joanna bujes wrote:
> Why did Stalin sign on to the Nazi-Soviet Nonagression Pact? It only
> bought time for the Nazis - that is why they wanted this pact so
> badly!.
Carrol Cox:>
I don't think all that highly of Stalin (and Mark himself at one time or
another has made some of the points you make), but on this I think you
are wrong. The evidence seems pretty good that the USSR was willing to
go to war in defense of Czechoslovakia before Munich. After Munich the
Molotov-Ribbentrop (sp?) pact became a rational move on Stalin's part.<
what kind of rationality? in economics, "rationality" typically means trying to attain a specific goal. Stalin may have been rational as part of the national goal of protecting "Mother Russia" -- and defending his power as Russia's despot -- when he signed the Pact (though his blood-purge of the military doesn't fit the former goal), but he wasn't rational in the sense of fighting for socialism.
It should be mentioned that the "allies" were just as duplicitous, pitting Russian and Germany against each other. All these creeps were playing the same type of game.
Jim
