The Foreign Policy of Soviet Russia

Login or Register to leave a comment.

Sign-up for free weekly updates from ForeignAffairs.com.

IT is not my purpose to attempt a systematic and complete statement of the foreign policy of my government, but to lay down certain guiding lines which may aid an understanding of the relations between the Union of Soviets and other Powers and of the attitude that the Soviet Government has taken towards various international problems.

In order to comprehend the foreign policy of the Soviet Republic, it is essential first to consider another more general question. What is the aim of the foreign policy of every country? Foreign policy, it will readily be understood, is only a projection of domestic policy and, clearly, has a close relation to the form of political and social organization of the nation and to its institutions generally. Every government strives to establish with other countries the sort of relations most favorable to the strengthening and development of its own institutions.

This general rule obviously applies to the Soviet Government. Probably not many persons continue to hold the mistaken opinion that the regime created in Russia by the triumph of the revolution of October, 1917, was a transitory episode, the result of a sudden stroke organized by a handful of men who were strangers to the history of the country acting against the will of the people and against the interests and aspirations of the nation. The fact that the Soviet Government has endured for eight years and that no one questions its political solidity, proves that its appearance was not an accident but a necessity, for deep-lying reasons, both in the evolution of Russia and of the whole world.

Without going into a detailed analysis of Tsarist Russia, the following three characteristics of its political and social organization may be noted:

1. The existence of a class of feudal aristocracy possessing a great share of the land, and holding subject to its domination and exploitation the peasants who made up four-fifths of the population. A régime of absolute power with a bureaucracy, which had all the vices of unregulated bureaucracies, was essential to maintain the power of the feudal class.

2. A capitalist class, much weaker because the feudal agrarian system hampered the economic development of the country, but for this reason the more rapacious in the exploitation of the workers...