Description

After the Fall of France and the unsatisfactory Battle of Britain came to a close Hitler turned to the east and issued Fhrer Directive 21 his secret order for the invasion of the Soviet Union on 18 December 1940 Prior to this the MolotovRibbentrop Pact a nonaggression agreement had enabled the two countries to divide the spoils after the invasion of Poland that had triggered the Second World War Hitler however had always regarded this agreement as nothing more than a temporary tactical maneuver In the early part of the Second World War the arrangement had suited the two nations with the Soviet Union preoccupied with its own issues while Hitler continued his aggression in Western Europe exporting manufactured goods to the Soviet Union in return for grain and oil But they were never easy bedfellows since their ideological differences were diametrically opposed