The Entente countries proposed in 1921 Russia to participate in an international conference, the purpose of which was to resolve disputed issues regarding the economic claims of Western countries to the Russian state. If these claims were accepted, European countries would officially accept Soviet Russia. The conference was opened in Genoa in early April. The event was attended by twenty-nine countries. Among them were England, Russia, Germany, France and other states.
The joint claims of the Western powers to Russia consisted in compensating for the debts of the Provisional and Tsarist governments (eighteen billion rubles in gold), returning the Western region of the former Russian Empire nationalized by the Bolsheviks. In addition, Western countries demanded the abolition of the monopoly on foreign trade, the opening of the road to foreign capital, and the cessation of revolutionary propaganda in their states.
In response, the Soviet government demanded compensation for damage caused by foreign intervention during the civil war (thirty-nine billion rubles), ensuring broad economic cooperation based on long-term loans from the West. Among the conditions put forward was the adoption of the Soviet program for a general reduction in armaments and the prohibition of the most barbaric methods of military operations.
Thus, due to the mutual unwillingness to make a political compromise, the negotiations have reached an impasse. At the same time, there was a certain split among Western powers during the conference. The irritation of the Entente states over the lack of results at the meetings was compounded by the success of the tactics of the "game of contradictions between imperialists" applied by the Bolsheviks.
Between the plenary sessions of the conference on April 14, 1922 on the outskirts of Genoa, the German Foreign Minister Rathenau and the People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs of Soviet Russia Chicherin signed a bilateral agreement (Rapallo Agreement) on the mutual termination of the nomination of claims. Refusal of claims included refusal of reparation claims, as well as the restoration of diplomatic relations. By signing the Rapallo Treaty, Soviet Russia was recognized de jure by Germany (legally).
Due to its difficult economic and political situation, Germany was forced to cooperate with Russia. In addition, the Rapallo Treaty fulfilled the task set by Lenin to split the ranks of the capitalist countries.
Later, in 1924, England, which was extremely interested in trade relations with Russia, was the first to officially recognize the existence of the Soviet state. Her example was later followed by France, Italy and other world powers.
Undoubtedly, the Rapallo Treaty was a successful diplomatic step of Soviet Russia. As a result of the signing of the rejection of claims by Germany, the Western countries could not form a single position on the issue of returning nationalized property to Russia. At the same time, the Moscow government’s refusal of the reparation share of Germany, which was supposed to be under the Versailles agreement , undermined the position of the French government, which still required reparation payments from Berlin.
Along with this, the agreement in Rapallo had important negative consequences. With its signing, cooperation between Russia and Germany on an anti-Versailles basis began. Military-technical, economic, cultural ties between the two countries began to develop rapidly. In addition, a joint Russian-German training of military specialists began. Germany and Russia, despite the Versailles bans, established secret cooperation, which lasted until the advent of Nazism.
The Rapallo Treaty of 1922 gave France reason to fear Russian-German relations.