NOVI POGLEDI NA SOVJETSKO-NEMAČKI SPORAZUM 1939. GODINE - PROBLEM OCENE I SADAŠNJE DISKUSIJE U SOVJETSKOJ ISTORIOGRAFIJI
NEW CONSIDERATIONS OF THE SOVIET-GERMAN TREATY OF 1939 - THE PROBLEM OF ITS EVALUATION AND THE PRESENT DISCUSSIONS IN THE SOVIET HISTORIOGRAPHY

Summary/Abstract: The dawn of the fiftieth year since the beginning of World War II gave rise in many countries to discussions about the questions which preceded this war. One of the controversial issues was the assessment of the 1939 Soviet-German Treaty. Gibijanski’s study shows the debate, appearing of late in Soviet historiography, which until recently was covered by a veil of silence. For years, Gibijanski states, Soviet historiography concealed, or denied as pure fiction, the existence of an annex to the Soviet/German Treaty, concerning the dividing of interest spheres and territories in Eastern Europe between Hitler’s Germany and the USSR. The subject of the Treaty, precisely, was the division of Poland and the annexation of the Baltic countries (Lithuania, Lettonia, Estonia), as well as Finland and Besarabia. Today, there is a new attitude towards this issue; the existence of this additional agreement is accepted (although the original document has not been found) and its negative consequences for Eastern European countries are being assessed. Gibijanski concludes, on the basis of new archive revelations, that Stalin initiated the negotiations with Hitler and that such a foreign policy orientation of his was not surprising since he had always considered the US and all West European countries, except Germany, to be the instigators of war. Further more, territory held great importance for him, and only with Germany could he settle the problem of new Soviet borders. This is why modem Soviet historiography correctly states that with the Molotov-Ribbentrop Treaty, the USSR became the „unwarring ally” of warring Germany.

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