Viacheslav Molotov, Address before the Central Executive Committee of the USSR. January 11, 1936

In this address, Molotov offered a stark assessment of Nazi Germany’s trajectory at a moment when the Soviet Union was trying to build a system of collective security in Europe. He quoted Hitler’s own language about “territorial conquest” to argue that German rearmament and propaganda pointed toward war, even as he noted the practical contradiction that Moscow continued to do business with Berlin through large state credits. The result was an unusually direct statement of Soviet unease, paired with a careful insistence that the USSR still pursued peace through agreements where it could.

Original Source: «План и наши задачи. Доклад председателя СНК Союза ССР тов. В. М. Молотова о народно-хозяйственном плане Союза ССР на 1936 год (на 2-й сессии ЦИК Союза ССР)» / Правда, 11 January 1936

I SHALL NOW pass to the relations with Germany and Japan, which for obvious reasons, attract the particular attention of the toilers of our country. I shall begin with Germany. I must say quite frankly that the Soviet Government would have desired the establishment of better relations with Germany than exist at present. This seems to its unquestionably expedient from the standpoint of the interests of the peoples both of the USSR and Germany. But the realization of such a policy depends not only on us, but also on the German Government.

And what is the foreign policy of the present German Government? I spoke of the principal trend of this foreign policy at the Seventh Congress of Soviets, when I quoted from Herr Hitler's book My Struggle,

which is in a sense a program, and which is being distributed in Germany in millions of copies. In this book Herr Hitler definitely speaks of the necessity of adopting a "policy of territorial conquest." And in this connection Herr Hitler makes no bones about declaring: When we speak of new lands in Europe to-day we can only think in the first instance of Russia and her border States."

Since the time these statements of Herr Hitler's were read from the rostrum of the Congress of Soviets, the German Government has not made any attempt to deny these plans of aggrandizement, although not in this direction alone.

This criminal propaganda for the seizure of foreign territory has now found new followers outside Germany...

Everybody knows that German Fascism is not merely confining itself to elaborating plans of conquest, but is preparing to act in the immediate future. The German Fascists have, in the sight of all, turned the country which has fallen into their hands into a military camp, which, owing to its position in the very center of Europe, constitutes a menace not only to the Soviet Union. Even if we do not mention countries, who does not know that over Czechoslovakia, for instance, which is not threatening any of her neighbors and is engaged in peaceful toil, the dark clouds of German Fascism have gathered, bristling with soldiers' bayonets and mouths of guns, supplied with every known, and yesterday still unknown, chemical for poisoning and infecting people, and with swift and silent war-planes, for the purpose of unexpected attack, and armed with everything which converts modern warfare into a mass slaughter not only of soldiers at the front, but also of simple, peaceful citizens, women and children?

All this constitutes a growing menace to the peace of Europe, and not of Europe alone.

How contradictory the situation in present-day Germany is can be seen from the following:

Side by side with the desperate anti-Soviet foreign policy of definite ruling circles in Germany, at the initiative of the German Government an agreement between Germany and the USSR was proposed and concluded on April 9, 1935, for a credit of 200,000,000 marks for a period of five years. On the whole, this credit is being successfully utilized by us just as is the five-year credit of 250,000,000 kroner accorded to us last year by Czechoslovakia. During the past few months representatives of the German Government have offered us a new and larger credit, this time for a period of ten years. Although we are not chasing after foreign credits and, in contradistinction to past days are now to a large extent purchasing abroad for cash and not on credit, we have not refused, and are not now refusing, to consider also this business proposal of the German Government ...

Finally, as regards relations with Japan.

The Soviet Union has demonstrated its peaceable and accommodating spirit by concluding an agreement for the sale of the Chinese Eastern Railroad in Manchuria. The agreement for the sale of the Chinese Eastern Railroad was signed last March. The railroad has been handed over to the Japanese-Manchurian authorities. The payments to the Soviet Union of the sums due for the Chinese Railroad and the purchase of goods with these sums in Japan and Manchuria are proceeding normally. On all other practical questions the Soviet Union has also hitherto found ways of reaching agreement with Japan.

However, the principal question in the relations between the USSR and Japan remains unsettled. Japan, so far, has evaded the proposal we made three years ago for the conclusion of a Soviet-Japanese treaty of non-aggression. Such conduct cannot be regard otherwise than as suspicious.

On the other hand, there is no cessation or reduction in the number of attempts made by Japanese-Manchurian troops to violate our frontiers ...

We must continue to strengthen our Red Army, and at the same time utilize every opportunity of maintaining peace and of explaining to the toilers of all countries the special line of principle we are pursuing in the international policy of peace.

The fact that we have joined the League of Nations does not mean that there is no longer a fundamental difference in principle between Soviet foreign policy and the policy of the foreign Powers. The Italian-Abyssinian War shows that the contrary is the case.

Source: Royal Institute of International Affairs, Documents on International Affairs, Vol. I (London: Oxford University Press: 1935), p. 222, citing translation published by the Anglo-Russian Parliamentary Committee, London