Stalin: Waiting for Hitler, 1929-1941 полностью

The session lasted two and a half hours before Hitler broke it off. Ribbentrop hosted a lobster dinner, sans Führer, at the Kaiserhof Hotel, near the foreign ministry. The German state secretary, Weizsäcker, thought the Soviets, in their standard-issue dark suits and felt fedoras, resembled extras in a gangster movie. But then again, Göring sported medals across his corpulent frame, from shoulder to waist, and multiple rings of precious stones on his fat fingers. Based on a report by Berlings, the Gestapo conveyed to Hitler and Ribbentrop that “last night, after the reception in the Kaiserhof, Molotov returned to the Bellevue and gathered a narrow circle of his entourage and embassy personnel. According to our agent, he was in a brilliant mood. The length of the talks he had with the Führer and the Reich foreign minister made a major impression on him. Then he said that he had a wonderful personal impression and that everything was going as he had envisioned and hoped.”²⁶⁵

Molotov (perhaps suspecting listening devices) understood that his ingratiating words would reach his Nazi hosts.²⁶⁶ Around midnight at the Bellevue, he wrote a coded telegram for Stalin, his second such cable of the day. “Their answers in conversation are not always clear and require further clarification,” he observed of the meetings. “Hitler’s great interest in reaching agreement to fortify the friendship with the USSR and spheres of influence is evident.” Molotov’s statement to Stalin indicates, of course, that this was Stalin’s great interest. Notwithstanding the nine-page detailed charge (dated November 9, 1940) that Molotov was following to the letter, he took nothing for granted, concluding, “I ask for directives.”²⁶⁷ Molotov was the sole person in the regime to whom Stalin was willing to entrust a one-on-one with Hitler, yet Stalin was micromanaging the talks from Moscow.

Molotov’s second day (November 13) included visits to Göring at the air ministry to discuss German military goods, and to Deputy Führer Rudolf Hess at Nazi party HQ, after which Molotov cabled Stalin that “they received me well and it is evident that they want to strengthen relations with the USSR.”²⁶⁸ In the afternoon, Hitler, this time in the company of Goebbels and Ribbentrop, again received Molotov, along with Dekanozov and Merkulov, for breakfast at 2:00 p.m. The menu, spartan as far as the Soviets were concerned, consisted of beef tea, pheasant, and fruit salad. Formal discussions resumed in Hitler’s vast ceremonial study, ninety feet long and fifty feet wide, with paneling of rare woods, a massive portrait of Bismarck over the colored marble fireplace, and a white marble statue of Frederick the Great on horseback sitting atop a marble table.²⁶⁹ The discussion lasted three and a half hours. Hitler was famous as a gifted orator and actor who intuited his audience’s moods and aspirations, and adapted accordingly. In the Reichstag he was a wise statesman; at party rallies, a fanatical leader; among industrialists, a reasonable nationalist; to women, a child-friendly father figure; to foreign interlocutors, a theatrical performer, alternating between lordly and warmly intimate.²⁷⁰ With the impassive Molotov, neither the poses nor the melodrama worked.

Adhering to Stalin’s cabled corrections of him, Molotov underscored that the 1939 Pact remained in force, adding that “not without the assistance of the Pact with the USSR had Germany been able to complete its operations in Norway, Denmark, Belgium, Holland, and France so quickly and with such glory.”²⁷¹ Hitler raised concerns about Bukovina. Molotov accused Hitler of trying to alter the terms of the secret protocol regarding Finland and Romania; Hitler claimed otherwise. Molotov noted that the Soviets merely wanted to protect themselves against an attack through the Gulf of Finland, the Straits, or the Black Sea. The exchange “never became violent,” recalled Hitler’s interpreter, “but the debate on both sides was conducted with singular tenacity.”²⁷² Goebbels judged that Molotov “made an intelligent, astute impression, very reserved. One gets almost nothing out of him. He listens attentively, but nothing more. Even with the Führer.”²⁷³

Hitler rose. As he escorted Molotov and his entourage to the door, he said he “regretted that he had not yet been able to meet such an immense historical personage as Stalin, especially since he believed he himself might possibly enter history,” according to the notetakers. “Molotov agreed with Hitler’s statement on the desirability of such a meeting and expressed the hope that such a meeting would take place.”²⁷⁴