 In November 1940 Stalin sent Molotov to Berlin to meet Ribbentrop and Adolf Hitler . In January 1941 , the British Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden visited Turkey in an attempt to get the Turks to enter the war on the Allies ' side . Though the purpose of Eden 's visit was anti @-@ German rather than anti @-@ Soviet , Molotov assumed otherwise , and in a series of conversations with the Italian Ambassador Augusto Rosso , Molotov claimed that the Soviet Union would soon be faced with an Anglo @-@ Turkish invasion of the Crimea . The British historian D.C. Watt argued that on the basis of Molotov 's statements to Rosso , it would appear that in early 1941 , Stalin and Molotov viewed Britain rather than Germany as the principal threat . 
