Roosevelt Churchill and Stalin Yalta. “The impression was that Stalin had a better attitude towards Roosevelt than towards Churchill.
The Crimean (Yalta) Conference, the second meeting of the leaders of the countries of the anti-Hitler coalition - the USSR, the USA and Great Britain - during the Second World War (1939-1945), occupies an important chapter in the history of not only our country, but the whole world. Interest in it does not weaken, although 70 years have passed since the date of its holding.
The venue for the conference was not chosen immediately. Initially, it was proposed to hold a meeting in the UK, as equidistant from the USSR and the USA. Malta, Athens, Cairo, Rome and a number of other cities also appeared among the names of the proposed venues. I.V. Stalin insisted that the meeting be held in the Soviet Union, so that the heads of delegations and their entourage could see for themselves the damage that Germany had inflicted on the USSR.
The conference was held in Yalta on February 4-11, 1945, at a time when, as a result of the successful strategic operations of the Red Army fighting were transferred to German territory, and the war against Nazi Germany entered the final stage.
In addition to the official name, the conference had several codenames. Going to the Yalta conference, W. Churchill gave it the name "Argonaut", drawing an analogy with ancient Greek myths: he, Stalin and Roosevelt, like the Argonauts, go to the Black Sea coast for the Golden Fleece. Roosevelt responded to London by agreeing: "You and I are the direct heirs of the Argonauts." As you know, it was at the Conference in Yalta that the division of the spheres of influence of the three powers in the post-war world took place. The code name - "Island" - was given to the conference to mislead opponents, since one of the possible places for its holding was Malta.
The Conference was attended by the leaders of the three allied powers: Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR I.V. Stalin, Prime Minister of Great Britain W. Churchill, President of the United States of America F.D. Roosevelt.
In addition to the Heads of the Three Governments, members of the delegations also participated in the Conference. From Soviet Union- People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs of the USSR V.M. Molotov, People's Commissar of the Navy N.G. Kuznetsov, Deputy Chief of the General Staff of the Red Army General of the Army, Deputy People's Commissars for Foreign Affairs of the USSR A.Ya. Vyshinsky and I.M. Maisky, Marshal of Aviation S.A. Khudyakov, Ambassador to Great Britain F.T. Gusev, Ambassador to the USA A.A. Gromyko. From the United States of America - Secretary of State E. Stettinius, Chief of Staff of the President Admiral of the Navy W. Leahy, Special Assistant to the President G. Hopkins, Director of the Department of Military Mobilization Judge J. Byrnes, Chief of Staff of the American Army General of the Army J. Marshall, Commander-in-Chief of the Naval By US forces, Admiral of the Fleet E. King, Chief of Supply of the American Army, Lieutenant General B. Somervell, Administrator of Naval Transportation Vice Admiral E. Land, Major General L. Cooter, Ambassador to the USSR A. Harriman, Director of the European Department of State Department of State F. Matthews, Deputy Director of the Office of Special Political Affairs of the State Department A. Hiss, Assistant Secretary of State C. Bohlen along with political, military and technical advisers. From Great Britain - Minister of Foreign Affairs A. Eden, Minister of Military Transport Lord Leathers, Ambassador to the USSR A. Kerr, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs A. Cadogan, Secretary of the Military Cabinet E. Bridges, Chief of the Imperial General Staff Field Marshal A. Brooke, Chief of Staff of the Air Air Force Marshal C. Portal, First Sea Lord Admiral of the Fleet E. Cunningham, Chief of Staff of the Secretary of Defense General H. Ismay, Supreme Allied Commander, Mediterranean Theater Field Marshal Alexander, Chief of the British Military Mission in Washington Field Marshal Wilson, member of the British Military Mission in Washington Admiral Somerville along with military and diplomatic advisers.
The USSR prepared for the reception of high-ranking guests in Yalta in just two months, despite the fact that the Crimea suffered greatly from military operations. Destroyed houses, remnants of military equipment made an indelible impression on all participants of the conference, US President Roosevelt was even "horrified by the extent of the destruction caused by the Germans in the Crimea."
Preparations for the conference were launched on an all-Union scale. Equipment, furniture, products were brought to the Crimea from all over the USSR, specialists from construction organizations and the service sector arrived in Yalta. In Livadia, Koreiz and Alupka, several power plants were installed in two months.
Sevastopol was chosen as the parking place for the allied ships and vessels, where reserves of fuel, drinking and boiler water were created, berths, lighthouses, navigation and anti-submarine equipment were repaired, additional trawling was carried out in bays and along the fairway, and a sufficient number of tugs were prepared. Similar work was carried out in the Yalta port.
The conference participants were located in three Crimean palaces: the USSR delegation headed by I.V. Stalin in the Yusupov Palace, the US delegation led by F. Roosevelt in the Livadia Palace and the British delegation led by W. Churchill in the Vorontsov Palace.
The host party was responsible for the safety of the conference participants. Protection on land was provided by aviation and artillery special groups, from the sea - by the cruiser "Voroshilov", destroyers, submarines. In addition, Allied warships joined them. Since the Crimea is still within the range of the German air force based in northern Italy and Austria, an air attack was not ruled out. In order to repel the danger, 160 fleet aviation fighters and the entire air defense were allocated. Several bomb shelters were also built.
Four regiments of NKVD troops were sent to Crimea, including 500 officers and 1,200 operational workers specially trained to carry out security. In one night, the park around the Livadia Palace was surrounded by a four-meter fence. The attendants were forbidden to leave the territory of the palace. The strictest access regime was introduced, according to which two security rings were installed around the palaces, and after dark a third ring of border guards with service dogs was organized. Communication centers were organized in all the palaces, providing communication with any subscriber, and employees who spoke English were attached to all stations.
Official meetings of members of delegations and informal ones - dinners of heads of state - were held in all three palaces: in Yusupov, for example, I.V. Stalin and Winston Churchill discussed the transfer of people released from Nazi camps. Foreign Ministers Molotov, Stettinius (USA) and Eden (Great Britain) met in the Vorontsov Palace. But the main meetings were held at the Livadia Palace, the residence of the American delegation, despite the fact that this was contrary to diplomatic protocol. This was due to the fact that F. Roosevelt could not move independently without outside help. From February 4 to February 11, 1945, eight official meetings took place in the Livadia Palace.
The range of military and political issues discussed turned out to be very wide. The decisions that were taken at the conference had a great impact on accelerating the end of the war and the post-war order of the world.
During the conference, the Heads of the three powers demonstrated a desire for cooperation, mutual understanding and trust. Achieved unity on issues military strategy and maintaining coalition war. Together, powerful strikes by the Allied armies in Europe and the Far East were coordinated and planned.
At the same time, the decisions taken by the conference participants on the most complex issues of world politics, which were the result of compromises and mutual concessions, largely determined the development of international political events for a long time. Favorable opportunities were created for the effective operation of the post-war system international relations based on the principles of balance of interests, reciprocity, equality and cooperation in order to ensure global peace and security.
As a result of the work of the conference, the most important international legal documents were approved, such as the Declaration of Free Europe, documents on the basic principles for the creation of the international United Nations, which laid the foundation for relations between states.
Conditions were worked out for the treatment of defeated Germany by the Allies and questions about her future were resolved. The participants in the conference declared their unbending determination to liquidate German militarism and Nazism, agreed on France's participation in settling the German problem, on Poland's borders and the composition of its government, and on the conditions for the USSR's entry into the war against Japan. An important role in the course and results of the negotiations was played by the enormous growth in the international prestige of the Soviet Union, which was facilitated by the outstanding victories of the Soviet Armed Forces.
Nevertheless, there were serious disagreements between the conference participants on a number of issues. Representatives of the Western member countries of the anti-Hitler coalition had fears associated with the transformation of the USSR into a world-class power. However, the persistent desire of Soviet diplomacy to search for mutually acceptable solutions and adopt them on the basis of equality without imposing their opinion on others led to the fact that the documents approved at the conference were a reflection of the consent of its participants, and not the result of Soviet diktat.
The work of the Conference began with an examination of the situation on the European fronts. The heads of government of the three powers instructed the military headquarters to discuss at their meetings the issues of coordinating the offensive of the allied armies from the east and west. During the meetings on military issues, it was confirmed that on February 8, 1945, the Soviet offensive would begin on the western front. However, American and British military experts evaded the requests of the Soviet side to prevent the transfer of German troops from Norway and Italy to the Soviet-German front. In general terms, the interaction of strategic aviation forces was outlined. The coordination of the relevant operations was entrusted to the General Staff of the Soviet Army and the heads of allied military missions in Moscow.
During the Conference, the issue of the USSR's entry into the war in the Far East was also resolved. The secret agreement, signed on February 11, 1945, provided that the Soviet Union would enter the war against Japan two to three months after the surrender of Germany. In this regard, the conditions for the entry of the USSR into the war against Japan, which were put forward by I.V. Stalin: maintaining the status quo of the Mongolian People's Republic; the return to the Soviet Union of the southern part of Sakhalin and all the islands adjacent to it; internationalization of Dairen (Dalian) and restoration of the lease on Port Arthur as a naval base of the USSR; resumption of a joint venture with China (with essential interests of the Soviet Union) exploitation of the East China and South Manchuria railways; transfer of the Kuril Islands to the USSR.
This agreement specified the general principles of allied policy, which were recorded in the Cairo Declaration, signed by the United States, Britain and China and published on December 1, 1943.
Since the prospect of the USSR entering the war with Japan assumed its defeat in the near future, this political agreement determined the boundaries of the possible advance of the Soviet Armed Forces in the Far East.
The leaders of the three great powers discussed the political issues that were to arise after the defeat of Germany. They agreed on plans for the enforcement of the terms of unconditional surrender and general principles for the treatment of a defeated Germany. Allied plans provided, first of all, the division of Germany into occupation zones. The conference confirmed the agreements developed by the European Consultative Commission "On the zones of occupation of Germany and on the management of Greater Berlin", as well as "On the control mechanism in Germany".
According to the terms of the agreement “On the zones of occupation of Germany and on the management of Greater Berlin”, the armed forces of the three powers were to occupy strictly defined zones during the occupation of Germany. The Soviet Armed Forces were to occupy the eastern part of Germany. The northwestern part of Germany was assigned to be occupied by British troops, the southwestern - by Americans. The Greater Berlin area was to be occupied jointly by the armed forces of the USSR, the USA and England. The northeastern part of "Greater Berlin" was intended to be occupied by Soviet troops. The zones for the troops of England and the USA have not yet been determined.
The agreement "On the Control Mechanism in Germany", signed on November 14, 1944, stated that the supreme power in Germany during the period of fulfillment of its basic requirements of unconditional surrender would be exercised by the commanders-in-chief of the armed forces of the USSR, the USA and England, each in his own zone of occupation according to instructions their governments. On matters affecting Germany as a whole, the commanders-in-chief would have to act jointly as members of the Supreme Control Organ, which would henceforth be known as the Control Council for Germany. Extending these regulations, the Crimean Conference decided to grant the zone in Germany also to France at the expense of the British and American zones of occupation and to invite the French government to join the Control Council for Germany as a member.
When discussing the German question at the Crimean Conference, the leaders of the United States and Great Britain insisted on making a decision to create a commission to study the question of the post-war structure of Germany and the possibility of its dismemberment. However, the Anglo-American plans for the dismemberment of Germany did not receive the approval of the Soviet delegation.
The point of view of the Soviet Union on the future of Germany was well known from the very beginning of the war from the speeches of the Soviet leaders. The USSR rejected the policy of revenge, national humiliation and oppression. At the same time, the leaders of the three powers declared their determination to carry out important measures in relation to defeated Germany: to disarm and disband all German armed forces; destroy the German General Staff; determine punishment for Nazi war criminals; destroy the Nazi Party, Nazi laws, organizations and institutions.
A special place at the conference was occupied by the question of German reparations, initiated by the USSR. The Soviet government demanded that Germany compensate for the damage inflicted on the allied countries by Hitler's aggression. The total amount of reparations was to be 20 billion dollars, of which the USSR claimed 10 billion dollars. The Soviet government proposed that reparations be collected in kind - in the form of a one-time withdrawal from Germany's national wealth and annual commodity deliveries from current production.
The collection of reparations through a one-time withdrawal from the national wealth (equipment, machine tools, ships, rolling stock, German investments abroad, etc.) was envisaged mainly with the aim of destroying Germany's military potential. The conference took into account the experience of resolving the reparation problem after the First World War, when Germany was required to compensate for damage in foreign currency and when the reparation issue, in the final analysis, contributed not to weakening, but to strengthening Germany's military potential.
During the discussion of this issue, the leaders of the United States and Great Britain were forced to admit the validity of the Soviet proposals for reparations from Germany. As a result of the negotiations, a protocol was signed, which was published in full only in 1947. It set out the general principles for resolving the reparation issue and outlined the forms for collecting reparations from Germany. The protocol provided for the establishment in Moscow of an inter-Allied reparations commission consisting of representatives of the USSR, the USA and Great Britain. The minutes indicated that the Soviet and American delegations agreed to base their work on the proposal of the Soviet government on the total amount of reparations and on the allocation of 50 percent of it for the USSR.
Thus, despite their disagreements, at the Crimean Conference, the Allied Powers adopted agreed decisions not only on the complete defeat of Germany, but also on a common policy in the German question after the end of the war.
An important place among the decisions of the Crimean Conference was occupied by the Declaration on Liberated Europe. It was a document on the coordination of policies in helping the peoples liberated from fascist occupation. The Allied Powers declared that general principle their policy towards the countries of liberated Europe is to establish an order that will allow the peoples to "destroy the last traces of Nazism and fascism and establish democratic institutions of their own choice." The Crimean Conference showed an example of the practical solution of such problems in relation to two countries - Poland and Yugoslavia.
The "Polish question" at the conference was one of the most difficult and debatable. The Crimean Conference was supposed to decide on the eastern and western borders of Poland, as well as on the composition of the future Polish government.
Poland, which before the war was largest country Central Europe, has sharply decreased and moved to the west and north. Until 1939, its eastern border passed almost near Kyiv and Minsk. The western border with Germany was located east of the river. Oder, while most of the Baltic coast also belonged to Germany. In the east of the pre-war historical territory of Poland, the Poles were a national minority among Ukrainians and Belarusians, while part of the territories in the west and north inhabited by Poles were under German jurisdiction.
The USSR received the western border with Poland along the "Curzon Line", established in 1920, with a retreat from it in some areas from 5 to 8 km in favor of Poland. In fact, the border returned to the position at the time of the division of Poland between Germany and the USSR in 1939 under the Treaty of Friendship and Border between the USSR and Germany, the main difference from which was the transfer of the Bialystok region to Poland.
Although Poland by the beginning of February 1945, as a result of the offensive of the Soviet troops, was already under the rule of a provisional government in Warsaw, recognized by the governments of the USSR and Czechoslovakia (Edvard Benes), there was a Polish government in exile in London (Prime Minister Tomas Archiszewski), which did not recognize decision of the Tehran Conference on the Curzon line and therefore could not, according to the USSR, the USA and Great Britain, claim power in the country after the end of the war. The instruction of the government-in-exile for the Home Army, drawn up on October 1, 1943, contained the following instructions in the event of an unauthorized entry of Soviet troops into the pre-war territory of Poland by the Polish government: agreement with the Polish government - at the same time declaring that the country will not interact with the Soviets. At the same time, the government warns that in the event of the arrest of representatives of the underground movement and any repressions against Polish citizens, the underground organizations will go over to self-defense.”
The allies in the Crimea were aware that “A new situation was created in Poland as a result of full release its Red Army. As a result of a long discussion of the Polish question, a compromise agreement was reached, according to which a new government of Poland was created - the "Provisional Government of National Unity", on the basis of the Provisional Government of the Polish Republic "with the inclusion of democratic figures from Poland itself and Poles from abroad." This decision, implemented in the presence of Soviet troops, allowed the USSR to further form in Warsaw a political regime that suited it, as a result of which clashes between pro-Western and pro-communist formations in this country were resolved in favor of the latter.
The agreement reached at Yalta on the Polish question was undoubtedly a definite step towards resolving one of the most controversial issues of the post-war order of the world. The conference did not accept the Anglo-American plan to replace the Provisional Polish Government with some new government. From the decisions of the conference it became clear that the existing Provisional Government should become the core of the future Government of National Unity.
At the suggestion of the USSR, the Crimean Conference discussed the question of Yugoslavia. It was about speeding up the formation of a unified Yugoslav government on the basis of an agreement concluded in November 1944 between the chairman of the National Committee for the Liberation of Yugoslavia, I. Tito, and the Prime Minister of the Yugoslav government in exile in London, I. Subašić. According to this agreement, the new Yugoslav government was to be formed from the leaders of the national liberation movement with the participation of several representatives of the Yugoslav government in exile. But the latter, with the support of the British government, hindered the implementation of the agreement.
After discussing the Yugoslav question, the conference adopted the proposal of the USSR with amendments by the British delegation. This decision was a great political support for the national liberation movement of Yugoslavia.
An important place in the work of the Crimean Conference was occupied by the problem of ensuring international security in the postwar years. Great value had the decision of the three allied powers to create a universal international organization to maintain peace.
The leaders of the three powers succeeded at Yalta in resolving the important question of the voting procedure in the Security Council, on which no agreement was reached at the Dumbarton Oaks conference. As a result, Roosevelt's "principle of the veto" was adopted, that is, the rule of unanimity of the great powers when voting in the Security Council on peace and security issues.
The leaders of the three allied powers agreed to convene a conference of the United Nations on April 25, 1945, in San Francisco to prepare a charter for an international security organization. The conference was supposed to invite countries that signed the United Nations declaration on January 1, 1942, and those countries that declared war on a common enemy by March 1, 1945.
During the work of the Crimean Conference, a special declaration "Unity in the organization of peace, as well as in the conduct of war" was adopted. It stated that the states represented at Yalta confirm their determination to preserve and strengthen in the coming period of peace that unity of action that made victory in the war possible and certain for the United Nations. This was a solemn undertaking by the three great powers to preserve in the future the principles of the mighty anti-fascist coalition formed during the Second World War. One manifestation of this determination was the agreement to establish a permanent mechanism for regular consultation between the three Foreign Ministers. This mechanism was called the "Conference of Ministers of Foreign Affairs". The conference decided that the ministers would meet every 3-4 months alternately in the capitals of Great Britain, the USSR and the USA.
The Crimean Conference of the leaders of the USSR, the USA and Great Britain had a great historical meaning. It was one of the largest international conferences during the war and the high point of cooperation between the three allied powers in waging war against a common enemy. The adoption by the Crimean Conference of agreed decisions on important issues is a convincing proof of the possibility and effectiveness of international cooperation states with different social order. In the presence of good will, the Allied Powers, even in the face of the most acute differences, were able to reach agreements imbued with the spirit of unity.
Thus, the decisions of the Crimean Conference strengthened the anti-fascist coalition in final stage war and contributed to the achievement of victory over Germany. The struggle for the comprehensive and complete implementation of these decisions became one of the main tasks of the Soviet Union. foreign policy not only at the end of the war, but also in the post-war years. And although the Yalta decisions were carried out exactly only by the Soviet Union, they, nevertheless, were an example of the military commonwealth of the "Big Three" during the war years.
All the work of the Crimean Conference proceeded under the sign of the immeasurably increased international prestige of the Soviet Union. The results of the work of the heads of the three allied governments served as the basis for those democratic, peace-loving principles for the post-war structure of Europe, which were developed by the Potsdam Conference shortly after the victory over fascist Germany. The bipolar world created in Yalta and the division of Europe into East and West survived for more than 40 years, until the end of the 1980s.
Prokhorovskaya A.I.
Senior Researcher, 3rd Department of the Research
Institute ( military history) Military Academy
General Staff of the RF Armed Forces
candidate historical sciences
The Crimean (Yalta) conference of the leaders of the governments of the three allied powers of the anti-Hitler coalition: the USSR, the USA and Great Britain was held from February 4 to 11, 1945. The Livadia Palace, which became the venue for official meetings, is associated with this event of world significance. In addition, during the conference, the Livadia Palace was the residence of US President F.D. Roosevelt and other members of the American delegation, for whom 43 rooms were prepared. The British delegation was accommodated in the Vorontsov Palace in Alupka. The Soviet delegation headed by I. V. Stalin - in the Yusupov Palace in Koreiz.
The composition of the delegations:
USSR
Head of delegation-- I.V. Stalin, Secretary of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks, Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars, People's Commissar of Defense,
Supreme Commander Armed Forces, Chairman of the Headquarters of the Supreme High Command, Chairman State Committee Defense Marshal.
V.M. Molotov - People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs;
N.G. Kuznetsov - People's Commissar navy, admiral of the fleet;
A.I. Antonov - Deputy Chief of the General Staff of the Red Army, General of the Army;
AND I. Vyshinsky - Deputy People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs;
THEM. Maisky - Deputy People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs;
S.A. Khudyakov - Chief of Staff of the Air Force, Air Marshal;
F.T. Gusev - Ambassador to Great Britain;
A.A. Gromyko - Ambassador to the USA;
V.N. Pavlov - translator.
USA
Head of delegation- F.D. Roosevelt, US President.
E. Stettinius - Secretary of State;
W. Leahy - Chief of Staff of the President, Admiral of the Fleet;
G. Hopkins - Special Assistant to the President;
J. Byrnes - Director of the Department of Military Mobilization;
J. Marshall - Army Chief of Staff, Army General;
E. King - Commander-in-Chief naval forces, admiral of the fleet;
B. Somervell - Chief of Supply, US Army, Lieutenant General;
E. Land - Naval Transportation Administrator, Vice Admiral;
L. Kuter - Representative of the US Air Force Command, Major General;
A. Harriman - Ambassador to the USSR;
F. Matthews - Director of the European Division of the State Department;
A. Hiss - Deputy Director of the Office for Special Political Affairs of the State Department;
Ch. Bohlen - translator.
Great Britain
Head of delegation- W. Churchill, Prime Minister, Minister of Defense.
A. Eden - Minister of Foreign Affairs;
Lord G. Leathers - Minister of War Transport;
A. Cadogan - Permanent Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs;
A. Bruk - head of the imperial general staff, field marshal;
H. Ismay - Chief of Staff of the Secretary of Defense;
Ch. Portal - Chief of Staff of the Air Force, Air Marshal;
E. Cunningham - First Sea Lord, Admiral of the Fleet;
H. Alexander - Supreme Commander of the Allied Forces in the Mediterranean Theater of Operations, Field Marshal;
G. Wilson - head of the British military mission in Washington, field marshal;
J. Somerville - member of the British military mission in Washington, admiral;
A. Kerr - Ambassador to the USSR;
A. Beers - translator.
In addition to members of official delegations, experts from the diplomatic and military departments of the three powers took part in the conference.
Also during the meeting in Yalta were Roosevelt's daughter Anna, Churchill's daughter Sarah, Hopkins' son Robert, and Harriman's daughter Kathleen.
Timeline of major events
January 1945
- Work has been carried out to prepare the palaces of the South Coast for the conference.
- Arrival of members of the US and British delegations to the Crimea, their accommodation in the Livadia and Vorontsov Palaces.
- Meeting of Stalin and Winston Churchill. Vorontsov Palace.
- Meeting of I. Stalin and F.D. Roosevelt. Livadia Palace.
- The first official meeting of the conference. Livadia Palace.
- Dinner, which was attended by F. Roosevelt, J. Stalin, W. Churchill, a number of members of the delegations of the three powers. Livadia Palace.
- The first meeting of military advisers of the three powers. Korean Palace.
- Meeting of foreign ministers of the three powers. Korean Palace.
- The second official meeting of the conference. Livadia Palace.
- Meeting of the Anglo-American Joint Chiefs of Staff. Alupka Palace.
- The second meeting of the military advisers of the three powers. Korean Palace.
- First meeting of foreign ministers. Livadia Palace.
- The third official meeting of the conference. Livadia Palace.
- Second meeting of foreign ministers. Korean Palace.
- The fourth official meeting of the conference. Livadia Palace.
- Meeting of the Anglo-American Joint Chiefs of Staff. Livadia Palace
- Third meeting of foreign ministers. Vorontsov Palace.
- Meeting of military advisers to the American and Soviet delegations. Korean Palace.
- Meeting of I. Stalin and F. Roosevelt. Discussion of the Far East issue. Livadia Palace.
- Fifth official meeting of the conference. Livadia Palace
- Dinner, which was attended by I. Stalin, F. Roosevelt, W. Churchill and a number of members of the delegations of the three powers. Korean Palace.
- Meeting of the Anglo-American Joint Chiefs of Staff. Livadia Palace.
- Meeting of the Anglo-American Joint Chiefs of Staff with the participation of F. Roosevelt and W. Churchill. Livadia Palace.
- Fourth meeting of foreign ministers. Livadia Palace.
- Meeting of military advisers to the American and Soviet delegations. Livadia Palace.
- Meeting of I. Stalin and F. Roosevelt. Livadia Palace.
- Photographing conference participants. Livadia Palace.
- Sixth official meeting of the conference. Livadia Palace.
- Fifth Foreign Ministers' Meeting. Korean Palace.
On the penultimate day of the conference, several meetings of the heads of delegations took place, preceding the next official meeting.
- Sixth Foreign Ministers' Meeting. Vorontsov Palace.
- Seventh official meeting of the conference. Livadia Palace.
- Dinner, which was attended by I. Stalin, F. Roosevelt, W. Churchill and a number of members of the delegations of the three powers. Vorontsov Palace.
- Eighth official meeting of the conference. Livadia Palace.
- Signing of the final documents by the heads of delegations. Livadia Palace.
- Final meeting of foreign ministers. Livadia Palace.
F. Roosevelt left the Crimea on February 12. W. Churchill stayed in Sevastopol for two days to see the battlefields of British troops during the Crimean War of 1853-1856. He left Crimea on 14 February.
Conference decisions
The results of the negotiations were reflected in the final documents of the conference.
The conference communiqué began with the section “The Defeat of Germany”, which stated that “Nazi Germany is doomed” and “the German people, trying to continue their hopeless resistance, only makes the price of their defeat more difficult”, for the speedy achievement of which the Allied Powers joined military efforts, exchanged information , fully agreed and planned in detail the timing, size and coordination of new and even more powerful attacks that will be launched in the heart of Germany by our armies and air forces from the east, west, north and south.
The parties agreed on a common policy and plans for the forced implementation of the terms of Germany's unconditional surrender: zones of occupation; coordinated administration and control through a special body composed of the commanders-in-chief of the three powers with headquarters in Berlin; granting France, "if she so desires", a zone of occupation and a place in the control body.
The powers of the anti-Hitler coalition declared that their "inexorable goal is the destruction of German militarism and Nazism and the creation of guarantees that Germany will never again be able to disturb the peace of the whole world." For this, a whole range of measures was envisaged, “including the complete disarmament, demilitarization and dismemberment of Germany”, as well as the collection of reparations, the amounts and methods of payment of which were to be determined by a special commission in Moscow.
To maintain peace and security, the Allies decided to create a universal international organization, for the preparation of the Charter of which, on April 25, 1945, a United Nations conference was convened in San Francisco. At the same time, it was established that the principle of unanimity of permanent members would operate in the Security Council of this organization, and the United States and Great Britain would support the proposal for admission to the initial membership in the organization of the Ukrainian SSR and the Byelorussian SSR.
In the "Declaration on a Liberated Europe", the Allies proclaimed: "coordination of the policies of the three powers and their joint actions in resolving the political and economic problems of a liberated Europe in accordance with democratic principles."
On the complex Polish issue, the parties agreed to reorganize the Provisional Government of Poland "... on a broader democratic basis with the inclusion of democratic figures from Poland itself and Poles from abroad." The eastern border of Poland was determined along the "Curzon Line" with a retreat from it in some areas from five to eight kilometers in favor of Poland, and in the north and west it was to receive "significant increments of territory."
On the question of Yugoslavia, the three powers recommended the formation of a Provisional United Government composed of representatives of the National Committee for the Liberation of Yugoslavia and the royal government in exile, as well as a Provisional Parliament.
At the conference, it was decided to create a permanent mechanism for consultations between the three foreign ministers, whose meetings were planned to be held every 3-4 months.
In accordance with the agreement signed by the three leaders, the USSR undertook to enter the war against Japan two to three months after the surrender of Germany and the end of the war in Europe, provided:
- “Preserving the status quo of Outer Mongolia (Mongolian People's Republic);
- Restoration of the rights belonging to Russia, violated by the perfidious attack of Japan in 1904, namely:
a) the return to the Soviet Union of the southern part of about. Sakhalin and all adjacent islands;
c) the internationalization of the commercial port of Dairen with the provision of the predominant interests of the Soviet Union in this port and the restoration of the lease on Port Arthur as a naval base of the USSR;
c) joint exploitation of the Chinese-Eastern and South-Manchurian railway, giving access to Dairen, on the basis of organizing a mixed Soviet-Chinese Society with ensuring the predominant interests of the Soviet Union, while it is understood that China retains full sovereignty in Manchuria;
- Transfer of the Kuril Islands to the Soviet Union.
The USSR expressed its readiness to conclude with China "a pact of friendship and alliance ... to assist it with its armed forces in order to liberate China from the Japanese yoke."
At the conference, bilateral agreements were also signed that determined the procedure for the treatment of prisoners of war and civilians of the states parties to the agreements in the event of their release by the troops of the allied countries, as well as the conditions for their repatriation.
At the Crimean (Yalta) conference of 1945, the foundations of the post-war world order were laid, which lasted almost the entire second half of the 20th century, and some of its elements, such as the UN, still exist.
Or the meeting of the leaders of the USSR, USA and Great Britain Joseph Stalin, Franklin Roosevelt and Winston Churchill, all researchers and historians call historical. It was on it, in the period from February 4 to February 11, 1945, that a number of decisions were made that for decades to come determined the way of Europe and the world as a whole.
At the same time, the meeting of the "Big Three" was not limited to the adoption of geopolitical decisions. There were formal and informal receptions, informal meetings, stops along the way, many of which are still shrouded in mystery.Not Malta, not Sicily, not Rome. To Yalta!
The first meeting between Stalin, Roosevelt and Churchill took place in November 1943 in Tehran. It determined the preliminary dates for the Allied landings in Europe in 1944.
Immediately after Tehran-43 and the landing of allied forces in France in June 1944, the heads of the three states in personal correspondence began to probe the ground for a meeting. According to historians, it was US President Franklin Roosevelt who first raised the topic of a new conference, or, as they say now, a summit. In one of his messages to Stalin, he writes: "A meeting should soon be arranged between you, the Prime Minister and myself. Mr. Churchill fully agrees with this idea."
The meeting was originally supposed to take place in Northern Scotland, Ireland, then on the island of Malta. Cairo, Athens, Rome, Sicily and Jerusalem were also mentioned as possible meeting places. However, the Soviet side, despite the objections of the Americans, insisted on holding the conference on its territory.
Churchill, like the Americans, did not want to go to the Crimea and noted in a letter to Roosevelt that "there is a terrible climate and conditions."
Nevertheless, the southern coast of Crimea and specifically Yalta, which was less destroyed after the occupation, was chosen as the meeting place.
"Eureka" and "Argonaut"
What Stalin allowed the British Prime Minister, who did not want to go to the Crimea so much, was to give the code name for the conference, which was mentioned in secret correspondence. Namely "Argonaut". Grumpy Churchill proposed this name, as if drawing a parallel between the ancient heroes of ancient Greek myths, who went to the Black Sea region for the Golden Fleece, and the participants in the Yalta Conference, who go to almost the same places, but the "Golden Fleece" for them will be the future of the world and the division of spheres of influence .
Greek mythology hung invisibly in the relationship of the "Big Three". It is no coincidence that the Tehran meeting of 1943 was held under the code name "Eureka". According to legend, it was with this legendary exclamation ("Found!") that Archimedes from Syracuse discovered the law that "on a body immersed in a liquid ...".
It is no coincidence that Tehran-43 showed the rapprochement of the positions of the heads of the three great powers, who really found a common language and ways to full-fledged cooperation.
Planes, anti-aircraft guns, ships and armored trains: safety is paramount
Although the war was in its final stages in February 1945, increased attention was paid to the security issues of the participants in the Yalta Conference.
According to the Russian writer and historian Alexander Shirokorad, which he cites in his publication in the Independent Military Review, thousands of Soviet, American and British security personnel, ships and aircraft were involved in ensuring the safe conduct of the meeting. Black Sea Fleet and the US and British navies. On the part of the United States, units of the Marine Corps participated in the protection of the president.
The air defense of the Saki airfield, which only received delegations, consisted of more than 200 anti-aircraft guns. The batteries were designed for seven-layer fire at a height of up to 9000 m, aimed fire at a height of 4000 m and barrage fire at a distance of up to 5 km to the airfield. The sky above it covered over 150 Soviet fighters.
In Yalta, 76 anti-aircraft guns and almost 300 anti-aircraft guns and heavy machine guns were deployed. Any aircraft that appeared over the conference area was to be shot down immediately.
The protection of highways was provided by personnel of seven checkpoints consisting of more than 2 thousand people.
When motorcades of delegations participating in the conference passed along the entire route, all other traffic stopped, and residents were evicted from residential buildings and apartments overlooking the highway - their place was taken by state security officers. About five regiments of the NKVD and even several armored trains were additionally transferred to the Crimea to ensure security.
To protect Stalin, together with the Soviet delegation in the Yusupov Palace in the village of Koreiz, 100 state security officers and a battalion of NKVD troops in the amount of 500 people were allocated. For foreign delegations arriving with their own guards and security services, the Soviet side external guards and commandants for the premises occupied by them were allocated. Soviet automobile units were allocated to each foreign delegation.
There is no reliable evidence that Hitler intended to assassinate his opponents in the Crimea. Yes, and he was not up to it then, when Soviet troops were already a hundred kilometers from the walls of Berlin.
Russian hospitality: caviar with cognac, but without bird's milk
The Saki airfield became the main airfield for receiving delegations arriving in the Crimea. The Sarabuz airfields near Simferopol, Gelendzhik and Odessa were considered as spares.
Stalin and the delegation of the Soviet government arrived in Simferopol by train on February 1, after which they went by car to Yalta.
The planes of Churchill and Roosevelt landed in Saki with an interval of about one hour. Here they were met by People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs Vyacheslav Molotov, other high-ranking officials of the USSR. In general, 700 people were brought to Crimea from Malta, where the meeting between the American president and the British prime minister was held the day before, who were part of the official delegations of the United States and Great Britain at meetings with Stalin.
According to the first researcher of the unofficial nuances of the Yalta meeting, the Crimean historian and local historian Vladimir Gurkovich, with whom the correspondent of RIA Novosti (Crimea) spoke, the Allied delegations were greeted with great fanfare. In addition to the obligatory formation of guards of honor and other honors in this case, the Soviet side also arranged a grand reception not far from the airfield.
In particular, three large tents were set up, where there were tables with glasses of sweet tea with lemon, bottles of vodka, cognac, champagne, plates with caviar, smoked sturgeon and salmon, cheese, boiled eggs, black and white bread. This is despite the fact that food cards were still in force in the USSR, and Crimea was liberated from the invaders less than a year ago.
Gurkovich's book about everyday and unofficial details of the Yalta Conference was published in 1995 and became the first such publication on this topic. The local historian collected testimonies of participants in the events still alive at that time: guards - employees of the NKVD, cooks, waiters, pilots, providing a "clear sky" over the Crimea.
He says that, according to one of the chefs who prepared meals for the reception at the Saki airfield, there were no restrictions on food and drinks.
“Everything had to be at the highest level, and our country had to confirm this level. And the tables were really bursting with all kinds of delicacies,” the Crimean local historian notes.
And this is only on the tables of official delegations. And American and British pilots were received at the Pirogov Saki military sanatorium, where about 600 places were prepared for them. Russian hospitality manifested itself here as well. They were prepared according to the menu, approved by a special order of the head of the rear of the Black Sea Fleet. According to eyewitnesses, the tables were also bursting with abundance: they had everything except bird's milk.
Churchill smoked a cigar in Simferopol, and Stalin shaved in Alushta
In fact, this stop of the Prime Minister of Great Britain in Simferopol, in the house at 15 Schmidt Street, cannot be called secret. Along the route of the corteges from Sak, several places of possible stops for rest were provided. One of them was in Simferopol, and the second in Alushta. The first of them was used by Churchill on his way to Yalta, and the second by Stalin.
The house on Schmidt Street in Simferopol was previously a reception house, or otherwise a hotel of the Council of People's Commissars of the Crimean ASSR. During the occupation, high-ranking officers of the Wehrmacht lived there, so the building and the interior were quite well-groomed and ready to receive distinguished guests.
Sir Winston Leonard Spencer-Churchill was a famous lover of cognac and cigars, which he used without sparing his health. When flying from Malta, and this is a rather long journey, he sent a telegram to Stalin that he was already on the flight and "had already had breakfast." And at the airfield in Saki, the allies were greeted with no less warm hospitality, with Armenian cognac and champagne for the British prime minister.
As Vladimir Gurkovich notes, there is nothing unusual about Churchill's stop in Simferopol. He, most likely, needed time in order to "come to his senses, think and again smoke a cigar". And he stayed in the guest house for no more than an hour, and indeed, going out onto the balcony, according to one of the state security officers, he smoked a traditional cigar.
Gurkovich also provides evidence that the chairman of the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR, Joseph Stalin, after arriving in the Crimea, stayed in Alushta - at the so-called dacha "Dove" of the retired tsarist general Golubov, on the first floor. “Here he rested and shaved,” testified the archival record found by Gurkovich.
"Dove" is also notable for the fact that it was here that the future heir to the throne Nikolai Alexandrovich (Nicholas II) and his future wife Alexandra Feodorovna stayed in 1894, after the blessing of their marriage by Emperor Alexander III, dying in Livadia.
Franklin Delano Roosevelt from Sak immediately went to the Livadia Palace without stopping.
Roosevelt and Churchill visited Sevastopol after the conference, which lay in ruins. And the British Prime Minister visited Balaklava, where one of his ancestors died in Crimean War(the first defense of Sevastopol in 1854-1855). However, he does not mention this trip in his memoirs.
Stalin to the Yusupovs, Roosevelt to the Romanovs, Churchill to the Vorontsovs
The main venue for the meeting was Livadia, the former estate of Russian emperors, starting with Alexander II. The famous Livadia Palace was built in 1911 by the architect Nikolai Krasnov for the last of the Romanovs, Nicholas II.
It was the Livadia Palace that was identified as the main residence of the US delegation at the talks, which was headed by Roosevelt. The President of the United States has been wheelchair-bound since 1921 due to polio and has had limited mobility. Therefore, Stalin, in order not to once again jeopardize Roosevelt's health and create comfortable conditions for him, appointed Livadia for work - both to accommodate the US delegation and meetings of the Big Three summit.
Churchill and the British delegation got the no less luxurious palace of the Governor-General of Novorossia Count Vorontsov in Alupka, which was built according to the project of the English architect Edward Blore.
Stalin chose the palace of Prince Yusupov in Koreiz for his residence.
A number of researchers note that this location was chosen, allegedly not by chance: Koreiz is located between Alupka and Livadia, and Stalin could observe all the movements of the allies.
To put it mildly, this is not so, or not quite so. Surveillance and wiretapping services of the Soviet state security worked at a high level, so it is unlikely that Stalin would draw back the curtain and observe the frequency with which motorcades run between the British and American residences.
Furniture and products were delivered by echelons
The palaces of the South Coast looked very deplorable after the occupation. The Germans tried to take out everything as valuable as possible from furnishings and decorations. Therefore, colossal efforts were made on the Soviet side to make the conference as comfortable as possible.
Suffice it to say that more than 1,500 wagons of equipment, building materials, furniture, services, kitchen utensils and food were delivered to Crimea for this purpose.
The renovation of the Livadia Palace alone took 20,000 working days. In Livadia, as well as in Koreiz and Alupka, bomb shelters were built, since the possibility of an enemy air raid was not ruled out.
Roosevelt, who traveled apprehensively to the summit, was nonetheless delighted with the design of his suite. Everything was to his taste: the curtains on the windows, the draperies on the doors, the bedspreads on his and his daughter's beds, and even the telephones in all the rooms were blue color. This color was Roosevelt's favorite color and, as he put it, "caressed his blue eyes."
In the White Hall of the Palace, where the main meetings of the conference were held, a round table for negotiations of the Big Three was mounted. For the working needs of the members of the delegations, the former billiard room was prepared, where most of the documents were signed, the inner Italian courtyard and the entire garden and park ensemble.
In Livadia, where not only the American delegation was located, but also the main negotiations between the leaders of the USSR, the USA and Great Britain took place, three power plants were installed. One working and two duplicates. In Alupka and Koreiz - two each.
The publication was prepared on the basis of RIA Novosti's own materials (Crimea) and open sources
The anti-Hitler coalition during the Second World War took shape in the summer of 1941, after the German attack on the Soviet Union, but the communication of the leaders of the participating countries for a long time was conducted, as they say, remotely.
Meanwhile, the resolution of certain political issues very often depends on the personal communication of leaders.
Stalin chose Iran
Until 1943, the prime minister was the most active member of the Big Three. England Winston Churchill. In August 1941, at a meeting with the US President Franklin Roosevelt The Atlantic Charter was signed. In January and June 1942 Churchill met with Roosevelt in Washington, and in August 1942 in Moscow with the Soviet leader Joseph Stalin.
Nevertheless, the idea of a large international conference was in the air. It was able to become a reality after the successes of the Red Army near Stalingrad and on the Kursk Bulge in late 1942 - early 1943. A radical turning point was outlined in the war, which made it possible to move on to high diplomacy.
The issue of the location of the conference was resolved with the help of more than 30 letters that were written to each other by Stalin, Roosevelt and Churchill. Iran, North Africa and Cyprus were suggested as possible venues.
Photofact: AiF
Stalin insisted on the Iranian version, who emphasized that the situation at the front did not allow him to leave the country without a stable connection with the military command of the Red Army.
Churchill and Roosevelt agreed with Stalin's proposal.
Defeat of Otto Skorzeny
Iran during the war was a rather turbulent place, which was full of Nazi agents. The policy unfriendly to the anti-Hitler coalition was pursued by the Shah of Iran, Reza Khan Pahlavi. In 1941, Soviet and British troops conducted a joint operation "Consent", during which Iran was completely occupied. There was practically no resistance from the Iranian army. In 1942, the Allies formally transferred power in the country to the son of the deposed Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi. However, the Allied troops remained on the territory of the country, so the power of the new Shah was rather conditional.
After the decision was made to hold an international conference in Tehran in late November - early December 1943, the secret services of the USSR, the USA and Great Britain began work to ensure the safety of the leaders of the countries during their stay in Iran.
The Tehran Conference was of great interest to the representatives Nazi Germany. After the defeat on the Kursk Bulge, the chances of the Nazis to successfully end the war became illusory, and for a new turning point in the war, something extraordinary had to be done. For example, the simultaneous elimination of all three leaders of the anti-Hitler coalition.
The plan for such an operation called "Long Jump" was indeed developed by the Abwehr. The operation was to be carried out by a special forces detachment led by the famous German saboteur Otto Skorzeny, who managed to free the fascist leader Benito Mussolini arrested in Italy.
However, Soviet intelligence became aware of the impending German operation. To neutralize the Nazi agents, a network of Soviet residency in Iran was involved.
A group of young Soviet agents, led by the then very young Gevork Vartanyan- the future legend of domestic intelligence.
Photofact: AiF
Vartanyan's group managed to find out the base of German radio operators in the vicinity of Tehran, who were preparing the landing of the main group of saboteurs. In the course of a joint operation of Soviet and British intelligence, radio operators were arrested, and the Nazi action itself was thwarted.
In addition, on the eve of the meeting in Tehran, general arrests took place, during which up to 400 people who collaborated with Hitler's intelligence were detained. Plans for the assassination of Stalin, Roosevelt and Churchill remained plans.
Churchill was forced to the "second front" in France
The Soviet embassy in Tehran was opposite the English one. Stalin managed to convince Roosevelt to stay in the Soviet embassy instead of traveling to the remote US embassy. A tarpaulin corridor was created between the embassies of the USSR and Great Britain so that the movements of the leaders were not visible from the outside.
Around a kind of Soviet-British "diplomatic center", three defense rings of tanks and infantry were created, thus eliminating the possibility of a sudden breakthrough.
Churchill and Roosevelt arrived at the conference by plane, the Soviet delegation led by Stalin reached Tehran by letter train via Stalingrad and Baku.
The main issue of the Tehran conference, which began on November 28, was, like the previous two years, the question of opening a "second front" in Europe.
The Soviet Union, in 1941 and 1942, in a difficult situation, sought to open a "second front" in northern France. These proposals were not implemented until the end of 1943.
Moreover, even in Tehran, Churchill insisted on the auxiliary nature of Operation Overlord (the code name for the landing of allied troops on the French coast of the English Channel), considering the so-called "Balkan strategy" to be the main one. Her the main objective consisted in the actions of the Anglo-American forces in Italy and the Balkans.
However, both Stalin and Roosevelt were well aware that Churchill's plan was to prevent the Red Army from entering the countries of Eastern and South-Eastern Europe.
Disappointed Stalin, after the discussion reached a dead end, got up from the table, throwing to Molotov: "Come on, we have too much to do at home." The disruption of the Allied conference was not part of Churchill's plans, and a compromise was reached - the opening of the "second front" in France was scheduled for May 1944. The Soviet Union undertook to undertake a large-scale offensive within the same time frame in order to deprive Germany of the possibility of transferring additional forces to the West.
Germany could not be at all
Great Britain and the USA also received a promise of assistance to the USSR in the Far East - Stalin guaranteed the entry of the Soviet Union into the war against Japan after the defeat of Nazi Germany. This decision Winston Churchill called it "historic".
At the Tehran conference, the future of Germany after the defeat of Nazism was also actively discussed. The projects of the USA and Great Britain did not bode well for the Germans - Roosevelt proposed dividing the country into five independent states, Churchill also advocated the dismemberment of Germany. Only the Soviet side insisted on the preservation of Germany as an independent state, subject to its demilitarization, democratization, the destruction of the Nazi order and the trial of fascist criminals.
However, Germany could not avoid territorial losses. The Allies agreed that the territory of East Prussia should go in favor of the Soviet Union. It was also planned to solve the “Polish issue” at the expense of German territories - independent Poland received them as compensation for the loss of Western Ukraine and Western Belarus that had departed the USSR.
Photofact: AiF
It is worth noting here that the very transition of Western Ukraine and Western Belarus to the USSR in 1939 was the restoration of the border along the so-called “Curzon Line”, the validity of which the Western powers recognized back in 1920.
The “Polish question” in Tehran was not finally resolved, but only ways were outlined for its resolution.
At the Tehran conference, the issue of creating a new international organization to replace the League of Nations, which was supposed to take over the issues of security and cooperation in the post-war world, was discussed. The contours of the future United Nations were becoming clearer and clearer.
The main outcome of the leaders' meeting in Tehran was what the world saw - the anti-Hitler coalition is strong and intends to turn the back of fascism at all costs.
It was still far from complete victory, but there was practically no doubt that the song of Hitler and his accomplices had been sung. For " true Aryans“It was time to pay the bills.
STALIN - ROOSEVELT - CHURCHILL: THE "BIG THREE" THROUGH THE PRISM OF WAR CORRESPONDENCE
V. O. Pechatnov*
The article, written on the basis of new documents from the archive of I. V. Stalin in the RGASPI and the Foreign Policy Archive of the Russian Foreign Ministry, sheds new light on Stalin's correspondence with F. Roosevelt and W. Churchill during the Second World War. It is traced how (together with V. M. Molotov) these messages were compiled, Stalin's direct contribution to this correspondence is clarified, based on the analysis of Stalin's editing, the true motives and priorities of the great dictator on the problems of the second front, Lend-Lease, the Polish question, meetings in top, as well as differences in his approach to relations with Roosevelt and Churchill. Based on the dispatches of the USSR Ambassador in London, I. M. Maisky, Churchill's direct reaction to Stalin's messages can be traced. The article shows that an in-depth analysis of the famous correspondence opens up new opportunities for studying the allied diplomacy of the war years.
Key words: Stalin, Roosevelt, Churchill, Big Three, anti-Hitler coalition, second front.
Key words: Stalin, Roosevelt, Churchill, the Big Three, anti-Hitler coalition, World War II, second front.
In the relationship between the leaders of the anti-Hitlers, their place is occupied by their famous correspondence of the military
coalition during the Second World War. However, this large difficult topic given there is a sea of literature, many memoirs are not easily exhausted, and it is the correspondence that opens
and other sources, among which the most important new opportunities for its additional study
* Pechatnov Vladimir Olegovich - Doctor of Historical Sciences, Professor, Head of the Department of History of European and American Politics, MGIMO (U) of the Russian Foreign Ministry, e-mail: [email protected]
cheniya. The fact is that until now relatively little is known about how these messages were actually written and perceived, with the exception of the correspondence between F. Roosevelt and W. Churchill, which was studied in detail and commented on by the famous American historian of the Second World War, W. Kimball1. The other two sides of this epistolary triangle - Stalin-Roosevelt and Stalin-Churchill are just beginning to be studied by historians2. Although the texts of the messages themselves have long been known and often quoted, knowledge of the background of the correspondence helps to better understand them often. hidden meaning and thus enriches our understanding of the true relationship within the Big Three.
The main contours of these relations have been studied quite well, but here even the most seemingly insignificant details and semitones are important, because in such a delicate and responsible matter as tripartite diplomacy at the highest level, they also acquired serious political significance. The correspondence of the “Big Three” in this sense is generally unique: perhaps, in the entire history of diplomacy, there is no analogue to it either in meaning, or in format, or in caliber and historical role the correspondents themselves. Correspondence has become for them the main channel of communication, providing direct personal contact at a critical time for the fate of the whole world. war time. In its course, the leaders not only informed each other, but also coordinated positions, defended the interests of their countries, sometimes engaging in heated polemics.
The specificity of this triangle was also that it was not "isosceles", since Roosevelt and Churchill were in much closer relations with each other than with Stalin. Their two-way correspondence (nearly two thousand messages for 1939-1945) is more than twice their correspondence with the Soviet leader, they met much more often during the war years and kept in touch by phone, not to mention the Anglo-American solidarity in the majority issues of allied diplomacy. The degree of awareness of the members of the “troika” about the actions of their partners was also unequal: if Roosevelt and Churchill constantly kept each other informed about their correspondence with the Kremlin, then Stalin could only guess about the content of their correspondence between themselves or rely on the work of his intelligence in this regard. This asymmetry put him in a less advantageous position compared to his partners.
The technology of preparing messages in all three capitals was also different. The vast majority of the epistles were prepared by assistants, but even here
there were notable differences: firstly, Roosevelt and Churchill had many more co-authors than Stalin, who relied mainly on V. M. Molotov (for example, a total of 17 people participated in correspondence with the British prime minister from the American side , besides the president himself)3; secondly, Stalin interfered much more in the prepared draft messages and more often wrote them with his own hand than Roosevelt and Churchill. Establishing the true authorship of the messages, in addition to the purely archaeographic side of the matter, is important for clarifying the motives and way of thinking of the main actors, their direct contribution to the correspondence. Particularly interesting, as we shall see, is the analysis of the corrections that the leaders made to the prepared draft messages.
In terms of the degree of closeness and personalization of correspondence, the Soviet side occupied the first place, where the content of the messages was entirely determined by the Stalin-Molotov tandem and only occasionally brought to the attention of individual senior members of the Politburo on issues of their competence. The British practice was the most open and collegial: the messages of Roosevelt and especially Stalin were regularly discussed at cabinet meetings, which then instructed (usually the Ministry of Foreign Affairs) to prepare a response of one kind or another. The messages themselves were regularly sent to the king and key cabinet members. The American procedure was closer to the Soviet one, with the difference that many more people took part in the preparation of the draft messages, among which not diplomats predominated, but the military and personal assistants to the president, primarily Mr. Hopkins. Through all three channels, the messages, as a rule, were transmitted by cipher telegrams through their embassies and handed over to the addressee in the original language.
Let us turn to the background of Stalin's correspondence with Roosevelt and Churchill, since it is precisely the "Stalinist angle" of this correspondence that remains the least studied so far. The first thing that draws attention to comparative analysis compiling Stalin's messages to Washington and London - this is a very subtle differentiation that the great dictator makes in his treatment of his main addressees. Molotov's drafts, as a rule, did not make this distinction, but Stalin, as we shall see, corrects them in the direction of "warming" and respectfulness in the case of Roosevelt, and, on the contrary, often toughens them in the case of Churchill. This differentiation was, of course, not accidental and reflected Stalin's different attitude towards the two leaders of the Anglo-American world.
His attitude towards Roosevelt was determined by a whole bunch of objective and subjective factors: the superior military and economic power of the United States, a more positive image of America compared to the old enemy of Tsarist and Soviet Russia Great Britain, less conflict potential of Soviet-American relations compared to Anglo-Soviet, personal reputation Roosevelt - the initiator of the diplomatic recognition of the USSR and assistance to it in the form of lend-lease, in contrast to the ardent anti-Soviet, the inspirer of the Entente campaign in the years civil war Churchill4. Personal qualities also mattered - Roosevelt's democratic courtesy and the bristling arrogance of the British prime minister, which manifested themselves both in correspondence and in personal communication of the "Big Three". During the talks in Tehran and Yalta, as confirmed by the chief intermediary between Roosevelt and Stalin, US Ambassador to Moscow A. Harriman, the latter "treated the president as the eldest of the participants"5; he was much more considerate with Roosevelt than with Churchill - he often agreed with him, and if he objected, then with restraint, never allowing himself the obvious barbs or rude jokes that fell to the lot of an Englishman. Probably, the choice of different nicknames for both leaders in the reports of Soviet intelligence was not accidental - “Captain” (Roosevelt) and “Boar” (Churchill) - the scouts were well aware of the tastes and preferences of the main addressee of their information.
Not even trusting himself, accustomed to seeing enemies in his allies, Stalin, of course, did not fully trust Roosevelt either, especially since, thanks to well-organized intelligence, he clearly saw his double game (primarily with the development atomic weapons and delaying the opening of a second front). And yet the American president was for him the main and most convenient partner, who could be used as a certain counterbalance to Churchill, playing on the Anglo-American differences6. However, for all the nuances of his correspondence with the Anglo-Americans, Stalin was well aware of the intimate nature of the special relationship between Roosevelt and Churchill and avoided saying to one what he would like to hide from the other. Let's now see how it all looked in real life, taking as examples the most important issues raised in the correspondence of the "Big Three".
The first serious complication in allied relations arose in the summer of 1942 in connection with London's decision to suspend northern convoys.
due to their heavy losses from German attacks. Moreover, in the draft of his message to Stalin, Churchill linked this step with the need to accumulate forces to open a second front in 1943, which ran counter to the May agreements on its opening in 1942, reached during Molotov's visits to London and Washington. Churchill sent this draft for approval to Roosevelt, who reluctantly agreed with the proposed text7. Having received a stern answer from Stalin (dated July 23), the allies became thoughtful. Churchill, in a message to Roosevelt, proposed limiting himself to sending Stalin his memorandum, handed to Molotov in May, with his reservations about the possibility of opening a second front in
1942 Roosevelt found this insufficient. “... The answer to Stalin,” he wrote, “should be thought out very carefully. We must always keep in mind the personality of our ally and the difficult and dangerous situation in which he finds himself. One cannot expect a universal view of war from a man whose country has been invaded by the enemy. I think we should try to put ourselves in his shoes.”8 As a confidence-building measure, the President proposed to let Stalin in on the strategic plans for
1942 related to Operation Torch for the invasion of North Africa. Churchill decided to meet with Stalin for a frank explanation on his way back from Cairo.
This difficult mission of Churchill is described in detail in the literature, records of his conversations with Stalin9 are published, the whole gamut of Moscow experiences of Churchill is well known, who was first crushed by the Stalinist cold, and then, especially during the famous night conversation at the leader’s apartment, was fascinated by the hospitality of the owner of the Kremlin and his instant insight into the essence and strategic advantages of Fakel. Churchill himself, in a detailed report to Roosevelt, wrote with sincere relief that the Russians "swallowed this bitter pill", and he managed to establish friendly personal relations with Stalin.
However, despite outward cordiality, Stalin seems to have only confirmed his deep distrust of Churchill. This was facilitated by the critical deterioration of the situation near Stalingrad and the story of the missing 154 Air Cobras - American fighters intended for the Stalingrad Front, but secretly transferred to the Americans at the direction of Churchill for the needs of Operation Torch. In mid-October, Stalin telegraphed the ambassador in London, I. M. Maisky: “In Moscow, we get the impression that Churchill is heading for the defeat of the USSR in order to
then come to terms with Hitler's or Brüning's Germany at the expense of our country. In response, Maisky (a rare case) even tried to convince the "Supreme", arguing that Churchill did not set such a task for himself, although "objectively" his policy could lead to this. Stalin (which also happened rarely) partly agreed with Maisky, but remained unconvinced about the perfidy of the British prime minister. “Churchill apparently belongs to the number of those figures who easily make a promise in order to just as easily forget about it or even grossly violate it ... Well, from now on we will know what kind of allies we are dealing with”11.
In the same telegram to Maisky, Stalin wrote that he "had little faith" in Operation Torch, but it developed successfully, exceeding the expectations of the Anglo-American command itself. The success of the allies was helped by a cynical deal between the Americans and the commander of the Vichy regime in North Africa, Admiral Darlan, who, in exchange for recognition of him in this capacity by the Anglo-Americans, refused to resist their landing and even facilitated it. In response to a message from Churchill with a contemptuous mention
about this deal with the “swindler Darlan”, Molotov drafted a message in which he decided to finally stigmatize the corrupt Frenchman: “As for Darlan, suspicions about him seem to me quite legitimate. In any case, lasting solutions in North Africa should not be based on Darlan and his like, but on those who can be an honest ally in the uncompromising struggle against Hitler's tyranny, with which, I am sure, you agree. Stalin crossed out Molotov's angry passage, which seemed to him, apparently, inappropriate prudishness, and replaced it with his very expressive one: “As for Darlan, it seems to me that the Americans skillfully used him to facilitate the occupation of North and West Africa. Military diplomacy should be able to use for military purposes not only Darlanov, but also the devil with his grandmother. The straightforward Molotov was far from the Machiavellian flexibility of the "Master"!
Stalin makes another characteristic addition to the same message. In response to Churchill's vague reference to "constant preparations" in the Pas de Calais and new bombardments of Germany, he interjects: "I hope that this does not mean abandoning your promise in Moscow to set up a second front in Western Europe in the spring
1943"13. As you can see, Stalin does not miss the opportunity to remind the allies of this promise, not yet knowing that they are already preparing to break it.
Although the double game on the issue of a second front was played jointly by Roosevelt and Churchill, the latter was its main inspirer, "leading Roosevelt in tow," in the figurative expression of the Soviet Ambassador to the United States M. M. Litvinov14. The American president, for his part, tried to soften Moscow's painful reaction to this game, including by more actively involving the Soviet military command in Anglo-American strategic planning, as well as by holding a trilateral summit. First, he pronounces these ideas with a skeptical Churchill, and in early December 1942, for the first time, he proposes such a meeting "in the near future" to Stalin himself15. He was in no hurry to agree, striving to come to this meeting as strengthened as possible by new military victories, capable of predetermining its success and even the venue itself. Roosevelt, as Churchill confided to Maisky, was very annoyed by this Stalinist intractability. “The President asked me what was the reason for Stalin's refusal to come. I told the president: Stalin is a realist. You can't get through it with words. If he came, the first question he would ask you and me would be: “Well, how many Germans did you kill in 1942? And how many do you expect to kill in 1943? What would we say to you? We don't know ourselves. This was clear to Stalin from the very beginning - what was the point of him going to the meeting? Especially since he really does do big things at home.
In this case, the prime minister did not dissemble. He did indeed write something similar to Roosevelt at the end of November: “I can say in advance what the position of the Russians will be. They will ask you and me: “How many German divisions can you forge in the summer of 1943? And how much did you shackle in 1942?” They will certainly demand a strong second front in 1943 in the form of a massive invasion of the continent from the west, south, or both. There really was nothing to answer to this, especially since the promised opening of a “strong second front” was again pushed back.
Stalin caught the first disturbing hint of this in Churchill's message of March 11, 1943, in which the prime minister conditioned the start of the operation in northern France by "sufficient weakening" of the enemy: he circles this phrase with a double line and puts a bold question mark in the margin. The leader's suspicions were quickly conveyed to Molotov, who prepared a draft response with an insistent request to eliminate the "uncertainty" of the prime minister's statements,
causing "alarm" in the Kremlin. However, for the time being, Stalin decided to soften the tone of the message somewhat, adding to the harsh reminder of the importance of the invasion of France in 1943, a conciliatory phrase that he "recognizes the difficulties" of the Anglo-Americans in carrying out such an operation.
At the end of March, Roosevelt and Churchill decided to stop sending northern sea convoys to Murmansk and Arkhangelsk in view of the heavy losses from the German submarines lying in wait for them. Having plucked up courage, Churchill delivered this difficult news to Stalin in a message dated March 30, corrected by Roosevelt. The next day, the prime minister received Maisky and told him about this decision, testing the Soviet reaction on him. “I decided to tell Stalin directly what I have,” he explained. - Never mislead an ally. We are warriors. We must be able to courageously face even the most unpleasant news. "Won't this lead to a rupture between me and Stalin?" Churchill asked with unconcealed anxiety. “I can’t say anything for Comrade Stalin,” the ambassador answered, “he will say it himself. In one thing I have no doubt that the cessation of the convoys will evoke very strong feelings in Comrade Stalin. Churchill continued: “Anything, but not a break. I don't want a break, I want to work with you. I am sure that I will be able to work with Stalin. I have no doubt that if I am destined to live longer, I can be very useful to you in establishing friendly relations with the United States. We, the three great powers, must at all costs ensure friendly cooperation after the war.
In the Kremlin, Maisky's excited dispatch was received on April 1, the day after the receipt of Churchill's message. Thus, Stalin could answer him already taking into account the ambassador's information about the fears and hopes of his British correspondent. Perhaps that is why his response message to Churchill on April 2 was so laconic - Stalin qualified this "unexpected act as a catastrophic reduction in the supply of military raw materials and weapons to the Soviet Union by Great Britain and the United States." “It is clear,” he concluded sparingly, “that this circumstance cannot but affect the position of the Soviet troops.”21 Churchill breathed a sigh of relief: “I consider Stalin's message a natural and stoic response,” he wrote to Roosevelt. - His last sentence for me means only one thing - "the Soviet army will be worse off and will have to suffer more"22.
A much more acute crisis in allied relations erupted in June 1943, when Ruz-
Welt and Churchill, after their third Washington conference (codenamed "Trident"), informed Stalin about another postponement of the second front. This time it was in Roosevelt's message of June 4, to which Stalin responded harshly but restrainedly, emphasizing that this decision "creates exceptional difficulties for the Soviet Union." Stalin even softened the tone of the message: the warning contained in Molotov's draft that the decision of the allies "will have the most serious consequences and decisive for the further course of the war" is replaced by "which could have grave consequences for the further course of the war"23. Along the way, in an indirect form, the "decisive importance" of the actions of the allies for the course of the war was generally denied, as if leaving this role only to the Soviet Union.
A much more severe rebuff awaited Churchill when he, in an answer coordinated with the White House, tried to give a detailed justification for the Anglo-American actions. The Kremlin recluse, with quotations from concrete statements by the Anglo-Americans, reminded him of all previous broken promises. Churchill's arguments were subjected to resolute and justified criticism, and at the end of the message a downright forged phrase was inserted: “I must tell you that it is not just about disappointing the Soviet Government, but about maintaining its confidence in the allies, which is being severely tested. We must not forget that we are talking on the preservation of millions of lives in the occupied areas of Western Europe and Russia and on the reduction of colossal casualties Soviet armies compared with which the casualties of the Anglo-American troops are small.
Maisky's dispatch preserved for historians a picture of Churchill's violent reaction, most of all stung by Stalin's accusation of deliberate deceit. “In the course of the conversation,” the ambassador reported, “Churchill returned several times to that phrase in Comrade Stalin’s message, which refers to “trust in the allies” (at the very end of the message). This phrase clearly haunted Churchill and caused him great embarrassment. The prime minister even questioned the advisability of continuing the correspondence, which, he said, "only leads to friction and mutual irritation." Maisky managed to reassure him somewhat by reminding him of the huge sacrifices of the Soviet Union and the importance of maintaining direct contact between the Allied leaders at a critical moment in the war. Churchill, in his words, "began to gradually go limp" and went over to
justifying his actions, as if continuing a dispute in absentia with Stalin: “Although Comrade Stalin’s message is a very skillful polemical document,” he said according to Maisky, “it does not fully take into account the actual state of affairs ... At the moment when Churchill gave Comrade Stalin his promises, he quite sincerely believed in the possibility of their implementation. There was no conscious rubbing of the glasses. “But we are not gods,” Churchill continued, “and we make mistakes. The war is full of all sorts of surprises. It is unlikely that these excuses were able to convince Stalin of something. As a warning to the allies, at the end of June he recalled the popular Soviet ambassadors in the West - Maisky from London and Litvinov from Washington.
With particular attention, Stalin corresponded on the question of the summit meeting. His dislike of long-distance travel and obsession with the prestige of the USSR led to a stubborn refusal to meet Roosevelt and Churchill away from Soviet territory. In his draft message to Roosevelt of August 8
1943, he writes a long passage with a proposal to arrange such a meeting "either in Astrakhan or in Arkhangelsk"26. In late August, he agrees to an Allied proposal to hold a meeting of the Big Three foreign ministers ahead of the summit. Churchill proposed to hold it in London, Roosevelt - in Casablanca or Tunisia. In a reply message to Roosevelt on this subject dated September 8, Stalin adds the key phrase to the Molotov project: "... moreover, I propose Moscow as the meeting place"27. Despite subsequent attempts by Roosevelt to replay this meeting place, Stalin managed to get his way. Thus was born the Moscow Conference of Foreign Ministers of the three Allied Powers, which became the prologue to the Tehran meeting of the Big Three.
But even on the way to this meeting, Stalin does not miss the opportunity to pull the Anglo-Saxons when he sees the slightest infringement of Soviet prestige or interests by them. Churchill is particularly hard hit, who, as the Kremlin is well aware from reports from Soviet intelligence and diplomacy, continued to persuade Roosevelt to delay the crossing of the English Channel. Stalin's message to Churchill of October 13 is indicative, in the draft of which he introduces a significant revision. Instead of Molotov's gratitude for the message about sending additional northern convoys, he inserts the following phrase - this message is "depreciated" by the Prime Minister's statement that sending these convoys is not a fulfillment of an obligation, but a manifestation of the good will of the British
Tan side. By refusing Churchill's request for more British naval personnel in northern Russia, Stalin steps up his reprimand against the British for the "unacceptable" behavior of British troops in Arkhangelsk and Murmansk who are trying to recruit Soviet people for intelligence purposes: he replaces Molotov’s rounded wording about the use by the British of “temptations of material wealth” with an angry accusation - “such phenomena that are offensive to Soviet people naturally give rise to incidents.”28. Churchill was so outraged by this "offensive" message, in his words, that he refused not only to answer it, but even to accept it, returning the document to the new to the Soviet ambassador F. T. Gusev with the explanation that E. Eden would deal with this issue at the forthcoming conference of foreign ministers in Moscow (there, by the way, the request of the British was granted)29.
The Tehran conference, at which, despite Churchill's resistance, the question of a second front was finally resolved, brings a clear thaw in relations between the Big Three. In his first message after Tehran to Churchill and Roosevelt on December 10, Stalin even inserts the unusual conclusion “Hi!” Most noticeable is the warming tone of his treatment of Roosevelt. Summing up the results of the meeting in a message to the president of December 6, Stalin adds the following words to the Molotov project (highlighted in italics - author): “Now there is confidence that our peoples will act together in unison both at the present time and after the end of this war. I wish the best infantry to you and your armed forces in the upcoming responsible operations.
On December 7, Headquarters received a message from Roosevelt about the appointment of General D. Eisenhower as commander of the operation to force the Channel (codenamed "Overlord"). In Tehran, Stalin insisted on the speedy appointment of an invasion commander, and the fact that he became the authoritative Eisenhower pleased him doubly, as confirmation of the seriousness of the allies' intentions. In addition, on the same day, in a separate message, Roosevelt and Churchill informed Stalin about additional measures to expand the scale of the upcoming operation. Therefore, on December 10, he answers Roosevelt with a brief message, in the draft of which he inserts the following words by hand (highlighted in italics - author): “I received your message on the appointment of General Eisenhower. Greetings
appointment of General Eisenhower. I wish him success in the preparation and implementation of the upcoming decisive operations. (Stalin, as we see, raises the importance of the landing of the allies in France in comparison with the previous message.)
As for Churchill, already in January, Stalin removed Molotov's Tehran sentiments from the draft message to the Prime Minister, deleting his final paragraph: “Your reports that you are working hard to ensure the success of the decision on a second front are very encouraging. This means that soon the enemy will understand how great is the role of Tehran in this great war”32.
Especially closely Stalin controlled the correspondence on the Polish question, which became the main stumbling block in relations between the allies after the second front. Here he invariably toughens Molotov's assessments of the Polish government in exile and the positions of the allies, without differentiating their tonality depending on the addressee, although Churchill remains the main target of his criticism. The Prime Minister gave grounds for this. Despite the fact that the Allies agreed in principle in Tehran to change the eastern border of Poland along the "Curzon Line", Churchill, in his message to Stalin on March 21, announced Britain's refusal to recognize the transfer of "territories produced by force" (a transparent allusion to the annexation of Western Ukraine and Belarus in 1939) and announced that he was going to speak openly about this in the British Parliament.
Stalin could not leave this attack unanswered. He was especially offended by the qualification of the actions of the Red Army as a forcible seizure of Polish territory. Therefore, he makes the following change to Molotov's draft (in italics -author): "I understand this in such a way that you expose the Soviet Union as a force hostile to Poland and, in fact, deny the liberation nature of the Soviet Union's war against German aggression." Churchill was also accused of a flagrant violation of the Tehran agreements and that he was not making sufficient efforts to force the "Londoners" to recognize the legitimacy of the Soviet demands. The message ended with a significant warning that "the method of threats and discredit, if continued, will not be favorable to our cooperation"33.
This time, Churchill evaded further polemics. “In my opinion, he (Stalin - author) barks more than bites,” he shared with Roosevelt and, on the recommendation of the cabinet, instructed
to make a response statement to the British Ambassador in Moscow A. Kerr34.
The long-awaited opening of the second front smoothed out inter-allied contradictions for a while. Stalin kept his promise to support the actions of the allies with a new Soviet offensive on the Soviet-German front. In a message to Churchill dated June 9, he directly names the date of the start of the first round of this offensive - June 10 (instead of the phrase “in the coming days” proposed by Molotov), realizing how important this accurate information is for the Allies. On the same day, Churchill responded with enthusiasm: “The whole world can see the embodiment of Tehran's plans in our concerted attacks against our common enemy. May all good luck and happiness accompany the Soviet armies. Roosevelt's reaction was more restrained: "Uncle Joe's plans are very promising," he wrote to Churchill, "although they come a little later than we hoped, in the end it may be for the better" 3b. What did the President mean in this mysterious final phrase , added by him to the text prepared by his assistant, Admiral W. Leahy? Apparently, it is worth agreeing with W. Kimball's assumption that Roosevelt was worried about the too far advance of the Red Army deep into Europe37. We saw this anxiety in Moscow as well. As Stalin himself later said in a conversation with M. Thorez, “... Of course, the Anglo-Americans could not allow such a scandal that the Red Army would liberate Paris, and they would sit on the shores of Africa”38.
But even understanding the self-interest of the allies, the Kremlin paid tribute to the grandiose Operation Overlord. Stalin's message to Churchill on June 11 stated that "the history of war knows no other similar enterprise in terms of its scale, broad conception and skill in execution." The exact authorship of this message remains unclear: Molotov's draft, preserved in Stalin's archive, does not contain significant Stalinist corrections, but its text almost verbatim coincides with Stalin's interview with the Pravda newspaper of June 14 and with what Stalin said on the same days to Ambassador A. Harriman39. Perhaps he simply used the Molotov text he liked, but, most likely, the people's commissar sketched it from the words of Stalin himself, especially since Molotov in his correspondence was usually careful not to get into questions of military strategy, leaving them to the "Supreme". Molotov's episodic forays in this direction rarely went uncorrected. For example, in the same June, he sent Stalin a draft notification of the allies about the second round of the Soviet offensive (Operation Bagration),
prepared by Molotov's eloquent deputy A. Ya. Vyshinsky and slightly "dried" by the people's commissar himself. Comparison of the draft and the final version clearly shows the features of the Stalinist style:
1) “As for our offensive, we are not going to give the Germans a break, but we will continue to expand the front of our offensive operations day by day, increasing the power of our onslaught on german armies more and more beginning to feel the force of our joint strikes. 2) “Regarding our offensive, we can say that we will not give the Germans a break, but will continue to expand the front of our offensive operations, increasing the power of our onslaught on the German armies”40.
Allied harmony, however, did not last long, and the Polish question again became the main irritant. The passions of the parties were especially inflamed in connection with the Warsaw uprising, raised by the Home Army and the London government in early August 1944 without notifying the Soviet command. Stalin, as you know, refused to support this, in his words, "adventure" and did not spare colors to belittle the role and capabilities of the rebels. In the draft message to Churchill dated August 5, he adds the final passage from himself: “The Polish regional army consists of several detachments, which are incorrectly called divisions. They have no artillery, no aircraft, no tanks. I have no idea how such detachments can take Warsaw, for the defense of which the Germans put up four tank divisions, including the Hermann Goering division. As the scale of the Warsaw tragedy became clearer, Stalin began to show sympathy for its victims, whom a "bunch of criminals" threw "under German guns, tanks and aircraft." But even from this draft message to Churchill of August 22, he blotted out the apparently too emotional words of his deputy about his readiness to “help our brother Poles liberate Warsaw and avenge the Nazis for their bloody crimes in the capital of the Poles,” which seemed to him too emotional. The Polish problem continued to poison allied relations until the very end of the war in Europe.
Thus, in Stalin's big message to Roosevelt on Polish affairs dated December 27, 1944, it was about the connivance of the Mikolajczyk government for the anti-Soviet actions of the Home Army in the rear of the Red Army. To characterize these "underground agents of the Polish government in exile" Stalin adds key words: "terrorists" who kill not only "any
day" (as it was with Molotov), but "soldiers and officers of the Red Army"; "Polish emigrants" in the English capital he turns into "a bunch of Polish emigrants in London." The main signal of the message - the USSR sees the future government of Poland not in London, but in the Polish Committee of National Liberation created under the Soviet auspices. Realizing the need for as much as possible convincing argument for the allies in this key and controversial issue, Stalin adds on his own a chased passage with arguments about the interests of the USSR in Poland, which he will then repeat both in correspondence and at the conference in Yalta: “It should be borne in mind that in strengthening the pro-Allied and democratic The Soviet Union is interested in Poland more than any other power, not only because the Soviet Union bears the main burden of the struggle for the liberation of Poland, but also because Poland is a state bordering the Soviet Union and the problem of Poland is inseparable from the problem of the security of the Soviet Union. To this it must be added that the successes of the Red Army in Poland in the fight against the Germans largely depend on the presence of a calm and reliable rear in Poland, and the Polish National Committee fully takes this circumstance into account, while the government in exile and its underground agents, by their terrorist actions, create a threat to civilian life. wars in the rear of the Red Army and oppose the successes of the latter”42.
The toughening of the resistance of the allies on the composition of the future governments of Poland and Romania was largely due to internal political considerations - pressure public opinion and the Eastern European diaspora in the United States. Churchill, who back in October
1944 enthusiastically divided the Balkans with Stalin into spheres of influence, now loudly protesting against Soviet violations of the "Declaration on a Liberated Europe" signed in Yalta. Meanwhile, in internal correspondence, the Anglo-Saxons acknowledged the vulnerability of their position. The Yalta Agreement, Roosevelt reminded Churchill in a message of March 29, "places more emphasis on the Lublin Poles than on the other two groups."43 The prime minister himself was aware of the inconsistency of the appeal to the democratic principles of self-determination against the backdrop of his secret ("percentage") deal with Stalin. “I really don’t want,” he confessed to Roosevelt in early March, “pedaling this issue to such an extent that Stalin could say,“ I didn’t interfere in your actions in Greece, why don’t you give me such
freedom of hands in Romania?”44. But in Moscow, the protests of the allies were perceived precisely as a manifestation of a double standard - a hypocritical violation of the unwritten rule of non-interference in a "foreign" sphere of influence. “Poland is a big deal! - Molotov wrote in the margins of Vyshinsky's note on the Polish question in February
1945 - But how the governments in Belgium, France, Germany, etc. are organized, we do not know. We were not asked, although we do not say that we like one or the other of these governments. We did not intervene, since this is the zone of operations of the Anglo-American troops” (emphasized in the text - author)45. Later, this cry from the soul of the People's Commissar in a softened form will migrate to Stalin's message to Churchill on April 2446.
One of the last dramatic episodes of the "Big Three" correspondence is connected with the well-known "Bern Incident" - the secret contacts of American intelligence with Nazi representatives in Bern in March 1945, which Stalin, not without reason, considered separate negotiations on the surrender of German troops in Northern Italy. Taking into account leading role in this case of the American side, he concentrated fire on the White House.
The first detailed message to Roosevelt on this issue dated March 29 was prepared by Molotov and left by Stalin almost without amendments. Carefully studying the American response he received, Stalin emphasizes the key passages in it: "there were no negotiations on surrender", "the goal was to establish contact", "Your information ... is erroneous." However, Roosevelt was unable to answer main question- if the Allies had nothing to hide, then why did they refuse to invite Soviet representatives to Bern? Building on these points of reference, Stalin counters point by point the president's excuses in his April 3rd message, which this time he writes entirely himself. Before finally approving the text, Stalin decides to sharpen the sound of this already angry document to the utmost. The last two additions are made to the message (marked in italics - author): “It is clear that such a situation cannot serve the cause of maintaining and strengthening trust between our countries ... Personally, and my colleagues, I would in no way take such a risky step, realizing that the momentary benefit, whatever it may be, pales before the fundamental benefit of maintaining and strengthening confidence between the allies.
Stalin's message breathes "suspicion and distrust of our motives," he wrote in
his diary W. Leahy. “I prepared for the president a sharp reply, which was then sent to Marshal Stalin, as close to a rebuke as possible in diplomatic exchanges between states.”48 Churchill expressed his solidarity with the President in a message to Stalin dated 5 April. However, in the end, the Kremlin's harsh rebuff had its effect: the incident was soon settled and Roosevelt, overcoming the objections of his "hawks", preferred to end this heavy explanation on a conciliatory note. On April 12, a few hours before his death, he wrote to Stalin: “Thank you for your sincere explanation of the Soviet point of view regarding the Bern incident, which, as it now seems, has faded and receded into the past, without bringing any benefit. In any case, there should be no mutual distrust, and minor misunderstandings of this nature should not arise in the future. Ambassador Harriman, who had a hand in fueling this crisis, delayed the transmission of this message, suggesting that the term "minor" be deleted from it, but Roosevelt considered this nuance very important. "I have no intention," he promptly replied to Harriman, "to omit the word 'insignificant', for I wish to regard the Bernese misunderstanding as an insignificant incident." In his last message to Churchill on April 11 (one of the very few written in his own hand), Roosevelt also spoke in favor of "minimizing the Soviet problem", since the existing differences "arise and are settled almost daily, as in the case of the meeting in Bern"51.
Roosevelt's death removed the last leash on Churchill's growing anti-Sovietism. The last weeks of the war and the victorious May were marked by a whole series of his open and secret steps aimed at limiting Soviet influence in Europe - starting from attempts to draw the Americans into the battle for Berlin and delaying his troops in the zone of occupation of Germany assigned to the Red Army and ending with the development of a plan for war with USSR (Operation Unthinkable)52. Churchill's "spring aggravation" also penetrated into his contacts with the Soviet side, including correspondence with Stalin, in which he, taking advantage of G. Truman's inexperience, assumes the role of the main representative of the allies. On April 28, Churchill (who shortly before had sent an alarmist telegram to Truman about an "Iron Curtain" in Europe) sent a long message to Stalin detailing all the post-Yalta claims of the Allies. Message from the veins
It began with what Churchill himself called “an outpouring of my soul to you” - a heartfelt warning about the threat of a post-war split into the Soviet and Anglo-American world: “It is quite obvious that a quarrel between them would tear the world apart and that all of us, the leaders of each of parties who had to have anything to do with it would be shamed before history”53. Churchill's outpouring remained unanswered - Stalin ignored its general part, limiting himself to continuing the polemic on the Polish question.
Meanwhile, he was well informed about the mood and intrigues of the prime minister, including the Unthinkable, as well as the preservation of German captured weapons and military units for possible use against the USSR. All this only strengthened Stalin in his attitude towards Churchill as the main and incorrigible potential adversary, with whom it was useless to conduct a strategic dialogue. It is no coincidence, apparently, sensing this mood of the "Master", Ambassador Gusev in his dispatches begins to warn "that we are dealing with an adventurer for whom war is his native element, that in war conditions he feels much better than in peace conditions." time"54. Nor did Truman inspire much hope, as he began to move away from the policies of his predecessor. “Now, after the death of President Roosevelt,
Stalin told GK Zhukov and Molotov, “Churchill will quickly clash with Truman”55. Further correspondence with Western partners became more and more dry and purely official. At the final stage, Stalin less and less intervenes in the texts prepared by Molotov. The correspondence of the allies was coming to an end - like the union itself.
Vladimir O. Pechatnov. Stalin-Roosevelt-Churchill: the Big Three through the wartime correspondence
The article based on new documents from the Russian State Archive of Social-Political History and the Archive of Foreign Policy of Russia sheds a new light on Stalin's correspondence with Franklin D. Roosevelt and Winston Churchill during World War II. The author examines how those messages were actually written and what was Stalin's personal contribution to the correspondence. Based on his editing of Vyacheslav M. Molotov's drafts revealed are Stalin's motives and priorities on such issues as opening of the second front, lend-lease, the Polish question, and WWII summits of "The Big Three". Also examined is Stalin's differential treatment of Roosevelt and Churchill. Newly declassified dispatches of Soviet Ambassador in London Ivan M. Maisky provide a vivid description of Churchill's immediate reaction to Stalin's messages. The article demonstrates the opportunities for further exploration of the Big Three correspondence as a major source on the Allied diplomacy during WWII.
1. Churchill & Roosevelt. The Complete Correspondence. Edited With Commentary by W. Kimball. Vol. 1-3. Princeton, 1984.
2. Pechatnov V. O. How Stalin wrote to Roosevelt (according to new documents). / / Source, 1999. No. 6; Idem. Stalin and Roosevelt (notes
historian). / War and society, 1941-1945: In 2 books. /Answer. ed. G. N. Sevostyanov. M., 2004. Book. one.
3. See: Churchill & Roosevelt. Vol. 1. P. 32.
4. This reputation of Churchill was well known in the Roosevelt White House. Forwarding to her husband one of Churchill's most outspoken statements against Bolshevism during the Civil War, Eleanor Roosevelt attributed: "It is not surprising if Mr. Stalin cannot forget it in any way" (Franklin D. Roosevelt Library, President "s Secretary File, Great Britain, W. Churchill ).
5. Staff meeting. December 8,1943. Library of Congress, W. A. Harriman Papers, Chronological File. cont. 171.
6. For more details, see: Pechatnov V. O. Stalin and Roosevelt (historian's notes). pp. 402-403.
7. Churchill & Roosevelt. Vol. 1. P. 529-533.
8. Ibid. P. 545.
9. Rzheshevsky O. A. Stalin and Churchill. Meetings. Conversations. Discussions: Documents, comments, 1941-1945. M., 2004.
10. Churchill & Roosevelt. Vol. 1. P. 570-571.
11. Rzheshevsky O. A. Stalin and Churchill. pp. 376, 378.
12. Russian State Archive of Socio-Political History (hereinafter - RGASPI). F. 558. D. 256. L. 154. Equally positively, Stalin assessed the deal with Darlan in a message to Roosevelt on December 14 // Correspondence of the Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the USSR with the US presidents and British prime ministers during the Great Patriotic War 1941-1945 M., 1957, (hereinafter - Correspondence ...). T. 2. P. 43.
13. Ibid.
15. Correspondence... T. 2. S. 40-41.
16. WUA RF. F. 059a. Op. 7. P. 13. D. 6. L. 221-222. The same dispatch from Maisky contains Churchill’s remark, unusual for an inveterate anti-Soviet, made under the fresh impression of the defeat of the Germans at Stalingrad: “Churchill is completely delighted and even touched by the Red Army. When he talks about her, tears come to his eyes. Comparing Ros-
this last war and Russia (that is, the USSR) of the current war, Churchill said: “Taking into account all factors, I believe that new Russia five times stronger than the old one." Slightly teasing Churchill, I half-laughing asked: “And how do you explain this phenomenon?” Churchill answered me in the same tone: “If your system brings happiness to the people, I am for your system. However, I am little interested in what will happen after the war ... Socialism, communism, cataclysm ... if only the Huns were defeated. (Ibid. L. 224).
17. Churchill & Roosevelt. Vol. 2. P. 43.
18. RGASPI. F. 558. D. 260. L. 62.
19. Churchill & Roosevelt. Vol. 2. P. 175-177.
20. WUA RF. F. 059a. Op. 7. P. 13. D. 6. L. 259-260.
21. Correspondence ... T. i. C. ill.
22. Churchill & Roosevelt. Vol. 2. P. 179.
24. Correspondence...T. i. S. 138.
25. WUA RF. F. 059a. Op. 7. P. 13. D. 6. L. 295-296.
26. AP RF. F. 45. Op. i. D. 366. L. 22.
27. Ibid. L. 71.
28. RGASPI. F. 558. D. 264. L. 38.
29. Churchill & Roosevelt. Vol. 2. P. 536.
30. AP RF. F. 45. Op. i. D. 367. L. 44.
31. There.L.55.
32. RGASPI. F. 558. D. 265. L. 89.
33. RGASPI. F. 558. D. 267. L. 44; Correspondence ... T. i. S. 215.
34. Churchill & Roosevelt. Vol. 3. P. 69-74.
35. Correspondence...T. i. S. 228.
36. Churchill & Roosevelt. Vol. 3. P. 173.
38. Narinsky M. M. Stalin and M. Thorez. 1944-1947. New materials. / New and recent history, 1996. No. i. S. 28.
40. RGASPI. F. 558. D. 267. L. 176.
41. RGASPI. F. 558. D. 268. L. 116.158.
42. AP RF. F. 45. Op. i. D. 369. L. 110,117.
43. Churchill & Roosevelt. Vol. 3. P. 593.
44. Ibid. P. 547.
45. WUA RF. F. 06. Op. 7. D. 588. L. 2.
46. Correspondence...T. i. S. 335.
47. AP RF. F. 45. Op. i. D. 370. L. 98-100.
48. Leahy Diaries, April 4, 1945. National Archives, Record Group 218, William Leahy Records, 1942-1948. cont. four.
49. Correspondence...T. 2. S. 211-212.
50. For Harriman from the President, April 12,1945. Library of Congress, W. A. Harriman Papers, Chronological File. cont. 178.
51. Churchill & Roosevelt. Vol. 3. P. 630.
52. Sokolov VV Stalin and Churchill - friends and allies involuntarily // War and society, 1941-1945. Book. i. pp. 445-446; Rzhe-
Shevsky O. A. Secret military plans of W. Churchill in May 1945 // New and Contemporary History, 1999. No. 3.
53. Correspondence ... T. i. S. 349.
54. WUA RF. F. 059a. Op. 7. P. 13. D. 6. L. 357-358.
55. Zhukov GK Memories and reflections. M., 1969. S. 713.