Vatlin A.Yu. The “Russian department” in the German Ministry of foreign affairs in1918–1919

Abstract: The end of the world war, the collapse of the Hohenzollern empire and the revolution of 1918 all contributed to significant changes in the German foreign policy, including in relation to Russia. Instead of its traditional geopolitical interests, the political elite’s fear of “world Bolshevism” took over and found its voice in the rise of anti-Soviet propaganda. The coordination of the German foreign policy was carried out by professional diplomats who worked both in the political department of the German Ministry of foreign affairs and in the country’s embassies in some of the largest European states. The focus of this research is on the informal network dubbed as the “Russian department” and is based on the documents from the Political archive of the German Ministry of foreign affairs. This network included officials from the Kaiser era, as well as newly selected diplomats. They were united by their knowledge of Russia’s pre-Revolution realities and at the same time by their inability to assess the new priorities of the Soviet foreign policy, including with regard to the Weimar republic. Consequently the “Russian department” of the German Ministry of foreign affairs in the first half of 1919 became a hindering factor in the stabilisation of the two states’ relations and ultimately they found themselves as outcasts in the Versailles system of international relations.

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