Potsdam Conference

The Potsdam Conference (German: Potsdamer Konferenz) was held at Cecilienhof, the home of Crown Prince Wilhelm in Potsdam, Germany, from 17 July to 2 August 1945. (In some older documents, it is also referred to as the Berlin Conference of the Three Heads of Government of the USSR, the USA, and the UK.[2][3]) The participants were the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom, and the United States, represented respectively by General Secretary of the Communist Party Joseph Stalin, Prime Ministers Winston Churchill[4] and Clement Attlee,[5] and President Harry S. Truman.

Potsdam Conference
The "Big Three" at the Potsdam Conference, Winston Churchill, Harry S. Truman and Joseph Stalin.
Host country Germany
Date17 July – 2 August 1945
Venue(s)Cecilienhof
CitiesPotsdam, Germany
Participants Joseph Stalin
Winston Churchill
Clement Attlee
Harry S. Truman
FollowsYalta Conference
A conference session including Clement Attlee, Ernest Bevin, Vyacheslav Molotov, William D. Leahy, Joseph E. Davies, James F. Byrnes, and Harry S. Truman
Joseph Stalin and Harry Truman meeting at the Potsdam Conference on 18 July 1945. From left to right, first row: Premier Joseph Stalin; President Harry S. Truman, Soviet Ambassador to the United States Andrei Gromyko, Secretary of State James F. Byrnes, and Soviet Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Molotov. Second row: Brigadier General Harry H. Vaughan, Truman's confidant and military aide, Russian interpreter Charles Bohlen, Truman naval aide James K. Vardaman, Jr., and (partially obscured) Charles Griffith Ross.[1]
Sitting (from left): Clement Attlee, Harry S. Truman, Joseph Stalin, and behind: Fleet Admiral William Daniel Leahy, Foreign Secretary Ernest Bevin, Secretary of State James F. Byrnes, and Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Molotov
Cecilienhof, site of the Potsdam Conference, pictured in 2014

Stalin, Churchill, and Truman gathered to decide how to administer Germany, which had agreed to unconditional surrender nine weeks earlier on 8 May (Victory in Europe Day).[6] The goals of the conference also included the establishment of postwar order, peace treaty issues, and countering the effects of the war.

Relationships among the leaders

A number of changes had taken place in the five months since the Yalta Conference that greatly affected the relationships among the leaders. The Soviet Union had occupied Central and Eastern Europe, and the Red Army effectively controlled the Baltic states, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Bulgaria, and Romania, and refugees were fleeing from those countries. Stalin had set up a puppet communist government in Poland, insisted that his control of Eastern Europe was a defensive measure against possible future attacks and claimed that it was a legitimate sphere of Soviet influence.[7]

Also, Britain had a new prime minister. Conservative Party leader Winston Churchill had served as prime minister in a coalition government; his Soviet policy, since the early 1940s, had differed considerably from Roosevelt's; Churchill believed Stalin to be a "devil"-like tyrant who led a vile system.[8] A general election had been held in the UK on 5 July 1945, but the results were delayed to allow the votes of armed forces personnel to be counted in their home constituencies. The outcome became known during the conference, when Labour leader Clement Attlee became the new prime minister.

Then, Roosevelt had died on 12 April 1945, and Vice-President Harry Truman assumed the presidency; his succession saw VE Day (Victory in Europe) within a month and VJ Day (Victory in Japan) on the horizon. During the war and in the name of Allied unity, Roosevelt had brushed off warnings of a potential domination by Stalin in part of Europe, explaining, "I just have a hunch that Stalin is not that kind of a man.... I think that if I give him everything I possibly can and ask for nothing from him in return, 'noblesse oblige', he won't try to annex anything and will work with me for a world of democracy and peace".[9]

Truman had closely followed the Allied progress of the war. George Lenczowski noted that "despite the contrast between his relatively modest background and the international glamour of his aristocratic predecessor, [Truman] had the courage and resolution to reverse the policy that appeared to him naive and dangerous", which was "in contrast to the immediate, often ad hoc moves and solutions dictated by the demands of the war".[10] With the end of the war, the priority of Allied unity was replaced with the challenge of the relationship between the two emerging superpowers.[10] Both leading powers continued to sustain a cordial relationship to the public, but suspicions and distrust lingered between them.[11]

Truman was much more suspicious of the communists than Roosevelt had been, and he became increasingly suspicious of Soviet intentions under Stalin.[10] He and his advisers saw Soviet actions in Eastern Europe as aggressive expansionism that was incompatible with the agreements that Stalin had committed to at Yalta the previous February. In addition, Truman became aware of possible complications elsewhere when Stalin objected to Churchill's proposal for an early Allied withdrawal from Iran, ahead of the schedule agreed at the Tehran Conference. The Potsdam Conference was the only time that Truman met Stalin in person.[12][13]

At the Yalta Conference, France had been granted an occupation zone within Germany. France had been a participant in the Berlin Declaration and was to be an equal member of the Allied Control Council. Nevertheless, at the insistence of the Americans, Charles de Gaulle was not invited to Potsdam, just as he had been denied representation at Yalta. The diplomatic slight was a cause of deep and lasting resentment for him.[14] Reasons for the omissions included the longstanding personal mutual antagonism between Roosevelt and De Gaulle, ongoing disputes over the French and American occupation zones and anticipated conflicts of interest over French Indochina,[15] but it also reflected the judgement of both the British and Americans that French aims in respect of many items on the conference's agenda were likely to contradict the Anglo-American agreed objectives.[16]

Agreements

Potsdam Agreements
Demographics map used for the border discussions at the conference
The Oder–Neisse line (click to enlarge)

At the end of the conference, the three heads of government agreed on the following actions. All other issues were to be answered by the final peace conference, which was to be called as soon as possible.

Germany
See also: Flight and expulsion of Germans (1944–50), Allied plans for German industry after World War II, Oder–Neisse line, Former eastern territories of Germany, and German reparations for World War II
  • The Allies issued a statement of aims of their occupation of Germany: demilitarization, denazification, democratization, decentralization, dismantling and decartelization.
  • Germany and Austria were both to be divided into four occupation zones, as had been agreed in principle at Yalta, and similarly each capital (Berlin and Vienna) was to be divided into four zones.
  • Nazi war criminals were to be put on trial.
  • All German annexations in Europe were to be reversed, including Sudetenland, Alsace-Lorraine, Austria, and the westernmost parts of Poland.
  • Germany's eastern border was to be shifted westwards to the Oder–Neisse line, effectively reducing Germany in size by approximately 25% from its 1937 borders. The territories east of the new border were East Prussia, Silesia, West Prussia and two thirds of Pomerania. Those areas were mainly agricultural, with the exception of Upper Silesia, which was the second-largest centre of German heavy industry.
  • "Orderly and humane" expulsions of the German populations remaining beyond the new eastern borders of Germany were to be carried out from Poland, Czechoslovakia and Hungary, but not Yugoslavia.[17]
  • War reparations to the Soviet Union from its zone of occupation in Germany were agreed, and 10% of the industrial capacity of the western zones unnecessary for the German peace economy should be transferred to the Soviet Union within two years. Stalin proposed, which was accepted, for Poland was to be excluded from division of German compensation and to be later granted 15% of compensation given to the Soviet Union.[18]
  • German standards of living were to be ensured to prevent them from exceeding the European average. The types and amounts of industry to dismantle to achieve that was to be determined later (see Allied plans for German industry after World War II).
  • German industrial war potential was to be destroyed by the destruction or control of all industry with military potential. To that end, all civilian shipyards and aircraft factories were to be dismantled or otherwise destroyed. All production capacity associated with war potential, such as metals, chemical or machinery, were to be reduced to a minimum level, which would later br determined by the Allied Control Commission. Manufacturing capacity thus made "surplus" was to be dismantled as reparations or otherwise destroyed. All research and international trade was to be controlled. The economy was to be decentralised (decartelisation). The economy was also to be reorganised, with the primary emphasis on agriculture and peaceful domestic industries. In early 1946, agreement was reached on the details of the latter: Germany was to be converted into an agricultural and light industrial economy. German exports were to be coal, beer, toys, textiles, etc., which would take the place of the heavy industrial products, which had formed most of Germany's prewar exports.[19]

France, having been excluded from the conference, resisted implementing the Potsdam agreements within its occupation zone. In particular, the French refused to resettle any expelled Germans from the east. Moreover, the French did not accept any obligation to abide by the agreements in the proceedings of the Allied Control Council; in particular, they resisted all proposals to establish common policies and institutions across Germany as a whole and anything that they feared could lead to the emergence of an eventual unified German government.[20]

Poland
Poland's old and new borders, 1945. The territory previously part of Germany is identified in pink.
  • A Provisional Government of National Unity, recognized by all three powers, should be created, known as the Lublin Poles. The Big Three's recognition of the Soviet-controlled government effectivity meant the end of recognition of the existing Polish government-in-exile, known as the London Poles.
  • Poles who were serving in the British Army should be free to return to Poland, with no security upon their return to the communist country guaranteed.
  • The provisional western border should be the Oder–Neisse line, defined by the Oder and Neisse Rivers. Silesia, Pomerania, the southern part of East Prussia and the former Free City of Danzig should be under Polish administration. However, the final delimitation of the western frontier of Poland should await the peace settlement, which would take place 45 years later, at the Treaty on the Final Settlement with Respect to Germany in 1990.
  • The Soviet Union declared that it would settle the reparation claims of Poland from its own share of the overall reparation payments.[21]

Potsdam Declaration

Leahy's role

One of those at the conference is William D. Leahy. The Fleet Admiral in the US Navy had stood as advisor to Roosevelt during the Yalta Conference and to Truman during the Potsdam Conference. Leahy had a lengthy military background since he had served as the most senior American military officer on active duty during the Second World War. He later stated in his book, I Was There: The Personal Story of the Chief of Staff to Presidents Roosevelt and Truman Based on His Notes and Diaries Made at the Time, that the Potsdam Conference was one of the most frustrating out of all the conferences because of hostile relations between the Soviet Union and Britain and the United States. Throughout his work, he refers to the conference as its code name, Terminal. Later in his book, he discusses a tour of Berlin that he took with Truman and describes the experience as "I never saw such destruction. I don't know whether they learned anything from it or not".

The Foreign Ministers: Vyacheslav Molotov, James F. Byrnes, and Anthony Eden, July 1945

In addition to the Potsdam Agreement, on 26 July, Churchill; Truman; and Chiang Kai-shek, Chairman of the Nationalist Government of China (the Soviet Union was not at war with Japan) issued the Potsdam Declaration, which outlined the terms of surrender for Japan during World War II in Asia.

Aftermath
Further information: Atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Eastern Bloc, and Cold War

Truman had mentioned an unspecified "powerful new weapon" to Stalin during the conference. Towards the end of the conference, on July 26, the Potsdam Declaration gave Japan an ultimatum to surrender unconditionally or meet "prompt and utter destruction", which did not mention the new bomb[22] but promised that "it was not intended to enslave Japan". The Soviet Union was not involved in that declaration since it was still neutral in the war against Japan. Japanese Prime Minister Kantarō Suzuki did not respond,[23] which was interpreted as a declaration that the Empire of Japan had ignored the ultimatum.[24] As a result, the United States dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima on 6 August 1945 and Nagasaki on 9 August. The justifications used were that both cities were legitimate military targets and that it was necessary to end the war swiftly and to preserve American lives.

When Truman informed Stalin of the atomic bomb, he said that the United States "had a new weapon of unusual destructive force",[25] but Stalin had full knowledge of the atomic bomb's development because of Soviet spy networks inside the Manhattan Project,[26] and he told Truman at the conference to "make good use of this new addition to the Allied arsenal".[27]

The Soviet Union converted the other countries Eastern Europe into satellite states within the Eastern Bloc, such as the People's Republic of Poland, the People's Republic of Bulgaria, the People's Republic of Hungary,[28] the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic,[29] the People's Republic of Romania[30] and the People's Republic of Albania.[31] Many of whom saw failed Socialist revolutions prior to World War 2.

Previous major conferences
  • Yalta Conference, 4 to 11 February 1945
  • Second Quebec Conference, 12 to 16 September 1944
  • Tehran Conference, 28 November to 1 December 1943
  • Cairo Conference, 22 to 26 November 1943
  • Casablanca Conference, 14 to 24 January 1943

See also
  • Diplomatic history of World War II
  • List of Soviet Union–United States summits

Notes
  1. Description of photograph, Truman Library.
  2. "Avalon Project – A Decade of American Foreign Policy 1941–1949 – Potsdam Conference". Avalon.law.yale.edu. Retrieved 20 March 2013.
  3. Russia (USSR) / Poland Treaty (with annexed maps) concerning the Demarcation of the Existing Soviet-Polish State Frontier in the Sector Adjoining the Baltic Sea 5 March 1957 (retrieved from the UN Delimitation Treaties Infobase, accessed on 18 March 2002)
  4. "Potsdam Conference". Encyclopædia Britannica. Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. 10 July 2018. Retrieved 4 September 2018.
  5. "BBC Fact File: Potsdam Conference". Bbc.co.uk. 2 August 1945. Archived from the original on 29 June 2012. Retrieved 20 March 2013.
  6. Attlee participated alongside Churchill while awaiting the outcome of the 1945 general election, and then replaced him as Prime Minister after the Labour Party's defeat of the Conservatives.
  7. Leffler, Melvyn P., "For the South of Mankind: The United States, the Soviet Union and the Cold War, First Edition, (New York, 2007) pg 31
  8. Miscamble 2007, p. 51
  9. Miscamble 2007, p. 52
  10. George Lenczowski, American Presidents and the Middle East, (1990), pp. 7–13
  11. Hunt, Michael (2013). The World Transformed. Oxford University Press. p. 35. ISBN 9780199371020.
  12. Harry S. Truman, Memoirs, Vol. 1: Year of Decisions (1955), p.380, cited in Lenczowski, American Presidents, p.10
  13. Nash, Gary B. "The Troublesome Polish Question." The American People: Creating a Nation and a Society. New York: Pearson Longman, 2008. Print.
  14. Reinisch, Jessica (2013). The Perils of Peace. Oxford University Press. p. 53.
  15. Thomas, Martin (1998). The French Empire at War 1940-45. Manchester University Press. p. 215.
  16. Feis, Hebert (1960). Between War and Peace; the Potsdam Conference. Princeton University Press. p. 138.
  17. Alfred de Zayas Nemesis at Potsdam, Routledge, London 1977. See also conference on "Potsdamer Konferenz 60 Jahre danach" hosted by the Institut für Zeitgeschichte in Berlin on 19. August 2005 PDF Archived 20 July 2011 at the Wayback Machine Seite 37 et seq.
  18. "Potsdam Conference | World War II". Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved 20 September 2018.
  19. James Stewart Martin. All Honorable Men (1950) p. 191.
  20. Ziemke, Earl Frederick (1990). The US Army and the Occupation of Germany 1944–1946. Center of Military History, United States Army. p. 345.
  21. "Foreign Relations of the United States: Diplomatic Papers, The Conference of Berlin (The Potsdam Conference), 1945, Volume II - Office of the Historian". history.state.gov. Retrieved 15 April 2020.
  22. "How The Potsdam Conference Shaped The Future Of Post-War Europe". Imperial War Museums. Retrieved 12 February 2018.
  23. "Mokusatsu: One Word, Two Lessons" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 6 June 2013. Retrieved 20 March 2013.
  24. "Mokusatsu, Japan's Response to the Potsdam Declaration", Kazuo Kawai, Pacific Historical Review, Vol. 19, No. 4 (November 1950), pp. 409–414.
  25. Putz, Catherine (18 May 2016). "What If the United States Had Told the Soviet Union About the Bomb?". The Diplomat. Retrieved 8 July 2016.
  26. Groves, Leslie (1962). Now it Can be Told: The Story of the Manhattan Project. New York: Harper & Row. pp. 142–145. ISBN 0-306-70738-1. OCLC 537684.
  27. Nichols, Tom (12 April 2016). "Simply No Other Choice: Why America Dropped the Atomic Bomb on Japan". National Interest.org. Retrieved 21 April 2016.
  28. Granville, Johanna, The First Domino: International Decision Making during the Hungarian Crisis of 1956, Texas A&M University Press, 2004. ISBN 1-58544-298-4
  29. Grenville 2005, pp. 370–71
  30. The American Heritage New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition. Houghton Mifflin Company, 2005.
  31. Cook 2001, p. 17

References
  • Cook, Bernard A. (2001), Europe Since 1945: An Encyclopedia, Taylor & Francis, ISBN 0-8153-4057-5
  • Crampton, R. J. (1997), Eastern Europe in the twentieth century and after, Routledge, ISBN 0-415-16422-2
  • Leahy, Fleet Adm William D. I Was There: The Personal Story of the Chief of Staff to Presidents Roosevelt and Truman: Based on His Notes and Diaries Made at the Time (1950) OCLC 314294296.
  • Miscamble, Wilson D. (2007), From Roosevelt to Truman: Potsdam, Hiroshima, and the Cold War, Cambridge University Press, ISBN 0-521-86244-2
  • Roberts, Geoffrey (Fall 2002). "Stalin, the Pact with Nazi Germany, and the Origins of Postwar Soviet Diplomatic Historiography". Journal of Cold War Studies. 4 (4): 93–103.
  • Wettig, Gerhard (2008), Stalin and the Cold War in Europe, Rowman & Littlefield, ISBN 0-7425-5542-9

Further reading
  • Michael Beschloss. The Conquerors: Roosevelt, Truman, and the destruction of Hitler's Germany, 1941–1945 (Simon & Schuster, 2002) ISBN 0684810271
  • Ehrman, John (1956). Grand Strategy Volume VI, October 1944-August 1945. London: HMSO (British official history). pp. 299–309.
  • Farquharson, J. E. "Anglo-American Policy on German Reparations from Yalta to Potsdam." English Historical Review 1997 112(448): 904–926. in JSTOR
  • Feis, Herbert. Between War and Peace: The Potsdam Conference (Princeton University Press, 1960) OCLC 259319 Pulitzer Prize; online
  • Gimbel, John. "On the Implementation of the Potsdam Agreement: an Essay on U.S. Postwar German Policy." Political Science Quarterly 1972 87(2): 242–269. in JSTOR
  • Gormly, James L. From Potsdam to the Cold War: Big Three Diplomacy, 1945–1947. (Scholarly Resources, 1990)
  • Mee, Charles L., Jr. Meeting at Potsdam. M. Evans & Company, 1975. ISBN 0871311674
  • Naimark, Norman. Fires of Hatred. Ethnic Cleansing in Twentieth-Century Europe (Harvard University Press, 2001) ISBN 0674003136
  • Neiberg, Michael. Potsdam: the End of World War II and the Remaking of Europe (Basic Books, 2015) ISBN 9780465075256
  • Thackrah, J. R. "Aspects of American and British Policy Towards Poland from the Yalta to the Potsdam Conferences, 1945." Polish Review 1976 21(4): 3–34. in JSTOR
  • Zayas, Alfred M. de. Nemesis at Potsdam: The Anglo-Americans and the Expulsion of the Germans, Background, Execution, Consequences. Routledge, 1977. ISBN 0710004583

Primary sources
  • Foreign Relations of the United States: Diplomatic Papers. The Conference of Berlin (Potsdam Conference, 1945) 2 vols. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1960
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