German–Soviet Axis talks

German–Soviet Axis talks occurred in October and November 1940 concerning the Soviet Union's potential adherent as a fourth Axis power during World War II. The negotiations, which occurred during the era of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, included a two-day conference in Berlin between Soviet Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Molotov and Adolf Hitler and German Foreign Minister Joachim von Ribbentrop. The talks were followed by both countries trading written proposed agreements.

After two days of negotiations from 12 to 14 November 1940, Germany presented the Soviets with a draft written Axis pact agreement that defined the world spheres of influence of the four proposed Axis powers (Germany, Italy, Japan and the Soviet Union). Hitler, Ribbentrop and Molotov tried to set German and Soviet spheres of influence. Hitler encouraged Molotov to look south to Iran and eventually India, to preserve German access to Finland's resources and to remove Soviet influence in the Balkans.

Molotov remained firm and sought to remove German troops from Finland and gain a warm water port in the Baltic. Soviet foreign policy calculations were predicated on the idea that the war would be a long-term struggle and so German claims that the United Kingdom would be defeated swiftly were treated with skepticism. In addition, Stalin sought to remain influential in Bulgaria and Yugoslavia. Those factors resulted in Molotov taking a firm line.

According to a study by Alexander Nekrich, on 25 November 1940, the Soviets presented a Stalin-drafted written counterproposal accepting the four power pact but including Soviet rights to Bulgaria and a world sphere of influence, to be centred on the area around Iraq and Iran. Germany did not respond and left the negotiations unresolved.

Regarding the counterproposal, Hitler remarked to his top military chiefs that Stalin "demands more and more", "he's a cold-blooded blackmailer" and "a German victory has become unbearable for Russia" so that "she must be brought to her knees as soon as possible." Germany ended the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact in June 1941 by invading the Soviet Union.

In the following years, the Soviet Information Bureau published a book titled Falsifiers of History, largely edited by Stalin himself, in which the Soviet premier claimed that he was simply testing his enemy. This became the official version of events that persisted in Soviet historiography up until the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991. According to Soviet diplomat Victor Israelyan, the book "certainly did nothing to disprove the existence of Soviet-German cooperation in the first years of World War II, a cooperation that to a certain degree assisted Hitler's plan".