Secret Notes to the Supplementary Treaty of August 27, 1918: an Unknown Plot From the History of Soviet-German Relations at the End of the First World War

Abstract

. The 1917 Russian Revolution made fundamental adjustments to the course of the First World War at its final stage. The Brest-Litovsk Treaty was supposed to deliver Germany from the Eastern Front, but instead, it put the question of finding a modus vivendi with the new political regime in Russia. The continuation of the German expansion in the territory of the former Russian Empire, the support of the newly formed limitrophe states, financial claims, and the problem of repatriation of prisoners required the development of a legal framework for bilateral relations. At the end of May 1918, the preparation of the Supplementary Treaty began in Berlin. It was concluded only on August 27, 1918. The Soviet envoy in Berlin, A.A. Ioffe, while aiming at the implementation of Lenin's concept of “respite”, was forced to integrate Soviet Russia into the system of international relations generated by the Brest-Litovsk Treaty. During the negotiations, the fate of the territories from the Barents Sea to the Caspian Sea, as well as the prospects for cooperation between the two powers were discussed: from military cooperation against the Entente to countering the Turkish expansion in the Transcaucasus. A special role was played by the financial nuances of the obligations assumed by the parties. The Bolsheviks’ participation in the new round of secret diplomacy was a deviation from the principles they had previously adhered to. Unlike Brest, where Soviet diplomats were forced to accept the winner's ultimatum, the contents of the Supplementary Treaty and the secret notes to it indicate their efforts to achieve the reconstruction of the Russia of the future and its sphere of geopolitical influence. The end of World War I saved the Brest system from being stress-tested, but some aspects of these agreements remained important in the following years, determining the place of Soviet Russia in the world of the interwar period. This article analyzes three secret notes, which specified the most important provisions of the Supplementary Treaty, including joint military actions against the Entente. The notes are published in Russian for the first time.