What was yalta ww2

The meeting was intended mainly to discuss the re-establishment of the nations of war-torn Europe. Within a few years, with the Cold War dividing the continent, Yalta had become a subject of intense controversy.

To a degree, it has remained controversial. Yalta was the second of three wartime conferences among the Big Three, preceded by the Tehran Conference in and followed by the Potsdam Conference in July , attended by Stalin, Churchill who was replaced halfway through by the newly elected British Prime Minister Clement Attlee , and Harry S.

The Yalta conference was a crucial turning point in the Cold War. All three leaders attempted to establish an agenda for governing post-war Europe and keep peace between post-war countries. On the Eastern Front, the front line at the end of December remained in the Soviet Union but by August , Soviet forces were inside Poland and Romania as part of their drive west. According to U. Stalin knew he would need the acceptance of the Western powers to achieve this.

Winston Churchill understood Stalin's goals. The pair had met in Moscow in October , and discussed the idea of carving Europe into spheres of influence for the USSR and the western powers. He also understood that the millions of Soviet troops that had pushed Germany out of central and eastern Europe far outnumbered the Allied forces in the west - and there was nothing the UK could do if Stalin chose to keep them there. The UK had declared war in September because Germany had invaded its ally, Poland, and Churchill was determined to ensure the country's freedom.

The UK however had also paid a heavy price for victory, and was now essentially bankrupt. Churchill hoped the US would support him and stand up to Stalin. But US President Roosevelt had his own priorities. He wanted Stalin to sign up to the United Nations - a new global peacekeeping body for the post-war world.

The president also wanted the Soviet Union to declare war on Japan. Though the tide had dramatically turned against the Japanese Empire, their forces were still inflicting heavy casualties on advancing US forces in the Pacific. Anxiety about a bloody invasion of the Japanese home islands loomed large in US strategic thinking. Although Roosevelt wanted to meet somewhere in the Mediterranean, Stalin - who had a fear of flying - instead offered up Yalta.

The three leaders had met before, at Tehran in Roosevelt was more willing to trust Stalin than was Churchill, who saw the Soviet leader as an increasingly dangerous threat.

After a week of talks, the Big Three announced their decisions to the world. Following its unconditional surrender, Germany would be broken apart.

The leaders agreed in principle to four occupation zones, one for each country at Yalta and also for France, and the same division of Berlin. A declaration also said Germany would pay reparations "to the greatest extent possible" , and a commission would be created in Moscow to determine how much they owed. The leaders also agreed to democratic elections throughout liberated Europe - including for Poland, which would have a new government "with the inclusion of democratic leaders from Poland itself and from Poles abroad".

The Soviet Union had already placed a provisional Communist government in Warsaw, which they agreed would be expanded. But democracy meant something very different to Stalin.

Though he publicly agreed to free elections for liberated Europe, his forces were already seizing key offices of state across central and eastern European countries for local communist parties.

Moreover, the leaders decided - at Stalin's urging - that Poland's borders were to move westward, giving land to the USSR. The Baltic States would also join the Soviet Union. Historian Anne Applebaum wrote in her text Iron Curtain that the leaders "decided the fate of whole swathes of Europe with amazing insouciance".

Roosevelt "half-heartedly" asked Stalin if the city of Lwow might stay a part of Poland, but did not push the idea, and it was quickly dropped. Roosevelt was more focused on his plan for the United Nations, and he got his wish. All three nations agreed to send delegates to San Francisco on 25 April , to help set up the new international organisation. Rising to power in an economically and politically unstable Germany, Adolf Code named Eureka, the Tehran Conference was the first time all three Allied leaders had ever been face to From July 10 through October 31, , pilots and support crews on both sides took to the Live TV.

This Day In History. History Vault. Pacific War While the war in Europe was winding down, Roosevelt knew the United States still faced a protracted struggle against Japan in the Pacific War, and wanted to confirm Soviet support in an effort to limit the length of and casualties sustained in that conflict. Poland and Eastern Europe Stalin took a hard line on the question of Poland, pointing out that within three decades, Germany had twice used the nation as a corridor through which to invade Russia.

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