The Eastern Question

Abstract

The retreat from the constant and active promotion of world revolution, which characterized Soviet foreign policy after March 1921, and had led by the end of 1922 to a marked consolidation of Soviet interests in Europe, was equally conspicuous in eastern affairs. The transition in eastern policy was in many respects less sharp and less difficult. While from 1920 onwards the emphasis on Soviet interest in Asia progressively increased, there was no non-European country where the prospects of proletarian revolution could be anything but remote, or where any native communist party was more than a slavish imitation of the Russian model or a direct emanation of Soviet influence. In these circumstances, the question which for so long embarrassed Soviet diplomacy in Europe — the question whether Moscow was more directly interested in stimulating the downfall of capitalist governments or in coming to terms with them — scarcely arose in Asia, or arose only in minor and transient episodes like that of Kuchik in Persia. In Asia such independent or semi-independent national governments as existed constantly found themselves, through the nature of their ambitions and aspirations, in a posture of active or potential hostility to the western Powers.