How aggressive was Stalin's policy?

Authors Avatar

How agressive was Stalin's policy?

The Soviet and U.S armies meeting in Berlin heralded the end of the second world war, the third reich had been eliminated and the bloody battle of Stalingrad was over.  The two armies embraced each other, and relations seemed better between the two nations than ever in the last century. But tension quickly arose for a number of reasons, most importantly because of their entirely different government systems, Capitalism (U.S) and Communism (Russia).

Factors of the war were still fresh inside Stalin's mind, and this was first demonstrated when he bugged the rooms of Churchill and Roosevelt in the Yalta conference (Feb, 1945.) This was due to his high suspicion of western policies.

Stalin killed millions of his own citizens, and helped the government of Spain in their civil war against Franco, the west saw this as a Russian attempt to spread communism and this was a clash of left and right wing ideologies. These were just some of the things that Stalin did, which cemented the idea that Stalin was a cruel and dangerous dictator in western minds.

But equally or more so were the acts of the west uncivilised. Stalin was not invited to the Munich conference of 1938, here the west gave the Sudetenland to Hitler, Stalin saw this as a breach of trust. The west was trying to tighten relations and turn aggression eastwards towards Russia. The west would hope a collossal war between Russia and Germany would cancel both powers out.

Join now!

When Britain guaranteed Polish neutrality in March 1939, it was a promise that could not be enforced. This convinced Stalin that the west was untrustworthy and full of empty promises and even further so when Britain and France declared war on Germany but did not attack. This "phoney" war was typical of western cowardice.

Another critical factor would be that in June 1940, Stalin would feel he was bearing the brunt of Nazi aggression, the West could have easily defeated Germany while they were preoccupied with Russia (Stalingrad). But instead they made excuses that they were not ready ...

This is a preview of the whole essay