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The Soviets and Northern Europe

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 July 2011

Albin T. Anderson
Albin T. Anderson
Affiliation:
University of Nebraska
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Extract

The mainsprings of Soviet action, expressed locally and generally, are a theme which has confounded scholars and journalists for more than three decades. A lack of adequate documentation has contributed to the dilemma of those seeking to resolve the enigma that is Russia. One obvious consequence has been to rely heavily upon the doctrinal premises in an abundant Marxist literature. This is understandable, but it is also an invitation to innumerable pitfalls because of the variety of ways in which Soviet society and Soviet policies can be conceptualized. A further danger is the loss of perspective. One cannot lightly ignore the factor of a people's historical experience, conditioned as it is, in part, by persistent geographic and economic forces. The culminating error is to overlook the frequent gaps which exist between professed aims and Soviet capacity to achieve them. Considering Soviet foreign policy as a whole, one is impressed with the fact that it has been pursued with a realistic evaluation of the consequences. Not since the early years of the revolutionary era has there been any reckless pursuit of ideological ends without a careful inventory of the available resources of power.

Type
Research Article
Information
World Politics , Volume 4 , Issue 4 , July 1952 , pp. 468 - 487
Copyright
Copyright © Trustees of Princeton University 1952

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References

1 Their enthusiasm was derived directly from Karl Haushofer, who closed his Weltpolitik von Heute (Berlin, 1936) with these words: “The study of world politics requires a brave spirit and a strong heart. But he who comprehends its meaning belongs to that select group of souls for whom life at last has real meaning” (p. 264).

2 At the same time honest German scholars were sounding warnings about the uncritical geopolitical approach. Cf., for example, Troll, Carl, “Die geographische Wissenschaft in Deutschland in den Jahren 1933 bis 1945,” Erdkunde: Archiv für Wissenschaftliche Geographie, I (1948), 3ff.Google Scholar

3 “The Round World and the Winning of the Peace,” Foreign Affairs, XXI (July 1943), 595–605

4 See his Democratic Ideals and Reality, London, 1919, p. 79.

5 Part of Mackinder's famous formula. Cf. his Democratic Ideals and Reality, p. 186.

6 Typical of the Soviet critique of geopolitics is an article by P. Fedoseyev, writing in Pravda, April 2, 1951. He stated, “History is not made by geographical designs, but on the basis of the laws of the economic development of society; the popular masses are the decisive force.”

7 As quoted in Rei, August, Nazi-Soviet Conspiracy and the Baltic States, London, 1948, p. 27Google Scholar, and drawn from Izvestia of December 25, 1918.

8 Message of October 2, 1919; cf. Degras, Jane, Soviet Documents on Foreign Policy, 1, London, 1951, p. 169.Google Scholar

9 Ibid., p. 190.

10 Potemkin, Vladimir, Istoria Diplomata, Moscow, 1945, III, 547.Google Scholar Also Hatt, Gudmund, östersjöproblemet, Malmö, 1941, pp. 9–10Google Scholar; and Beloff, Max, The Foreign Policy of Soviet Russia, London, 1947, I, 133–34.Google Scholar

11 Izvestia, October 11, 1938.

12 Essen, Rütger, Den Ryska Ekvationen, Stockholm, 1940, p. 162.Google Scholar

13 Quoted from his speech to the first house of the Riksdag, January 17, 1940; in Svensk Utrikespolitik under andra Världskriget, Stockholm, 1946, p. 57.

14 In both Pravda and Izvestia, May 25, 1951.

15 Hatt, , op. cit., p. 40.Google Scholar

16 This discussion appeared in the form of a long, laudatory review of a recent master's dissertation, “The Regime of the Baltic Straits in International Law,” by S. V. Molodtsov.

17 Extensive, although inconclusive, discussions took place in 1938 which are summarized in Tanner's, Väinö memoirs, Finlands Väg 1939–1940 (Swedish edition), Helsingfors, 1950, pp. 7–27.Google Scholar

18 For one person's opinion of the legalistic-optimistic attitude of the Finnish government, cf. Carl Frietsch, O., Finlands ödesår, 1939–1943, Helsingfors, 1945Google Scholar, especially Chapters I–III.

19 Ibid., pp. 86–87. For a slightly different version, cf. Tanner, , op. cit., p. 40.Google Scholar

20 Finnish Blue Book, New York, 1940, pp. 56–60, for the appropriate extracts of Molotov's speech.

21 It seems to the author that nothing else can explain the unusual amount of publicity given to the specific demands.

22 Shabad, Theodore, Geography of the U.S.S.R., New York, 1951, p. 151.Google Scholar

23 Pantenburg, Vitális, Russland's Griff um Nordeuropa, Leipzig, 1938, p. 72.Google Scholar

24 See map opposite page 35 in the Soviet “colored” book, Die Sowjetunion und Finnland, Moscow, 1939.

25 Allied experiences during World War II made this fully apparent. Cf. “Allied Convoys to Murmansk and Arkhangel'sk, 1941–45,” by an anonymous British Admiralty writer, in The Polar Record (January 1950), pp. 427ff.

26 Pantenburg, , op. cit., p. 123.Google Scholar

27 See the article by Durdenevsky, V., “Antarctica and the Arctic,” Vestník Moskovskovo Universiteta, October 1950Google Scholar; also published in full in C.D.S.P., IV: 40. For a summary of earlier Russian claims, see Webster, C. J., “The Growth of the Soviet Arctic and Subarctic,” Arctic (May 1951), pp. 27–45.Google Scholar

28 Cf. Durdenevsky, ibid.

29 Webster, op. cit.

30 Balzak, S. S., Vasutin, V. F., and Feigin, Ya. F., Economic Geography of the U.S.S.R., New York, 1949, p. 87.Google Scholar

31 Rudmose Brown, R. N., “Svalbard of Today,” Scottish Geographical Magazine (December 1950), p. 177.Google Scholar

32 Rassadin, G., writing in Pravda, October 28, 1951.Google Scholar

33 Ibid.

34 Cf. Mandel, William, “Some Notes on the Soviet Arctic During the Past Decade,” Arctic (April 1950), p. 61.Google Scholar

35 Balzak, et al., op. cit., p. 214.Google Scholar

36 Cf. Lazarev's, M. I.summary of the Stalinist position in Sovetskoye gosudarstvo i pravo, December 15, 1949.Google Scholar Complete text also in C.D.S.P., II: 6.

37 For the military viewpoint, cf. Lt.-Col. Khomenko, E., “On Wars Just and Unjust,” Krasny Flot, October 9, 1949Google Scholar; also the appropriate sections of History of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (Short Course).

38 Lazarev, loc. cit.