ABSTRACT
The aim of Stalin's historical doctrine was thus the opposite of that of Michael N. Pokrovsky's time. On May 16th, 1934, Stalin signed the decree, introducing an entire revaluation of world history. On June 8th the Central Executive Committee of the USSR promulgated a "Law on the Betrayal of the Country", imposing the heaviest penalties, not only on offenders but on members of their families who were not involved, for espionage, the betrayal of military secrets or secrets of state, and similar crimes. Ten days later, on June 19th, 1934, there took place on the Red Square in Moscow the ceremony of welcoming the Russians who had set out in the "Chelyuskin" for the Polar region of the Arctic Ocean and ultimately, after abandoning their ship and spending weeks of hardship on an iceberg, had been rescued by Soviet aviators without loss of life. Hitler's nationalism had revealed in Germany a driving force beyond all comparison with Thälmann's Marxism.
