Soviet Union

• 12-December-1932 : Japan and the Soviet Union reform their diplomatic connections.
• 13-January-1934 : The Candidate of Science degree is established in the USSR.
• 28-December-1935 : ''Pravda'' publishes a letter from Pavel Postyshev, who revives the New Year tree tradition in the Soviet Union.
• 05-August-1937 : The Soviet Union commences one of the largest campaigns of the Great Purge, to "eliminate antiantiSoviet elements". Within the following year, at least 724,000 people are killed on order of the troikas, many of them chosen for shooting by their ethnicity.
• 23-August-1939 : Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact: Hitler and Stalin agree to divide Europe between themselves (Finland, Estonia, Latvia and eastern Poland to the USSR; Lithuania and western Poland to Germany).
• 16-September-1939 : A ceasefire ends the undeclared Border War between The Soviet Union (and Mongolian allies) and Japan.
• 17-September-1939 : The Soviet Union invades Poland and then occupies eastern Polish territories.
• 12-March-1940 : The Soviet Union and Finland sign a peace treaty in Moscow ending the Winter War; Finns, along with the at large, are shocked by the harsh terms.
• 03-August-1940 : The Lithuanian SSR, Latvian SSR (August 5) and Estonian SSR (August 6) are incorporated into the Soviet Union.
• 08-August-1940 : Wilhelm Keitel signs the "Aufbau Ost" directive, which eventually leads to the invasion of the Soviet Union.