Jakow Sakharovich Suriz

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Jakow Sacharowitsch Suriz ( Russian Яков Захарович Суриц, scientific transliteration Jakov Zacharovič Suric; * 1882 in Dvinsk , Vitebsk Governorate ; † January 2, 1952 in Moscow ) was a Soviet diplomat .

Life

Youth and Exile

Suriz was born in 1882 into the family of a Jewish jeweler. He studied at the political science department of the Philosophical Faculty of Berlin University . In 1902 Suriz joined the General Jewish Workers' Union . It is unclear when he became a Bolshevik - either as a result of the split in the Russian Socialists in 1903 or not until the October Revolution . In 1907 he was arrested and exiled to Tobolsk Governorate , where he stayed until 1910. He then emigrated to Germany, where he attended law lectures at Heidelberg University . In 1917 Suriz returned to Russia.

Diplomatic activity until 1934

In 1918, Suriz became an authorized representative (polpred) of Soviet Russia in Denmark on the recommendation of Chicherin . He stayed in this post until June 1919, when he was sent to Afghanistan , where he did not arrive until December due to the civil war at the front . Suriz stayed there until 1921 and then worked as a polpred in Norway until 1923 . From 1923 to 1934 Suriz was the authorized representative of the Soviet Union in Turkey , where he primarily promoted cultural exchange between the two countries. Under his aegis, the Soviet-Turkish friendship and neutrality pact was signed in 1925. In 1934 Suriz led the negotiations to establish diplomatic relations between the Soviet Union and Bulgaria . In the same year he was awarded the Order of Lenin .

Ambassador to Germany

On June 11, 1934 Suriz was transferred to Hitler Germany as a polpred . Despite his diplomatic immunity, he had a difficult position as a Jew and as a representative of a socialist state. Nevertheless, he found himself at the center of diplomatic circles in Berlin and was highly valued as an intellectual. Suriz had a close friendship with the American ambassador William Edward Dodd - he characterized Suriz as the "brightest head among the local diplomats" and "an impeccable gentleman in all respects".

On the one hand, Suriz tried to live up to his mandate and to maintain German-Soviet relations. On the other hand, as a confidante of Foreign Minister Litvinov, he relied on the cooperation of the Soviet Union with England and France against Hitler, while the leadership around Josef Stalin showed an at least ambivalent attitude towards Nazi Germany. On the occasion of the NSDAP party congress in 1936 , Suriz wrote to Moscow calling for sharp protests and economic sanctions against Germany. The Politburo rejected his proposal, supported by Litvinov, and did not even vote to send a protest note.

France and end of career

On April 7, 1937 Suriz was withdrawn from Germany and transferred to France, where he survived both the Great Terror and the “purges” of the People's Commissariat for Foreign Affairs after Litvinov's dismissal in 1939 unscathed. Between 1937 and 1939 he was a member of the Soviet delegation to the League of Nations . His position wavered in 1940 when he sent an unencrypted telegram to Stalin on the occasion of the Winter War , in which, in accordance with current Stalinist doctrine, England and France were described as "arsonists". After the French authorities intercepted the telegram, Suriz was declared a persona non grata and had to leave the country.

Suriz stayed in Russia until the end of the war and worked in the People's Commissariat for Foreign Affairs. There he wrote memoranda on the design of Germany, including: "The post-war design of Germany from the point of view of our interests". In 1946 he became the Soviet ambassador to Brazil , but in October 1947 diplomatic relations between the two countries were suspended for the time being. In early 1948, Suriz retired and devoted himself primarily to his art collection, which included works by Matisse and Degas , among others . Yakov Suriz died of a heart attack on January 2, 1952.

literature

  • Adibekov, G. et al. a. ( Ed .): Politbjuro CK RKP (b) -VKP (b) i Evropa. Rešenija "osoboj papki". 1923-1939 , Moskva: ROSSPEN 2001.
  • Crowley, Edward L .: The Soviet Diplomatic Corps. 1917-1967 , New Jersey: Scarecrow Press 1970.
  • Sizonenko, Aleksandr: V spiske lučšich. Etapy diplomatičeskoj kar'ery Jakova Surica . In: “Nezavisimaja Gazeta”, March 1, 2003.
  • Zalesskij, KA (ed.): Imperija Stalina. Biografičeskij enciklopedičeskij slovar , Moskva: Veče 2000, pp. 434–435.

Individual evidence

  1. Suric, Jakov. In: Elektronnaja Evrejskaja Enciklopedija, https://eleven.co.il/article/13977
  2. ^ Trotsky, Leo : Arbeiterstaat, Thermidor und Bonapartismus, http://www.marxists.org/deutsch/archiv/trotzki/1935/02/arbstaat.htm#f17
  3. Formed from Russ. Polnomočnyj predstavitel ', the term was used to describe the ambassador of the Soviet Union until the 1940s, when the pre-revolutionary term posol was reintroduced.
  4. http://www.ng.ru/style/2001-03-01/16_listed.html
  5. MID SSSR (ed.): Documenty vnešnej politiki. Vol. XIX, Moskva 1970, p. 762.
  6. ^ RGASPI , Moscow, f. 17 op.162 d. 20 l. 78. Publ. In: G. Adibekov et al. a. (Hgg): Politbjuro CK RKP (b) -VKP (b) i Evropa. Rešenija "osoboj papki". 1923-1939, Moskva, ROSSPEN, 2001, p. 303.
  7. ^ Laufer, Jochen: Pax sovietica. Stalin, the Western Powers and the German Question 1941–1945. Cologne u. a. 2009. p. 349
  8. Sizonenko, Aleksandr: V spiske lučšich. Etapy diplomatičeskoj kar'ery Jakova Surica.

Web links

Commons : Jakov Surits  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files