Maxim Maximovich Litvinov, Russian pronunciation: [m%C9%90%CB%88ks%CA%B2im mɐˈksʲiməvʲɪtɕ lʲɪˈtvʲinəf]; born Meir Henoch Wallach-Finkelstein (17 July 1876 – 31 December 1951) was an ethnic Jewish Russian revolutionary and prominent Soviet Bolshevik politician.

A strong advocate of diplomatic agreements leading towards disarmament, Litvinov was influential in making the Soviet Union a party to the Kellogg–Briand Pact of 1928 and was chiefly responsible in 1929 for adoption of the so-called Litvinov Protocol, a multilateral agreement bringing Kellogg-Briand into force between the USSR and a number of neighboring states. In 1930 Litvinov was named as People's Commissar of Foreign Affairs, the top-ranking diplomatic position in the Soviet state.

Contents 1 Biography 1.1 Early life and first exile 1.2 Second emigration 1.3 Diplomat of the 1920s 1.4 People's Commissar of Foreign Affairs 1.5 Negotiations regarding Germany and dismissal 1.6 Ambassador to the United States and latter 1.7 Death and legacy 2 See also 3 Footnotes 4 Cited sources 5 Further reading 6 Works 7 External links Biography Early life and first exile

Maxim Litvinov in 1896 Meir Henoch Wallach was born into a wealthy Polish Jewish banking family in Białystok, Grodno Governorate of the Russian Empire, formerly part of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, he was the second son of Moses and Anna Wallach. He joined the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (SDLP) in 1898 at which time the party was considered an illegal organization, and it was customary for its members to use pseudonyms. He changed his name to Maxim Litvinov (a common Litvak surname), but was also known as Papasha and Maximovich. Litvinov also wrote articles under the names M.G. Harrison and David Mordecai Finkelstein.[1]

His early responsibilities included carrying out propaganda work in the Chernigov Governorate. In 1900, Litvinov became a member of Kiev party committee, but the entire committee was arrested in 1901. After 18 months of captivity, he led an escape of 11 inmates from Lukyanovskaya prison and lived in exile in Switzerland, where he was an editor for the revolutionary newspaper Iskra.

In 1903, he joined the Bolshevik faction and returned to Russia.

However, the most important event in 1903 for the advancement of Litvinov's political career was meeting Lenin in the British Library.[2]

Lenin and Litvinov went to Hyde Park to hear some of the speeches, and continued to remain in touch during this pre-revolutionary period.[3]

After the 1905 Revolution, he became editor of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (SDLP)'s first legal newspaper, Novaya Zhizn (New Life), in St. Petersburg.

Second emigration When the Russian government began arresting Bolsheviks in 1906, Litvinov left the country and spent the next ten years as an émigré and arms dealer for the party. Based in Paris, he travelled throughout Europe, sometimes posing as a procurement officer from Ecuador, buying rifles in Belgium, Germany and the Austro-Hungarian empire. Despite some notable disasters, such as the wrecking of a gun running yacht on the Romanian coast, he had some success in smuggling these arms into Russia via Finland and the Black Sea.[4]

In 1907, he attended the 5th Party Congress of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party in London. Initially he had to rely on the charity of the Rowton Houses for accommodation in London. However, the party eventually arranged a rented house for him that he shared with Joseph Stalin, who had also been anxious to find more comfortable housing than the Rowton poor hostels. [5][6]

Litvinov in 1902 In 1908, he was arrested under the name Meer Wallach by French police while carrying twelve 500-ruble banknotes that had been stolen from a bank in Tiflis during the 1907 Tiflis bank robbery that took place on 26 June 1907.[7] Litvinov was deported from France and he went to Belfast in Ireland where he joined his sister Rifka and her family.[8] There, he taught foreign languages in the Jewish Jaffe Public Elementary School until 1910.[9] He then moved to England and lived in London, where he was active in the International Socialist Bureau.

When war broke out in 1914, the Tsar requested that all Russian émigrés who were in England and liable for Russian military service be returned to fight in the Russian army. However Litvinov did not return as he was able to convince the English officer who interviewed him that if he returned to Russia he would be tried rather than fight in the army.[10]

Litvinov regularly spoke in public opposing the war, but failed to face up to the fact that if Britain had not declared war, it would have broken a treaty to defend Belgium.[11] At the pinnacle of his power in the 1930s, Litvinov constantly stressed the importance of abiding by the terms of treaties.[12]

He addressed the conference of the Entente Labour Parties but they were not persuaded to change course.

"While holding the olive branch in one hand, we have to hold the sword in the other. We have been forced to take up the sword as the only means of defence. We must not forget we are able to assemble here because the Royal Navy hold the high seas and millions of Allied troops hold the line. If Germany was to succeed, the resolutions we pass would be a mere scrap of paper and of no more value than the Russian bank notes of the Russian state bank."[13]

Later, a mutiny took place on a Russian ship in the Mersey. The police having been warned of possible trouble had the ship under surveillance, and when shouts were heard that the crew were threatening to kill their officers, the ship was boarded and the crew were arrested. Shortly before the mutiny a police report confirmed that Litvinov had received the sailors very well.[14] Therefore, at best, Litvinov had failed to try to dissuade the sailors from carrying out the mutiny or condemn it, and at worst, encouraged it.[15]

Litvinov was also seeking interview with British, American, Australian and Canadian soldiers and inculcating them with Bolshevik ideas, as well as inducing British and American soldiers of Jewish descent to carry on propaganda in their regiments. There was an occasion in which thirty Royal Engineers, along with some American and Canadian soldiers, were received in Litvinov’s office. It was assumed that Litvinov was similarly encouraging them to state their grievances.[14]

In England, Litvinov met and in 1916 married Ivy Low, the daughter of a Jewish university professor.[16] Low's ancestors had emigrated from Hungary to England following the unsuccessful revolutions of 1848. Her father, Walter Low, was a prominent writer and a close friend of H.G. Wells.

Diplomat of the 1920s File:1933 Soviet Envoy Talks With Roosevelt.ogv Universal Newsreel about the visit of Soviet Foreign Minister Maxim Litvinov to the US (1933). On the day after the October Revolution of 1917, Litvinov was appointed by the Council of People's Commissars (Sovnarkom) as the Soviet government's plenipotentiary representative in Great Britain.[16] His accreditation was never officially formalised, and his position as an unofficial diplomatic contact was analogous to that of Bruce Lockhart, Britain's unofficial agent in Soviet Russia.[17]

Litvinov was still allowed to speak freely even after the treaty of Brest-Litovsk between Germany and Russia which took Russia out of the war.[18]

In January 1918 Litvinov addressed the Labour Party Conference by praising the achievements of the Revolution:

"The land has been given to the peasants. The factories are under the supervision of their shop steward committees. Superfluous apartments of the rich have been made available to provide shelter for the homeless. The banks have been nationalised, and in short, a nationalisation policy has been carried out in all the services of the community. The Army has been democratised and self-determination has been guaranteed to all nationalities of Russia."

He then appealed to the Conference with these words:

"The Russian worker has been fighting an unequal battle against the imperialists of all the world for democratic principles honestly applied. They have begun the proceedings for a general peace, but it is obvious they cannot finish it alone. I would say to the representatives of British Labour, ‘Speed up your peace.’"[19]

Kerensky, the Russian leader of the democratic Government that replaced the Tsar and was overthrown by Lenin, was welcomed by the British Government on a visit to London and addressed the Labour Party Conference by criticising the dictatorship of Lenin’s government:

"They have dispersed the Constituent Assembly, abolished freedom of speech, have made human life the easy prey of every red guardsman, have destroyed the liberty of the elections, even in the Councils of the Workmen, that have made an end of all institutions of self-government that have been elected by universal suffrage. The Bolsheviks claim that the present state of Russia is a dictatorship of the proletariat, although the most ruthless repression is applied against the democratic and socialist parties. War has been organised against the helpless population and every Russian citizen who refuses to recognise this method of government as perfect is declared counter-revolutionary."[20]

Litvinov in the left-wing English press criticised Kerensky with these words:

"The continuance of the government in time of Revolution, for eight months without a standing army, except voluntary detachments, without police and press censorship and indeed with greater freedom of speech and the press than exists in any other country immediately disproves allegations to the contrary. Kerensky and his friends, having convinced themselves of the futility of any counter-revolutionary revolts in Russia, are now coming abroad to seek foreign military intervention for the overthrow of the Soviets under the pretext of fighting Germany. Further, if Kerensky is successful in overthrowing the Bolshevik regime, it will not be replaced by a socialist or even a democratic government but by the most brutal and barbaric military dictatorship resting on foreign bayonets, with the inevitable restoration of Tsarism.[21] Clearly, the reception given to Kerensky indicated that the vast majority of the British Labour movement believed that a safer route to improve the prosperity of the working class was through the parliamentary route rather than by revolution."[22]

Later in 1918, Litvinov was arrested by the British government, ostensibly on a charge of having addressed public gatherings held in opposition to British intervention in the ongoing Russian Civil War.[16] Litvinov was held until exchanged for Lockhart, who had been imprisoned similarly in Russia.[16]

Following his release, Litvinov returned to Moscow, arriving there at the end of 1918.[16] There, he was appointed to the governing collegium of the People's Commissariat of Foreign Affairs (Narkomindel) and immediately dispatched on an official mission to Stockholm, Sweden, where he presented a Soviet peace appeal.[16] Litvinov was subsequently deported from Sweden, but spent the next months as a roving diplomat for the Soviet government, helping to broker a multilateral agreement allowing the exchange of prisoners of war from a range of combatants, including Russia, Great Britain, and France.[16] This successful negotiation amounted to de facto recognition of the new revolutionary Russian government by the other signatories to the agreement and established Litvinov's importance in Soviet diplomacy.[16]

However Litvinov undoubtedly tried to intervene in Britain's internal politics agreeing at the request of the Daily Herald, a newspaper supporting the Labour Party to ask the Soviet government to give it financial assistance[23] saying:

If we do not support the Daily Herald, which is now passing through a fresh crisis, the paper will have to turn to a Right trade union. On Russian questions it acts as if it is our organ. After Lansbury’s journey to Moscow earlier in the year, the Herald has moved considerably to the Left and decidedly advocates direct action in support of the Soviet regime. It needed £50,000 in six months, after which once again it hoped to be on firm ground. I beg for an early and favourable answer because there is no hope of establishing a purely Communist newspaper at this time.[24]

In view of the publicity caused by the leak the money was never accepted by the Daily Herald.[25][26]

In March 1921 a trade agreement was negotiated between the Soviet Government and British Government permitting trade between the two countries making trade lawful so that gold sent to Britain to pay for goods could not be confiscated.

However, immediately after the agreement was signed, the British Government and even more the British press began to complain about Communist propaganda. Finally, the British Foreign Secretary sent a note of protest to the Soviet Government, charging it with responsibility for intrigues against the British Government.[27]

Litvinov replied:

The British Foreign Office has been misled by a gang of professional forgers and swindlers, and had it known the dubious sources of its information, its note of 7 September would never have been produced.

Litvinov stated: The British Government’s complaints of anti-British activities in India, Persia, Turkistan, Angora and Afghanistan to a certain extent are based on the above-mentioned fictitious reports and speeches, but the Russian Government wishes to state most emphatically that, after the conclusion of the Anglo-Russian agreement … it had given strict instructions to its representatives in the East to abstain from any anti-British propaganda.

At the same time Litvinov claimed:

True to the principle of self-determination, the Soviet Government and its representatives exercise the greatest respect for the independence of the Eastern countries in giving up the privileges and concessions forcibly extorted from them by the Tsarist Government.

The Russian Government, on its part, feels compelled to place on record that the attitude of the British Government has lately been far from friendly towards Russia.

The imprisonment by British authorities in Constantinople of a number of Russian trade agents and their expulsion without any charge having been preferred against them, the co-operation with the French Government in the so-called ‘Russian question’, the continued support given to French schemes tending to frustrate every effort on behalf of various countries and international bodies to bring some help to the famine-stricken population of Russia, and lastly the presentation of the British note itself of 7 September with its grave charges based merely on imaginary facts and unchecked loose information obtained from dubious sources at a time when France was inciting Poland and Rumania to make war on Russia, do not belong to the category of facts that would induce the Russian Government to believe that it is the sincere desire of the British Government to foster friendly relations between the governments and peoples of the two countries.[28]

In 1921, Litvinov was appointed First Deputy People's Commissar of Foreign Affairs, second in command to People's Commissar Georgy Chicherin (1872–1936).[16] Although both were unflinchingly loyal to the Soviet regime, Litvinov and Chicherin proved to be temperamental opposites and ultimately emerged as rivals. Chicherin was cultivated and polished in personal style and taste, but held a strongly anti-Western political orientation. He sought to hold Soviet Russia aloof from diplomatic dealmaking with capitalist powers.[16] As diplomatic historian Jonathan Haslam has observed, Litvinov was precisely the reverse: less erudite and more coarse, but willing to deal in good faith with the West for peace and a breathing space for Soviet Russia to pursue its own internal development.[16]

Litvinov was a strong supporter of the principle of disarmament and favored Soviet participation in the Kellogg-Briand Pact of 1928, which pledged signatories to the elimination of the use of war as a tool of foreign policy—a position directly at odds with that advocated by his nominal superior, Chicherin.[16] He was frustrated by the failure of the Kellogg Pact's signatories to ratify the treaty. So he proposed the Litvinov Protocol, in which signatories formally proclaimed themselves in mutual compliance with the pacifistic goals of the Kellogg-Briand Pact. It was signed in Moscow in February 1929 by the Soviet Union, Poland, Romania, Latvia, and Estonia, and later by several other countries.

People's Commissar of Foreign Affairs

Józef Beck and Maxim Litvinov. Moscow, February 1934 In 1930, Joseph Stalin appointed Litvinov People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs. A firm believer in collective security, Litvinov worked very hard to form a closer relationship with France and Britain—a policy seemingly at odds with the "class against class" line of the so-called Third Period being advocated by the Communist International.[29] Litvinov remained the only leading official of Narkomindel during the middle 1930s who had direct personal access to Stalin and who could deal with Stalin's inner circle on terms approaching equality—in marked contrast to other top Foreign Affairs officials such as Litvinov's protegé Boris Stomonyakov and rival Nikolay Krestinsky, for whom access was limited to the level of occasional supplication.[29]

Stalin was largely detached from and uninterested in foreign policy throughout the first half of the 1930s, largely leaving the general operations of Narkomindel and the Comintern to their designated chiefs.[29] This left Litvinov with fairly wide latitude to pursue policy objectives subject only to broad review and approval from the center, with Stalin frequently delegating even this aspect of leadership to members of his personal secretariat, including Karl Radek, until the summer of 1936.[29] As a result, Litvinov's Narkomindel was able to pursue a moderate foreign policy line emphasizing stable relations between governments leading towards general disarmament which was — as one historian has called it—a "curious mismatch" with the revolutionary militance vocalized by the Comintern in the period.[29]

In 1933, Litvinov was instrumental in winning a long-sought diplomatic plum: formal diplomatic recognition by the United States of the Soviet government. Franklin D. Roosevelt sent comedian Harpo Marx to the Soviet Union as a good-will ambassador. Litvinov and Marx became friends and even performed a routine on stage together.[1] Litvinov also actively facilitated the acceptance of the USSR into the League of Nations, where he represented his country from 1934 to 1938.

Negotiations regarding Germany and dismissal After the Munich Agreement, German media derided Litvinov about his Jewish ancestry, referring to him as "Finkelstein-Litvinov."[30]

On 3 May 1939, Stalin replaced Litvinov with Vyacheslav Molotov.[31] That night, NKVD troops surrounded the offices of the Commissariat of Foreign Affairs.[31] The phone at Litvinov's dacha was disconnected and, the following morning, Molotov, Georgy Malenkov, and Lavrenty Beria arrived at the commissariat to inform Litvinov of his dismissal.[31] After Litvinov's dismissal, many of his aides were arrested and beaten, evidently in an attempt to extract compromising information.[31]

Maxim Litvinov plays chess with his son Misha in 1936 The replacement of Litvinov with Molotov significantly increased Stalin's freedom to maneuver in foreign policy.[32] The dismissal of Litvinov, whose Jewish ethnicity was viewed disfavorably by Nazi Germany, removed an obstacle to negotiations with Germany.[33] Stalin immediately directed Molotov to "purge the ministry of Jews."[30][34] Recalling Stalin's order, Molotov commented, "Thank God for these words! Jews formed an absolute majority in the leadership and among the ambassadors. It wasn't good."[34]

Given Litvinov's prior attempts to create an anti-fascist coalition, association with the doctrine of collective security with France and Britain, and pro-Western orientation by Kremlin standards, his dismissal indicated the existence of a Soviet option of rapprochement with Germany.[35] Likewise, Molotov's appointment was a signal to Germany that the USSR was open to offers.[35] The dismissal also signaled to France and Britain the existence of a potential negotiation option with Germany. One British official wrote that Litvinov's disappearance also meant the loss of an admirable technician or shock-absorber, while Molotov's "modus operandi" was "more truly Bolshevik than diplomatic or cosmopolitan."[36]

With regard to the signing of a German-Soviet nonaggression pact with secret protocols dividing eastern Europe three months later, Hitler remarked to military commanders that "Litvinov's replacement was decisive."[33] A German official told the Soviet Ambassador that Hitler was also pleased that Litvinov's replacement, Molotov, was not Jewish.[37] Hitler also wrote to Mussolini that Litvinov's dismissal demonstrated the Kremlin's readiness to alter relations with Berlin, which led to "the most extensive nonaggression pact in existence."[38] When Litvinov was later asked about the reasons for his dismissal, he replied by asking, "Do you really think that I was the right person to sign a treaty with Hitler?"[39]

Ambassador to the United States and latter Following his dismissal as head of Narkomindel, Litvinov was dispatched to Washington, DC, to serve as the USSR's Ambassador to the United States.

Litvinov, like Churchill, had misgivings about the Munich Agreement. Following the Nazi invasion of the USSR on 22 June 1941, Litvinov said on a radio broadcast to Britain and the United States, "We always realized the danger which a Hitler victory in the West could constitute for us."

After returning to USSR Litvinov has become deputy minister for foreign affairs. He was dismissed from his post after interview given to Richard C. Hottelet on June 18, 1946 in which he has declared belief that war between West and Soviet Union was inevitable.[40]

Grave of Maxim Litvinov at Novodevichy Cemetery in Moscow Death and legacy There have been rumours indicating Litvinov was murdered on Stalin's personal instructions to the MVD. According to Anastas Mikoyan, a truck deliberately collided with Litvinov's car as it rounded a bend near to the Litvinov dacha on New Year's Eve 1951, and he later died of his injuries. British television journalist Tim Tzouliadis stated: "The assassination of Litvinov marked an intensification of Stalin's anti-Semitic campaign."[41]. However, according to Litvinov's wife and daughter, Stalin was still on good terms with him at the time of his death. He had serious heart problems and was given the best treatment available during the final weeks of his life, which ended in a heart attack on 31 December 1951.[42]

After Litvinov's death, his widow remained in the Soviet Union until she returned to live in Britain in 1972.

In his reminiscences dictated to a supporter when he was an old man, Litvinov's replacement as chief of foreign affairs and right-hand man of Joseph Stalin, Vyacheslav Molotov, remembered Litvinov as "intelligent" and "first rate" but declared that Stalin and he "didn't trust him" and consequently "left him out of negotiations" with the United States during the whole war.[43]

Molotov declared Litvinov "not a bad diplomat—a good one" but proclaimed him "quite an opportunist" who "greatly sympathized with Trotsky, Zinoviev, and Kamenev.[43] "Litvinov remained among the living [in the Great Purge] only by chance," Molotov declared.[43]

Litvinov's grandson, Pavel Litvinov, who resides in the United States, is a physicist and writer and was a Soviet-era dissident.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maxim_Litvinov

• https://et.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maksim_Litvinov
• https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%9B%D0%B8%D1%82%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%BD%...
• http://vseslova.com.ua/word/%D0%9B%D0%B8%D1%82%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%BD%D0... -----------------------------

מקסים מקסימוביץ' ליטבינוב

' (ברוסית: Максим Максимович Литвинов)‏ (17 ביולי 1876 - 31 בדצמבר 1951), מהפכן יהודי רוסי, שר החוץ של ברית המועצות.

קורות חיים נולד בשם מאיר חנוך וולך, בעיר ביאליסטוק (אז בתחומי האימפריה הרוסית, כיום בפולין), למשפחה יהודית אמידה. לאחר סיום בית הספר שירת בצבא הרוסי, ועם שחרורו חזר לביאליסטוק ועבד כרואה חשבון.

בשנת 1898 הצטרף למפלגה הסוציאל-דמוקרטית הרוסית, גוף מהפכני ומחתרתי (בעתיד - המפלגה הבולשביקית). עסק בתעמולה קומוניסטית בקרב הפועלים במזרח אוקראינה. בשנת 1901 נעצר על ידי המשטרה, נשפט ונידון למאסר ממושך. בשנת 1902, עם עוד 11 חברים, הצליח לברוח מהכלא בקייב ולהימלט לשווייץ. חי תחילה בשווייץ לאחר מכן בצרפת וב-1914 עבר לבריטניה.

לאחר המהפכה הבולשביקית ברוסיה מונה לנציג דיפלומטי של רוסיה הסובייטית בבריטניה. הבריטים לא הכירו במעמדו ואף עצרוהו, לאחר שדיפלומט בריטי בשם לוקרט נעצר ברוסיה. כעבור כחודש שוחרר וגורש לרוסיה. לאחר חזרתו החל לעבוד במשרד החוץ הסובייטי. בשנת 1919 נשלח לשוודיה ותוך זמן קצר גורש מהמדינה לצד נציגים סובייטים נוספים (אהרון שיינמן ווצלב וורובסקי). בשנים 1920–1921 כיהן כשגריר באסטוניה. בשנים 1921–1930 שימש סגן שר החוץ ולאחר מכן מונה לתפקיד שר החוץ של ברית המועצות. במהלך שנות פעילותו בתפקיד זה הביא לכינון יחסים דיפלומטיים עם ארצות הברית ולקבלת ברית המועצות לארגון חבר הלאומים. בשנת 1939 הוחלף בתפקידו על ידי ויאצ'סלב מולוטוב ופרש משירות החוץ.

בשנת 1941, לאחר פלישת הנאצים לברית המועצות, חזר לשירות. מונה לתפקיד סגן שר החוץ ובמקביל (עד שנת 1943) היה גם שגריר ברית המועצות בארצות הברית. בשנת 1946 פרש ליטבינוב סופית מהשירות במשרד החוץ.

מקסים ליטבינוב נפטר בשנת 1951 במוסקבה ונקבר בבית העלמין נובודוויצ'י.

https://he.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D7%9E%D7%A7%D7%A1%D7%99%D7%9D_%D7%9C...

Википедия

Макси́м Макси́мович Литви́нов, урождённый Меер-Генох Моисеевич Валлах (5 (17 июля) 1876 года, Белосток, Гродненская губерния, Российская империя — 31 декабря 1951 года, Москва, СССР) — российский революционер, советский дипломат и государственный деятель.

Член ЦИК СССР 2—7 созывов, депутат Верховного Совета СССР 1—2 созывов. Член ЦК ВКП(б) (1934—1941[1]).