Ribbentrop became Hitler's favourite foreign-policy adviser, partly by dint of his familiarity with the world outside Germany, but also by shameless flattery and sycophancy.

Ribbentrop was tasked with ensuring that the world remained convinced that Germany sincerely wanted an arms-limitation treaty while also ensuring that no such treaty ever materialized.

Ribbentrop also engaged in diplomacy on his own.

The British historian Victor Rothwell wrote that the newspapers that Ribbentrop used to provide his press summaries for Hitler, such as the Daily Express and the Daily Mail, were out of touch not only with British public opinion, but also with British government policy in regard to Poland.

The signing of the Molotov – Ribbentrop Pact on 23 August 1939 not only won Germany an informal alliance with the Soviet Union, but also neutralized Anglo-French attempts to win Turkey to the “ peace front ”.

Ribbentrop also tried unsuccessfully to arrange for the Vichy French troops in North Africa to be formally placed under German command.

Ribbentrop also worked closely with the SS for what turned out to be his last significant foreign-policy move: Operation Panzerfaust, the coup that deposed Admiral Horthy on 15 October 1944.

Ribbentrop is also a key figure in the historical novel Famous Last Words by Timothy Findley ( Penguin Books 1982, ISBN 0-14-006268-8 ) and Harry Turtledove's alternate history series Worldwar where his Soviet counterpart Molotov frequently expresses contempt for his lack of intelligence.

Ribbentrop is also mentioned in the movie, The King's Speech, for sending the future British king's fiancée 17 carnations a day.

The Treaty of Non-Aggression between Germany and the Soviet Union, also known as the Nazi – Soviet Pact and the Molotov – Ribbentrop Pact ( after its chief architects, Soviet foreign minister Vyacheslav Molotov and German foreign minister Joachim von Ribbentrop ) was a non-aggression pact, signed in Moscow in the late hours of 23 August 1939, at the height of the Nomonhan fighting in the far east between the Soviet Union and the Empire of Japan.

She also told Joachim von Ribbentrop, the German Ambassador who later became the Foreign Minister of Germany, that Hitler looked too much like Charlie Chaplin to be taken seriously.

Particularly its early reports and serials in regards to the Reichstag fire authored by former SS officers Paul Carell ( who had also served as chief press spokesman for Nazi Germany's Foreign Minister Joachim von Ribbentrop ) and Fritz Tobias have since about the year 2000 been considered influential in historiography due to the fact that since the 1960s the Spiegel reports written by these two authors had made accredited historian Hans Mommsen a lifelong champion for the guilt blame of Marinus van der Lubbe, the man the Nazis themselves had presented as perpetrator of the Reichstag fire in 1933.

" He also claimed to have carried a loaded pistol in his coat pocket at a meeting with Hitler and Ribbentrop in July 1939 and was " seriously troubled " about not shooting when he had the chance, adding "... f this war breaks out, as I feel sure it will, then I shall feel very much to blame for not killing these two.

The country's future in an Axis-dominated Europe was further discussed in a 1940 round-table conference between Italian foreign minister Galeazzo Ciano and German foreign minister Joachim von Ribbentrop, also attended by Hitler.

He also influenced and mentored many like Berthold Ribbentrop, W. Schlich and C. A.

After long hesitation, Ribbentrop was also persuaded that the award should go beyond the ethnic principle, and should above all give Hungary the important towns of Košice ( Kassa ), Uzhhorod ( Ungvár ) and Mukachevo ( Munkács ).

The issue of what the Ryti – Ribbentrop Agreement was " in reality ", remains somewhat controversial, as also the issue of whether Finland's co-belligerence with Nazi Germany " in reality " was a concealed alliance, and whether the Continuation War " in reality " was a Finnish war of aggression although initiated as a defensive war against a Soviet pre-emptive attack.

He also was an advisor at the Dienststelle Ribbentrop from 1934 to 1938 ( when Ribbentrop was made foreign minister his old bureau was disbanded ).

It appears that Baudouin was also a monarchist at heart, as on the 8 October Abetz, the German Ambassador in Paris, wrote to von Ribbentrop that " some ( French ) ministers, such as Alibert, Baudouin and Bouthillier, are hoping for an eventual restoration of the Bourbons ".

Protests against the Molotov Ribbentrop Pact were also held in Tallinn and Riga in 1987.

In 1932 Konstantin von Neurath was appointed foreign minister, he also held the office after Hitler became chancellor, finding himself exposed to increasing competition from Nazi politicians like Alfred Rosenberg and Joachim von Ribbentrop, who followed him in 1938.

For the Nazis ' part, the talks were facilitated through Wilhelm Keppler, Joachim von Ribbentrop and the banker Kurt Freiherr von Schröder, a former officer and head of the old-guard conservative " Herrenklub " ( Gentlemen's club ) in Berlin, in which von Papen was also active.

Ribbentrop quickly learned that Hitler always favoured the most radical solution to any problem, and accordingly tended his advice in that direction as a Ribbentrop aide recalled: When Hitler said ' Grey ', Ribbentrop said ' Black, black, black '.

I listened to what Hitler said one day when Ribbentrop wasn't present: ' With Ribbentrop it is so easy, he is always so radical.

In July 1939, Ribbentrop's claims about Bonnet's alleged statement of December 1938 were to lead to a lengthy war of words via a series of letters to the French newspapers between Bonnet and Ribbentrop over just what precisely Bonnet had said to Ribbentrop.

In his funeral oration, Ribbentrop described the shooting as an attack by the Jews on the German people: " We understand the challenge, and we accept it ", he said.

* In science-fiction stories Samolot von Ribbentrop ( Von Ribbentrop's plane ) and Atomowa Ruletka ( Nuclear Roulette ) by Polish writer Andrzej Pilipiuk, " red mercury reactors " are used as highly efficient power sources, although no further information about either the substance or said reactors is given.

This led to a long war of words between the two foreign ministers in the summer of 1939 over just what precisely Bonnet actually said to Ribbentrop.

This investigation, based on a combination of surveillance, informants and hearsay, alleged that the Windsors, especially the duchess, had been passing secrets to the Nazis to wreck the Allies ' war effort, primarily through Ribbentrop, who was said to be Mrs. Simpson's lover.

As for the contradiction between German rearmament and his message of peace, Ribbentrop argued to whoever would listen that the German people had been “ humiliated ” by the Versailles treaty, that Germany wanted peace above all, and German violations of Versailles were part of an effort to restore Germany's " self-respect " By the 1930s, much of British opinion had been convinced that the treaty was monstrously unfair and unjust to Germany, so as a result, many in Britain like Thomas Jones were very open to Ribbentrop ’ s message that if only Versailles could be done away with, then European peace would be secured.

Ribbentrop believed the British aristocracy comprised some sort of secret society that ruled from behind the scenes, and if he could befriend enough members of Britain's " secret government ", he could bring about the alliance.

In September 1937, the British Consul in Munich, writing about the group Ribbentrop had brought to the Nuremberg Party Rally, reported that there were some " serious persons of standing among them " and that an equal number of Ribbentrop's British contingent were " eccentrics and few, if any, could be called representatives of serious English thought, either political or social, while they most certainly lacked any political or social influence in England ".

Since Hitler was not really interested in obtaining the former colonies, especially if the price was a brake on expansion into Eastern Europe, Ribbentrop was forced to turn down the Anglo-French offer that he had largely brought about.

By April 1938, Ribbentrop had ended all German arms shipments to China and had all of the German Army officers serving with the Kuomintang government of Chiang Kai-shek recalled ( with the threat that the families of the officers in China would be sent to concentration camps if the officers did not return to Germany immediately ).

Ribbentrop told the head of Hitler's Press Office, Fritz Hesse, that the Munich Agreement was " first-class stupidity ... All it means is that we have to fight the English in a year, when they will be better armed ... It would have been much better if war had come now ".

On 20 March 1939, Ribbentrop summoned the Lithuanian Foreign Minister Juozas Urbšys to Berlin and informed him that if a Lithuanian plenipotentiary did not arrive at once to negotiate turning over the Memelland to Germany the Luftwaffe would raze Kaunas to the ground.

Ribbentrop had used such extreme language, in particular his remark that if Germany had a different policy towards the Soviet Union then Poland would cease to exist, that it led to the Poles ordering partial mobilization and placing their armed forces on the highest state of alert on 23 March 1939.

Ribbentrop in turn sent out instructions to the German Ambassador in Warsaw, Count Hans-Adolf von Moltke, that if Poland agreed to the German demands, then Germany would ensure that Poland could partition Slovakia with Hungary and be ensured of German support for annexing the Ukraine.

The meeting ended with Ribbentrop screaming that if Poland were to invade the Free City, then Germany would go to war to destroy Poland.

On 25 May 1939, Ribbentrop sent a secret message to Moscow to tell the Soviet Foreign Commissar, Vyacheslav Molotov, that if Germany attacked Poland " Russia's special interests would be taken into consideration ".

When Ciano asked if there was anything Italy could do to broker a Polish-German settlement that would avert a war, he was told by Ribbentrop that " We want war !".

Ribbentrop expressed his firmly-held belief that neither Britain nor France would go to war for Poland, but if that should occur, he fully expected the Italians to honour the terms of the Pact of Steel ( which was both an offensive and defensive treaty ), and declare war not only on Poland, but on the Western powers if necessary.

Even if the British were serious in their warnings of war, Ribbentrop took the view that since a war with Britain was inevitable, the risk of a war with Britain was an acceptable one and accordingly he argued that Germany should not shy away from such challenges.

It would be a dangerous illusion to think that, if war once starts, it will come to an early end even if a success on any one of the several fronts on which it will be engaged should have been secured " Ribbentrop for his part told Hitler that Chamberlain's letter was just a bluff, and urged his master to call it.

On the night of 30 – 31 August 1939, Ribbentrop had an extremely heated exchange with the British Ambassador, Sir Nevile Henderson, who objected to Ribbentrop's demand, given at about midnight, that if a Polish plenipotentiary did not arrive in Berlin that night to discuss the German " final offer ", then the responsibility for the outbreak of war would not rest on the Reich.

When on the morning of 3 September 1939 Chamberlain followed through with his threat of a British declaration of war if Germany attacked Poland, a visibly shocked Hitler asked Ribbentrop " Now what?

But even in prison, Ribbentrop remained loyal to Hitler: " Even with all I know, if in this cell Hitler should come to me and say ' Do this!

Through Raeder expressed some worry in the first half of 1939 over the prospect of a war with Britain when the Plan Z had barely began, he accepted and believed in the assurances of Hitler and the Foreign Minister Joachim von Ribbentrop that neither Britain nor France would go to war if the Reich attacked Poland.

Strong British pressure for a warning to be delivered in Berlin made Bonnet reluctantly order Ambassador Robert Coulondre late on the afternoon of the 1st to warn Ribbentrop that if the Germans continued with their aggression, then France would declare on Germany.

If it were not ceded to Germany peacefully, Ribbentrop vowed, Memel " will be taken by other means if necessary ".