![]() In fact the Red Army was in control of Poland where the USSR was in the process of setting up a communist government. Expansion of Communismĭespite agreeing at Yalta that free elections would be held in Eastern Europe after the defeat of Nazi Germany, there was little evidence at Potsdam that Stalin intended to allow them. At Potsdam, Truman chose to inform Stalin that the US possessed ‘a new weapon of unusual destructive force’. When first told about the success of the experiment, Truman is said to have remarked: if it works. Just before the Conference began, on 16 July 1945, the USA had successfully exploded an atomic bomb at their test site in the New Mexico desert. The first detonation of a nuclear weapon conducted as part of the Manhattan Project Although Truman began the conference with a positive view of Stalin – he is believed to have stated I can deal with Stalin - he became more impatient with the Soviets after the news of the atomic bomb emerged. He quickly ended the economic support that the Americans had been giving the Soviets through the Lend-Lease programme during the war. Truman made little secret of his dislike for communism and for Stalin personally. ![]() However, Truman was not so keen to work with Stalin. Roosevelt had believed that co-operation with Stalin was essential, not only because he needed the USSR to join the war against Japan, but also because he wanted the Soviet Union to be part of the new United Nations organisation. The US President, Franklin D Roosevelt, had died and been replaced by his Vice-President, Harry S Truman. ![]() While the meeting at Yalta had been reasonably friendly, the Potsdam Conference was fraught with disagreements, which were the result of some significant changes that had taken place since the Yalta Conference. The main objective of the Potsdam Conference was to finalise a post-war settlement and put into action all the things agreed at Yalta. See more Encyclopedia articles on: U.S.The next meeting of the Big Three took place in August 1945 at Potsdam, just outside Berlin. Copyright © 2022, Columbia University Press. The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, 6th ed. The vague wording and tentative provisions of the Potsdam Agreement, allowing a wide range of interpretation, have been blamed for its failure. The work of the Allied Control Council for Germany was at first blocked by France, which did not feel bound by an agreement to which it had not been party the council had not even begun to function when the rift caused by the cold war broke it up. (The atom bomb was not actually mentioned.) Rarely was any agreement so consistently breached as was the Potsdam Agreement. The so-called Potsdam Declaration issued (July 26) by the conference presented an ultimatum to Japan, offering that nation the choice between unconditional surrender and total destruction. A Council of Foreign Ministers was established to consider peace settlements. A mode for German reparations payments was outlined. The German population in these territories and in other parts of Eastern Europe was to be transferred to Germany. All former German territory E of the Oder and Neisse rivers was transferred to Polish and Soviet administration, pending a final peace treaty. The German economy was to be decentralized, and monopolies were to be broken up the development of agriculture was to be emphasized in reorganizing the German economy. The Allies set up a new system of rule for Germany, aimed at outlawing National Socialism and abolishing Nazi ideology, at disarming Germany and preventing its again becoming a military power, and at fostering democratic ideals and introducing representative and elective principles of government. The so-called Potsdam Agreement transferred the chief authority in Germany to the American, Russian, British, and French military commanders in their respective zones of occupation and to a four-power Allied Control Council for matters regarding the whole of Germany. The foreign ministers of the three nations were also present. The chief representatives were President Truman, Premier Stalin, Prime Minister Churchill, and, after Churchill's defeat in the British elections, Prime Minister Attlee. ![]() 2, 1945) of the principal Allies in World War II (the United States, the USSR, and Great Britain) to clarify and implement agreements previously reached at the Yalta Conference. Potsdam Conference, meeting (July 17–Aug.
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