Effects of the Ideas of the October Revolution in Russia on the Foreign Policy of Yugoslavia in the Period 1945-1947

Abstract

This paper explains how the ideas that initiated the October Revolution in Russia in 1917 were embedded in the foreign policy of Yugoslavia after the end of World War II. From the very beginning (1945), the political actors of Yugoslavia had directed foreign policy towards bilateral cooperation, first of all with the Soviet Union, and with other democratic countries. All foreign policy issues were solved in the context of belonging to the socialist political camp, on the wings of the World War II victory and national liberation from the occupiers and the capitalist way of organizing society. Such a socialist foreign political course lasted only until the end of 1947. However, the article considers that there had been an October Revolution sentiment in Yugoslavia long before the adoption of the socialist organization of society after 1945. For this reason, apart from the international importance of the idea of the October Revolution, attention is directed towards analysis of the continuity of the idea of the revolution in Yugoslavia (1919-1945), and then towards the foreign policy practice of Yugoslavia observed through the analysis of primary political sources (1945-1947).