ABSTRACT
A series of low-level Anglo-Soviet trade talks in Moscow were transformed into political discussions by British Board of Trade representative Robert Hudson, Maxim Litvinov, and Anastas Mikoyan, the longtime commissar for foreign trade, who had just been elevated to full Politburo status at the Eighteenth Soviet Communist Party Congress. The French, who had become strong advocates of an Anglo-Soviet-rench alliance, were concerned about the inclusion of countries in the Baltic region in the Soviet proposal and on April 19 asked Moscow for clarification. While the Baltic countries sought to impress upon Whitehall their disinterest in any guarantee system that included the Soviet Union, Adolf Hitler responded to Franklin Roosevelt's April 14 message in a speech two weeks later before the Reichstag. Although much of it involved a denunciation of the 1935 Anglo-German naval agreement and German-Polish differences, Hitler also made allusions to the Baltic states.
