Anglo-French vs Soviet war in the 1930s?

I'm wondering - is there any way to get the UK and France at war with the USSR in the 1930s, a war that 1) doesn't involve the Winter War or 2) at least has Germany as a neutral party?

I know a neutral Germany (say Hitler never comes to power and the Weimar regime somehow wheezes its way along, or whatever) leaves a big gaping hole in the lines of battle, but c'est la vie.

Anyway, it would be a strange sort of conflict, wouldn't it? Allied air strikes out of the Middle East, amphibious attacks on Vladivostok... neither side able to deploy the bulk of the army against the enemy, at least without widening the war to a Scandinavian or (God help them) Chinese front or something even more ridiculous.
 
I know little to be a REAL historian, but my guess is that this war isn't going to be possible!

The Soviet Union had the biggest army in the 1930's and France and England had the Treaty of Versailes to back them up, plus Britain and France still remembers the horrors of the First World War.

I don't think such a thing could even be feasible!
 
Not really any chance of this happening. The Soviet Union had no interest to expand territoriality in the 1930s, and Britain and France weren't interested in another world war.
 
Britain and France weren't lookng for trouble. Russia would have to deliberately provoke them.
 
Britain and France weren't lookng for trouble. Russia would have to deliberately provoke them.
why doesnt sabotaging their political infrastructure count as deliberately provoking them?

Maybe a failed soviet-backed coup in england and/or france?
 
why doesnt sabotaging their political infrastructure count as deliberately provoking them?

Maybe a failed soviet-backed coup in England and/or France?

Aware of how unstable the French political system was in the 30s?

I don't know about the UK, but you can bet everything you own that the French reds would have done everything possible to make prosecution of such a war next to impossible for the French: Open insurrection wouldn't even be out of the question.
The Soviet Union had no interest to expand territoriality in the 1930s

The people of Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia would like a word with you
 
Not really any chance of this happening. The Soviet Union had no interest to expand territoriality in the 1930s, and Britain and France weren't interested in another world war.

That would be neglecting several of the old Russian Empire territories that Stalin strategically made efforts to take control over in the late 30's.

Though these were places that generally had little strategic value for the British and the French, so there is no reason to call them on it anyway.

I really don't see it happening in the end though, Stalin was cautious and only picked fights where he knew the West didn't care, and the West, particularly the French, knew full well that conflict with the Soviets was folly when the threat of Germany was looming. For this to happen, Germany as a threat has to be negated in some way.
 
That would be neglecting several of the old Russian Empire territories that Stalin strategically made efforts to take control over in the late 30's.

Though these were places that generally had little strategic value for the British and the French, so there is no reason to call them on it anyway.

I really don't see it happening in the end though, Stalin was cautious and only picked fights where he knew the West didn't care, and the West, particularly the French, knew full well that conflict with the Soviets was folly when the threat of Germany was looming. For this to happen, Germany as a threat has to be negated in some way.

If by late 1930s you mean in the last few months of 1939, and only as a result of a proposition by Germany first, then yes.
 
If by late 1930s you mean in the last few months of 1939, and only as a result of a proposition by Germany first, then yes.

Traditionally pro-Finnish Germany proposed the invasion of Finland :p?

In all seriousness, yes, but really I think the 30's vs. 40's debate is a bit counterproductive, the time did not change his desire to take these territories, merely the focus of the Soviet Union in the 30's was inward, looking at development of the USSR proper, as opposed to outward, looking for expansion.
 
There's no feasible way to do it without the Winter War or Germany being involved in some way.

The best way would be for a Red Germany (strings pulled by the Soviets) to appear. That would sandwhich Poland in between two communist states and leave the British and the French crapping their collective pants.
 
There's no feasible way to do it without the Winter War or Germany being involved in some way.

The best way would be for a Red Germany (strings pulled by the Soviets) to appear. That would sandwhich Poland in between two communist states and leave the British and the French crapping their collective pants.

Eh, the way I see it the only way to get the Anglo-French alliance to ignore the Germans (or more importantly allow German remilitarization) is if the Soviets are viewed as a more serious threat. Stalin was smart, he avoided picking fights until his country was stronger, and even then he shied away at even a potential conflict with the West.

There are a few potential chances for the Bolsheviks to very seriously change how the West deals with them at this point in time, the most obvious would probably be a Soviet victory in the Polish-Soviet War (a capture of Warsaw and subsequent installation of a communist Polish government, annexation is... unlikely), it quite likely butterflies both the Nazis and potentially the rise of Stalin, but it could pretty easily satisfy the conditions of the PoD.
 
Traditionally pro-Finnish Germany proposed the invasion of Finland :p?

In all seriousness, yes, but really I think the 30's vs. 40's debate is a bit counterproductive, the time did not change his desire to take these territories, merely the focus of the Soviet Union in the 30's was inward, looking at development of the USSR proper, as opposed to outward, looking for expansion.

Agreed, and any expansion would have been more subtle than an outright "through the Fulda Gap" invasion.
 
America is probably involved in some way, and what about the Japanese? Maybe, not being invaded by the Nazis allows Stalin to take Germany and Poland instead, forcing the UK and France to intervene. Ye, I know this would happen in the 1940s, but it's the best I can think of
 
Traditionally pro-Finnish Germany proposed the invasion of Finland :p?

In all seriousness, yes, but really I think the 30's vs. 40's debate is a bit counterproductive, the time did not change his desire to take these territories, merely the focus of the Soviet Union in the 30's was inward, looking at development of the USSR proper, as opposed to outward, looking for expansion.

It's not completely counterproductive. There's a very radical change in direction in '37 in every possible sense, just like there was a radical change away from foreign adventures in the late 20s. Failure of diplomacy in '38 justified Stalin's new nationalist approach, hence '39 happened.

Until Stalin was firmly in control of everything, and until the internationalist approach had been discredited, and until basically the stars aligned to crown a Red Tsar, there was little attempts at recreating the Tsarist Empire (except now with more hammers and sickles and tractors).

The only meddling on any real scale was in Xinjiang, and even there any territorial expansion plans were curtailed in favour of propping up the local warlord (partly because the Bolsheviks were afraid of another Muslim uprising a-la 20s and Xinjiang had LOTS of that going on).

So "the 30s" are distinct from "the 40s" in the USSR if we take '37 as the dividing line.
 
America is probably involved in some way, and what about the Japanese? Maybe, not being invaded by the Nazis allows Stalin to take Germany and Poland instead, forcing the UK and France to intervene. Ye, I know this would happen in the 1940s, but it's the best I can think of

Stalin aimed for good relations with the Weimar Republic. The last thing he wanted was to have a united front against him. Which is why I doubt he'd put the USSR in the situation of making itself seen as a unilateral threat to all of Europe.

Germany and the USSR had plenty of reason to simply co-exist, and to collaborate on solving the Polish Question as well. Whether Stalin ever wanted a war with the West even if he did get it on his own terms is up for debate, but what we can tell is that he was cautious enough to try and avoid one.

Stalin was a thousand times the politician Hitler was. Hitler made a series of stupid, but fortunate gambles. Stalin would never have chanced war with the West on an all-out, unilateral invasion of Poland. The Soviet Union only involved itself towards the very end, when Poland's fall was all but assured, and afterward so that the West's attentions turned entirely towards Germany and the USSR's own opportunistic expansionism was completely ignored.
 

Tyr Anazasi

Banned
Poland and the Soviets signed a treaty of non agression in January 1932. In July it was amended by a clause not to make alliances with Germany against Poland. In 1936 a similar treaty with France followed. In this years the USSR under Stalin was very pro-French and pro-Polish, despite the close relations to Germany before. A POD of a Franco-British-Soviet war needs to be before January 1932.

In any case Germany would likely be a Soviet ally then. As then Poland would be in the other team. The question would only be the time of the German war entry.
 
It's not completely counterproductive. There's a very radical change in direction in '37 in every possible sense, just like there was a radical change away from foreign adventures in the late 20s. Failure of diplomacy in '38 justified Stalin's new nationalist approach, hence '39 happened.

Until Stalin was firmly in control of everything, and until the internationalist approach had been discredited, and until basically the stars aligned to crown a Red Tsar, there was little attempts at recreating the Tsarist Empire (except now with more hammers and sickles and tractors).

The only meddling on any real scale was in Xinjiang, and even there any territorial expansion plans were curtailed in favour of propping up the local warlord (partly because the Bolsheviks were afraid of another Muslim uprising a-la 20s and Xinjiang had LOTS of that going on).

So "the 30s" are distinct from "the 40s" in the USSR if we take '37 as the dividing line.

No, Stalin had every reason to grab some of what he did, notably oil-rich Bessarabia. The Baltic States, meanwhile, provided a buffer against the highly-vulnerable but crucial Baltic port at Leningrad. These were traditionally backyards of the Tsarist Empire for pragmatic reasons as well as prestige ones.
 
No, Stalin had every reason to grab some of what he did, notably oil-rich Bessarabia. The Baltic States, meanwhile, provided a buffer against the highly-vulnerable but crucial Baltic port at Leningrad. These were traditionally backyards of the Tsarist Empire for pragmatic reasons as well as prestige ones.

There were excellent reasons to do all of the above, yes. But before '37 and the purges and the consolidation of power it wasn't on the agenda, and if things went even slightly differently abroad or domestically, maybe they wouldn't have been so in the short term.

In the very long term, yes of course. The Baltic countries were pretty valuable strategically, that much was known since before the 13th c.

Notably the Reds did fight over Finland, and did invade the Caucasus, and so on. But that was in the "exporting revolution" phase and Trotsky was commissar and there was lots of chaos and opportunity. The situation wasn't the same at all until much later (as in the late 30s).
 
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