The Devil’s Alliance – Forgotten by Many but not the Few On 23rd August 1939 in the presence of Stalin his Foreign Minister Molotov signed a pact with the German Foreign Minister Ribbentrop and at the same time carved up the future of Eastern Europe between them. When I was taught history at school the pact was nothing more than a footnote in history quickly glossed over and forgotten. As one of the Polish Diaspora my family was deeply affected by this pact even more so the 17th September 1939 when the Red Army crossed the Polish Border on the same day the Polish government had to escape via Romania in to exile. My grandfather was captured by the Nazis that day (he managed to escape and fight in France 1940 and on into Britain), my great Grandmother saw her husband for the last time that day, he was a police officer, she later found that other families were murdered at Katyn. 13th April 1940 she was arrested at 2am by the NKVD for having a husband who was a Police Officer and a son as a Polish Soldier was an enemy combatant. She was transported by the NKVD on a cattle truck, before the Nazis had used them in the Holocaust, along with thousands of other Polish enemies of the state to hard labour camps. 75% of her fellow Poles on that Journey did not survive the transportation. She was released in 1946 and was not allowed to return home to Skałat but was sent to Krakow to make her home, minus her now exiled son & nephew, her murdered brothers and her missing husband. Like many Polish families we lost more via the Russians than the damage of the German war effort brought to Poland. Over the years I have heard so many excuses by so many Historians that Stalin made the pact so that he could make sure the Soviet Union was ready for war. Poppycock and in the Devil’s Alliance Roger Moorhouse shines a light on this dark episode of history and debunks a lot of the Soviet and their western communist supporters lies, which continue to this day. Moorhouse has already had this excellent piece of work attacked by various left wing historians. For them the lie continues and while they espouse their trash it will continue. As Moorhouse notes in The Devil’s Alliance both Hitler and Stalin were form the same totalitarian feather and that even though they may have seemed different they were a lot closer in character of leadership than they would ever admit. Behind the spin of the apologists Moorhouse notes that Nazi and Soviet regimes during the life of this pact worked closely and traded secrets and blueprints, technology as well as raw materials. One just has to point out the oil wells in Ukraine as an example. As The Devil’s Alliance reminds us the pact facilitated the invasion of Poland and during the later stages of that invasion the Nazis were wondering when the Soviets would enter to split the Polish Army. The Pact also has had a long lasting effect on the map of Europe as many of the borders there still remain, for Poland, the Baltic States, Finland and large swathes of Eastern Central Europe. It is right and correct that Roger Moorhouse shines a light in this long forgotten by many episode of history. For those who do not know what really went on at that time really need to have a good read of Chapter 6 “Oiling the Wheels of War” which is an very illuminating chapter that in my case annoyed me at the closeness of the Alliance greasing those wheels of war. While Britain and France were dealing with the phoney war things were quite different in the East. The Devil’s Alliance is a well written well researched history that has been crying out to be revealed to those in the west and this book does that. Roger Moorhouse has had access to some brilliant primary source material as well as an excellent bibliography. This is a book for all those who are bored of all the rehashed stories of the period and introduces them to the forgotten pact and the tragedy that it brought to Eastern Europe who for many the war did not end until 1989. Brilliant read buy it borrow it and tell people about this book as it deserves a wide audience.