ABSTRACT
In Europe, Stalin's policy towards the German Communist Party can be seen in retrospect to have been equally tragic, though for different reasons and with more calamitous repercussions for the security of the Soviet Union. In close step with his 1928left wheel in domestic policies, through the Comintern Stalin ordered that there should be no political or electoral alliance between communist and other left-wing or socialist parties. The German Social Democrats were smeared with political abuse as 'social fascists' even when the example of Mussolini's Italy had already given warning of the danger from the extreme right, and when the German National Socialist (Nazi) Party was gaining strength in the dying days of the Weimar Republic. While not itself directly responsible, this ultrasectarian policy towards the left arguably facilitated the electoral victory of AdolfHitler (1889-1945) as German Chancellor in 1933. But still Stalin underestimated the menace of fascism and Nazism, and continued with his vilification of Europe's non-communist left.
