ABSTRACT
Joseph Stalin had founded the Cominform as one of his instruments to secure the hegemony of the Soviet Union over the states which had fallen under its sphere of influence. The role of the Russian Communist party in leading the international Communist movement had itself seemed to be undisputed even before the founding of the Cominform. After the dissolution of the Communist International in May 1943 there was no longer any international organization by which Moscow could bring to bear its direct authority over the leadership of foreign Communist parties. Josip Broz Tito, son of a Croatian peasant, had, until his break with Stalin, been unquestionably loyal to him as a strict and orthodox Communist. In 1920 he had returned from Russia, where he had been taken as a prisoner-of-war after fighting as a soldier of the Austro-Hungarian army, as a convinced Communist, and his work in the Communist party thereafter filled his life.
