Soviet commercial agency

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Establishing a Soviet commercial agency in the country of each trading partner was the aim of Soviet Russia , according to the statutory stipulation of the Soviet foreign trade monopoly in the decree of June 11, 1920 . By decree of October 16, 1922, they became representatives of the People's Commissariat for Foreign Trade and for the time being the sole bearer of the Soviet foreign trade monopoly. They were state economic agencies that represented the only decisive authority against foreign merchants.

Purpose and powers of commercial agencies

By decree of April 22, 1918, the Soviets had nationalized foreign trade; Lenin wanted it to be completely subordinate to the requirements of the basic economic plan. In wartime communism , the foreign trade commissariat was still the “all-Russian merchant”, but the task of selling Russian goods and buying foreign products was now transferred to the commercial agencies:

"In its novelty, it has been described as a mixture of a central authority, a study society, a technical control apparatus and a commercial business - a name that really expresses the summary of its diverse tasks."

What posed a problem for the host countries was not so much the presence of the Soviet foreign trade monopoly on their soil as the Soviet requirement that the trade agency be viewed as a full part of its diplomatic mission, including immunity and other customary privileges. This was not a common legal right and therefore first had to be regulated in a contract. The Soviet Union eased its argument on this by providing clear information about its own position with the decree on commercial agencies abroad of September 13, 1933. At this point in time, there had already been such a change compared to the original concept that, in view of the scope and complexity of the trade in goods, the commercial agencies increasingly refrained from doing their own business in favor of functions with a regulatory character. Parallel to the actual purpose, the facilities provided the opportunity for subversive secret service activity, since Soviet secret agents could be brought into western capitals without diplomatic representation.

The importance of the commercial agencies declined when in 1935 the Union foreign trade associations were allowed to conclude foreign trade transactions abroad and they soon assumed the rank of almost the sole bearer of all operational foreign trade management. Where it had not been possible to set up a commercial agency until the Second World War , the USSR may later be satisfied with a commercial council or a commercial attaché at the embassy. The commercial agencies still existed in the 1970s, partly to monitor compliance with the relevant laws at foreign trade associations, partly to coordinate their activities and provide assistance with knowledge of local conditions.

Countries with Soviet commercial representation

By 1932 the USSR was able to set up commercial agencies in the following countries, among others: Afghanistan , China , Denmark , Germany , Estonia , Finland , France , Greece , Iran , Italy , Japan , Canada , Latvia , Lithuania , Mongolia , Norway , Poland , Sweden , Czechoslovakia , Turkey and United States . The states of China, Finland, France, Japan and Poland denied diplomatic privileges to the trade agency, as did the USA, where the USSR was represented in trade matters by the Amtorg Trading Corporation . Some countries have allowed branches to be set up outside the capital. The Switzerland had to make do without a local sales agency, after the murder of the ambassador Lorowski was acquitted in court and the Soviet Union responded with a boycott. When a French court ordered the confiscation of Soviet imported goods, the commercial agency was relocated from Paris to London . A serious incident there was the search of the commercial agency and the associated company All-Russian Cooperative Society (Arcos) in 1927, known as the Arcos raid . According to the British police, a spy center should serve to bring about a planned coup, and diplomatic relations were broken off as a result. No reason for Sweden not to grant diplomatic privileges to the trade agency in October 1927, but with one special feature: the Soviets had to pay income tax in the country . This was usually avoided, as was the entry in the local commercial register .

The Soviet commercial agency in Berlin

In the German-Russian trade agreement of May 6, 1921, the establishment of a Soviet commercial agency was planned for the future. An important task immediately fell to her: in Russia the importance of the foreign trade monopoly was emphatically emphasized by Lenin, but the voices of those opponents who feared excessive isolation of their market could not be ignored. The opposite had to be proven, so that private foreign capital could also have a significant impact. The mixed companies set up for this purpose - the Soviets each secured at least 50% of the share capital - received trade concessions "with the exception of the Basic Law on the government monopoly of foreign trade". Significant among them was the German-Russian trading stock company (Russgertorg) with the Otto Wolff group . BS Stomonjakow , the head of the commercial agency, took over half of the shares in the Berlin company, the commercial agency sent three people to the supervisory board and made up half of the executive board with two members. After it was founded on October 9, 1922, Lenin expressed his "lively satisfaction with the conclusion of the Otto Wolff Treaty" to the German government, but Wolff's joy lasted until his contract was terminated in January 1924 at the longest.

Building used until 1935 at Lindenstrasse 20-25

In the relationship between the two countries, the so-called "May incident" caused a "clouding of mutual relations" in the same year. The communist Johannes Botzenhardt, who was facing a high treason trial, fled to his former employer on May 3, 1924, an occasion for the Berlin police to search the commercial agency. The USSR then broke off trade with Germany, and only German concession in the protocol of July 29, 1924 smoothed things out. The German ambassador in Moscow, Count von Brockdorff-Rantzau , had proposed the “ extraterritoriality of the whole of Lindenstrasse”, as later found in the German-Soviet trade agreement of 1925 . In the subsequent Russian business that took place up to the German invasion of the Soviet Union , the commercial agency assumed the role of accepting the Russian commercial bills of exchange used for payment . In addition, there was the service for those Western European countries that obtained their imports from the USSR via Berlin. This required a breakdown according to the 24 branches of industry served, with departments that came close to true wholesalers in terms of scope. Deutsch-Russische Lager- und Transport-GmbH ( Derutra ) also became a de facto department of the commercial agency after its German shareholder withdrew. The graphic artist John Heartfield supplied catalog drafts for the Soviet trade agency, as well as the equipment of exhibition stands at the technical fair in Leipzig and the fairs in Cologne and Königsberg.

A building of the Victoria insurance was used until 1935, then one in the Lietzenburgerstrasse 11 (later no. 86) after the start of the war against the Soviet Union to the for the Occupied Eastern Territories Reich Ministry went. After 1945 the house in the British sector fell into disrepair. A Soviet commercial agency was reopened in East Berlin in 1953 .

The conclusion of a government agreement with the Federal Republic in April 1958 made it possible to set up a commercial agency in Cologne . The building on Aachener Strasse was ultimately the subject of an 18-year legal dispute before it was foreclosed on the basis of a ruling in September 2013.

literature

  • Hubert Schneider: The Soviet Foreign Trade Monopoly 1920–1925. Verlag Wissenschaft und Politik, Cologne 1973, ISBN 3-8046-8471-8 .
  • Tamara Solonewitsch : Three years with the Berlin Soviet trade representation. Essen Publishing House , Essen 1939
  • Jan F. Triska, Robert M. Slusser: The Theory, Law, and Policy of Soviet Treaties. Stanford University Press, Stanford 1962, pp. 325-333.
  • Kaspar-Dietrich Freymuth: The historical development of the organizational forms of the Soviet foreign trade (1917–1961). Reports of the Eastern European Institute at the Free University of Berlin, Berlin 1963, pp. 66–68, 107–110 and others. 140-145.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Louis Eichhorn: The trade relations of Germany to Soviet Russia. A contribution to the problem of German-Soviet Russian trade. Carl Hinstorffs Verlag, Rostock 1930, p. 9.
  2. ↑ Wolfgang Krieger : History of the secret services. From the Pharaohs to the NSA , Verlag CH Beck, 3rd, updated and expanded edition, Munich 2014, p. 197.
  3. ^ John Quigley: The Soviet Foreign Trade Monopoly. Institutions and Laws. Ohio State University Press, Columbus 1974, pp. 87-90.
  4. ^ A b c Hubert Schneider: The Soviet foreign trade monopoly 1920-1925. Cologne 1973, pp. 89-90.
  5. ↑ a b Dittmar Dahlmann : The Otto Wolff company: from scrap iron trade to global corporation (1904 - 1929). In: Peter Danylow / Ulrich S. Soénius (ed.): Otto Wolff. A company between business and politics , Siedler Verlag, Munich 2005, p. 44.
  6. ↑ Louis Eichhorn: The trade relations of Germany to Soviet Russia. Rostock 1930, p. 12.
  7. ^ Jürgen Zarusky : The German Social Democrats and the Soviet Model. Ideological disputes and foreign policy concepts 1917–1933. R. Oldenbourg Verlag, Munich 1992, p. 184 f.
  8. ^ Akademie der Künste zu Berlin (ed.): John Heartfield , DuMont Buchverlag, Cologne 1991, p. 395
  9. ^ Karl Schlögel : The Russian Berlin. Munich 2007, p. 155
  10. ^ No Soviet House for West Berlin , Die Zeit, September 20, 1963
  11. ↑ Website of the Trade and Economic Office of the Embassy of the Russian Federation in the Federal Republic of Germany (accessed on August 31, 2014)
  12. ↑ Oliver Görtz: Entrepreneur wins against Russia , Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger, September 19, 2013 (accessed on August 31, 2014)