Trotsky, Brest-Litovsk and Foreign Affairs: HSC Modern History Personality

What this dot point is asking

NESA expects you to outline Trotsky's tenure as Commissar for Foreign Affairs from November 1917 to March 1918 and to explain the significance of the Brest-Litovsk negotiations. Strong answers integrate the publication of the secret treaties as the inauguration of "diplomacy of a new type," the December-January negotiations, the no-war-no-peace formula, the German Operation Faustschlag, and the eventual Central Committee decision to sign.

The answer

Appointment as Commissar for Foreign Affairs

The Second Congress of Soviets, in establishing Sovnarkom on 26 October 1917, appointed Trotsky Commissar for Foreign Affairs. Trotsky took the post reluctantly, telling Lenin he expected the post to consist of "issuing some revolutionary proclamations to the peoples and then closing up shop." His expectation was that the Russian Revolution would shortly be followed by revolutions in Germany, Austria, France, and Britain, and that conventional diplomacy would become irrelevant.

The Decree on Peace and the publication of the secret treaties

On 8 November 1917 Sovnarkom issued the Decree on Peace, calling on belligerents to open negotiations for a peace "without annexations or indemnities." Only the Central Powers replied. The Allies did not formally respond.

Between 10 November and the end of December 1917 Trotsky published the Tsarist secret treaties in Pravda and Izvestia. The documents included the 1915 Treaty of London (Italian entry into the war in exchange for Habsburg territory), the 1916 Sykes-Picot Agreement (Anglo-French partition of the Ottoman Middle East), and the 1916 Tsar-Allied agreement on the Straits. The publication was front-page news in London, Paris, Washington, and Berlin and produced a permanent shift in the public diplomacy of the war.

Negotiations at Brest-Litovsk

The Soviet armistice with the Central Powers was signed on 5 December 1917. Peace negotiations opened at Brest-Litovsk on the German Eastern Front headquarters on 22 December 1917. The first Soviet delegation was led by Adolph Joffe. The Central Powers were represented by Foreign Minister Richard von Kuhlmann and the chief of staff of the Eastern Front General Max Hoffmann.

The German position hardened in January 1918 as the dimensions of the Russian collapse became evident. The Germans demanded Russian withdrawal from Poland, Lithuania, Courland, Estonia, Livonia, the cession of Ukraine to a German-sponsored Ukrainian government, and the Caucasus regions.

Trotsky at Brest

Trotsky took personal command of the Soviet delegation in early January 1918. His strategy was delay: he counted on imminent revolution in Germany and Austria, where the January 1918 mass strikes (Berlin, Vienna, Budapest) seemed to confirm the analysis.

In Pravda articles he framed the negotiations as a publicity platform. The negotiations were the first in modern diplomatic history to be open to the press. The Soviet delegation appealed past the German foreign ministry to the German working class.

"No war, no peace"

On 28 January 1918 (Old Style) the Soviet delegation, having received the final German terms, made Trotsky's famous declaration: "We are withdrawing our army from the war. We refuse to sign an annexationist peace. The state of war between the German Empire and the Russian Soviet Republic is ended." The Soviet delegation then walked out of Brest-Litovsk.

The proposal had been worked out between Lenin (who wanted to sign the German terms) and Bukharin (who wanted revolutionary war). Trotsky's formula split the difference: no signature, no army.

The Bolshevik Central Committee was deeply divided. Lenin's January 1918 theses argued for immediate signature on the ground that the army would not fight. Bukharin's Left Communist position argued for revolutionary war as the defence of the international revolution.

Operation Faustschlag

On 18 February 1918 the Germans launched Operation Faustschlag ("Fist Punch"), advancing on Petrograd, Kiev, and the southern Russia oilfields. Russian forces collapsed; in five days the Germans took Pskov and Reval. The Bolshevik Central Committee debated in continuous session. Lenin threatened to resign if the German terms were not accepted.

The Central Committee voted on 23 February 1918 by 7 to 4 with 4 abstentions to accept the German terms. Trotsky was one of the abstainers; his abstention gave Lenin the majority. The new German terms, harsher than the January ones, were communicated to Brest.

The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk

The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk was signed at 5:50 PM on 3 March 1918 by Grigori Sokolnikov for the Soviet side. Russia ceded:

• Poland, Lithuania, Courland, Livonia, and Estonia.
• Finland (already independent).
• Ukraine to the German puppet Rada.
• Kars, Ardahan, and Batum in the Caucasus to the Ottoman Empire.

The territorial losses were 1.4 million square kilometres, 50 million people (27 per cent of the prewar Russian population), 25 per cent of the territory, 33 per cent of the railways, 75 per cent of the iron and coal industry, and 30 per cent of the manufacturing industry. The treaty was annulled on 13 November 1918 after the German Armistice.

Move to the War Commissariat

The Brest-Litovsk experience destroyed Trotsky's tenure at the Foreign Affairs Commissariat. He resigned shortly after the signature. On 13 March 1918 he was appointed People's Commissar for War. From the new post he built the Red Army that would fight the Civil War.

How to read a source on this topic

The Brest-Litovsk minutes, published by the German Foreign Ministry in 1920 and by the Soviet side in 1925, are the primary record. Joffe's memoir (1925), Trotsky's How the Revolution Armed (1923-1925), and Lenin's Collected Works are the participant accounts.

Carr's volume on Brest-Litovsk in A History of Soviet Russia (1953) remains the standard secondary treatment. Wheeler-Bennett's Brest-Litovsk: The Forgotten Peace (1938) is the older account. Service (Trotsky, 2009) is sharply critical of the "no war, no peace" gambit.

Examples in context

Example 1. The publication of the secret treaties (November to December 1917). Trotsky as Foreign Commissar released the Allied secret treaties (Sykes-Picot, Treaty of London, Sazonov-Paleologue) from the Tsarist archive. Pierre Broue and Robert Service both treat the publication as one of the most consequential acts of the early Soviet regime, exposing imperial diplomacy and shaping Wilsonian rhetoric in 1918.

Example 2. The Brest-Litovsk negotiations (December 1917 to March 1918). Trotsky's "no war, no peace" formula collapsed when Germany resumed the offensive on 18 February 1918. The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk (3 March 1918) ceded around 25 per cent of Russia's population. Isaac Deutscher's The Prophet Armed (1954) defends Trotsky's gamble; Service draws on Trotsky's later self-criticism to argue it cost the regime credibility with Lenin.

Try this

Q1. Source A is an extract from Trotsky's address at the Brest-Litovsk negotiations (10 February 1918). Using Source A and your own knowledge, explain the "no war, no peace" formula. [5 marks]

• What the marker wants. Identify Trotsky's calculated stall; cite German offensive of 18 February; link to the harsh treaty of 3 March.

Q2. Evaluate the extent to which Trotsky's conduct of foreign affairs in 1917 to 1918 served Bolshevik interests. [25 marks]

• What the marker wants. Weigh secret-treaty publication and revolutionary signal against the harsh Brest-Litovsk terms; use Deutscher, Service.

Q3. Compare the views of Isaac Deutscher and Robert Service on Trotsky at Brest-Litovsk. [10 marks]

• What the marker wants. Deutscher (principled revolutionary gamble) versus Service (poor diplomatic judgement); judgement.