27 Facts About Adolph Joffe

Adolph Abramovich Joffe was a Russian revolutionary, Bolshevik politician and Soviet diplomat of Karaite descent.

Adolf Abramovich Joffe was born in Simferopol, Crimea, Russian Empire, in a wealthy Karaite family.

Adolph Joffe became a social democrat in 1900 while still in high school, formally joining the Russian Social Democratic Labor Party in 1903.

In 1904 Adolph Joffe was sent to Baku, which he had to flee to avoid arrest.

Adolph Joffe was then sent to Moscow, but had to flee again, this time abroad.

In Russia, Adolph Joffe was close to the Menshevik faction within the Russian Social Democratic Party.

Adolph Joffe used his family's fortune to support Pravda financially.

In 1912 Adolph Joffe was arrested while visiting Odessa, imprisoned for 10 months and then exiled to Siberia.

In 1917, Adolph Joffe, freed from the Siberian exile by the February Revolution, returned to the Crimea.

Adolph Joffe headed the Bolshevik faction in the Petrograd Duma in the fall of 1917 and was one of the Duma's delegates to the Democratic Conference between 14 and 22 September.

In October 1917, Adolph Joffe supported Lenin's and Trotsky's revolutionary position against Grigory Zinoviev's and Lev Kamenev's more moderate position, demanding that the latter be expelled from the Central Committee after an apparent breach of party discipline.

From 30 November 1917 until January 1918, Adolph Joffe was the head of the Soviet delegation that was sent to Brest-Litovsk to negotiate an end to the hostilities with Germany.

On 22 December 1917 Adolph Joffe announced the following Bolshevik pre-conditions for a peace treaty:.

Once the Bolshevik Central Committee decided to sign the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk on 23 February 1918, Adolph Joffe remained a member of the Soviet delegation only under protest and in a purely consultative capacity.

Mr Adolph Joffe looked astonishedly at me with his gentle eyes and was silent for a while.

At the VII Extraordinary Congress of the Bolshevik Party between 6 and 8 March 1918, Adolph Joffe was re-elected to the Central Committee, but only as a candidate member.

Adolph Joffe signed the Soviet-German Supplementary Treaty on 27 August 1918.

On 6 November 1918, shortly before the Armistice and the German Revolution, the Soviet delegation in Berlin headed by Adolph Joffe was expelled from the country on charges of preparing a Communist uprising in Germany.

Adolph Joffe was not re-elected to the Central Committee at the VIII Party Congress in March 1919 and would never again occupy a major leadership position.

Adolph Joffe negotiated a ceasefire with Poland in October 1920 and peace treaties with Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania in late 1920.

Adolph Joffe was one of the Soviet delegates at the Genoa Conference in February 1922, an experience he described in a short book published later that same year.

In 1923, Adolph Joffe signed an agreement with Sun Yat-Sen in Shanghai on aid to the Kuomintang on the assumption that the latter would cooperate with Chinese Communists, presumably with Lenin's approval.

The negotiations proved long and difficult, and ended when Adolph Joffe became gravely ill and had to be sent back to Moscow.

Adolph Joffe tried to concentrate on teaching, but it proved difficult due to his ill-health.

Adolph Joffe remained a friend and loyal supporter of Leon Trotsky through the 1920s, joining him in the Left Opposition.

Adolph Joffe left a farewell letter addressed to Trotsky, but the letter was seized by Soviet secret police agents and later quoted by Stalinists to discredit both Joffe and Trotsky.

Trotsky's eulogy at Adolph Joffe's funeral was his last public speech in the Soviet Union.