As World War II broke out, Bunin's friends in New York, anxious to help the Nobel Prize laureate get out of France, issued officially-endorsed invitations for him to travel to the USA, and in 1941 they received their Nansen passports enabling them to make the trip.
Ivan Bunin was a staunch anti-Nazi, referring to Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini as "rabid monkeys" [REF].