ABSTRACT
The course taken by the war before the German attack upon Russia is outside the scope of the narrative. Not until the spring of 1940 did hostilities between Germany and the Western Allies really begin. The rupture between the allies was not long delayed. Hitler had fortified his position by concluding a treaty with Turkey on June 18, 1941. Hitler accused Stalin of waiting his opportunity to stab Germany in the back; of violating treaties; of establishing spheres of Bolshevik influence in the Balkans; of encouraging provocative 'incidents'; and—worst of all—of conspiring with England against Germany. More immediately important was the Treaty of Alliance concluded at Teheran by Great Britain and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics with the Shah-in-Shah of Iran on January 29, 1942. In the summer and autumn of 1941 the Russians had been compelled to abandon a great part of Western Russia and to yield to the Germans the important industrial and agricultural districts therein.
