and failure to meet the minimum workdays by collective farmers could lead to criminal prosecution. However, the attempts of the country's leadership to achieve the set goals, developing the enthusiasm of the masses and at the same time using the method of intimidation, did not give the desired result. The three-year plan of the Third Five-Year Plan was not fulfilled.

In connection with threat of war importance was given to the development of military production, especially in the East of the country. In the Volga region, in the Urals, in Siberia, there was an intensive construction of defense enterprises based on the local fuel and metallurgical base. The pace of development of the defense industry was high. If over the three years of the Third Five-Year Plan growth industrial production amounted to a total of 13.2% per year, then in the military industries - 39%. Particular importance was attached to the creation newest species military equipment. Research organizations were enlarged, design bureaus and experimental workshops were created at the leading defense plants; closed design bureaus were actively operating, where repressed specialists worked (in particular, the famous aircraft designers Tupolev and Sukhoi). Prospective models have been developed military equipment: heavy tank KV, medium tank T-34; aircraft: Yak-1, LaGG-3, MIG-3 fighters; Il-2 attack aircraft, Pe-2 bomber; rocket launchers on cars ("Katyusha"), etc. However, to arrange the release new technology on a massive scale by the beginning of the war failed.

From the end of the 30s, and especially after the war with Finland, which revealed many of the weaknesses of the Red Army, intensive measures aimed at increasing the combat capability of the armed forces. Them total strength by June 1941 amounted to 5.7 million people; additionally formed infantry, tank, aviation, mechanized divisions, increased airborne troops, engineering parts; the network of military schools expanded, 19 military academies operated. However, to make up for the monstrous losses from the mass repressions of the 30s, when 80% of the higher education was destroyed officers army failed. Professional level command personnel was low, advanced methods of armed struggle were not mastered, the Soviet military doctrine was based on an offensive nature and practically did not involve long-term defensive actions. All this predetermined the major defeats of the Red Army at the beginning of the war.

Fast growth military power Germany not only did not cause concern to the governments of the victorious countries, but, on the contrary, was encouraged by them in every possible way. In the person of a strong but submissive Germany, the American-British imperialists wanted to have a reliable force that, if the opportunity presented itself, could be used to resume intervention against the Soviet state.
A similar policy toward West Germany was pursued by the American-British imperialists after the Second World War. Having set out to turn West Germany into a foothold, and the Ruhr basin into the European arsenal of the third world war, they violated Potsdam Agreement, resorted to the dismemberment of Germany and formed a puppet government in the western occupation zones, completely subordinate to the American financial magnates.
By continuing to violate treaty obligations, the ruling circles of America, Britain and France frustrated the denazification and demilitarization of West Germany. They arbitrarily established control over the Ruhr and began rapidly rebuild in West Germany military industry both at the expense of the huge funds allocated by the United States, and at the expense of intensifying the brutal exploitation of the German working class, by increasing taxes on the population of West Germany.
Not confining themselves to restoring the military potential of West Germany, the US-British imperialists arbitrarily released almost all of the "major Hitlerite war criminals convicted after the end of the Second World War by the International Military Tribunal. Inflating revanchist sentiments in every possible way in West Germany, the American-British imperialists set about creating a West German army, which they expect to use as a shock fist in the armed forces of the aggressive North Atlantic bloc directed against the USSR and the countries of people's democracy.
The world economic crisis that erupted in 1929-1933 extremely exacerbated the contradictions between the capitalist countries. The aggravation of the struggle for markets and sources of raw materials put war on the line as a means of a new redistribution of the world and spheres of influence in favor of stronger states. At the same time, the growth of the revolutionary movement of the working masses, driven to despair, forced the imperialists to shift more and more from parliamentarism to openly terrorist methods of maintaining their dictatorship.
Chauvinism and preparations for war foreign policy and open terror against the working class in the region domestic policy pointed out that things were moving towards a new imperialist war, in which the imperialists were looking for a way out of the difficult situation that had arisen.
In 1931, the Japanese imperialists attacked China without declaring war and seized Manchuria, which they intended to use as a springboard for their planned aggression against the Soviet Union. So on Far East the first hotbed of war was formed. The second center of the war was formed in the center of Europe - in Nazi Germany.
The German bourgeoisie, fearing the growth of a revolutionary upsurge in the country, as evidenced by the successes of the German communist party, which received six million votes in the elections to the Reichstag, decided to call the imperialist party led by Hitler to power. By establishing a bloody terrorist dictatorship, this party was supposed to suppress the revolutionary movement of the working class, with demagogic propaganda to kindle the revanchist moods of the petty bourgeoisie and drag them along, and by preparing the economy for war, facilitate the way out of the economic crisis.
The henchmen of the bourgeoisie - the leaders of the German Social Democracy - cleared the way for the fascists by their conciliatory policy, and at the beginning of 1933 the fascists seized power in Germany. The coming to power of the Hitlerite party, the party of the imperialists, the most predatory and predatory among all the imperialists of the world, who were striving to restore Germany's military might, win world domination and enslave the masses of the people, hastened the outbreak of the Second World War.
Having seized power, the German fascists immediately set about turning Germany into a military camp.

Foreign policy of the USSR on the eve of World War II.

1. The international situation on the eve of the Second World War.

2. International relations of the USSR with England, USA and France.

3. Soviet-German relations.

4. Development of relations between the USSR and small states.

5. Evaluation of the foreign policy of the USSR 30 - 40 years.

6. List of references.

International situation on the eve of the Second World War.

During the period between the end of World War I and the beginning of World War II, qualitative changes took place in the alignment of forces in the world community: the emergence of the first socialist state, the aggravation of contradictions between the world's metropolises and colonies, the restoration and new rapid economic recovery of the defeated in the First World War and dissatisfied with his position in the world. states - Germany. The consequence of these changes in the international arena was a change in the nature of the approaching conflict. From the dispute between the imperialist powers for the redivision of the world, which, according to V.I. Lenin, there was the First World War, the approaching war was to turn into an arena of opposition and clash of interests of both the imperialist states among themselves, and the entire bloc with a state of a different socio-economic formation - the Soviet Union. It was this circumstance, in my opinion, that determined the policy of the leading capitalist states and the USSR on the eve of World War II.

2 International relations of the USSR with England, the USA and France.

At the end of the 1930s, England and its allies took an openly hostile position towards the USSR. Despite the failure of the Munich agreement and the forced entry into the war with Germany, the policy of the Anglo-French bloc and the United States of America that supported it was sharply anti-Soviet. This manifested itself during the events in Poland in September 1939, and in various intrigues in the Balkans, the Middle and Far East, in the active assistance of the reactionary government of Finland and the Baltic countries, in the exclusion of the USSR from the League of Nations for Finnish war and in many other anti-Soviet actions.

On September 1, 1939, Germany started the war against Poland, which gave rise to the Second World War. AT international relations a complex knot of contradictions was formed: the countries of democracy (England, France, USA) - the USSR - the countries of the fascist bloc (Germany, Italy, Japan).

A considerable share of the responsibility of the pre-war political crisis falls on the ruling circles of England and France. That caution, or even just distrust in the foreign policy of the USSR, which was demonstrated by the governments of Great Britain, France, the USA and other countries, was due to many reasons. But one of them, undoubtedly, was caused by the internal political situation of the USSR. In the ruling circles of the West, there was a fear of unpredictable decisions Soviet leadership in foreign policy and in front of the terrorist regime established by Stalin inside the country. It is difficult to avoid the conclusion that it was precisely at this difficult moment that the Soviet leaders also lost their sense of realism and restraint. Apparently, the words of A.N. Yakovlev are quite applicable to this position of Stalin and his entourage: “To justify one’s own falls by the sins of others is not a way to honest self-knowledge and renewal, but to historical unconsciousness.”

The Soviet leadership could not have been unaware that the Munich Treaty was not the last foreign policy step of the Western powers. It was aware of Hitler's global plans. Therefore, along with the policy of England and France, Stalinism became one of the main reasons why the Soviet Union was not ready to agree with these countries on joint actions against fascism.

Making the main bet on the implementation of their aggressive plans on military force, Hitler attached great importance and diplomatic means. The task of preventing the possibility of unification against the German aggression of the USSR, France and Great Britain was entrusted to the foreign policy apparatus of the fascist Reich. Taking advantage of the reactionary moods of the British ruling circles, the Nazis sought to convince them that Germany wanted to live in peace and friendship with Great Britain and thought only of fighting against the Soviet Union. In a significant part of the British ruling circles, these assurances of the Nazi leadership inspired confidence and found support. They tended to view Germany as an ally. Chamberlain believed that he could agree with Hitler on the division of spheres of influence, and German aggression would be directed against the USSR.

However, Germany only concealed their true intentions. The task of German diplomacy was to, in deep secrecy, but with all possible decisiveness, "put together an alliance against England."

The US government, which made concessions to internal reaction and tried to create the appearance of "non-intervention" in European affairs, actually adhered to a policy of connivance with Germany's aggressive intentions. The ruling circles in the United States counted on the fact that the United States would only benefit from the clash of other countries, and the aggressive course of Germany and its allies would help contain communism in Europe and Asia.

Under the conditions of the growing military threat, the Soviet Union on April 17, 1939. invited England and France to begin negotiations on mutual obligations to provide each other with the necessary assistance, including military, in the event of aggression in Europe against any of the contracting states. Under pressure public opinion England and France were forced to negotiate. However, the negotiations stalled.

In the summer of 1939, the USSR proposed to Britain and France a military convention providing for joint action by the armed forces of the three states in the event of aggression. The ruling circles of England and France did not respond to this proposal. The threat of foreign policy isolation hung over the USSR.

With the coming to power of the Churchill cabinet in England, and especially after the defeat of France by Germany, the situation gradually began to improve. Gradually, the conviction became stronger that the anti-Soviet course was tantamount to a split in potential anti-Hitler forces and only helped Hitler to isolate his opponents from each other. As early as May 1940, the British government decided to send its "special and extraordinary commissioner" Stafford Clipps to Moscow for negotiations on trade, which the Chamberlain government led to a dead end.

The nature of US-Soviet relations has also changed somewhat. The US government has been slow and inconsistent in this. Nevertheless, relations between the Soviet Union and the United States of America gradually improved. In January 1941 State Department The US notified the Soviet ambassador in Washington that "the policy set out in the statement delivered by the president to the press on December 2, 1939, commonly referred to as the 'moral embargo', will no longer apply to the Soviet Union." Thus, the Roosevelt government abandoned the anti-Soviet measures introduced during the Soviet-Finnish conflict.