The Source of the Term Molotov Cocktail
David Landau
Human Rights Documents Online
In this article I have endeavored to examine Hämäläinen’s suggestion that the name
Molotov cocktail may have been first used by English speaking foreign correspondents,
and as such it was not a translation from Finnish. We do have two examples of the terms
appearing in British publications in the latter part of January 1940. However, one of them,
in Citrine’s book, is in a genitive mode which suggests a Finnish or Swedish origin, and
the other one is in an English form. Hämäläinen did not include Citrine’s book in his
extensive bibliography. For Hämäläinen to be correct, we should find an earlier evidence
of Molotoff cocktail in English press and demonstrate how it spread among the Finns
before the arrival of the British delegation on Wednesday, 24th January, 1940.