How many lies have the Communists told the world? No enumeration is needed for the present purpose, for such lies could be recorded into volumes. Suffice to say that what Ernest Bevin termed the utterances of Soviet delegates to the United Nations Assembly as "the upside-down language of Soviet diplomacy" can be applied to all propaganda works of the Communists
Why should we waste time on such terms as "people's democracy", "world peace" etc, which the Communists claim as being advocates, and "Fascist brigands", "imperialists", "war mongers" and any number of similar terms which they have used to denounce leaders of the free nations? Let facts speak for themselves. We need only produce evidences to prove the guilt of the culprit. For this reason the editors of this magazine take pleasure to extract and publish in the following pages a portion of the Report of the Committee on Foreign Affairs of the House of Congress, U. S. A., which Report is entitled "Background Information on the Soviet Union in International Relations."
SOVIET TERRITORIAL EXPANSION
A. THE COMMUNIST WORLD
Country 1949 area1 Population1
(square miles)
A. U.S.S.R.-1939 territory 8,176,000 170,467,000
B. Territorial acquisitions, 1939-492 264,200 24,036,000
1. Finnish Provinces 17,600 450,000
2. Polish Provinces 69,900 11,800,000
3. Rumanian Provinces 19,400 3,700,000
Bessarabia 17,100 3,200,000
Bukovina 2,300 500,000
4. Baltic States 65,200 6,030,000
Estonia 18,300 1,122,000
Lativa 25,400 1,951,000
Lithuania 21,500 2,957,000
5. Kalinimgrad (Koenigsberg) area 5,400 1,187,000
6. Caechoslovakian areas 4,900 731,000
7. South Sakhalin 13,900 415,000
8. Kurile (Chishima) Island 3,900 18,000
9. Tanna Tuva 64,000 65,000
C. U. S. S. R. (1949)3 8,591,700 200,000,000
D. Soviet dominated terriories4 4,823,960 552,878,000
1. Occupied areas 53,160 21,238,000
Germany 42,900 18,807,000
Soviet zone 41,400 17,600,000
Soviet sector of Berlin 1,500 1,207,000
Austria 10,260 2,431,000
Soviet zone 10,200 1,931,000
Vienna (Soviet sectors) 60 500,000
2. European satellites4 351,100 70,540,000
Albania 11,100 1,186,000
Bulguria 42,800 7,160,000
Czechoslovakia 49,300 12,463,000
Hungary 35,900 9,224,000
Poland 120,400 24,500,000
Rumania 91,600 16,007,000
3. Asiatic satellites 4,419,700 461,100,000
China5 3,745,300 450,000,000
Mongolian People's Republic 625,900 2,000,000
North Korea 48,500 9,100,000
Total, Communist World4 13,415,660 752,878,000
1Aside from the U. S. S. R. all area and population data relate to 1949. Except for the 1949 estimated total, the Soviet figures relate to the prewar populations, no later official figures being available. Unless otherwise indicated data were drawn from the League of Nations and United Nations statistical publications. Other Sources are as follows:
Polish Provinces, Population Index, (January 1947); Kaliningrad area, Statistisches Hanubuch von Deutschland, 1949; Czechoslovakia areas and Tanna Tuva, the Statesman's. Yearbook; South Sakhalin and Kurile Islallds, 1940 census of Japan.
2The figures do not include about 350 square miles of territory under Soviet control but which are neither Satellite countries nor territories directly incorporated into the U. S. S. R. These are the Porkkala peninsula in Finland (187 square miles), leased by the Soviet Union for 50 years; and Port Arthur, Manchuria (163 square miles) By agreement with Communist China, the area is under joint U. S. S. R.-Chinese administration up to 1952.
3While no recent census or official population estimate of the Soviet Union is available, election district data indicate a population of approximately 200,000,000. The official Soviet figures for area of the U. S. S. R. in 1939, plus the territorial annexations of 1939-49, do not add to the official Soviet figure for the total postwar area, apparently owing to revised estimates based on more recent surveys.
4Excluding Yugoslavia.
5Excluding Taiwan.
B. SOVIET TERRITORIAL
ACQUISITIONS OF WORLO WAR II
General
Post World War I Soviet Russia had an area of approximately 8,176,000 square miles. The only extension of territory before 1939 was the formal annexation, (announced in 1926) of all islands in the Arctic which fall within the trio angle described by the lines of longitude 32°4'31" East and 168°49'31" West, the North Pole forming the apex and the northern coast of the U. S. S. R., the base of the triangle. Figures for the area involved have not been issued by the U. S. S. R. Except for this addition, the borders of Soviet Russia remained static until 1939.
At present its territory comprises 8,591,700 square miles. Since 1939 the U. S. S. R. has expanded extensively. A total of 246,200 square miles has been brought under direct Soviet control and 350 square miles are leased or jointly occupied. Territories have been regained which at one time were part of the Russian Empire, comprising 183,800 square miles in all. These include Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Bessarabia and South Sakhalin, as well as large parts of prewar Poland and Finland. In addition, the Konigsberg area, Sub-Carpathian Ruthenia, Northern Bukavina, Tannu Tuva and the Kuriles (totaling 80,500. square miles) have been brought within Russian boundaries for the first time. Not officially part of the U. S. S. R., but temporarily under Soviet control are Prokkala (Peninsula) in Finland and Port Arthur in Manchuria, totaling approximately 350 square miles. Only a small part of these recent additions have been internationally recognized. The new area have been acquired in a variety of ways but the validity of Soviet claim to them rests principally upon sheer force.
Finnish Provinces
Following defeat in the war of 1939-40, Finland ceded to the U. S. S. R., by treaty of March 12, 1940, the greater part of the province of Viipuri (Viborg), including the city of Viipuri, the Karelian Isthmus and the shores of Lake Ladoga, and a strip of land in the Kuolayarvi region of Oulu Province. The Finnish Army cooperated with the Germans in the invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941 and reoccupied most of the territory ceded in 1940, but as a result of the defeat of Germany again lost these territories and in addition was compelled by armistice of September 19, 1944, to cede the Petsamo corridor to the Arctic Ocean and a larger territory in the Kuolayarvi region. The Peace Treaty of February 10, 1947, finalized the relationship and included a lease of the Porkkala area (187 square miles) to the U. S. S. R. as a naval base for 50 years. The population of the ceded territories in 1939 amount ed to about 450,000, but almost the entire population has been resettled in Finland, leaving a negligible Finnish population in the lost areas.
Polish Provinces
As a result of the German invasion and Soviet-German agreements, Poland was partitioned in 1939. As of November 1, 1939, the U. S. S. R. annexed an area of 75,200 square miles with an estimated population of 12,500,000. The Soviet-German treaties of 1939 were repudiated at the time of the German invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941. Following Soviet reoccupation in 1944 and the establishment or a provisional Polish Government in December 1944, the eastern frontier of Poland was established as the Curzon line, ceding to the Soviet Union the old voivodships of Wilno, Nowogrodek, Polesie, Wolyn, Tarnopol, and Stanislawow, as well as substantial portions of Bialystok and Lwow, including the important city of that name. These areas had a prewar population of 11,800.000. The town of Wilno and the surrounding areas were-annexed to the Lithuanian S. S. R. The remainder of the Wilno district, Nowogrodek district, and most of Polesie went to the Byelorussian S. S. R., while Wolyn, Tarnopol, Stanislawow, and the city of Lwow and environs were annexed to the Ukrainian S. S. R.
Rumanian Provinces
Following the acceptance of a Soviet ultimatum Soviet troops occupied Bessarabia and northern Bukovina, which were incorporated in the Soviet Union on August 2, 1940. The Rumanian Peace Treaty on February 10, 1947, confirmed these cessions.
Baltic States
On the basis of the Soviet German agreement of August 23, 1939, the U. S. S. R. occupied Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania in June 1940; these were annexed by Soviet decrees in August 1940.
Kaliningrad (Koenigsberg) area
In 1945 the U. S. S. R. occupied this area of East Prussia, containing the important cities of Koenigsberg, Tilsit, and Insterburg and following the Potsdam meetings the area was annexed as a special Okrug of the U. S. S. R. Permanent title to this area awaits the peace treaty.
Czechoslovakian areas
Sub-Carpathian Ruthenia and a small part of Slovakia were added to the Soviet Union by the treaty of Moscow with Czechoslovakia in July 1945.
Southern Sakhalin and the Kurile Islands
Under the terms of the Yalta Agreement with the Allies in February 1945, these areas were incorporated in the U. S. S. R. following the defeat of Japan. Permanent title depends directly upon the peace treaty with Japan.
Tanna Tuva
The list of electoral districts published in the Soviet Press October 17, 1946, disclosed that the nominally independent republic had been incorporated into the U. S. S. R. as the Tuva Autonomous Region.
C. THE NON-COMMUNIST WORLD
Region Area1 Population1
(square miles)
Europe2 1,511,000 300,794,000
Near and Middle East3 3,775,000 509,462,000
Far East3 3,677,000 282,079,000
Africa3 11,399,000 198,293,000
North America 9,373,000 214,341,000
South America 6,857,000 107,101,000
Oceania 3,304,000 12,403,000
Total 39,896,000 1,624,473,000
11949 areas and population as given in situation publications of the United Nations.
2Including Yugoslavia
3There is no universal definition as to what countries should be included in the Near and Middle East. For this study Egypt and the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan were considered as portions of Africa; Greece and European Turkey, in Europe; Asiatic Turkey through India and including to Arabian Shield, Ceylon, Napal and Bhutan as parts of the Near and Middle East. The remainder of non-Communist Asia was included in the Far East.
D. COMPARISONS OF COMMUNIST AND NONCOMMUNIST WORLDS
Region Total Communist-dominated Communist-dominated
Area Population Area Population Area Population
(square miles) (square miles)
U. S. S. R. 8,591,700 200,000,000 8,591,700 200,000,000 100 100
Europe 1,915,000 392,572,000 404,000 91,778,000 21 23
Near and
Middle East 3,775,000 509,462,000
Far East 8,097,000 743,179,000 4,420,000 461,100,000 55 62
Africa 11,399,000 198,239,000
North America 9,373,000 214,341,000
South America 6,857,000 107,101,000
Oceania 3,304,000 12,403,000
World 53,311,700 2,377,351,000 13,415,700 752,878,000 25 32
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'Climbing a tree to seek for fish.'
Mencius