p The Soviet government attached paramount importance to preventing Germany from overrunning Czechoslovakia. The Czechoslovak Minister in the USSR, Zdenek Fierlinger, reported to Prague on April 23, 1938, that he had received a message from the Soviet Ambassador to Czechoslovakia, S. S. Alexandrovsky, who was in Moscow at the time, for transmission to the Czechoslovak government, which said, in particular: "The USSR, should it be asked for it, is prepared to take all the steps required, together with France and Czechoslovakia to ensure the security of Czechoslovakia. It has all the necessary means at its disposal for this purpose. The condition of the Army and the Air Force permitted it to do so." ^^72^^ On April 27, the Czechoslovak Minister stressed in a conversation with Potemkin that this position of the Soviet government was "very encouraging for the Czechoslovaks".^^73^^

p The People’s Commissar for Defence, Kliment Voroshilov, told the British military attache in Moscow, R. 162 Firebrace, on May 2, 1938, that the Soviet Union would certainly loyally honour all its commitments under the treaty with Czechoslovakia.^^74^^ In virtue of that treaty, the Soviet Union was to provide assistance to her only if France did likewise. That did not mean that the Soviet government could not afford any assistance to Czechoslovakia without waiting for France to enter into the war beforehand, should Czechoslovakia have offered resistance to the aggressor and asked the USSR for help against the German aggression. Although, consequent upon the Nazi annexation of Austria, the situation in Europe had seriously deteriorated, the position of Czechoslovakia was not hopeless. In a crucial moment, should Czechoslovakia have given a determined rebuff to the aggressors, there could still have been a collective front of struggle against the fascist invaders.

p The matter was brought up, for example, by Mikhail Kalinin, President of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, in his report on April 26, 1938. After setting out the terms of the Soviet-Czechoslovak Treaty, he added: "Naturally, this Pact does not forbid either party to come to the other’s aid without waiting for France to do so."^^75^^ The same issue was touched upon by Stalin during his conversation with Klement Gottwald, General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia in the middle of May 1938.^^76^^

Describing the Soviet position, the French Ambassador in Moscow, Coulondre, wrote to Paris that the USSR was earnestly striving for co-operation with the Western powers over Czechoslovakia.^^77^^