User:Paul Siebert/SandboxTriple

Following Hitler's March 1939 denunciation of the 1934 German–Polish Non-Aggression Pact, Soviet foreign minister Litvinov outlined a French–British–Soviet alliance including military commitments against Fascist powers.

The first phase of the Anglo-Franco-Soviet negotiations began in April 1939. The two sides approached the negotiations differently: the Western powers believed that war could still be avoided and, if it came, the USSR, could hardly be a main military participant. In contrast, the USSR, had little faith either that war could be avoided or in the Polish army. It wanted a guaranteed commitment of military support in a war in which the USSR would play, along with France, an aggressive role in a two-pronged attack on Germany.

On June 2, 1939, the Soviet Union submitted a proposal to France and Britain suggesting tripartite military action if (i) a European Power (i.e., Germany) attacked a contracting party; (ii) Germany acted aggressively against Belgium, Greece, Turkey, Romania, Poland, Latvia, Estonia, or Finland (all of whom the contracting parties had promised to defend); (iii) a participant became involved in the in a war due to rendering assistance to a European country which has pled for aid. The June 2 proposal was discussed for the next two months, with the French and Germans agreeing with much of it. Molotov suggested signing the (political) alliance treaty together with the military treaty, for which Western delegations were sent to Moscow.

On August 3, 1939, German Foreign Minister Joachim Ribbentrop told Soviet diplomats that "there was no problem between the Baltic and the Black Sea that could not be solved between the two of us." The Germans also stated that, unlike Britain, Germany could permit the Soviets to continue their developments unmolested, and that "there is one common element in the ideology of Germany, Italy and the Soviet Union: opposition to the capitalist democracies of the West."

Military negotiations between the Soviets, French and British were conducted in Moscow between August 12 and August 17. On August 14, the question of Poland was raised by Voroshilov for the first time. The Polish government feared that the Soviet government sought to annex disputed territories, the Eastern Borderlands, received by Poland in 1920 after the Treaty of Riga ending the Polish–Soviet War. The Polish government refused to allow the Soviet military to enter its territory and establish military bases.

On August 21, 1939, the Anglo-Franco-Soviet talks broke down when the parties failed to reach agreement on Stalin's demand to move Red Army troops through Poland and Romania (which Poland and Romania opposed) if the alliance went to war with Germany.

Negotiations between the Soviet Union, France and the United Kingdom for a military alliance against Germany stalled, mainly due to mutual suspicions. The Soviet Union sought guarantees for support against German aggression and recognition of the right of the Soviet Union to act against "a change of policy favorable to an aggressor" in the countries along the western Soviet border. Although none of the affected countries had formally asked for protection by the Soviet Union, it nevertheless announced "guarantees for the independence of Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Poland, Romania, Turkey, and Greece", the so-called "cordon sanitaire" erected between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union. The British and French feared that this would allow Soviet intervention in neighboring countries' internal affairs, even in the absence of an immediate external German threat.

However, with the Third Reich now demanding territorial concessions from Poland in the face of Polish opposition, the threat of war was increasing. Although telegrams were exchanged between the Western Powers and the Soviet Union as early as April 1939, the military missions sent by the Western Powers (on a slow transport vessel) did not arrive in Moscow until August 11, and were given no authority to conduct talks resulting in binding agreements or to sign treaties.

Critics of Stalin question his determination to oppose Germany's growing military aggressiveness, as the Soviet Union began commercial and military cooperation with Germany in 1936 and upheld this relationship until the German invasion began. After the British and French declaration of war on Germany, these economic relationships allowed Germany to partially circumvent the Allied naval blockade, allowing it to avoid the disastrous situation it faced in World War I. However, Soviet industry also benefited from cooperation with Germany, so such cooperation itself provides no argumentation for or against Stalin's motives.

ref>According to Paul Flewers, Stalin’s address to the eighteenth congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union on March 10, 1939 discounted any idea of German designs on the Soviet Union. Stalin had intended: "To be cautious and not allow our country to be drawn into conflicts by warmongers who are accustomed to have others pull the chestnuts out of the fire for them." This was intended to warn the Western powers that they could not necessarily rely upon the support of the Soviet Union. As Flewers put it, “Stalin was publicly making the none-too-subtle implication that some form of deal between the Soviet Union and Germany could not be ruled out.” From the Red Flag to the Union Jack: The Rise of Domestic Patriotism in the Communist Party of Great Britain 1995

For months, the Germans had also secretly hinted to Soviet diplomats that they could offer the Soviets better terms than Britain and France. On May 3, Stalin replaced Litinov, whose Jewish ethnicity was viewed disfavorably by Germany, with Molotov as Foreign Minister, thereby removing a major obstacle for negotiations with Nazi Germany. Litvinov had been associated with the previous policy of creating an anti-fascist coalition, and was considered pro-Western by the standards of the Kremlin. Molotov let it be known that he would welcome a peaceful settlement of issues with Germany. In Jonathan Haslam's view it shouldn't be overlooked that Stalin's adherence to the collective security line was purely conditional. This is completely in line with the politics of the times, given the Western nations' "conditional" adherence to their guarantees to Czechoslovakia.

From the beginning of the negotiations with France and Britain it was clear that Soviet position required agreeing to their occupation of Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania in the event of a war. Finland was to be included in Soviet sphere of influence as well. .

After contacting Molotov on August 15, 1939 regarding the possibility of "settling by negotiation all outstanding problems of Soviet–German relations", and stressing the urgency of such negotiations, Ribbentrop visited Moscow on August 19, 1939. A seven-year German–Soviet trade agreement establishing economic ties between the two states was signed for a German credit to the Soviet Union of 200 million marks in exchange for raw materials – petrol, grain, cotton, phosphates, and timber. Molotov then proposed an additional protocol "covering the points in which the High Contracting Parties are interested in the field of foreign policy." This was thought by some to have been precipitated by the alleged Stalin's speech on August 19, 1939, where he supposedly asserted that a great war between the Western powers was necessary for the spread of World Revolution.