But the people’s government of Finland never took office. The Finns showed the Red Army fierce and capable resistance. As the war dragged on, a strongly anti-Soviet mood spread throughout the rest of the world. The USSR was expelled from the League of Nations, and France and England prepared to intervene on the Finnish side. Stalin decided not to tempt fate. Despite a series of victories made possible by a major buildup of forces, in March 1940 he signed a peace treaty with Finland. Plans to sovietize the USSR’s northern neighbor were set aside. The Finns wound up losing a significant portion of their territory and economy, but they maintained their independence. The Red Army lost approximately 130,000 troops, either killed in combat, dying from wounds or disease, or missing in action. More than 200,000 were wounded or frostbitten. The Finnish losses were significantly lower: 23,000 killed or missing in action and 44,000 wounded.
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The war, a major symbolic defeat for the USSR and Stalin personally, exposed weaknesses in every component of the Soviet military machine. Historians have proposed that it was this conflict that prompted Hitler to push forward his timetable for invading the Soviet Union.
Soviet failure in Finland contrasted ominously with Hitler’s triumphant advance. Soon after the Winter War, in April–June 1940, Germany occupied a number of West European countries, forcing France to capitulate in just weeks. British troops were evacuated from the continent, and Italy entered the war on Germany’s side. France’s quick and inglorious fall radically changed the situation in the world. Khrushchev later described how upset and worried Stalin was about the French defeat, lamenting the country’s inability to put up a fight.
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Even if Khrushchev’s account is tainted by hindsight, there is no reason to doubt Stalin’s general sense of alarm. The Soviet leader had lost his former maneuvering room between the warring sides. A strategy that had looked rock solid had suddenly turned to dust. Now there would be no easy way out through a mutually convenient treaty. A huge threat hung over the Soviet Union. The nation that had been its sole if unreliable ally began to look like a mortally dangerous enemy.
Stalin reacted feverishly. As Germany solidified its control over Western Europe in the summer of 1940, Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia were incorporated into the USSR, as were Bessarabia and part of Bukovina, both of which had been taken from Romania. A top priority for the Stalinist leadership was the rapid sovietization of these new possessions. A large-scale expropriation of private property was accompanied by a massive purge of the population. Repression now fell on the newly integrated western regions. As usual, in addition to the arrest and execution of “unreliable” citizens, many were exiled to remote areas of the Soviet interior. In four relocation campaigns in 1940 and the first half of 1941, some 370,000 people were moved from western Ukraine, western Belarus, the Baltic states, and Bessarabia into the Soviet interior. This was a huge number given the small populations of these regions.
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Busy as he was dealing with hundreds of thousands of “suspect” people in the newly sovietized areas, Stalin did not forget about faraway enemies. In August 1940 Lev Trotsky was killed in Mexico on his orders. An NKVD agent who had penetrated Trotsky’s inner circle killed the former opposition leader with an ice pick. Stalin had long stalked his most implacable, energetic, and eloquent foe. Was he driven by a personal thirst for revenge or concern that Trotskyites within the USSR might rally in time of war? Most likely both factors played a role.
Having subdued the territories stipulated for Soviet control under his agreements with Hitler, Stalin faced the question: What now? On one hand, the success of the German war machine made friendship with Hitler more important than ever. On the other, the growing threat that Nazi aggression posed to the USSR made such friendship increasingly dangerous. Soviet and German interests were clashing in Finland, where Germany, having occupied Norway, was making inroads as a result of the outcome of the Winter War. The two powers were also clashing in the Balkans due to Hitler’s desperate need for Romanian oil. Stalin also hoped to gain a share of Romania and Bulgaria and achieve a long-standing Russian imperial goal: control over the Turkish Straits.
For Stalin, the signing of the Tripartite Pact among Germany, Italy, and Japan on 27 September 1940 was bad news. The three aggressor countries were agreeing to help each other divide up the rest of the world. Germany and Italy were recognized as dominant in Europe, and Japan in Asia. In theory, this agreement was aimed at Great Britain and the United States. But Stalin had every reason to worry.
Believing it necessary at this stage to avoid exacerbating tensions with the Soviet Union, in November 1940 Hitler made a conciliatory gesture by inviting Molotov to Berlin. During negotiations with Hitler and von Ribbentrop, the Soviet foreign minister insisted that his country’s interests be recognized in Finland, the Balkans, and the Turkish Straits. Hitler was equally firm, especially when it came to Soviet claims in Finland and Romania. While avoiding making specific promises, Hitler suggested that the USSR become a fourth partner in the Tripartite Pact, take part in dividing up the British Empire, and determine exact Soviet spheres of influence through further negotiations.
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Both sides apparently were probing to see what such an arrangement might offer. Was this four-way alliance ever a real possibility? On one hand, we know that while these negotiations were going on, Hitler was already hatching plans to invade the USSR. We also know that Stalin was entirely aware of the threat posed by Germany. On the other hand, in August 1939, when the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact was being concluded, the Soviet Union and Germany were just as fundamentally hostile toward one another. Everything had changed in an instant once Stalin and Hitler found a point of common interest.
On 25 November 1940, shortly after his return from Berlin, Molotov gave the German ambassador in Moscow the Soviet conditions for a four-way pact. Here, Stalin was again resorting to the tactic that had yielded success in August 1939. In exchange for the support of his partners (and with an understanding that significant amounts of Soviet raw materials would be supplied to Germany), he issued four specific demands. First, German troops must pull out of Finland. In exchange he would guarantee that Finland would remain friendly toward Germany and supply it with timber and nickel, a point on which Hitler had particularly insisted during his talks with Molotov. Second, Stalin laid claim to Soviet influence in Bulgaria, including the conclusion of a mutual assistance treaty and the establishment of Soviet military bases near the Turkish Straits. Third, the three partners must recognize the Soviet Union’s right to expand southward through Iran and Turkey to the Persian Gulf. Fourth, Japan must give up claims to coal and oil concessions in North Sakhalin in exchange for “fair compensation.”
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This program, which closely mirrored the aspirations of the Russian Empire, probably included everything Stalin wanted, and he was undoubtedly prepared to bargain. The submission of these conditions to Berlin indicated, presumably, his readiness to cast his lot with the aggressor countries.
It has been asserted, however, that Stalin never seriously considered Hitler’s proposal to form a four-way pact and that the demands sent to Berlin on 25 November were a delaying tactic, intentionally designed to be unacceptable to Germany. The most significant evidence cited by proponents of this view is an account of a Politburo meeting on 14 November 1940, during which Molotov supposedly reported on his negotiations in Berlin. The account has Stalin stating that Hitler could not be trusted and that the time had come to prepare for war against Germany. But there is no record of any such Politburo meeting or of Stalin making this remark. The only source of this information is Yakov Chadaev, chief of administration for the Sovnarkom (Sovet Narodnykh Kommissarov; the Council of People’s Commissars—the Soviet cabinet), who claimed to have been present and to have taken notes at the meeting.
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There are several reasons to doubt Chadaev’s account. First, Molotov could not have been in Moscow on 14 November since that is the day he boarded the train home from Berlin. Furthermore, it is hard to understand why Stalin would have wanted to hold such a meeting, especially one including people who were not Politburo members.
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Most other major foreign policy decisions during the prewar years (including the Nazi-Soviet Pact of 1939) were not voted on by the Politburo. Stalin kept his foreign policy cards close to the vest, at most consulting with Molotov. The talks exploring joining the Tripartite Pact were a closely held state secret.
Another piece of evidence casting doubt on the meeting is the log of visitors to Stalin’s office, which shows no activity between 6 and 14 November. It is nearly certain, therefore, that Stalin spent these days at his dacha.
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Finally, there is no evidence of any Politburo meetings in November, and even if there had been, Chadaev is unlikely to have been allowed to attend, to say nothing of his taking notes. As chief of administration for the Sovnarkom, he gained easy access to Stalin only after the
vozhd
became chairman of that body in May 1941. The fact remains that on 25 November 1940, Stalin responded quickly and substantively to Hitler’s proposal for an enhanced alliance. Berlin did not react to Stalin’s conditions, despite being prodded by Moscow. Soon after Molotov left Berlin, Hungary, Romania, and Slovakia—three countries entirely dependent on Hitler’s will—joined the pact, followed in March 1941 by Bulgaria, which Stalin had so insistently claimed for his sphere of influence. In April Germany took over Greece and Yugoslavia.
In December 1940, Hitler approved plans to invade the USSR in May 1941. The only allies Stalin had left were his own people. The
vozhd
spent the final months before Hitler marched into the Soviet Union consolidating his power and making extraordinary efforts to bolster the country’s military strength.
THE CONSOLIDATION OF SUPREME POWER
One important result of the Great Terror was the dramatic shift in the balance of power within the Politburo. Remnants of collective leadership survived into the mid-1930s, but by late 1937 the Politburo was entirely subject to Stalin’s will. The Terror brought his power to new heights. He was now a full-fledged dictator in whose hands rested the lives not only of ordinary citizens, but also those of his most esteemed fellow leaders. Five Politburo members (Stanislav Kosior, Vlas Chubar, Robert Eikhe, Pavel Postyshev, and Yan Rudzutak) were shot, and one (Grigory Petrovsky) was expelled from the upper echelons and survived only because Stalin chose to show him clemency. Another name on the list of Stalin’s high-ranking victims was Grigory Ordzhonikidze, driven to suicide by Stalin’s ruthlessness. But even the top leaders who held onto their posts found themselves in an impotent and demeaning position, forced to carefully walk the line between power and death and unable to protect their most valued subordinates or even close friends and relatives. The names of top leaders inevitably came up in the countless confessions the NKVD extracted under torture. It was up to Stalin to decide what denunciations and incriminations should be taken seriously. Anyone could suddenly be labeled an enemy.
As Stalin’s longtime comrades disappeared from the top leadership, younger faces took their place. As noted, these replacements were an important element of his consolidation of power. Lacking the revolutionary credentials of the older generation, these young leaders owed their standing directly to Stalin and were entirely dependent on him. In March 1939 Andrei Zhdanov and Nikita Khrushchev, members of this second generation, were granted full membership in the Politburo. At the same time, a member of the third generation, Lavrenty Beria, was made a candidate member. In February 1941 three other members of the third generation were added: Nikolai Voznesensky, Georgy Malenkov, and Aleksandr Shcherbakov.
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These appointments did not simply represent the normal advance of competent leaders up the career ladder. Stalin made a point of placing young officials in important posts, often as counterweights to his older, more deserving colleagues.
Changes to the composition of the Politburo were just one manifestation of processes taking place under the surface that ultimately destroyed the formal aspects of the collective leadership and substituted new unofficial or quasi-official institutions adapted to the administrative and political needs of Stalin’s dictatorship and lifestyle. The deterioration of the Politburo’s meaningful role was brought to its logical conclusion when it essentially ceased to function as a formal institution. During the years of the Great Terror, it was replaced by a narrower group within the leadership, always chaired by Stalin. In early 1938 the “Secret Five” took shape, consisting of Stalin, Molotov, Voroshilov, Mikoyan, and Kaganovich. This group, though not an official body, largely took the place of the Politburo. The only vote that mattered was Stalin’s. In addition to his deliberations during meetings of the Five, Stalin settled many questions with individual members of the leadership. These ad hoc decision-making mechanisms bore little resemblance to constitutional structures or procedures and depended purely on the will of the
vozhd
. The meetings, following Stalin’s habits and nocturnal lifestyle, took the most varied forms. Matters of state could be decided day or night, in Stalin’s Kremlin office or at his dacha, in the movie theater or during long hours at the dinner table.
The next level of the pyramid of power consisted of governmental bodies to which Stalin delegated particular authority while retaining overall control. This system first took shape within the party’s Central Committee apparat, which had the mission of promulgating ideology and selecting and assigning senior party and state officials. These key areas were overseen personally by Stalin’s protégés, Zhdanov and Malenkov, who could make relatively trivial decisions on their own but had to bring more consequential ones to Stalin for approval. In January 1941, Stalin explained the Central Committee’s new modus operandi: “It’s been four or five months since we in the Central Committee have convened the Politburo. All questions are prepared by Zhdanov, Malenkov, and others in separate meetings with comrades who have the necessary expertise, and the job of governing is only going more smoothly as a result.”
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