ABSTRACT
Moscow continued a steady drumbeat of propaganda warning of Tokyo’s threat to the Soviet Union, while at the same time edging Japan’s attention to China in the south. Japan’s strategy toward the Soviet Union had become fundamentally defensive, a view shared by diplomats of various countries. The shaky economic base of Japanese imperialism was another important factor affecting Japan’s relations with the Soviet Union. Japan’s heavy industry paled in comparison with that of the Soviet Union. To make matters worse for Japan, the CER sale led to Soviet industrial espionage. The announcement of Japan’s five-year plan in June 1937 was received with some alarm by the foreign press. Although Stalin knew by the mid-1930s that Japan no longer presented a serious threat, this did not dissuade him from trying to eliminate any threat altogether. Alarmed by the Soviet offensive moves, Japan floundered. Historians make much of the so-called Anti-Comintern Pact signed in November 1936 between Japan and Germany.
