after the german–soviet non-aggression pact and germany's invasion of poland of 1939, and despite thälmann's loyalty to stalin during his time leading the kpd, moscow pragmatically removed a slogan for the 1939 international youth day which read in part, "long live comrade thälmann!" it was replaced with what read in part, "long live the wise foreign policy of the soviet union, guided by comrade stalin's instructions." it later became known that thälmann's long-time party rival walter ulbricht had ignored several requests for help from thälmann's family when a thawing in german–soviet relations could have made a release possible, preferring to let thälmann remain imprisoned; at the same time numerous german communists who had been close to thälmann had been murdered in stalin's camps in the 1930s.