Abstract
Until a few years ago, analysis and interpretation of Stalin’s foreign policies had to be based almost exclusively on such statements, notes and similar documents as had been intended for public consumption. While these materials are most relevant for Soviet interaction with the outside world given the fact that the effort to influence foreign audiences was a crucial part of the USSR’s foreign policy, particularly after the Cold War had begun in mid-1947, evidence from private government sources is essential for both information on intrabureaucratic detail and assessment of underlying intent. It therefore adds considerably to previous historical knowledge that documents from Russian archives have recently become available, if only in bits and pieces.1 The following attempt to assess and to interpret the general traits of Stalin’s policy towards post-war Germany in the early 1950s is based on such a number of detailed studies for which material from Russian archives has been utilized. This basis includes results from my own research and from that of other historians.2
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Notes
A notable exception is R. Badstubner, W. Loth (eds), Wilhelm Pieck — Aufzeichnungen zur Deutschland-Politik 1945–1953 (Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 1994).
An exception to this is W. Loth, Statins ungeliebtes Kind. Warum Moskau die DDR nicht wollte (Berlin: Rowohlt Verlag, 1994).
For review see, inter alia, P. Zolling, ‘Mut ist oft sehr dumm’, Der Spiegel, 25 (1994) 68–72;
H. Köhler, ‘Stalin — ein deutscher Demokrat’, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, 2 August 1994.
W. Leonhard, Die Revolution entlasst ihre Kinder (Cologne-Berlin: Kiepenheuer & Witsch, 1955) pp. 357–8.
The fact that the Soviet side had been clearly heading towards confrontation in Germany before the open rift occurred in mid-June 1947 has been emphasized on the basis of new archival evidence by J. Laufer, ‘Auf dem Weg zur staatlichen Verselbständigung der SBZ. Neue Quellen zur Münchener Konferenz der Ministerpräsidenten 1947’, in J. Kocka (ed.), Historische DDR-Forschung. Aufsätze und Studien (Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 1993) pp. 27–56.
Cf. G. Wettig, Entmilitarisierung und Wiederbewaffnung in Deutschland 1943–1955. Internationale Auseinandersetzungen über die Rolle der Deutschen in Europa (Munich: Oldenbourg, 1967) pp. 192–8.
G. Wettig, ‘All-German Unity and East German Separation in Soviet Policy, 1947–1949’, Jahrbuch für Historische Kommunismusforschung (1994) 122–39;
G. Wettig, ‘Die KPD als Instrument der sowjetischen Deutschland-Politik. Festlegungen 1949 und Implementierungen 1952’, Deutschland Archiv, 8 (1994) 816–25.
See, for example, the evidence for Soviet defensive military planning in the German theatre in winter 1946–7 as provided by M.A. Garelow [M.A. Gareev], ‘Woher droht Gefahr?’, Einheit, 6 (1989) 573–89.
V. Gobarev, ‘Soviet Military Plans and Activities during the Berlin Crisis, 1948–1949’, paper presented at the conference ‘The Soviet Union, Germany, and the Cold War, 1945–1962: New Evidence from Eastern Archives’ (Essen, 28–30 June 1994), and
M. Narinskii, ‘Soviet Policy and the Berlin Blockade, 1948’, paper presented at the same conference.
K. Weathersby, ‘The Soviet Role in the Early Phase of the Korean War: New Documentary Evidence’, Journal of American-East Asian Relations, 2, 4 (Winter 1993) 425–58.
Cf. Soviet Foreign Minister Vyshinskii’s remark as quoted by G.D. Paige, ‘Comparative Case Analysis of Crisis Decisions — Korea and Cuba’, in C.F. Hermann (ed.), International Crises (New York: Free Press, 1972) pp. 48–9.
Evidence for this can be found in the paper by M. Lemke, ‘Eine deutsche Chance? Die innerdeutsche Diskussion um den Grotewohlbrief vom November 1950’, presented at the conference ‘The Soviet Union, Germany, and the Cold War, 1945–1962’.
O. Grotewohl, Im Kampf um die einige Deutsche Demokratische Republik. Reden und Aufsätze, Vol. 2 ([East] Berlin: Dietz Verlag, 1959) pp. 444–64.
G. Wettig, ‘Die Deutschland-Note vom 10. März 1952 auf der Basis diplomatischer Akten des russischen Auβenministeriums’, Deutschland Archiv, 7 (1993) 786–805, particularly 797–8;
Id., ‘Stalin and German Reunification: Archival Evidence on Soviet Foreign Policy in Spring 1952’, The Historical Journal, 2 (1994) 411–19;
Id., ‘Die Deutschland-Note vom 10. Marz 1952 nach sowjetischen Akten’, in Die Deutschlandfrage von der staatlichen Teilung Deutschlands bis zum Tode Stalins (Berlin: Duncker & Humboldt, 1994) pp. 83–111;
V. Mastny, ‘Stalin’s German Illusion’, paper presented at the conference on ‘The Soviet Union, Germany and the Cold War, 1945–1962’, and
L. van Dijk, ‘The Stalin Note: Last Chance for Unification?’, paper presented at the same conference.
See W. Ulbricht, Zur Geschichte der deutschen Arbeiterbewegung. Aus Reden undAufsätze, Vol. 4 ([East] Berlin: Dietz, 1960) p. 336.
See H. Graml, ‘Die Legende von der verpassten Gelegenheit’, Vierteljahre-shefte für Zeitgeschichte, [1981] 329.
See, for example, F. Schenk, ‘Der lange Schatten Stalins. Erinnerungen an die Deutschland-Note 1952 und das Scheitern der Berliner Aussenminis-terkonferenz’, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, 10 March 1994.
Cf. G. Wettig, ‘Die KPD als Instrument der sowjetischen Deutschland-Politik. Festlegungen 1949 und Implementierungen 1952’, Deutschland Archiv, 8 (1994) 826–9.
H.-P. Schwarz, ‘Adenauer als politischer Neuerer’, in G. Langguth (ed.), Macht bedeutet Verantwortung (Cologne: Verlag Wissenschaft und Politik, 1994) p. 31.
cf. M.M. Narinskii, ‘SSSR i plan Marshalla. Po materialam Arkhiva Prezidenta’, Novaia i noveishaia istoriia, 2 (1993) 11–17.
See, for example, R. Steininger, ‘Eine Chance zur Wiedervereinigung? Darstellung und Dokumentation auf der Grundlage unveroffentlichter britischer und amerikanischer Akten’, Archiv für Sozialgeschichte, 12 (1985).
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Wettig, G. (1996). The Soviet Union and Germany in the Late Stalin Period, 1950–3. In: Gori, F., Pons, S. (eds) The Soviet Union and Europe in the Cold War, 1943–53. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-25106-3_22
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