Legal and Economic Factors Affecting Soviet Russia's Foreign Policy, II

There are abundant controversial treatises bearing on Soviet-Nazi relationships, with their consequent effect on world power politics. The observations summarized herewith may shed light on recent developments, suggesting the cataclysm that today shakes the world.(1) Mutual distrust on the part of the British and French governments on the one hand and the Soviet régime on the other, dating back to the Revolution of October 7, 1917. In a large measure, this is due to the fact that there have been, and there are now, active Communists and sympathizers in England and in the United States to propagandize the Soviets' point of view and to apologize for the faults of the Stalin régime. Conversely, there have never been, and there are not now, democratic agents and sympathizers at large in Soviet Russia to represent and interpret Western ideas of democracy either to the Russian people or to the Soviet leaders. There is a school of thought represented by distinguished scholars in America and England which contends that the Soviet overtures at Geneva looking toward disarmament were naively insincere. Ambassador Litvinov's personal motives were, however, beyond reproach.