Lenin's death at the beginning of 1924 coincided with an exhaustive search by the USSR for a modus vivendi with the capitalist world. A relaxation of international tension was considered a prerequisite for the construction of socialism in one country, a policy dictated by the decreasing likelihood of imminent revolution on a world scale.

In laying the foundations of peaceful coexistence priority was given to the cultivation of relations with Britain. It was axiomatic with the Russians that reconciliation with Britain, the spearhead of the military efforts to crush the Soviet regime in its infancy as well as the post-war arbitrator of European affairs, would set the pace for acceptance by the rest of Europe. This study examines the British Government's various responses to the Soviet overtures. The scope of the work ranges from Labour's de jure recognition of the Soviet Union at the beginning of 1924 to the Conservatives' severance of relations in May 1927. The bulk of the study is set against the background of rapidly-deteriorating relations and traces the unsparing measures employed by the Russians to forestall an open breach.

Notwithstanding the pre-eminence which the Russians attached to relations with Britain, no comprehensive scholarly study of Anglo-Soviet relations in the 1920s has been undertaken. The neglect probably stems from the impact of the Second World War, which led historians to concentrate on the events immediately leading up to it and to pay little attention to a more remote but nevertheless significant period of international friction.