ABSTRACT
The aborted Communist uprising in Germany and the Soviet adventure in Chinese affairs were matters in which Maxim Litvinov played no role, but he could only have been distressed by such pointless ventures. In 1924, he had a long conversation in England with the radical US writer Max Eastman and his wife, Eliena Krylenko, who was Litvinov’s secretary. According to Eastman, even in the very first days of the domestic power struggle following Lenin’s death, Litvinov was disgusted. Litvinov had a strong pro-British orientation, but by the mid-1920s, his views on international relations had matured conceptually. Litvinov recognized the continuing decline in Anglo-Soviet relations and attempted without success to improve the atmosphere. Litvinov replied that his government was “forced” to impose censorship because the “sources which American correspondents draw upon for their information” made it impossible for them to give an accurate picture.
