Page:Max M. Laserson - The Development of Soviet Foreign Policy in Europe, 1917-1942 (1943).pdf/15

 Charter was made the common program of aims and principles for which the war is being fought (B Nos. 41, 42, 43). Russian ties with the anti-Axis powers were strengthened by the treaty of Mutual Assistance between Great Britain and the Soviet Union of May 26, 1942. In the speeches and statements of Joseph Stalin and of Vyacheslav Molotov the struggle against Hitlerite Germany and Hitlerite tyranny remains the leitmotiv and the common denominator of policy (A Nos. 28, 29); the same is true of the basic treaties of the war period. This has been taken to signify an abandonment of the aims of universal revolution of the first years of the Soviet Union. In some of these speeches, as for instance the speech of Stalin on November 7, 1941, patriotic ideas are dominant (A No. 25), while socialist references are restricted to appeals to the banner of Lenin.

Further changes in policy may be seen in Soviet recognition of the Governments-in-Exile as allied powers. Typical of this arc the Polish-Russian Agreement of July 5, 1941 (B No. 39), and the subsequent Declarations of Friendship of December 5, 1941 (B No. 40). The Polish Soviet agreement of July 30, 1941, put an end to the "fourth partition of Poland" effected by the treaty signed by Berlin and Moscow on September 19, 1939. The exact terms of the latter are not available but Article 1 of the Agreement declares "the Soviet-German treaties of 1939 as to territorial changes in Poland as having lost their validity." This renewal of Russo-Polish friendship is especially worthy of note since the end of Poland's independence was indirectly stated in the note delivered by the Soviet Union to the Polish Ambassador on September 17, 1939, (C No. 1) and directly proclaimed in Molotov's broadcast of the same date (C No.2).

Part C presents a selection of documents relating to the Soviet border territories and the States neighboring the Soviet Union beginning with autumn, 1939. In this connection it is important to note the following. The formerly Polish territories of Western Ukraine and Western Byelo-Russia were incorporated in the respective co-national constituents of the U. S. S. R. shortly after Poland was overrun (C No. 8; C No.4; C No.5). Two new republics were added in a different manner a short time later: the Karelo-Finnish on March 31, 1940, and the Moldavian on August 2, 1940 (C No. 8). Finally, on August 7, 1940, the Supreme Soviet of the U. S. S. R. acting upon petitions formally presented by