Armed with full powers in writing from Hitler to conclude a nonaggression treaty “and other agreements” with the Soviet Union, which would become effective as soon as they were signed, Ribbentrop set off by plane for Moscow on August 22. The large German party spent the night at Koenigsberg in East Prussia, where the Nazi Foreign Minister, according to Dr. Schmidt, worked throughout the night, constantly telephoning to Berlin and Berchtesgaden and making copious notes for his talks with Stalin and Molotov.
The two large Condor transport planes carrying the German delegation arrived in Moscow at noon on August 23, and after a hasty meal at the embassy Ribbentrop hurried off to the Kremlin to confront the Soviet dictator and his Foreign Commissar. This first meeting lasted three hours and, as Ribbentrop advised Hitler by “most urgent” wire, it went well for the Germans. Judging by the Foreign Minister’s dispatch, there was no trouble at all in reaching agreement on the terms of a nonaggression pact which would keep the Soviet Union out of Hitler’s war. In fact the only difficulty, he reported, was a distinctly minor one concerning the division of spoils. The Russians, he said, were demanding that Germany recognize the small ports of Libau and Windau in Latvia “as being in their sphere of interest.” Since all of Latvia was to be placed on the Soviet side of the line dividing the interests of the two powers, this demand presented no problem and Hitler quickly agreed. Ribbentrop also advised the Fuehrer after the first conference that “the signing of a secret protocol on the delimitation of mutual spheres of interest in the whole Eastern area is contemplated.”
The whole works – the nonaggression treaty and the secret protocol – were signed at a second meeting at the Kremlin later that evening. So easily had the Germans and Russians come to agreement that this convivial session, which lasted into the small hours of the following morning, was taken up mostly not by any hard bargaining but with a warm and friendly discussion of the state of the world, country by country, and with the inevitable, effusive toasts customary at gala gatherings in the Kremlin. A secret German memorandum by a member of the German delegation who was present has recorded the incredible scene.
To Stalin’s questions about the ambitions of Germany’s partners, Italy and Japan, Ribbentrop gave a breezy, reassuring answers. As to England the Soviet dictator and the Nazi Foreign Minister, who was now on his best behavior, found themselves at once in accord. The British military mission in Moscow, Stalin confided to his guest, “had never told the Soviet government what it really wanted.” Ribbentrop responded by emphasizing that Britain had always tried to disrupt good relations between Germany and the Soviet Union. “England is weak,” he boasted, “and wants to let others fight for her presumptuous claim to world dominion.”
“Stalin eagerly concurred,” says the German memorandum, and he remarked: “If England dominated the world, that was due to the stupidity of the other countries that always let themselves e bluffed.”
By this time the Soviet ruler and Hitler’s Foreign Minister were getting along so splendidly that mention of the Anti-Comintern Pact no longer embarrassed them. Ribbentrop explained again that the pact had been directed not against Russia but against the western democracies. Stalin interposed to remark that “the Anti-Comintern had in fact frightened principally the City of London [i.e., the British financiers] and the English shopkeepers.”
At this juncture, the German memorandum reveals, Ribbentrop felt himself in such good humor at Stalin’s accommodating manner that he even tried to crack a joke or two – a remarkable feat for so humorless a man.
The Reich Foreign Minister [the memorandum continues] remarked jokingly that M. Stalin was surely less frightened by the Anti-Comintern Pact than the City of London and the English shopkeepers. What the German people thought of this matter was evident from a joke, which had originated with the Berliners, well known for their wit and humor, that Stalin will yet join the Anti-Comintern Pact himself.
Finally the Nazi Foreign Minister dwelt on how warmly the German people welcomed an understanding with Russia. “M. Stalin replied,” says the German record, “that he really believed this. The Germans desired peace.”
Such hokum grew worse as the time for toasts arrived.
M. Stalin spontaneously proposed a toast to the Fuehrer:
“I know how much the German nation loves its Fuehrer. I should therefore like to drink to his health.”
M. Molotov drank to the health of the Reich Foreign Minister . . . MM. Molotov and Stalin drank repeatedly to the Nonaggression Pact, the new era of German-Russian relations, and to the German nation.
The Reich Foreign Minister in turn proposed a toast to M. Stalin, toasts to the Soviet Government, and to a favorable development of relations between Germany and the Soviet Union.
And yet despite such warm exchanges between those who until recently had been such mortal enemies, Stalin appears to have had mental reservations abut the Nazis’ keeping the pact. As Ribbentrop was leaving, he took him aside and said, “The Soviet Government take the new pact very seriously. He could guarantee on his word of honor that the Soviet Union would not betray its partner.”
What had the new partners signed?
The published treaty carried an undertaking that neither power would attack the other. Should one of them become “the object of belligerent action” by a third power, the other party would “in no manner lend its support to this Third Power.” Nor would either Germany or Russia “join any grouping of Powers whatsoever which is aimed directly or indirectly at the other Party.”
Thus Hitler got what he specifically wanted: an immediate agreement by the Soviet Union not to join Britain and France if they honored their treaty obligations to come to the aid of Poland in case she were attacked.
The price he paid was set down in the “Secret Additional Protocol” to the treaty:
On the occasion of the signature of the Nonaggression Treaty between Germany and the Soviet Union the undersigned plenipotentiaries discussed in strictly confidential conversations the question of the delimitation of their respective spheres of interest in eastern Europe.
1. In the event of a territorial and political transformation in the territories belonging to the Baltic States (Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania), the northern frontier of Lithuania shall represent the frontier of the spheres of interest both of Germany and the U.S.S.R.
2. In the event of a territorial and political transformation of the territories belonging to the Polish State, the spheres of interest of both Germany and the U.S.S.R. shall be bounded approximately by the line of the rivers Narew, Vistula and San.
The question whether the interests of both Parties make the maintenance of an independent Polish State appear desirable and how the frontiers of this State should be drawn can be definitely determined only in the course of further political developments.
In any case both Governments will resolve this question by means of a friendly understanding.
Once again Germany and Russia, as in the days of the German kings and Russian emperors, had agreed to partition Poland. And Hitler had given Stalin a free hand in the eastern Baltic.
Finally, in Southeastern Europe, the Russians emphasized their interest in Bessarabia, which the Soviet Union had lost to Rumania in 1919, and the Germans declared their disinterest in this territory – a concession Ribbentrop later was to regret.
“This protocol,” the document concluded, “will be treated by both parties as strictly secret.”
As a matter of fact, its contents became known only after the war with the capture of the secret German archives.
William L. Shirer, The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich
I’ll bet folks were lining up to book on a German liner for a trip to a British territory. I’ll take a couple of non-refundable tickets on the September 1 sailing...
I find interesting the ad by the German/American and North German Lloyd lines offering a 4 day trip from New York to Bermuda for $ 55 - starting September 1. Bon voyage! Gute Reise! Have a nice trip!
On September 4, when the ship was scheduled to arrive in Bermuda, U. S. Ambassador Anthony Drexel Biddle was standing in his garden in Warsaw looking at his villa which had just been bombed by the Luftwaffe.
Poland to continue her resistance - Aug 23, 1939
(snip)..This was the view expressed to me to-day by Marshal Smigly-Rydz, Inspector-General of Poland’s armed forces and her leader in the present crisis, in an exclusive interview in his office in the War Ministry in Warsaw.
“We Poles have never been inclined to measure ourselves in words against other nations. If the need comes, we will show what we can do, in action,” he said. (more at link)