Trotsky’s asylum in France

Underlying the many strands in this bizarre story are the bilateral relations between France and the Soviet Union, and the Franco-Soviet rapprochement, which was initiated in 1931 and culminated in the Franco-Soviet Mutual Assistance Pact of May 1935. This pact necessitated France to accommodate Joseph Stalin's implacable hostility towards Trotsky. The French Ministry of the Interior and police considered Trotsky a nuisance and troublemaker, and would have preferred that Trotsky was refused asylum from the start.