Anti-Comintern Pact

Germany "Anti-Komintern" (GDAV) The Anti-Komintern, officially the Gesamtverband Deutscher antikommunistischer Vereinigungen (abbr. GDAV, 'general association of German anti-communist federations'), was a German agency established by Joseph Goebbels in 1933. This marked the beginning of a series of attempts by Adolf Hitler to improve relations between the two countries. In Hitler's mind, a positive relationship towards the United Kingdom would weaken Britain's allies France and Italy (at that point still a German rival) and contain the Soviet Union. Hitler would later also send Ribbentrop to London with the specific task of securing British membership in the Anti-Comintern Pact during his 1936–1938 tenure as German ambassador to the United Kingdom, declaring British accession into the pact as his 'greatest wish'. In Japan, the treaty was viewed with suspicion. Mushanokōji on 4 July 1935 in an embassy meeting stated his opinion that it would be unwise for Japan to rush into an alliance with Germany, as he (correctly) interpreted the Anglo-German Naval Agreement as a German attempt to ally the UK. The United States and Britain had been hostile towards Japan ever since the Mukden Incident of 1931, and Mushanokōji feared that Japan might isolate itself if Germany ended up choosing a partnership with Britain over a partnership with Japan. where he could carry out Hitler's personal foreign policy requests independently from foreign ministry consent. This created a rivalry between the two services. While Ribbentrop was Hitler's personal diplomat of choice, his personal view on geostrategic diplomacy varied quite distinctly from Hitler's during the late 1930s. Whereas Hitler favored a friendly policy towards Britain to eliminate the Soviet Union, When it came to Japan, Ribbentrop believed that the Japanese focus on the Soviet Union as its main antagonist could be redirected towards the United Kingdom also, thus enabling Japan to be a partner in Ribbentrop's anti-British coalition. German-Soviet interwar treaties During the time of the Weimar Republic, the German government had made major treaties with the USSR, including the 1922 Treaty of Rapallo and the 1926 Treaty of Berlin. Germany was already agitating against the Soviet Union in 1935 when after a previous German–Polish declaration of non-aggression, through Hermann Goring proposed a military alliance with Poland against the Soviet Union, but this was rejected. Germany made later approaches to Poland nevertheless. In a note on the day of the signing of the Anti-Comintern Pact, 25 November 1936, Ribbentrop informed Mushanokōji that the German government viewed these two treaties' terms as void under the secret additional protocol. Culturally, the 1922 Washington Treaty was viewed as yet another betrayal by the Western powers, after the Japanese proposals for guaranteed racial equality under the League of Nations had been rejected in 1919. German historian Bernd Martin dubbed the Washington Naval Conference the "Japanese 'Versailles'." The diplomatic reaction of the European great powers to Japan's attack against China was insufficient to stop the Japanese advance, despite continued Chinese appeals to the League of Nations. This attack, which had no central order from Tokyo precede it and was rather an autonomous decision by the Kwantung Army leadership, Following the Lytton Report, which laid the blame for the conflict in Manchuria firmly at the feet of the Japanese, Sir John Simon, the foreign secretary of the United Kingdom, failed to condemn Japan in his speech on 7 December 1932, and subsequently earned the favor of Japanese politicians such as Yōsuke Matsuoka, who viewed the lackluster British response as further encouragement for the Japanese course in China. Japan left the League of Nations as a result of the Lytton Report in February 1933. Japanese–Soviet fishery treaty negotiations and border disputes At the time of the negotiations for the Anti-Comintern Pact, the Japanese government was also in negotiations with the Soviet government over fishing rights in the Sea of Japan. As the Anti-Comintern Pact's secret additional protocol between Germany and Japan against the USSR was to forbid political treaties by either state with the Soviet Union without the express consent of the other party to the Anti-Comintern Pact, Japanese ambassador Mushanokōji was concerned whether the Pact would result in consequences for the Japanese-Soviet negotiations. He inquired about it in a letter to Ribbentrop after the signing of the treaty on 25 November, and also mentioned the issue of border questions between Japanese-controlled Manchukuo and the USSR. Ribbentrop confirmed the German government's assent that Japan was autonomous and free to proceed in the matters mentioned by Mushanokōji his reply on the same day. Both countries shared examples of very politically significant racial ideologies, with Alfred Rosenberg in Germany and Shūmei Ōkawa in Japan becoming the leading racialist ideologues. Whereas Rosenberg enjoyed government backing and was a central party figure after the Nazis' rise to power in 1933, Ōkawa's audience was more limited. Ōkawa found his main support base with young nationalistic military officers, particularly those in the Kwantung Army, the military unit that instigated Japan's initial invasion of North East China in 1931. To prevent diplomatic complications as a result of German racial thought, German racist propaganda in the state-controlled press was directed away from the topic of the Japanese people so as to not irritate Japan. the Communist International drastically changed the course that communist parties were advised to take in democratic systems. Instead of viewing the democratic and fascist parties as politically allied ("social fascism"), the communist movements were encouraged to ally with leftist and centrist forces (the policy of the popular front) in order to prevent the rightists from gaining ground. Diplomatically, the Seventh World Congress also brought on the "collective security" policy in the Soviet Union, wherein the USSR would attempt to align with the western democracies to counteract the fascist regimes. Role of China in German–Japanese relations The Republic of China was an important partner to the Germans, but a bitter enemy of the Japanese Empire, as Japan had invaded Manchuria in 1931. Although Ribbentrop hoped to involve both China and Japan in his anti-communist bloc, the continued hostilities and eventual outbreak of war made the ambivalent German position, including the Sino–German military cooperation and the status of Alexander von Falkenhausen and other military advisors to Chiang Kai-shek, a serious concern to both of the Asian states. Furthermore, China was the biggest trade partner for German businesses in Asia. For their part, the Japanese political and military establishments were by 1934 also less than certain about the usefulness of the new Hitler government in Germany, which Tokyo assumed would attempt to maintain a peaceful relationship with the Soviet Union and avoid any open alignment with Moscow's enemies. The distrust that Japan felt was partially caused by the close relationship between Germany and China, which in turn was perceived as an ally of the Soviet Union against Japan. China eventually declared war on Germany and Italy, along with Japan, on 9 December 1941, in the aftermath of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor and the American entry into World War II, citing German and Italian support for Japanese aggression as the reason. Instability in France The domestic situation in the French Third Republic was unstable. This provided the opportunity for France's rivals, especially Germany, to expand their influence, while at the same time weakening France's European partners, such as Poland and Czechoslovakia. The cabinet of Léon Blum, supported by France's popular front, had taken the reins in June 1936. The social instability and political violence within France made the French government careful and ineffective in applying France's otherwise extensive diplomatic and military power. Hitler, who expected France's popular front to result in a situation similar to the Spanish Civil War, openly announced to the French ambassador on 6 October 1936 that a communist takeover in France would not be treated by Germany as a domestic affair. In French foreign policy, the 1934 German–Polish Non-Aggression Pact had caused concerns about the stability of the French alliance system in eastern Europe, leading to a French realignment towards the Soviet Union that resulted in the 1936 Franco-Soviet Treaty of Mutual Assistance. The Spanish Civil War was viewed by the Germans as concrete proof that the teachings of the Seventh World Congress of the Comintern, which had been specifically aimed against Germany (and Japan), were indeed affecting geopolitics. == Creation ==

Early designs by Dienststelle Ribbentrop and Hiroshi Ōshima After the Anglo-German Naval Agreement and the Seventh World Congress, the German Dienststelle Ribbentrop envisioned in October 1935 an anti-communist diplomatic system that might involve both the Empire of Japan and the Republic of China. This idea had support on the Japanese side by Hiroshi Ōshima, then the military attaché for Japan in Berlin, although Ōshima was more concerned with a Japanese subjugation of China rather than with an equal Sino–Japanese alliance against the Soviet Union. Originally, the treaty was scheduled for November 1935, and invitations were to be extended to China, the United Kingdom, Italy and Poland. However, the German military and diplomatic leadership stalled the treaty's realization, as they feared a breakdown in the German relations with China. Historian Carl Boyd interprets this as a reference to the contact with Ōshima established via Hack. the German diplomatic ambivalence between the ideological proximity and military potential of Japan and the economic value of China continued, and Neurath remained in favor of German alignment with China. In April 1936, Germany signed a major commercial treaty with China and gave them a credit of 100,000,000 marks for China to purchase German industrial and other products. It was Hitler himself who, unbeknownst to Neurath and the foreign ministry, began to reassess the importance of China and Japan in German foreign relations over the course of the summer of 1936. Hitler sanctioned new negotiations with the Japanese. Some minor adjustments were still made between August and October, when the pact was formally initialed. Its length was reduced to 5 years, down from 10 as had originally been planned. And, against Ōshima's and Hitler's hopes, the military leadership in Japan insisted that the military provisions could be only defensive and not offensive, even if agreed upon in a secret addendum. The military leadership was concerned that, if Japan was caught in a war against China, an offensive clause to the treaty would diplomatically force Japan into a war against the Soviet Union that it was militarily unwilling to fight. As a result, the first article of the secret additional protocol spoke specifically of "unprovoked attack" by the Soviet Union and had no offensive provisions. On the other hand, the Japanese side was unable to gain the upper hand on the topic of the pact's publication, which was advocated for by the Germans and which Japan had attempted to avoid. Furthermore, the secret protocol remained explicitly aimed at the Soviet Union, something that the Japanese had felt was an ineffective provision. The treaty draft was finalized on 23 October 1936. Approval by the Japanese Privy Council and by Adolf Hitler The Anti-Comintern Pact required the approval of the Privy Council of Japan to allow Japanese accession to the treaty. Prime Minister Hirota had expressed his personal relief upon hearing the treaty draft's conclusion on 23 October 1936, and compared the achievement of the IJA in its advancement of the Anti-Comintern Pact to the IJN's success in forging the 1902 Anglo-Japanese Alliance. The elder Japanese statesman Saionji Kinmochi, last of the genrō, had disagreed with the Japanese government's diplomatic step and denounced the Anti-Comintern Pact as exclusively useful to Germany and as without benefit for Japan. Kinmochi instead would have preferred a diplomatic course more in line with Japanese public opinion and geography, both of which made a positive relationship with UK and USA desirable. However, Kinmochi's critical stance remained unheard in the Privy Council. In the view of the proponents of the treaty within Japan, spearheaded by the IJA, Japan was militarily threatened by the Soviet Union's meddling in China, just as Germany was threatened by Soviet support for France and Czechoslovakia. Furthermore, both countries feared subversion by communist forces. This, as a result, made Germany and Japan natural allies against the Soviet Union and the Comintern. The opponents, who gathered around the IJN, cited the likelihood that the Anti-Comintern Pact would increase rather than decrease the threat posed by the USSR and that there would be considerable domestic resistance against the agreement. Ultimately, the supporters won out in the discussions that took place on 13 November and 18 November, and the Privy Council gave the treaty its unanimous support on 25 November 1936. On the German side, all that was required for German accession to the pact was Hitler's approval, which was given quickly, and subsequently supported by a wave of anti-communist propaganda in the state-controlled German press. == Signing ==

The treaty, which outlined a joint German and Japanese policy to counteract the activities of the Communist Internationale, was initially to be in force for five years, until November 1941. This reduced length was one of the concessions made after the objections of the Japanese foreign ministry to the initial Bayreuth draft of the treaty, in which the treaty was at first supposed to have a duration of ten years. In the first article, German and Japan agreed to have their competent authorities "closely co-operate in the exchange of reports on the activities of ... and on measures of information and defense against" the Comintern. The two contracting parties also agreed, in the second article, to have their competent authorities "within the framework of the existing law ... take stringent measures against those who at home or abroad work on direct or indirect duty" of the Comintern. China The Anti-Comintern Pact between Germany and Japan was a direct threat to China, which relied on German military assistance against the threat of the imminent Japanese invasion. The German foreign ministry, which had been opposed to ''Dienststelle Ribbentrop's'' alignment with Japan, made significant efforts to reassure China of German assistance. This lasted until the outbreak of hostilities between Japan and China in July 1937, after which Germany, keeping with Ribbentrop's agenda, aligned clearly with Japan, Germany The German public was informed of the treaty's entry into legislation by the German Reichsgesetzblatt in 1937. Ribbentrop justified the Anti-Comintern Pact as a joint German–Japanese act to defend Western civilization. The German government launched a pro-Japanese publicity campaign to improve the general opinion of the German public about Japan. Italy The Italian government, which had still viewed Germany as a potential rival well into the year 1935, had initially abstained from the negotiations of the Anti-Comintern Pact. In the aftermath of the agreement, the influx of national socialist ideology into Japanese society after the alignment with Germany caused an increase in antisemitism in Japan. was the treaty's main proponent. Prince Kotohito had signalled the army's positive predisposition towards Ōshima's efforts in Berlin. The Japanese navy would have preferred to avoid the treaty if that meant a better relationship with the United States and the United Kingdom as a result. Litvinov had also, in speaking to the All-Union Congress of Soviets on 26 November, cast doubt on the completeness of the treaty as presented to the public, declaring it to be "only a camouflage for another agreement which was simultaneously discussed". Yurenev had even contacted Japanese foreign minister Arita before the pact's publication, on 16 November and 20 November. While Arita had on the first request dodged the issue by pointing to the fact that the negotiations were only concerned with the Comintern and not the Soviet Union, he did not respond to the latter contact by Yurenev, in which the ambassador accused the Japanese foreign service of holding secret negotiations with Germany specifically aimed against the USSR. United Kingdom The United Kingdom also saw its colonial empire in Asia and eventually Africa threatened by the Japanese and later also the Italian alliance with Germany. This view was not completely unjustified in the context of the Axis Powers' navies, as the naval high commands of Germany, Italy and Japan mainly aimed their common considerations against the United Kingdom, not the Soviet Union. In the House of Commons, the Anti-Comintern Pact became a subject of debate multiple times. The British armed forces were concerned about a potential military conflict with Germany and Japan, and this feeling was escalated upon Italian accession to the agreement. United States In the United States, the German-Japanese agreement was viewed as an indication that Germany might follow Japan's path of satisfying territorial claims with military action, as Japan had done in Manchuria in 1931. In a September 1937 report to the Treasury (after the outbreak of the Second Sino-Japanese War), it was argued that the long-term consequence of a Japanese victory in China would result in other "dissatisfied" powers, such as Germany and Italy, seeking the fulfillment of their objectives in military endeavors of their own. The American armed forces were concerned about the prospect of Japan gaining military allies in the form of Germany and later Italy, as that posed a potential threat to the American War Plan Orange. In 1937, American ambassador to Japan Joseph Grew analyzed the Anti-Comintern Pact's anti-communist rhetoric as a mere banner for "have-not" countries to unite under while in truth aiming primarily against the British Empire's global dominance. Franklin D. Roosevelt, U.S. president from 1933 to 1945, shared French concerns about the safety of Poland and Czechoslovakia. Roosevelt believed that the pact contained secret clauses outlining an alliance that was both defensive and offensive, and that it divided the world into spheres of influence for each of the signatories. Eventually, the USS Panay incident of 1937 resulted in the President's attempt to break the Anti-Comintern Pact by appeasing Germany and Italy with the goal of isolating Japan from its allies to hinder its progress in China. Cordell Hull noted in his memoirs that "[n]othing could have been more logical and natural than an alliance of Berlin and Tokyo", citing shared values of militarism, conquest and disregard for international treaties as the reason for his conclusion. == Expansion and adaptations ==

The Anti-Comintern Pact's original provisions had included a specific provision that allowed Germany and Japan to jointly invite additional members into the pact. it made no particular effort, diplomatic or otherwise, to stop the Japanese aggression against China. The German government and foreign service still remained privately critical of the Japanese course of action. When Japanese ambassador to Germany Mushanokōji explained to state secretary Ernst von Weizsäcker that the Japanese invasion of China kept in the spirit of the Anti-Comintern Pact in its attempt to vanquish Chinese communism, Weizsäcker dismissed Mushanokōji's explanation on the basis of the German view that the Japanese action would foster rather than stifle the growth of communism in China. By 1937, the Italian interest in the pact had changed, as the Mussolini administration desired to have its own military alliance with Japan and felt that accession to the agreement would be the easiest way to forge the triangular alliance with Germany and Japan that the Italian government desired. In this military-political purge, Hitler removed twelve generals (not counting Blomberg and Fritsch) and reassigned 51 other military posts. Mussolini, who had by now given up his attempts at Italian diplomatic ambivalence between the United Kingdom and Germany and fully committed to Italian alliance with Germany, The overall Japanese attitude, still anti-Soviet rather than anti-British, did not fit with the German and Italian designs to openly antagonize the United Kingdom. The Japanese foreign service did not wish to be drawn into a war between the nations of Western Europe and as a result aimed to differentiate between the Axis Powers' designs against the UK and those against the USSR. Ribbentrop's designs were thus rejected by the Japanese delegates, who insisted on the Anti-Comintern Pact's initial anti-communist designs and were unwilling to see an anti-British component added to it. Eventually, Japanese caution led Ribbentrop to settle for only a bilateral alliance rather than the trilateral one he had hoped for, and the Pact of Steel was signed between Germany and Italy on 22 May 1939. It was the first member with some independence outside of the big three, and it was subsequently the first country to be denied first-class status among the pact's members, thus establishing the division between Germany, Italy and Japan as the leading nations of the pact and the remaining countries as their subordinates. This superior status of the three leading countries was later formalized in the extension of the pact on 25 November 1941. In his memoirs, Hungary's strongman Miklós Horthy would later complain that Germany had unduly involved itself in Hungarian domestic affairs even before Hungary's accession to the Anti-Comintern Pact, and that German media had no place to insist that Hungary had a 'bill to pay' after profiting from German diplomatic intervention on her behalf during the First Vienna Award. Entry of Spain Francisco Franco's Spain joined the pact on 27 March 1939, the same day that the surrender of the Spanish Republicans at the end of the Siege of Madrid brought about the end of the Spanish Civil War. The British government, after nationalist victory had become obvious, had attempted to quickly improve relations with the new government in Madrid, but the progress on Anglo-Spanish relations received a setback with the Spanish entry into the pact. France, although nominally also interested in positive relations with the falangists as seen in the Bérard-Jordana Agreement of 25 February 1939, made even less headway than the British. After Spanish entry into the Anti-Comintern Pact, there was a Spanish military buildup in colonial Morocco, and the Franco government further worsened tensions by refusing to allow the re-entry of refugees that had fled the country in the closing days of the Spanish Civil War. In January 1939, the Axis Powers were courting the Stojadinović government in Yugoslavia to attempt to induce Yugoslavia to join the Anti-Comintern Pact. which came as a surprise to the Axis Powers, who had believed Stojadinović was secure in office. Reactions within the Anti-Comintern Pact Italy On the backdrop of the preparations for World War II, the Italian reaction to Germany's actions was ambivalent. The Italian population's pre-existing anti-German and anti-war sentiments were not helped at all by the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, Japan , Fumimaro Konoe and Benito Mussolini In the Japanese view, the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact was a violation of the Anti-Comintern Pact, as Germany had not revealed its negotiations with the USSR to Japan. Subsequently, the Japanese sought to settle the Soviet–Japanese Border War and abandoned any territorial aspirations against the Soviet Union. Starting with the German-Soviet War, the Japanese loss of interest in war with the USSR had the consequence that Japan was unwilling to open up a second front against the Soviet Union to relieve German efforts, as Japan interpreted Germany's aggression as an insufficient reason to trigger the treaty. As a result of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, there was a significant cooling of German–Japanese relations between late 1939 and the summer of 1940, but after Germany's victories in 1940, the elimination of the French and Dutch colonial powers caused Japan, interested in the acquisition of the colonies in question, to approach Germany again. == During World War II ==

All further additions to the Anti-Comintern Pact were after 1 September 1939 and thus during World War II. The supposed purpose of the pact, as a defensive coalition against communism to counteract the potential of Soviet aggression, became outdated when most of its European member states became engaged in the German–Soviet War. This came to pass as part of the Tripartite Pact of 27 September 1940. However, the Japanese distrust in the German partner remained, and Japan avoided entanglement in Germany's eventual war against the Soviet Union to fully focus on its own struggle in China. China under Wang Jingwei submitted its signature ahead of time on 22 November 1941, the other countries submitted theirs on the day of signing, the 25th. • • • • Nanjing China • Denmark takes up no military obligations. • Anti-communist action in Denmark should be limited to police operations. • The treaty should be limited to Danish territory. • Denmark will remain neutral in World War II. The Germans, somewhat unhappy with these requests, moved them into a secret addendum as a compromise, making Denmark appear as a full member of the pact from the outside. This damaged the international reputation of the Danish civilian government among the Allies. Finland The status of Finland during the Second World War remains controversial into the modern day, as historians debate whether Finland was an ally of the Axis Powers, or as claimed by the wartime Finnish government, just in a state of co-belligerence (, ) with Germany in the Continuation War against the Soviet Union. Finnish entry into the Anti-Comintern Pact on 25 November 1941, alongside other elements such as Finland's explicit acknowledgement of having been an ally of "Hitlerite Germany" in the 1947 Paris Peace Treaty, form the case in favour of arguing that Finland was an ally of the Axis Powers. Nanjing China The "Reorganized National Government of the Republic of China," also referred to as "China-Nanjing" or the Wang Jingwei regime, a Japanese puppet state established in Nanjing by the defeated Nationalist Party politician Wang Jingwei in March 1940, joined the Anti-Comintern Pact on 25 November 1941. It had submitted its signature to the treaty ahead of time, on 22 November. Romania Romania was Germany's most militarily important partner in the war against the Soviet Union, but its German partners had done little to actively earn that loyalty. Germany had in quick succession overseen three territorial losses in Romania, when it first awarded the Bessarabia region to the Soviet Union in the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, then granted large parts of the Transylvania region to Hungary as part of the Second Vienna Award, and finally approved of Bulgarian territorial gains in the Dobruja region as part of the Treaty of Craiova. Romania, under the leadership of the fascist Iron Guard, thus had its main enemies not only in the Soviet Union, but also among the ranks of the Axis Powers, especially in the form of Hungary. Still, the Iron Guard, which had before the territorial losses advocated a pro-German position, now viewed alignment with Germany as the only way to avoid another German intervention against Romania and in favor of Hungary. The Romanian participation in the Anti-Comintern Pact on 25 November 1941 thus arose out of the necessity to please the German partner and to further the Romanian campaign against the Soviet Union, to hopefully regain Bessarabia, and to make territorial acquisitions in Soviet Ukraine. Slovakia Slovakia, established in 1939 after the German-instigated dissolution of Czechoslovakia, joined the Anti-Comintern Pact on 25 November 1941. == Suggested memberships ==

Between 1936 and 1945, the Axis Powers used the Anti-Comintern Pact as a diplomatic tool to increase their political and diplomatic leverage but were often unsuccessful. Argentina, Brazil, and Chile There were efforts by Germany to involve the South American (''ABC States"), consisting of Argentina, Brazil, and Chile, into the pact. After serious consideration, the Chiang administration refused. Another attempt at exploratory peace talks was made by for the Chinese side, who had two delegates with Yōsuke Matsuoka in Tokyo on 12 October 1940. Their proposal for peace between Japan and China and the unification of the Wang and Chiang governments also included the entry of the unified Chinese state into the Anti-Comintern Pact. Poland In 1935, Poland had been one of the countries that Ribbentrop had hoped to induce to join the pact. Poland rejected this proposal. it had a well-established anti-Soviet record. However, its economic dependency on and long-standing diplomatic alliance with the United Kingdom made Portugal unlikely to accept an invitation to the Anti-Comintern Pact in the eyes of Oswald Baron von Hoyningen-Huene, the German ambassador to Portugal 1934–1945. Yugoslavia Yugoslavia was Axis-friendly during the tenure of Milan Stojadinović as Prime Minister, and Germany and Italy were optimistic about its accession in January 1939. Stojadinović was however ousted in February 1939, and the subsequent Cvetković administration was more cautious and non-aligned. The Cvetković administration, pressured by the diplomatic alignment of Romania, Hungary and Bulgaria with the Axis Powers, joined the Anti-Comintern Pact's successor, the Tripartite Pact, on 25 March 1941. in response, Chief of the General Staff Dušan Simović and other officers launched a coup d'état on 27 March, cancelling Yugoslavia's entry into the Tripartite Pact. In response, the Axis Powers initiated the invasion of Yugoslavia on 6 April. == Legacy ==

The Anti-Comintern Pact ended up playing a significant role at the Nuremberg trials and was specifically mentioned in the verdict that sentenced Joachim von Ribbentrop to death. == See also ==