KELLOGG-BRIAND PACT
The Kellogg-Briand Pact, also known as the Pact of Paris, was the creation of French Foreign Minister Aristide Briand and U.S. Secretary of State Frank B. Kellogg in 1928. Parties to this treaty pledged themselves to “renounce the resort to war as an instrument of national policy in their mutual relations” and to resolve all international disputes by “peaceful means alone.” This agreement was signed in Paris on August 27, 1928, by France, the United States, and thirteen other powers. Soon it was endorsed by almost every country in the world, including the Soviet Union, Britain, Germany, and Japan. The treaty contained no enforcement mechanism and was, therefore, merely a pious promise to avoid war.
Soviet ratification of the pact on August 29, 1928, was part of a “peace offensive” spearheaded by Deputy Commissar of Foreign Affairs Maxim M. Litvinov. Beyond attempts to improve bilateral relations with the great powers and Russia’s smaller neighbors, this campaign included efforts to promote broad measures of disarmament and to involve the USSR in the multilateral diplomacy of Europe. The pact was also supplemented by the Litvinov Protocol, signed on February 9, 1929, by the USSR, Poland, Rumania, and Latvia (and subsequently by Lithuania, Iran, and Turkey), pledging the peaceful resolution of all disputes among the signatories. Soviet participation in the pact and the protocol represented a victory for Litvinov’s policy of constructive engagement with the dominant Western powers and a defeat for his nominal chief, Foreign Commissar Georgy Chicherin. It also marked a temporary victory for Nikolai Bukharin and other moderate Politburo members who supported the New Economic Policy and advocated security through peace and cooperation with the great powers.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Bukharaev, Ravil. (1995). Kazan: The Enchanted Capital. London: Flint River. Keenan, Edward L. (1979- 1980). “Kazan-The Bend.” Harvard Ukrainian Studies 3/4: 484-96. Matthews, David J., and Ravil Bukharaev, eds. (2000). Historical Anthology of Kazan Tatar Verse: Voices of Eternity. Richmond, England: Curzon Press. Pelenski, Jaroslaw. (1974). Russia and Kazan: Conquest and Imperial Ideology (1438-1560s). The Hague: Mouton.
See also: BUKHARIN, NIKOLAI IVANOVICH; LITVINOV, MAXIM MAXIMOVICH; NEW ECONOMIC POLICY
Ferrell, Robert H. (1952). Peace in Their Time: The Origins of the Kellogg-Brian Pact. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. Jacobson, Jon. (1994). When the Soviet Union Entered World Politics. Berkeley: University of California Press.
(1881-1970), leading figure of the Provisional Government in 1917.
Alexander Kerensky was born on May 4, 1881, in Simbirsk, Russia. He studied history and law at St. Petersburg University. In 1906 he became a defense lawyer in political cases and soon became a well-known public figure. In 1912, Kerensky was elected to the Fourth Duma. Although he described himself as a socialist and associated with the Socialist Revolutionary Party (SRs), he was the mildest of socialists, his views constituting a blend of moderate socialism with left-wing liberalism.
During the February Revolution he seemed to be everywhere-giving a speech here, haranguing soldiers there, scurrying in and out of meetings, issuing orders, dramatically arresting members of the old regime and equally dramatically rescuing others from mob violence. A young man of thirty-five, he emerged as the popular hero of the February Revolution and the new government, the object of public adulation; his face adorned postcards and store windows. When the Petrograd Soviet was formed on March 27, he was elected vice-chairman. He was the only Socialist to enter the Provisional Government when it was formed on March 2 and more and more became its key figure, serving in succession as minister of justice (March-May), minister of war (May-September), and minister- president (July-November), and adding the title of commander in chief of the army in September. Indeed, more than any other political figure of 1917 he identified completely with the Provisional Government and in turn came to be identified with it, both in 1917 and after.
In May and June 1917 he became the government’s focal point for preparing a major military
Prime Minister Alexander Kerensky salutes while inspecting his troops in 1917. © HULTON-DEUTSCH COLLECTION/CORBIS
K.G.B.
offensive, taking long tours of the front to stimulate fighting enthusiasm among soldiers. Despite the unpopularity and disastrous outcome of the offensive, Kerensky’s personal reputation survived, and he became minister-president of the new, second coalition government. Moreover, as other leading political figures left the government, Kerensky became more and more dominant within it. Even as Kerensky achieved complete leadership of the government, however, both its and his own popularity eroded as the government failed to solve problems and to fulfill popular aspirations (despite its substantial achievements). The Kornilov Affair in September, a conflict growing out of the complex relation between Kerensky and General Lavr Kornilov that many saw as a counterrevolutionary attempt, earned Kerensky the enmity of both left and right and completed the destruction of his reputation. Crowds that earlier had cheered him as the hero of the revolution now cursed him Kerensky remained head of the government after the Kornilov Affair, but his popularity was gone, and his personal authority swiftly declined. His fateful decision was to move against the Bolsheviks on the eve of the Second Congress of Soviets; this sparked the October Revolution, which swept him from power.
After the Bolshevik Revolution, Kerensky spent several weeks underground, trying unsuccessfully to organize an anti-Bolshevik movement. In May 1918, he made his way out of the country and lived the rest of his life in exile, where he was active in emigr? politics, delivered lectures, and wrote several accounts of the revolution and his role in it. He died on June 11, 1970, in the United States.
Kerensky was both the heroic and the tragic figure of the Russian Revolution of 1917. Thin, pale, with flashing eyes, theatrical gestures, and vivid verbal imagery, he was a dramatic and mesmerizing speaker with an incredible ability to move his listeners. Huge crowds turned out to hear him. As the year wore on, however, Kerensky’s oratory could not compensate for the government’s failures. The same speech-making that had made him a hero in the spring earned him scorn and a reputation as an empty babbler by autumn’s end. The new paper currencies issued by the Provisional Government under his leadership were popularly called “Kerenki,” and because inflation quickly made them worthless, his name thus took on something of that meaning as well. It was a tragic fall for the hero of February.
Alexander Kerensky, leader of the 1917 Provisional Government. THE ART ARCHIVE/MUS?E DES 2 GUERRES MONDIALES PARIS/DAGLI ORTI See also: FEBRUARY REVOLUTION; KORNILOV AFFAIR; OCTOBER REVOLUTION; PROVISIONAL GOVERNMENT
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Abraham, Richard. (1987). Alexander Kerensky: The First Love of the Revolution. New York: Columbia University Press. Kerensky, Alexander. (1965). Russia and History’s Turning Point. New York: Duell, Sloan and Pearce. Kolonitskii, Boris I. (1997). “Kerensky.” In Critical Companion to the Russian Revolution, 1914-1921. Bloom- ington: Indiana University Press.
K.G.B. See STATE SECURITY, ORGANS OF.
(c. 1610-1667), adventurer, explorer of Siberia.
Born in Vologda region, Yerofei Khabarov began his career managing a saltworks for the famed Stroganov clan. He traveled throughout western Siberia in the 1620s. He moved on to the Yenisei River, then the Lena, in the 1630s. He invested in farmlands and local saltworks. He also developed useful ties to Vasily Poyarkov, the administrator of Yakutsk and an early explorer of the Amur River basin.
In 1649 Khabarov turned to exploration. His goal was to follow up on Poyarkov’s earlier forays into the Amur region, seeking an easier and more reliable route than Poyarkov had been able to find. In March, Khabarov left
