What Countries Did Stalin Invade in WWII?
Joseph Stalin, the infamous General Secretary of the Communist Party in the Soviet Union, led the U.S.S.R. from 1922 until his death in 1953. Stalin's Soviet aggression and Eastern European conquest began at the onset of World War II. In 1939, Stalin aligned the Soviet Union in a non-aggression pact with Germany. Soon after, Germany invaded western Poland, setting the stage in which Stalin thought himself entitled to overtake other nations. His aggression began in the Soviet Union's buffer states, and after WWII, culminated in Stalin's expressed interest in controlling as much of Europe as possible.
Other People Are Reading
-
The First Conquest: Poland
-
Germany's invasion of western Poland started WWII, and Stalin's aggressive eastern European attack. The German-Soviet Union nonaggression pact allowed Nazi Germany and Stalin's Soviet Union to take over the lands they lost during World War I without facing the threat of each other's conquest. The two Axis powers pursued western and eastern European nations, respectively. Germany first invaded western Poland, beginning the conquest and the second world war, and the Soviet Union followed Germany's lead, aggressively taking control of eastern Poland.
The Buffer States: Baltic Nations
-
After Poland's fall, Joseph Stalin attacked the "buffer states," or those states bordering the Soviet Union. These territories were previously under Soviet control, but the country lost them after the nation's defeat in World War I (1914-18) and the following Russian Civil War (1917-23). The Soviet Union forced the surrender of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania, the three Baltic nations, threatening military invasion if the nations failed to comply. By October of 1939, the Soviet Union officially took control of the three Baltic countries.
-
The Buffer State: Finland
-
Not a month later, in November 1939, the Soviet Union began its assault against Finland, but found conquest not as easily achieved as Stalin had anticipated. The Finns were greatly outnumbered but were considerably more skilled than Stalin's troops. Before the war, Stalin had rearranged his military in the Great Purge from 1936 to 1938, executing a great number of skilled officers and political leaders of the preceding regime. This left only the most inexperienced and under-trained forces available to battle Finland in what became known as the Winter War. In March 1940, after both sides experienced severe casualties, Finland and the Soviet Union signed a peace treaty. While Stalin failed to conquer the nation as a whole, the Soviet Union maintained control of Korelia, in southeastern Finland.
Bessarabia, Bukovina and Romania
-
Romania agreed to Soviet rule, provided that citizens could emigrate safely, a pact that Stalin transgressed against. In 1940, Stalin moved Soviet troops into Bessarabia and Bukovina, in modern-day Moldova. Following World War I, the Allies gave Romania these two territories. Stalin felt justified in re-occupying the small countries, and after annexing them, he continued with a threat against Romania. Romania immediately agreed to surrender.
Conquests as an Allied Nation
-
The year 1941 found Germany transgressing its non-aggression pact with the Soviet Union. After Germany invaded the Soviet Union, Stalin joined the Allied forces against Germany. When the war ended in 1945, the Soviet Union occupied Poland, the Balkans, Romania, Yugoslavia, East Prussia, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Belarus, and the Ukraine, with Allied support.
After WWII
-
The Berlin Wall separated Western from Soviet-occupied Eastern Berlin. When World War II ended, the Allies, including the Soviet Union, were victorious. The nations under Axis occupation were given sovereignty, or placed under Allied control. During the Potsdam and Yalta Conferences, the "Big Three" Allied leaders, Dwight Eisenhower of the United States, Winston Churchill of the United Kingdom, and Joseph Stalin of the U.S.S.R. discussed Germany's reconstruction, and the state of the European nations. During these conferences, the Soviet Union relinquished control of the buffer states, allowing these bordering nations to realize sovereignty. However, Stalin disregarded the treaties and regained control of the buffer states within the next three years, successfully completing his "Iron Curtain."
-
References
Resources
- Photo Credit Photos.com/Photos.com/Getty Images Hemera Technologies/AbleStock.com/Getty Images NA/AbleStock.com/Getty Images
