DISINFO: European Union is spreading anti-Soviet myths about the beginning of World War II
SUMMARY
Some countries in the European Union are spreading anti-Soviet myths about the beginning of World War II. The aim is to place the responsibility for the war on the Soviet Union. Some countries of the EU equate Nazism and Communism, comparing USSR and Nazi Germany.
The war between the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany started on June 22, 1941, when Hitler and his European allies invaded the territory of the USSR. The Third Reich authorities were hoping to quickly destroy the Soviet state and take over territories and natural resources.
RESPONSE
The claim advances a recurring pro-Kremlin disinformation narrative distorting the events leading up to the Second World War, and accusing the West of historical revisionism.
The Soviet Union started collaborating with Nazi Germany in 1939. The Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact of August 1939 between Germany and the USSR contained a secret supplementary protocol that stipulated a coordinated Nazi-Soviet attack on Poland and the carving up of Eastern Europe between the USSR and The Third Reich. Just a week after the signing of the Pact, the German attack on Poland started World War II. Two weeks later, Soviet troops entered Polish territory. Later in 1939, Soviet Russia attacked Finland.
The intentions of the Soviet Union also expressed by this fact: on August 19, 1939, Stalin publicly expressed the need to push Europe to a major war that would become an overture to the “world revolution”.
Read similar examples of the Russian historical revisionism concerning this issue: West rewriting history by claiming USSR colluded with Nazi Germany; The Soviet Union saw no possibility to refuse to sign the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact; USSR was forced to go to WWII only in June 1941.