For several months Russia had been negotiating a treaty with Germany, with whom there were claims on both sides to be adjusted. Since Germany had been compelled by the Treaty of Versailles to renounce the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, there had been no new document to take its place. Before Russians and Germans arrived at Genoa, the treaty had not taken final form. But when the representatives of the two nations saw that the Entente Powers intended to settle their affairs for them by decisions secretly taken in pre-conference meetings from which they were excluded, they withdrew to Rapallo, where the treaty was signed. This disturbing news for the Entente Powers was announced on Easter Sunday. The Russo-German treaty provided for mutual waiving of war claims, with the stipulation that Russia should make no agreement with a third power except on similar terms, and for the resumption of full diplomatic relations. The Entente statesmen protested vigorously against the conclusion of a direct agreement of this character both to Dr. Rathenau and M. Tchitcherin, asserting that it anticipated and prejudiced the general principle of settlement with Russia, in which Germany’s interests were the same as those of the other nations. The Germans were accused of bad faith and the Russians of duplicity. Loudest in denunciation were Mr. Lloyd George and M. Barthou. When Germans and Russians both answered that the negotiations had begun long before the Genoa Conference, but that anyway, even if they had not, the two delegations, excluded from the secret conferences of the preceding fortnight, had only followed the example given them by the British and French delegations, there was a wrathful outburst. The assumption was that Great Britain and France had the right to do what they denied to Germany and Russia. Germany was a defeated nation. Russia was an outlaw nation. They should not forget their complete dependence upon the Entente Powers. There was truth in this contention in so far as Germany was concerned. Germany was at the mercy of the Entente Powers for the time being. But Russia was not at their mercy, and the Russian delegates did not see why any such illusion should be entertained by the Entente statesmen. When they demanded reciprocity in adjusting claims for damages and obligations contracted during the war, it did not occur to them that they were “insolent,” as Mr. Lloyd George put it, or “impudent,” as M. Barthou said. The only positive result of the Genoa conference was the Russo-German treaty. Tchitcherin and his colleagues rejected the conditions of the Entente Powers and left Genoa, declaring that they would never sign any agreement except on the basis of reciprocity in the fullest sense of the word. They did not intend to barter Russia’s economic independence for political recognition.