German–Soviet Border and Commercial Agreement
| Signed | January 10, 1941 |
|---|---|
| Location | Moscow, Russian SFSR, Soviet Union |
| Signatories |
 Soviet Union Nazi Germany
|
| Languages | German, Russian |
The German–Soviet Border and Commercial Agreement, signed on January 10, 1941, was a broad agreement settling border disputes and continuing raw materials and war machine trade between the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany. The agreement continued the countries' relationship that started in 1939 with the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact containing secret protocols dividing Eastern Europe between the Soviet Union and Germany, and the subsequent invasions by Germany and the Soviet Union of that territory. The German–Soviet Border and Commercial Agreement contained additional secret protocols settling a dispute regarding land in Lithuania previously split between the countries. The agreement continued Nazi-Soviet economic relations that had been expanded by the 1939 German–Soviet Commercial Agreement and the larger 1940 German–Soviet Commercial Agreement.
The agreement proved to be short lived. Just six months after it was signed, Germany invaded the Soviet Union, and economic relations between the two countries came to an end. The raw materials imported by Germany from the Soviet Union between 1939 and 1941 played a major role in supporting the German war effort against the Soviet Union after 1941.
Germany lacked natural supplies of several key raw materials needed for economic and military operations. German planners in mid-1939 determined that the nation possessed only two to three months' supply of rubber stocks and three to six months of oil stocks. They estimated that, after a planned German attack on Poland and the expected subsequent allied naval blockade, the Soviet Union would become the only potential supplier for many key raw materials needed for a war.
On August 19, 1939, the Soviet Union and Germany entered German–Soviet Commercial Agreement (1939) providing for the trade of certain German military and civilian equipment in exchange for Soviet raw materials. On August 23, they entered the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, which contained secret protocols dividing the states of Northern and Eastern Europe into German and Soviet "spheres of influence."
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