Chair of the Soviet delegation at Brest-Litovsk and Trotsky's longest-standing comrade
In his farewell letter he called his death "the protest of a fighter" and Trotsky's and Zinoviev's expulsion "the beginning of the Thermidorian period." He wrote the letter's body in the night of 15-16 November and dated it the 16th; sources give his death as 16 or 17 November.
Trotsky's longest-standing comrade and a Bolshevik diplomat. Born into a Jewish merchant family in Simferopol, he joined the RSDLP in 1903; arrested in Odessa in 1912, he served ten months and was exiled to Siberia, freed by the February Revolution of 1917. He helped prepare the October rising in the Petrograd Military Revolutionary Committee and, per Trotsky's testimony, chaired it. He led the Soviet delegation at Brest-Litovsk on the "neither war nor peace" line, built the Soviet embassy in Berlin as plenipotentiary to Germany and was expelled in November 1918 (sources record both a charge of preparing revolution and active preparation). Soviet representative to China in 1922-23, he issued the 1923 declaration with Sun Yat-sen, then sided with the Left Opposition; when treatment abroad was refused, he protested by suicide, and his family was repressed after his death.
Activities and affiliations
Career Timeline
- 1903–1907Began revolutionary work as a Menshevik; studied medicine in Berlin and law in Zurich
- 1908–1912Published Vienna Pravda with Trotsky; studied psychoanalysis under Alfred Adler
- 1912–1917Arrested in Odessa, imprisoned ten months and exiled to Siberia; freed by the February Revolution of 1917
- 1917.5Returns to Russia, joins the Mezhraiontsy
- 1917.8VI Congress: joins Bolsheviks with Mezhraiontsy; candidate CC member and secretary
- 1917.10Chaired the Petrograd MRC during the October rising
- 1917.11–1918.1Chaired the Soviet delegation at the Brest-Litovsk peace talks
- 1918.4–11RSFSR plenipotentiary to Germany; signed the Supplementary Treaty, expelled in November with sources recording both the charge of preparing revolution and active preparation
- 1922–1923Soviet representative to China; the Sun-Joffe Declaration opened the path to KMT-CCP cooperation
- 1924–1925USSR plenipotentiary to Austria
- 1925.6–1927Deputy chair of the Main Concession Committee under Trotsky
- 1919–1920People's Commissar of State Control and member of the Council of Labor and Defense of the Ukrainian Soviet Republic
- 1920–1921Peace treaties with Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, and the Peace of Riga with Poland
- 1922Member of the Soviet delegation to the Genoa Conference
- 1923–1927Active in the Left Opposition
- 1927Professor in the Faculty of Soviet Law at Moscow University
Related historical events
- 1917.02–07The February RevolutionRevolutionary freed from exileHe was freed from exile in Siberia by the February Revolution of 1917.
- 1917.10–1918.01The October RevolutionChairman of the Petrograd Military Revolutionary CommitteeAs chairman of the Petrograd MRC on 24–25 October, he directed the practical seizure of the capital's key installations during the insurrection.
- 1917.12–1918.11Brest-Litovsk and Germany’s eastern occupationInitial Soviet negotiatorHeaded the first Soviet delegation in December 1917 and put forward the six principles of peace without annexations; ambassador in Berlin after the treaty, he was expelled in November 1918.
- 1918.10–1919.08The German Revolution of 1918–1919Soviet envoy who prepared revolution in GermanyAs Soviet envoy to Germany, he was expelled in November 1918 amid accounts of his active preparations for revolution.
- 1918–1922The Civil War and Foreign InterventionInitial Soviet negotiatorInvolved in this event as initial Soviet negotiator.
- 1918.11–1920.10Baltic wars of independence and border settlementsSoviet negotiator at TartuLed the Soviet delegation at Tartu from December 1919, signing the treaty with Estonia on 2 February 1920, and went on to negotiate with Latvia, Lithuania and Poland.
- 1924–1927The first united front, the Northern Expedition and the catastrophe of 1927Soviet signatory of the Sun–Joffe statementAgreed the basic terms of the alliance with Sun in January 1923.
The Sun–Joffe Manifesto: Starting Point of Kuomintang–Soviet Cooperation
In 1922 Joffe was appointed extraordinary ambassador to China and Japan, and from 26 July 1922 he served as the Soviet government's representative in Beijing. On 23 September 1922, at the Changchun conference, he demanded the withdrawal of Japanese troops from North Sakhalin; on 26 September 1922 the Japanese delegation refused to withdraw and broke off the conference. On 26 January 1923 Joffe and Sun Yat-sen issued the Sun–Joffe Manifesto (孫文越飛宣言).
The manifesto asserted that the Soviet system was not suitable for China and announced Soviet willingness to co-operate with the Kuomintang in its struggle to unify China. It did not settle the Outer Mongolia or Chinese Eastern Railway questions, but it succeeded in establishing political relations with Sun and became the foundation of Kuomintang–Soviet co-operation. The Russian-side account treats the document as an important one defining policy toward Soviet Russia and credits it with helping to start co-operation between the Kuomintang and the Chinese Communist Party. In July 1923 Sun sent Chiang Kai-shek to Russia to study Soviet military and political conditions. The 1923 manifesto sits immediately before the 1924 First United Front.
In the Shanghai negotiations that led to the manifesto, it was agreed that Communist Party members would join the Kuomintang as individuals, constituting a "bloc within" the party. The individual-membership formula belongs to the negotiations leading up to the declaration, not to the period after it.
While based in China, Joffe travelled to Japan after the declaration to settle Soviet–Japanese relations, but the timing is disputed across sources: the English-language account dates the journey to January 1923, while other sources place the Japan trip after the declaration. Those negotiations ended when he became gravely ill and had to be sent back to Moscow. Sources also differ on the illness: one biography records that he contracted tropical malaria in Japan, after which his legs gave out and he suffered two heart attacks, whereas the Russian-language account attributes his grave 1923 illness to polyneuritis. Neither account is presented here as settled.