To Genoa and Rapallo

Abstract

If the Soviet Government assumed that the conclusion of the Anglo-Soviet Trade Agreement of March 16, 1921, completed by the treaties just concluded with the three eastern nations — Persia, Afghanistan and Turkey — and followed two days later by the final peace treaty with Poland, would at once break the ice and result in the establishment of normal relations with the outside world, this expectation took too little account of the persistence of hostile attitudes in the capitalist countries. The example set by Great Britain failed immediately to inspire any important number of imitators. Of European countries only Germany, like Russia an outcast from the European community, made haste to conclude a provisional trade agreement with the RSFSR.1 This was signed on May 6, 1921; and it was probably no mere coincidence that it was signed on the day after an allied ultimatum to Germany threatening further sanctions (three towns in the Ruhr had already been occupied in March 1921) in the event of non-compliance with reparations and disarmament demands. The trade agreement settled some of the practical difficulties of trade between private firms and a state trading monopoly. But its most important provisions did not relate to trade at all.