DR. HORN: On 18 August was Ambassador Henderson again asked to see your State Secretary because the situation was becoming more acute in Poland and Danzig?
VON RIBBENTROP: Yes. A conversation took place a few days later between the English Ambassador and the State Secretary. The State Secretary explained to him in very clear words the great seriousness of the situation and told him that things were taking a very serious turn.
DR. HORN: Is it true that in this phase of the crisis you made up your mind, on the basis of a suggestion made to you, to initiate negotiations with Russia, and what were your reasons for doing that?
VON RIBBENTROP: Negotiations with Russia had already started sometime previously. Marshal Stalin, in March 1939, delivered a speech in which he made certain hints of his desire to have better relations with Germany. I had submitted this speech to Adolf Hitler and asked him whether we should not try to find out whether this suggestion had something real behind it. Hitler was at first reluctant, but later on he became more receptive to this idea. Negotiations for a commercial treaty were under way, and during these negotiations, with the Führer’s permission, I took soundings in Moscow as to the possibility of a definite bridge between National Socialism and Bolshevism and whether the interests of the two countries could not at least be made to harmonize.
DR. HORN: How did the relations taken up by the Soviet Russian commercial agency in Berlin with your Minister Schnurre develop?
VON RIBBENTROP: The negotiations of Minister Schnurre gave me within a relatively short period of time a picture from which I could gather that Stalin had meant this speech in earnest. Then an exchange of telegrams took place with Moscow which, in the middle of August, led to Hitler’s sending a telegram to Stalin, whereupon Stalin in answer to this telegram invited a plenipotentiary to Moscow. The aim in view, which had been prepared diplomatically, was the conclusion of a non-aggression pact between the two countries.
DR. HORN: Is it true that you were sent to Moscow as plenipotentiary?
VON RIBBENTROP: Yes, that is known.
DR. HORN: When did you fly to Moscow, and what negotiations did you carry on there?
VON RIBBENTROP: On the evening of 22 August I arrived in Moscow. The reception given me by Stalin and Molotov was very friendly. We had at first a 2-hour conversation. During this conversation the entire complex of Russo-German relations was discussed. The result was, first, the mutual will of both countries to put their relations on a completely new basis. This was to be expressed in a pact of non-aggression. Secondly, the spheres of interests of the two countries were to be defined; this was done by a secret supplementary protocol.