USSR Had No Alternative To Pact With Germany In 1939

MOSCOW. Aug 17 (Interfax-AVN) – The former Soviet
Union had no other choice but sign the
non-aggression pact with Germany in August 1939,
according to documents declassified by the
Russian Foreign Intelligence Service.

“By signing the Munich Agreement in 1938, the
British and French governments staked on a deal
with Hitler. Their delegations thwarted the
Moscow negotiations on the anti-Hitler coalition
in August 1939,” says a report of the Foreign
Intelligence Service’s public relations and media
bureau received by Interfax on Monday. The report
was dedicated to the release of declassified
documents under the title “The Baltic Region and Geo-Policy.”

Intelligence materials collected in 1935-1945
uncovered the actual intentions of statesmen of
leading European countries, the service said.

Confidential notes of the foreign ministries of
the leading nations, which were included in the
brochure, gave the Soviet political
administration a clear idea of the opinion of
European and U.S. leaders about military and
strategic changes in pre-war Europe, the service said.

“Thus, the only possible way of self-defense of
the former Soviet Union was the signing of the
non-aggression pact with Germany on August 23,
1939. That document prevented the Nazi occupation
of the Baltic area and its transformation into a
bridgehead for the attack on the Soviet Union,” the service said.

The declassified documents from the archives of
the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service will
broaden the readers’ knowledge about the Western
attitude to the Baltic subject through the prism
of the real military and political situation of
the 1930s-1940s, the service said.