for German industrial goods. Under the agreement, Germany also granted the Soviet Union a merchandise credit of 200 million Reichsmarks over 7 years to buy German manufactured goods at an extremely favorable interest rate. Soviets adjourn tripartite military talks and strike a deal with Germany After the Poles' resistance to pressure, on August 21, Voroshilov proposed adjournment of the military talks with the British and French, using the excuse that the absence of the senior Soviet personnel at the talks interfered with the autumn manoeuvres of the Soviet forces though the primary reason was the progress being made in the Soviet-German negotiations. That same day, August 21, Stalin has received assurance would approve secret protocols to the proposed non-aggression pact that would grant the Soviets land in Poland, the Baltic states, Finland and Romania. That night, with Germany nervously awaiting a response to Hitler's August 19 telegram, Stalin replied at 9:35 p.m. that the Soviets were willing to sign the pact and that he would receive Ribbentrop on August 23. The Pact was signed sometime in the night between August 23–24. Pact signing On August 24, a 10-year non-aggression pact was signed with provisions that included: consultation; arbitration if either party disagreed; neutrality if either went to war against a third power; no membership of a group "which is directly or indirectly aimed at the other." Most notably, there was also a secret protocol to the pact, according to which the states of Northern and Eastern Europe were divided into German and Soviet "spheres of influence". Poland was to be partitioned in the event of its "political rearrangement". The USSR was promised an eastern part of Poland, primarily populated with Ukrainians and Belarusians, in case of its dissolution, and additionally Latvia, Estonia and Finland. Bessarabia, then part of Romania, was to be joined to the Moldovan ASSR, and become the Moldovan SSR under control of Moscow. The news was met with utter shock and surprise by government leaders and media worldwide, most of whom were aware only of the British–French–Soviet negotiations that had taken place for months. Ribbentrop and Stalin enjoyed warm conversations at the signing, exchanging toasts and further discussing the prior hostilities between the countries in the 1930s. Ribbentrop stated that Britain had always attempted to disrupt Soviet–German relations, was "weak", and "wants to let others fight for her presumptuous claim to world dominion." Stalin concurred, adding "[i]f