From the Tito-Stalin Split to Yugoslavia's Finnish Connection: Neutralism Before Non-Alignment, 1948-1958
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ABSTRACT Title of Document: FROM THE TITO-STALIN SPLIT TO YUGOSLAVIA'S FINNISH CONNECTION: NEUTRALISM BEFORE NON-ALIGNMENT, 1948-1958. Rinna Elina Kullaa, Doctor of Philosophy 2008 Directed By: Professor John R. Lampe Department of History After the Second World War the European continent stood divided between two clearly defined and competing systems of government, economic and social progress. Historians have repeatedly analyzed the formation of the Soviet bloc in the east, the subsequent superpower confrontation, and the resulting rise of Euro-Atlantic interconnection in the west. This dissertation provides a new view of how two borderlands steered clear of absorption into the Soviet bloc. It addresses the foreign relations of Yugoslavia and Finland with the Soviet Union and with each other between 1948 and 1958. Narrated here are their separate yet comparable and, to some extent, coordinated contests with the Soviet Union. Ending the presumed partnership with the Soviet Union, the Tito-Stalin split of 1948 launched Yugoslavia on a search for an alternative foreign policy, one that previously began before the split and helped to provoke it. After the split that search turned to avoiding violent conflict with the Soviet Union while creating alternative international partnerships to help the Communist state to survive in difficult postwar conditions. Finnish-Soviet relations between 1944 and 1948 showed the Yugoslav Foreign Ministry that in order to avoid invasion, it would have to demonstrate a commitment to minimizing security risks to the Soviet Union along its European political border and to not interfering in the Soviet domination of domestic politics elsewhere in Eastern Europe. Following Yugoslavia’s expulsion from the Soviet bloc, its party leadership increasingly granted the Foreign Ministry resources needed to establish a wider and more important range of diplomatic relations than those of any East European state. The placement of Tito’s closest associate Kardelj as Foreign Minister from August 1948 to January 1953 carried the process forward. It created a Yugoslav Foreign Ministry that produced political analysis independent from that of Tito’s own committee on foreign relations. By 1953, the ministry regarded the Finnish model of neutralism as a solution to the Yugoslav security dilemma. It came to abandon that in favor of the Non-Aligned Movement only after 1958, when it became clear that relations between Yugoslav and Soviet parties would not be harmonious even after rapprochement. FROM THE TITO-STALIN SPLIT TO YUGOSLAVIA'S FINNISH CONNECTION: NEUTRALISM BEFORE NON-ALIGNMENT, 1948-1958. By Rinna Elina Kullaa Dissertation submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate School of the University of Maryland, College Park, in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy 2008 Advisory Committee: Professor John R. Lampe, Chair Professor Michael David-Fox Professor Jeffrey Herf Professor Karol Soltan Assistant Professor Peter Wien © Copyright by Rinna Elina Kullaa 2008 Dedication To all women who dedicate their lives to knowledge and learning ii Acknowledgements I owe a special debt of gratitude to my advisor and mentor Professor John R. Lampe, and I wish to thank for their advice and instruction Professor Michael David-Fox, Professor Jeffrey Herf, Professor Ivo Viskovi ć, Assistant Professor Peter Wien and Professor Madeline C. Zilfi. iii Table of Contents Dedication…………………………………………………………………………i Acknowledgements…………………………………………………………..........ii Chapter 1: Introduction……………………………………………………............4 1.1 Western and Yugoslav Historiography of the Split ……….............16 1.2 Recent Soviet and Russian Historiography of the Split ………….23 1.3 The Non-Alignment Myth in the Historiography of Yugoslavia ….27 1.4 Finlandization versus the Finnish Myth of Neutralism ……………35 1.5 Soviet-Finnish and Soviet-Yugoslav Relations – Yugoslavia’s Northern Connection ………………………………………………...40 Chapter 2: 1948 – The Soviet Test for Yugoslavia and the Tito-Stalin Split ……...46 2.1 Soviet Wartime Collaboration with Western Allies and Postwar Yugoslav Objections ………………………………………………….49 2.2 Launching an Independent Yugoslav Foreign Policy 1945-1948 52 2.3 Edvard Kardelj’s Prominent Role as Foreign Minister ……… ……..64 2.4 Escalating Yugoslav-Soviet Differences, January-March 1948….69 2.5 The Tito-Stalin Exchanges of March-June, 1948 ………………….80 2.6 Summarizing the Split ………………………………………………...85 Chapter 3: 1948 –The Soviet Test for Finland and the Compromise on Neutralism 89 3.1 The Paasikivi-Kekkonen Line and the Origins of Finnish Neutralism ……………………………………………………………...99 3.2 Fateful Negotiations in Moscow, 25 March –6 April 1948 ………..104 3.3 The Trade-Off Policy: Independence, Expanded Economic Ties, Curtailed Civil Liberties ……………………………………………….118 3.4 Transformation of the Finnish Foreign Ministry Following the Finnish-Soviet Treaty ………………………………………………... 121 3.5 Western and Yugoslav Responses to the Soviet-Finnish Agreement ………………………………………………………….... 126 3.6 Finland after the Split ………………………………………………... 132 Chapter 4: The Death of Stalin and the Beginning of a Beautiful Yugoslav-Finnish Friendship…………………………………………………………………..136 3.1 Helsinki’s Predictions for Soviet Foreign Policy in Europe………140 3.2 Finland’s Focus on Soviet-Yugoslav Relations …………………...144 3.3 Belgrade’s Reaction to Stalin’s Death and the Finnish Connection …………………………………………………………….147 3.4 Ko ča Popovi ć and the Emergence of an Autonomous Foreign iv Ministry …………………………………………………………………152 3.5 Finnish-Soviet Relations and the Yugoslav Perspective, 1953-1955 ……………………………………………………………...160 3.6 Building Yugoslav-Finnish Ties from Sports to Trade …………….164 3.7 Yugoslavia Tries Turning to Finnish Neutralism …..……………….169 3.8 The Limited Revival of Soviet Relations with Yugoslavia 1953-1955 …………………………………………………………….174 3.9 Forming Finnish and Yugoslav Neutralism along the Soviet- European Border ……………………………………………………..179 Chapter 4: Surviving Hungary 1956: Khrushchev, Tito and Yugoslav/Finnish Neutralism…………………………………………………………………..182 4.1 Neutralism and Soviet Foreign Policy in 1955-1956 ……………...188 4.2 The Yugoslav Response to Khrushchev’s New Foreign Policy …201 4.3 The Yugoslav Foreign Ministry and Finland, 1955-1956 …………210 4.4 Finnish Foreign Policy and Yugoslavia, 1955-1956 ………………217 4.5 Tito’s and Kardelj’s Second Response to the Events in Hungary.226 4.6 The Independence of the Yugoslav Foreign Ministry: A Survivor of Hungary 1956 ………………………………………………………232 4.7 1956: Consequences …………………………………………………236 Chapter 5: Freezing Out Finland and Yugoslavia: The Soviet Rifts of 1957-1958...241 5.1 Khrushchev’s Approach to Yugoslavia and Finland ……………...244 5.2 An Independent Yugoslav Foreign Ministry and Soviet Relations 250 5.3 Yugoslav Foreign Ministry’s Analysis of Soviet Foreign Policy in 1958 …………………………………………………………………….258 5.4 Soviet-Finnish Relations in 1958: The Year of the “Night Frost” ... 263 5.5 Finnish Analysis of Soviet-Yugoslav Relations, 1957-1958 ……...276 5.6 Two Roads to Repairing Soviet Relations ………………………... 282 Chapter 6: Conclusion and Afterword: From Neutralism to Non-Alignment……...286 6.1 Neutralism as Political Strategy ……………………………………..294 Bibliography……………………………………………………………..................300 v List of Abbreviations Original Translation (if non-English) ASCG Arhiv Srbije Crne Gore Archive of Serbia and Montenegro AP Maalaisliitto Agrarians’ Party APR Arhiv Predsednika Republike Archive of the Office of the President Josip Broz ‘Tito’ AVP RF Arkhiv Vneshnei Politiki Rossiskoy Archive of Foreign Policy Federatsii of the Russian Federation BRP Bulgarska rabotnicheska partiia Bulgarian Communist Party Cominform Informbiro Communist Information Bureau CPY Komunisti čka partija Jugoslavije Communist Party of Yugoslavia DASMIP Diplomatski arhiv Saveznog Archive of the Yugoslav ministarstva za inostrane poslove Foreign Ministry EDES Ethnikos Dimokratikos Ellinikos National Democratic Syndesmos Greek League EFTA European Free Trade Association EK Etsivä Keskuspoliisi Investigatory Central Police of Finland ELAS Ethnikos Laikos Apeleftherotikos National Popular Stratos Liberation Army EU European Union FPRY Federativna Narodna Republika Federal Peoples Republic Jugoslavija of Yugoslavia FTT Free Territory of Trieste JAT Jugoslovenski Aerotransport Yugoslav Airlines vi JNA Jugoslovenska narodna armija Yugoslav Peoples Army JUSTA Soviet-Yugoslav Civil Air Transport Company KGB Komitet Gosudarstvennoi Committee of State Security bezopasnosti KKE Kommounistikó Kómma Elládas Communist Party of Greece LCY Savez komunista Jugoslavije League of Communists of Yugoslavia NATO North Atlantic Treaty Organization NCP Kokoomus National Conservative Party OSCE Organization on Security and Cooperation in Europe RGASPI Rossiiskii gosudarstvennyi arkhiv Russian State Archive of sotsial'no-politicheskoi istorii Socio-Political History RTsKhIDNI Rossiiskii Tsentr Khraneniia i Russian Centre for the Izucheniia Dokumentov Noveishei Preservation and Study of Istorii Documents of Most Recent History SDP Sosialidemokraattinen Puolue Finnish Social Democratic Party SKDL Suomen Kansan Demokraattinen Finnish People’s Democratic Liitto League SKP Suomen Kommunistinen Puolue Finnish Communist Party SUPO Suojelupoliisi Finnish Protection Police UDBa Uprava državne bezbednosti Yugoslav Administration for State Security vii UKK Urho Kekkosen Arkisto Presidential Archives of Urho Kekkonen UM Ulkoministeriö Foreign Ministry Finland VP Valtiollinen Poliisi State Police of Finland