Preparations for the Last Summit

1. Preparations for the Last Summit • Matters of Dispute: • Germany – issue of reparations; question of division of Germany. • Poland – organization of the new Polish government; question of Polish-German boundaries. • Yugoslavian affairs – Question of Trieste and Yugoslav-Austrian border. • Central European affairs – Romania, Bulgaria, Hungary. • Japanese question. • Place of the conference determined – Potsdam, the old Prussian capital, nearby Berlin (therefore, conference is named “The Berlin (Potsdam) Conference). • Stalin’s goals. • Churchill’s Goals. • Truman’s goals. • De Gaulle in anger when knowing that he will not participate in the conference.

2. The Berlin (Potsdam) Conference July 17 – August 1, 1945 • Opening of the conference. Stalin asks Truman to be the chairman. • Discussions about the future of Germany. • Decision to bring war criminals – the Nazis and military personnel before tribunals in the liberated countries. • Decision to set up an Interallied Special Tribunal in Nuremberg for the leaders of Nazi Party and those holding posts of responsibility in Wermacht. • Each power could satisfy its requirements by requisitioning in its own zone, but the Soviets also received 25% of the industrial equipment in the British and American zones. • Soviet demand of two billion dollars worth of equipment from Ruhr. Stalin gives up this demand only at the last session fearing that Americans and British will ask for the partial control in the Soviet zone. • Question of Berlin. • Question of establishing the central government in Germany. • Decision to give the whole authority in Germany to the Control Council formed by the military leaders of the four occupation zones.

3. Polish Question at the Potsdam Conference • Question of the Polish Boundaries. • Mikolajczyk and Bierut found common language about the German-Polish border. Both asked for the frontier at the Western Neisse river. • Poles already in the control of the disputed area. Around 8 million Germans expelled or freed from the regions, which had to be given to Poland (Historically all these lands really belonged to Poland, but they had lost control over them several centuries before and they were already Germanized). • Western Neisse adopted as the new German-Polish boundary. • Question of the government not solved. Poles had to have free elections, but as soon as Stalin had complete control over the country, elections on the next year were not free at all. The only concession which he made, was that he agreed to appoint Mikolajczyk as the Prime Minister of the new government, but the overwhelming majority of ministers, were members of the Lublin government, including the major posts.

4. Less Significant Questions • Decision to evacuate Iran soon. • Decision to divide Austria into the occupation zones and organize free elections (surprisingly, it really worked out, though it took 10 years to re-establish Austria as an independent state). • Decision to open Russo-Turkish negotiations for revising the Montreux Convention. • Decision to maintain an international zone in Tangier, Morocco. • No decisions about the Soviet demand for the part of Italian colonies, freedom of navigation on all international waterways (Stalin opposed it). • British complaints about Romania and Bulgaria Stalin called “fairy tales”.

5. Atomic Diplomacy and Changes in the British Delegation • Successful tests at Alamogordo and Truman’s decision to notify Stalin about the new weapon, though without describing what it was. • Stalin’s reaction. Truman and Churchill thinking that he simply did not understood what the talk was about. • Stalin’s immediate orders after getting news from Truman. • The results of elections in Great Britain. Unexpected triumph of the British Labour Party. Clement Attlee replaces Winston Churchill at the conference. • Churchill about Attlee: “He is a sheep in the sheep’s clothing”. • Changes in the British delegation speeds up the real end of the conference.

6. Ultimatum to Japan and the End of the Conference • Working out the Potsdam Declaration about Japan. • Chiang Kai-shek gave his approval. • France was not even consulted on this question. • Ultimatum: • Japan would not be either destroyed as a nation or reduced to slavery or deprived of essential liberties; • Japanese armies had to surrender unconditionally, otherwise Japan “would lay herself open to complete and utter destruction”. • The end of the conference. • Conference results: was it a successful conference or not?