Facts about Nazi-Soviet Pact
- 06
Poland was invaded by Germany just one week after the Nazi-Soviet Pact was signed, triggering the outbreak of World War II.
- 05
Announced on August 23, 1939, the Nazi-Soviet Pact shocked the world because Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union had been ideological enemies throughout the 1930s.
- 04
A key effect of the Nazi-Soviet Pact was enabling the Soviet Union to annex the Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania in 1940.
- 03
Germany violated the Nazi-Soviet Pact less than two years after its signing by launching Operation Barbarossa, the invasion of the Soviet Union, in June 1941.
- 02
Signed by Soviet foreign minister Vyacheslav Molotov and German foreign minister Joachim von Ribbentrop, the Nazi-Soviet Pact is often called the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact after its signatories.
- 01
The Nazi-Soviet Pact, signed in August 1939, included a secret protocol dividing Eastern Europe into German and Soviet spheres of influence.