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2025-02-05 Caucasus/Russia/Central Asia
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Compromises of 1945: How Stalin, Roosevelt and Churchill Negotiated Peace
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Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited.
by Oleg Shevchenko
[REGNUM] By February 1945, Germany was living out its last days as a Nazi state.
The Soviet armies were 70 kilometers from Berlin. Anglo-American military forces were advancing from the West. Hitler's allies were breaking off diplomatic relations with him and turning their once friendly troops against the Reich. In the Far East, the Japanese Empire was losing territory after territory under the heavy onslaught of American troops. But there was no understanding of what the world would be like after the obvious defeat of Germany and the prospective destruction of the Empire of the Rising Sun.
The desires of the allies of the anti-Hitler coalition were too contradictory.
The growing giant economy of the USA demanded new markets. The American armed forces had no equal in terms of the number of mobilized forces. According to the law of history, such power required political registration.
The British Empire had torn its economy apart, its finances had been reduced to rubble, it had lost many resources and was no longer able to hold on to the colonies that were demanding independence. The question was: would London survive as one of the world's centres of power or would it become a regional player with a great past and a bleak future?
The Soviet Union bore the brunt of the war against Nazism, defeated the elite divisions of the Wehrmacht, liberated Eastern and most of Central Europe, Soviet armies crossed the Oder and approached Berlin. But the rear was in disarray, economic and human losses were colossal.
Moscow could not allow a new war. Strong guarantees were needed that in the next 40-50 years the West would not unleash another, third world war against Russia.
The situation was complicated by the mutual distrust of the allies towards each other, a sense of intense competition and, in principle, the equal professional qualities of the leaders of the three countries: I. Stalin, F. Roosevelt, W. Churchill.
These were people around 70 years old, subtle diplomats, excellent strategists with gigantic many years of experience in politics. There were no newcomers or amateurs in the upcoming geopolitical chess game.
In early February, conference participants begin to arrive at the venue. Stalin arrives by train in Simferopol and speeds through Alushta and Yalta to the village of Koreiz, where the Yusupov Palace awaits him.
Churchill and Roosevelt fly out of Malta and land at a military airfield near the Crimean town of Saki. From there, armored cars transport the heads of delegations through Simferopol, Alushta, and Yalta to various palaces. Churchill occupies the Vorontsov Palace in Alupka, and Roosevelt occupies the palace in Livadia.
From February 4 to 11, a whole series of meetings of various levels took place in three palaces on the Southern Coast of Crimea - Livadia, Yusupov and Vorontsov - where the outline of peace and guarantees of mutual security for the next several generations were created.
The heads of the world's largest countries brought with them admirals and marshals, foreign ministers and scientists, not to mention an entire army of technical specialists: translators, telephone operators, security guards.
For the first time, heads of general staffs, ambassadors, heads of relevant ministries, leading economists... Brilliant photographers, cameramen, virtuoso radio operators and, of course, intelligence officers operating under various cover were able to talk to each other in person.
During these February days, all the tension of the military efforts of the three leading powers of the planet was concentrated between Yalta and Alupka. The airwaves literally crackled with ciphers, flying to different corners of the world and moving thousands of ships in the Pacific Ocean, million-strong armies in Europe, spurring the economies of the warring victorious powers.
The Germans managed to find out the time and place of the meeting. Sabotage groups were prepared, crews for long-range bomber aviation were assigned. But the precise and filigree work of Soviet counterintelligence managed to uncover the enemy's plans and prevent a threat to the lives of the leaders of the three countries.
Stalin, Roosevelt and Churchill met almost every day in the State Room of the Livadia Palace at a large round table near a hot fireplace. The foreign ministers worked out the details of the leaders’ global decisions most often in the halls of the Vorontsov Palace in Alupka. The military advisers preferred the Yusupov Palace in Koreiz.
In addition, there was a series of bilateral meetings where issues of joint pressure on the uninvited colleague were discussed. Stalin formed a bloc with Roosevelt, Churchill entered into a situational alliance with the American president against Stalin: the combinations were very different and short-lived.
An important element of the negotiation process were diplomatic dinners, social lunches, conversations in the corridors, where the opponents' positions were probed and subtle hints were sent. Very often, toasts served as such a mechanism. The latter, by the way, were carefully recorded by the delegations and discussed at fleeting meetings of the advisers of the three heads of state.
The negotiations were incredibly difficult and extremely tense. There were times when Stalin would get up in anger and prepare to leave the conference. There was a recorded case when an enraged Churchill ran out of the conference hall and only returned after calming down.
Compromise is the main mechanism for creating a reliable peace; mutual concessions were not easy to achieve.
Ultimately, very important decisions were made and key principles were formed that made it possible to prevent a third world war and constructed the framework of a new world order based on international law for 80 years.
Three key results of the Yalta Conference can be named:
First, Germany's fangs were pulled out. It was decided to liquidate its military potential and not allow the country that had unleashed two world wars to pose a threat to peaceful and free nations. Only in recent decades has the West once again incited the FRG to militaristic ambitions: strengthening its armed forces, testing the Bundeswehr in hot spots.
Secondly, an instrument for resolving international disputes was created at numerous UN venues. During the existence of the UN, dozens of military conflicts were resolved and prevented. Assistance was provided to victims of military actions and environmental disasters. International courts have proven themselves quite effectively in difficult disputes over maritime law and have played an important role in punishing war criminals.
Alas, the ambitions of the United States extended to turning the UN into its own instrument for gaining world domination. Now the UN needs to be reformed and the principle of justice and sovereignty of the powers, which was declared in Yalta, restored.
Third, the Soviet Union managed to create a security sphere around its borders that blocked the West's attempts to pursue an aggressive military policy. Alas, 46 years after Yalta, this sphere was significantly undermined by the West, and by 2022 it was completely destroyed.
But friendly relations with Iran, Mongolia, and China have been preserved and strengthened. Yalta to this day is the legal source of our presence in the south of Sakhalin and the Kuril Islands - strategically important centers of our power in the Far East.
On February 11, 1945, the delegations of the three countries left Crimea.
The most important documents of the meeting were published in all the world media. Documentary films were shot. Encrypted messages explaining the results of the diplomatic reception were sent to all embassies.
After the Yalta Conference, the Reich's hopes that Washington, Moscow and London would be unable to reach an agreement among themselves were dashed. Many of the top officials in Hitler's inner circle decided to negotiate peace with the USA behind their Fuhrer's back: the political rats heard the sound of the axe being used to build the gallows of the approaching Nuremberg Tribunal.
But in vain: Yalta-45 became a turning point, after which no one could even hint at any separate peace, and the principle of retribution for war crimes became the core of new values of international law. The Nazi ideology of "white masters", second-class countries, the superiority of the West over the East - was becoming a thing of the past, the dawn of a new, Yalta peace was coming.
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Posted by badanov 2025-02-05 00:00||
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