3. Schmidt, Statist, 312, 317. On the aspects of Schmidt’s memoirs requiring scholarly caution, see Namier, In the Nazi Era, 104–8. The best account of Ribbentrop in London is Spitzy, So haben wir das Reich verspielt, 92–122. Ribbentrop actually spent limited time in London: Jacobsen, Nationalsozialistische Aussenpolitik, 706.
4. Rees, Nazis, 93–5 (citing Spitzy); Snyder, Encyclopedia of the Third Reich, 295. Prince Otto von Bismarck, grandson of the Iron Chancellor and Counselor at the German embassy in Rome, told Ciano of Ribbentrop “he is such an imbecile, he is a freak of nature.” Ciano, Ciano’s Hidden Diary, 151.
5. Ribbentrop had ended up in London almost by accident. On April 18, 1936, the German ambassador to the Court of St. James’s, Leopold von Hoesch, died; initially, no one was appointed to take his place. Then, when von Bülow died on June 21, Ribbentrop expected to get his position as state secretary (number two) under Neurath, but the latter objected, and Ribbentrop was posted to London as consolation. Ribbentrop spent most of 1936 and 1937 not in the United Kingdom, but negotiating with Japan and Italy for an alliance against the UK. On Dec. 28, 1937, he wrote to Hitler that Britain was Germany’s “most dangerous enemy.” Heineman, Hitler’s First Foreign Minister, 140–44; Seabury, Wilhelmstrasse, 54–6; Weinberg, “Hitler and England,” 87–8; Waddington, “Ribbentrop and the Soviet Union”; Ciano’s Diary 1937–1938, 24.
6. Almost alone, von Ribbentrop had interpreted the Munich Pact as a blow against Britain, commenting that Chamberlain “has signed a death sentence for the British empire and invited us to fix the date of implementation of this sentence.” Dalton, Fateful Years, 195.
7. Ribbentrop later wrote that he constantly reminded Hitler of Bismarck’s Russia policy. Ribbentrop, Memoirs, 151. Wilhelmstrasse, 76, was a two-story former private home constructed in the eighteenth century; Bismarck had had his medium-sized office as well as family quarters on the upper floor. Pflanze, Bismarck, II: 35.
8. Molotov, Stati’i i rechi, 1935–1936, 12, 20–1 (Jan. 28, 1935); Haslam, Struggle for Collective Security, 46. On a document sent to him by Molotov, Zhdanov wrote that “entering into agreement with England and France against Germany, even concluding a military alliance with them, we should not forget for one minute that in this alliance, England and France will conduct a policy of insincerity, provocation, and betrayal with respect to us.” Nekrich, Pariahs, 105 (undated reference, letter by V. P. Zolotov).
9. Recall Stalin’s statement to Eden that the world situation was worse than it had been on the eve of the Great War, “because in 1913 there was only one source of the threat of war—Germany—and presently there are two such sources, Germany and Japan” (both of which bordered the Soviet Union). DVP SSSR, XVIII: 246–251 (at 249–50: March 29, 1935); RGVA, f. 33 987, op. 3, d. 1144, l. 325.
10. Efimenko et al., Vooruzhennyi konflikt, 32–6 (RGVA, f. 32113, op. 1, d. 203, l. 6–11: May 16, 1939), 36–40 (d. 202, l. 6–10: May 16), 41–3 (f. 33797, op. 1, d. 37, l. 17–21), 43–4 (op. 3, d. 1225, l. 5–6), 44–5 (op. 1, d. 38, l. 6), 45–6 (d. 36, l. 39–40, 48), 46–8 (l. 51), 48–50 (d. 35, l. 26–35), 51–2 (op. 3, d. 1225, l. 12–4), 52–3 (f. 32113, op. 1, d. 204, l. 33), 53–4 (f. 7977, op. 1, d. 37, l. 55); Coox, “Introduction,” 122.
11. Coox, Nomonhan, 186–9 (April 25, 1939); Goldman, Nomonhan, 1939, 1 (citing U.S. Department of the Army, Forces in the Far East, Japanese Special Studies on Manchuria, 13 vols. [Tokyo, 1954–6], XI/1: 99–102), 83–8.
12. Coox, Nomonhan, 188–95.
13. Gromyko et al., SSSR v bor’be za mir nakanune, 406; Efimenko et al., Vooruzhennyi konflikt, 54–6: RGASPI, f. 82, op. 2, d. 1386, l. 8–12; AVP RF, f. 06, op. 1, pap. 1, d. 2, l. 22–3.
14. Krasnov, Neizvestnyi Zhukov, 90–9; Zhukov, Vospominaniia, II: 249–87(at 250–3). Zhukov’s memoir dates the meeting with Voroshilov to June 2, but a letter to his wife and other documents indicate May 24. See also Roberts, Stalin’s General, 48–9.
15. Sokolov, Neizvestnyi Zhukov, 115–8. In June 1938, when Zhukov had been promoted to deputy commander of the Belorussian military district, he denied in writing any ties to enemies of the people. Daines, Zhukov, 81.
16. Krasnov, Neizvestnyi Zhukov, 100–1 (Zhukov to Voroshilov, May 30, 1939).
