Cold War

presidential election and the importance of establishing cooperation

between the London Poles and the Lublin government-in-exile situated in

Moscow. Roosevelt had been willing to make a major concession to Russia's

security needs by accepting the Soviet definition of Poland's new

boundaries. But he also expected some consideration of his own political

dilemma and of the principles of the Atlantic Charter.

Such consideration appeared to be forthcoming in the summer of 1944

when Stalin agreed to meet the prime minister of the London-Polish

government and "to mediate" between the two opposing governments-in-exile.

But hopes for such a compromise were quickly crushed as Soviet troops

failed to aid the Warsaw Polish resistance when it rose in massive

rebellion against German occupation forces in hopes of linking up with

advancing Soviet forces. The Warsaw Poles generally supported the London

government-in-exile. As Red Army troops moved to just six miles outside of

Warsaw, the Warsaw Poles rose en masse against their Nazi oppressors. Yet

when they did so, the Soviets callously rejected all pleas for help. For

eight weeks they even refused to permit American planes to land on Soviet

soil after airlifting supplies to the beleaguered Warsaw rebels. By the

time the rebellion ended, 250,000 people had become casualties, with the

backbone of the pro-London resistance movement brutally crushed. Although

some Americans, then and later, accepted Soviet claims that logistical

problems had prevented any assistance being offered, most Americans

endorsed the more cynical conclusion that Stalin had found a convenient way

to annihilate a large part of his Polish opposition and facilitate

acquisition of a pro-Soviet regime. As Ambassador Averell Harriman cabled

at the time, Russian actions were based on "ruthless political

considerations."

By the time of the Yalta conference, the Red Army occupied Poland,

leaving Roosevelt little room to maneuver. When one American diplomat urged

the president to force Russia to agree to Polish independence, Roosevelt

responded: "Do you want me to go to war with Russia?" With Stalin having

already granted diplomatic recognition to the Lublin regime, Roosevelt

could only hope that the Soviets would accept enough modification of the

status quo to provide the appearance of representative democracy. Spheres

of influence were a reality, FDR told seven senators, because "the

occupying forces [have] the power in the areas where their arms are

present." All America could do was to use her influence "to ameliorate the

situation."

Nevertheless, Roosevelt played what cards he had with skill. "Most

Poles," he told Stalin, "want to save face. ... It would make it easier for

me at home if the Soviet government could give something to Poland." A

government of national unity, Roosevelt declared, would facilitate public

acceptance in the United States of full American participation in postwar

arrangements. "Our people at home look with a critical eye on what they

consider a disagreement between us. ... They, in effect, say that if we

cannot get a meeting of minds now . . . how can we get an understanding on

even more vital things in the future?" Although Stalin's immediate response

was to declare that Poland was "not only a question of honor for Russia,

but one of life and death," he finally agreed that some reorganization of

the Lublin regime could take place to ensure broader representation of all

Poles.

In the end, the Big Three papered over their differences at Yalta by

agreeing to a Declaration on Liberated Europe that committed the Allies to

help liberated peoples resolve their problems through democratic means and

advocated the holding of free elections. Although Roosevelt's aide Admiral

William Leahy told him that the report on Poland was "so elastic that the

Russians can stretch it all the way from Yalta to Washington without ever

technically breaking it," Roosevelt believed that he had done the best he

could under the circumstances. From the beginning, Roosevelt had

recognized, on a de facto basis at least, that Poland was part of Russia's

sphere of influence and must remain so. He could only hope that Stalin

would now show equal recognition of the U.S. need to have concessions that

would give the appearance, at least, of implementing the Atlantic Charter.

The same basic dilemmas, of course, occurred with regard to the

structure of postwar governments in all of Eastern Europe. As early as

1943, Roosevelt had made clear to Stalin at Tehran that he was willing to

have the Baltic states controlled by the Soviets. His only request, the

president told Stalin, was for some public commitment to future elections

in order to satisfy his constituents at home for whom "the big issues . . .

would be the question of referendum and the right of self-determination."

The exchange with Stalin accurately reflected Roosevelt's position over

time.

Significantly, Roosevelt even sanctioned Churchill's efforts to divide

Europe into spheres of influence. With Roosevelt's approval, Churchill

journeyed to Moscow in the fall of 1944. Sitting across the table from

Stalin, Churchill proposed that Russia exercise 90 percent predominance in

Romania, 75 percent in Bulgaria, and 50 percent control, together with

Britain, in Yugoslavia and Hungary, while the United States and Great

Britain would exercise 90 percent predominance in Greece. After extended

discussion and some hard bargaining, the deal was made. (Poland was not

even included in Churchill's percentages, suggesting that he was

acknowledging Soviet control there.) At the time, Churchill suggested that

the arrangements be expressed "in diplomatic terms [without use of] the

phrase 'dividing into spheres,' because the Americans might be shocked."

But in fact, as Robert Daliek has shown in his superb study of Roosevelt's

diplomacy, the American president accepted the arrangement. "I am most

pleased to know," FDR wrote Churchill, "you are reaching a meeting of your

two minds as to international policies." To Harriman he cabled: "My active

interest at the present time in the Balkan area is that such steps as are

practicable should be taken to insure against the Balkans getting us into a

future international war." At no time did Roosevelt protest the British-

Soviet agreement.

In the case of Eastern Europe generally, even more so than in Poland,

it seemed clear that Roosevelt, on a de facto basis, was prepared to live

with spheres-of-influence diplomacy. Nevertheless, he remained constantly

sensitive to the political peril he faced at home on the issue. As

Congressman John Dingell stated in a public warning in August 1943, "We

Americans are not sacrificing, fighting, and dying to make permanent and

more powerful the communistic government of Russia and to make Joseph

Stalin a dictator over the liberated countries of Europe." Such sentiments

were widespread. Indeed, it was concern over such opinions that led

Roosevelt to urge the Russians to be sensitive to American political

concerns. In Eastern Europe for the most part, as in Poland, the key

question was whether the United States could somehow find a way to

acknowledge spheres of influence, but within a context of universalist

principles, so that the American people would not feel that the Atlantic

Charter had been betrayed.

The future of Germany represented a third critical point of conflict.

For emotional as well as political reasons, it was imperative that steps be

taken to prevent Germany from ever again waging war. In FDR's words, "We

have got to be tough with Germany, and I mean the German people not just

the Nazis. We either have to castrate the German people or you have got to

treat them in such a manner so they can't just go on reproducing people who

want to continue the way they have in the past." Consistent with that

position, Roosevelt had agreed with Stalin at Tehran on the need for

destroying a strong Germany by dividing the country into several sectors,

"as small and weak as possible."

Still operating on that premise, Roosevelt endorsed Secretary of the

Treasury Henry Morgenthau's plan to eliminate all industry from Germany and

convert the country into a pastoral landscape of small farms. Not only

would such a plan destroy any future war-making power, it would also

reassure the Soviet Union of its own security. "Russia feared we and the

British were going to try to make a soft peace with Germany and build her

up as a possible future counter-weight against Russia," Morgenthau said.

His plan would avoid that, and simultaneously implement Roosevelt's

insistence that "every person in Germany should realize that this time

Germany is a defeated nation." Hence, in September 1944, Churchill and

Roosevelt approved the broad outlines of the Morgenthau plan as their

policy for Germany.

Within weeks, however, the harsh policy of pastoralization came

unglued. From a Soviet perspective, there was the problem of how Russia

could exact the reparations she needed from a country with no industrial

base. American policymakers, in turn, objected that a Germany without

industrial capacity would prove unable to support herself, placing the

entire burden for maintaining the populace on the Allies. Rumors spread

that the Morgenthau plan was stiffening German resistance on the western

front. American business interests, moreover, suggested the importance of

retaining German industry as a key to postwar commerce and trade.

As a result, Allied policy toward Germany became a shambles. "No one

wants to make Germany a wholly agricultural nation again," Roosevelt

insisted. "No one wants 'complete eradication of German industrial

production capacity in the Ruhr and the Saar.' " Confused about how to

proceed, Roosevelt—in effect—adopted a policy of no policy. "I dislike

making detailed plans for a country which we do not yet occupy," he said.

When Churchill, Stalin, and Roosevelt met for the last time in Yalta, this

failure to plan prevented a decisive course of action. The Russians

insisted on German reparations of $20 billion, half of which would go to

the Soviet Union. Although FDR accepted Stalin's figure as a basis for

discussion, the British and Americans deferred any settlement of the issue,

fearing that they would be left with the sole responsibility for feeding

and housing the German people. The only agreement that could be reached was

to refer the issue to a new tripartite commission. Thus, at just the moment

when consensus on a policy to deal with their common enemy was most urgent,

the Allies found themselves empty handed, allowing conflict and

misunderstanding over another central question to join the already existing

problems over Eastern Europe.

Directly related to each of these issues, particularly the German

question, was the problem of postwar economic reconstruction. The issue

seemed particularly important to those Americans concerned about the

postwar economy in the United States. Almost every business and political

leader feared resumption of mass unemployment once the war ended. Only the

development of new markets, extensive trade, and worldwide economic

cooperation could prevent such an eventuality. "The capitalistic system is

essentially an international system," one official declared. "If it cannot

function internationally, it will break down completely." The Atlantic

Charter had taken such a viewpoint into account when it declared that all

states should enjoy access, on equal terms, to "the raw materials of the

world which are needed for their economic prosperity."

To promote these objectives, the United States took the initiative at

Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, in 1944 by creating a World Bank with a

capitalization of $7.6 billion and the International Monetary Fund with a

capitalization of $7.3 billion. The two organizations would provide funds

for rebuilding Europe, as well as for stabilizing world currency. Since the

United States was the major contributor, it would exercise decisive control

over how the money was spent. The premise underlying both organizations was

that a stable world required healthy economies based on free trade.

Attitudes toward economic reconstruction had direct import for postwar

policies toward Germany and Eastern Europe. It would be difficult to have a

stable European economy without a significant industrial base in Germany.

Pastoral countries of small farms rarely possessed the wherewithal to

become customers of large capitalist enterprises. On the other hand, a

prosperous German economy, coupled with access to markets in Eastern and

Western Europe, offered the prospect of avoiding a recurrence of depression

and guaranteed a significant American presence in European politics as

well. Beyond this, of course, it was thought that if democracy was to

survive, as it had not after 1918, countries needed a thriving economy.

Significantly, economic aid also offered the opportunity either to

enhance or diminish America's ties to the Soviet Union. Averell Harriman,

the American ambassador to Moscow after October 1943, had engaged in

extensive business dealings with the Soviet Union during the 1920S and

believed firmly in the policy of providing American assistance to rebuild

the Soviet economy. Such aid, Harriman argued, "would be in the self-

interest of the United States" because it would help keep Americans at work

producing goods needed by the Russians. Just as important, it would provide

"one of the most effective weapons to avoid the development of a sphere of

influence of the Soviet Union over eastern Europe and the Balkans."

Proceeding on these assumptions, Harriman urged the Russians to apply

for American aid. They did so, initially, in December 1943 with a request

for a $1 billion loan at an interest rate of one-half of 1 percent, then

again in January 1945 with a request for a $6 billion loan at an interest

rate of 2.25 percent. Throughout this period, American officials appeared

to encourage the Soviet initiative. Secretary of the Treasury Morgenthau

had come up with his own plan for a $10 billion loan at 2 percent interest.

When Chamber of Commerce head Eric Johnson visited Moscow, Stalin told him:

"I like to do business with American businessmen. You fellows know what you

want. Your word is good, and, best of all, you stay in office a long

time—just like we do over here." So enthusiastic were some State Department

officials about postwar economic arrangements that they predicted exports

of as much as $1 billion a year to Russia. Molotov and Mikoyan encouraged

such optimism, with the Soviets promising "a voluminous and stable market

such as no other customer would ever [offer]."

As the European war drew to a close, however, the American attitude

shifted from one of eager encouragement to skeptical detachment. Harriman

and his aides in Moscow perceived a toughening of the Soviet position on

numerous issues, including Poland and Eastern Europe. Hence, they urged the

United States to clamp down on lend-lease and exact specific concessions

from the Russians in return for any ongoing aid. Only if the Soviets

"played the international game with us in accordance with our standards,"

Harriman declared, should the United States offer assistance. By April

1945, Harriman had moved to an even more hard-line position. "We must

clearly recognize," he said, "that the Soviet program is the establishment

of totalitarianism, ending personal liberty and democracy." A week later he

urged the State Department to view the Soviet loan request with great

suspicion. "Our basic interest," he cabled, "might better be served by

increasing our trade with other parts of the world rather than giving

preference to the Soviet Union as a source of supply."

Congress and the American people, meanwhile, seemed to be turning

against postwar economic aid. A public opinion poll in December 1944 showed

that 70 percent of the American people believed the Allies should repay

their lend-lease debt in full. Taking up the cry for fiscal restraint,

Senator Arthur Vandenberg told a friend: "We have a rich country, but it is

not rich enough to permit us to support the world." Fearful about postwar

recession and the possibility that American funds would be used for

purposes it did not approve, Congress placed severe constraints on

continuation of any lend-lease support once the war was over and indicated

that any request for a postwar loan would encounter profound skepticism.

Roosevelt's response, in the face of such attitudes, was once again to

procrastinate. Throughout the entire war he had ardently espoused a

generous and flexible lend-lease policy toward the Soviet Union. For the

most part, FDR appeared to endorse Secretary Morgenthau's attitude that "to

get the Russians to do something [we] should ... do it nice. . . . Don't

drive such a hard bargain that when you come through it does not taste

good." Consistent with that attitude, he had rejected Harriman's advice to

demand quid pro quos for American lend-lease. Economic aid, he declared,

did not "constitute a bargaining weapon of any strength," particularly

since curtailing lend-lease would harm the United States as much as it

would injure the Russians. Nevertheless, Roosevelt accepted a policy of

postponement on any discussion of postwar economic arrangements. "I think

it's very important," the president declared, "that we hold back and don't

give [Stalin] any promise until we get what we want." Clearly, the amount

of American aid to the Soviet Union—and the attitude which accompanied that

aid— could be decisive to the future of American-Soviet relations. Yet in

this—as in so many other issues—Roosevelt gave little hint of the ultimate

direction he would take, creating one more dimension of uncertainty amidst

the gathering confusion that surrounded postwar international arrangements.

The final issue around which the Cold War revolved was that of the

atomic bomb. Development of nuclear weapons not only placed in human hands

the power to destroy all civilization, but presented as well the critical

question of how such weapons would be used, who would control them, and

what possibilities existed for harnessing the incalculable energy of the

atom for the purpose of international peace and cooperation rather than

destruction. No issue, ultimately, would be more important for human

survival. On the other hand, the very nature of having to build the A-bomb

in a world threatened by Hitler's madness mandated a secrecy that seriously

impeded, from the beginning, the prospects for cooperation and

international control.

The divisive potential of the bomb became evident as soon as Albert

Einstein disclosed to Roosevelt the frightening information that physicists

had the capacity to split the atom. Knowing that German scientists were

also pursuing the same quest, Roosevelt immediately ordered a crash program

of research and development on the bomb, soon dubbed the "Manhattan

Project." British scientists embarked on a similar effort, collaborating

with their American colleagues. The bomb, one British official noted,

"would be a terrific factor in the postwar world . . . giving an absolute

control to whatever country possessed the secret." Although American

advisors urged "restricted interchange" of atomic energy information,

Churchill demanded and got full cooperation. If the British and the

Americans worked together, however, what of the Soviet Union once it became

an ally?

In a decision fraught with significance for the future, Roosevelt and

Churchill agreed in Quebec in August 1943 to a "full exchange of

information" about the bomb with "[neither] of us [to] communicate any

information about [the bomb] to third parties except by mutual consent."

The decision ensured Britain's future interests as a world power and

guaranteed maximum secrecy; but it did so in a manner that would almost

inevitably provoke Russian suspicion about the intentions of her two major

allies.

The implications of the decision were challenged just one month later

when Neils Bohr, a nuclear physicist who had escaped from Nazi-occupied

Denmark, approached Roosevelt (indirectly through Felix Frankfurter) with

the proposal that the British and Americans include Russia in their plans.

Adopting a typically Rooseveltian stance, the president both encouraged

Bohr to believe that he was "most eager to explore" the possibility of

cooperation and almost simultaneously reaffirmed his commitment to an

exclusive British-American monopoly over atomic information. Meeting

personally with Bohr on August 26, 1944, Roosevelt agreed that "contact

with the Soviet Union should be tried along the lines that [you have]

suggested." Yet in the meantime, Roosevelt and Churchill had signed a new

agreement to control available supplies of uranium and had authorized

surveillance of Bohr "to insure that he is responsible for no leakage of

information, particularly to the Russians." Evidently, Roosevelt hoped to

keep open the possibility of cooperating with the Soviets—assuming that

Bohr would somehow communicate this to the Russians—while retaining, until

the moment was right, an exclusive relationship with Britain. Implicit in

Roosevelt's posture was the notion that sharing atomic information might be

a quid pro quo for future Soviet concessions. On the surface, such an

argument made sense. Yet it presumed that the two sides were operating on

the same set of assumptions and perceptions—clearly not a very safe

presumption. In this, as in so many other matters, Roosevelt appears to

have wanted to retain all options until the end. Indeed, a meeting to

discuss the sharing of atomic information was scheduled for the day FDR was

to return from Warm Springs, Georgia. The meeting never took place, leaving

one more pivotal issue of contention unresolved as the war drew to a close.

Conclusion.

Given the nature of the personalities and the nations involved, it was

perhaps not surprising that, as the war drew to an end, virtually none of

the critical issues on the agenda of postwar relationships had been

resolved. Preferring to postpone decisions rather than to confront the full

dimension of the conflicts that existed, FDR evidently hoped that his own

political genius, plus the exigencies of postwar conditions, would pave the

way for a mutual accommodation that would somehow satisfy both America's

commitment to a world of free trade and democratic rule, and the Soviet

Union's obsession with national security and safely defined spheres of

influence. The Russians, in turn, also appeared content to wait, in the

meantime working militarily to secure maximum leverage for achieving their

sphere-of-influence goals. What neither leader nor nation realized,

perhaps, was that in their delay and scheming they were adding fuel to the

fire of suspicion that clearly existed between them and possibly missing

the only opportunity that might occur to forge the basis for mutual

accommodation and coexistence.

For nearly half a century, the country had functioned within a

political world shaped by the Cold War and controlled by a passionate

anticommunism that used the Kremlin as its primary foil. Not only did the

Cold War define America's stance in the world, dictating foreign policy

choices from Southeast Asia to Latin-America; it defined the contours of

domestic politics as well. No group could secure legitimacy for its

political ideas if they were critical of American foreign policy,

sympathetic in any way to "socialism," or vulnerable to being dismissed as

"leftist" or as "soft on communism." From national health insurance to day

care centers for children, domestic policies suffered from the crippling

paralysis created by a national fixation with the Soviet Union.

Now, it seemed likely that the Cold War would no longer exist as the

pivot around which all American politics revolved. However much politicians

were unaccustomed to talking about anything without anti-communism as a

reference point, it now seemed that they would have to look afresh at

problems long since put aside because they could not be dealt with in a

world controlled by Cold War alliances.

In some ways, America seemed to face the greatest moment of possibility

in all of postwar history as the decade of the 1990s began. So much

positive change had already occurred in the years since World War II—the

material progress, the victories against discrimination, the new horizons

that had opened for education and creativity. But so much remained to be

done as well in a country where homelessness, poverty, and drug addiction

reflected the abiding strength that barriers of race, class, and gender

retained in blocking people's quest for a decent life.

Glossary:

Cold War - is the term used to describe the intense rivalry

that developed after World War II between groups of

Communist and non-Communist nations/ On one side

were the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR)

and its Communist allies, often referred to as the

Eastern bloc. On the other side were the United

States and its democratic allies, usually referred

to as the Western bloc. The struggle was called the

Cold War because it did not actually lead to

fighting, or "hot" war, on a wide scale.

Iron Curtain - was the popular phrase, which Churchill made to

refer to Soviet barriers against the West. Behind

these barriers, the USSR steadily expanded its

power.

Marshall Plan - encouraged European nations to work together for

economic recovery after World War II (1939-1945) /

In June 1947, the United States agreed to administer

aid to Europe in the countries would meet to decide

what they needed/ The official name of the plane was

the European Recovery Program. It is called the

Marshall Plane because Secretary of the State George

C. Marshall first suggested it.

Potsdam Conference -was the last meeting among the Leaders of Great

Britain, the Soviet Union and the United States,

during World War II. The conference was held at

Potsdam, Germany, near Berlin. It opened in July 17,

1945, about two months after Germany's defeat in the

war. Present at the opening were U.S. President

Harry S. Truman, British Prime Minister Winston

Churchill, and the Soviet Premier Josef Stalin.

Yalta Conference - was one of the most important meetings of key

Allied Leaders during World War II. These Leaders

were President Franklin D. Roosevelt of the United

States, Prime Minister Winston Churchill of Great

Britain, and Premier Josef Stalin of the Soviet

Union. Their countries became known as the "Big

Three". The conference took place at Yalta, a famous

Black Sea resort in the Crimea, from Feb. 4 to 11,

1945. Through the years decisions made there

regarding divisions in Europe have stirred bitter

debates.

The reference list.

1. William H. Chafe

"The Unfinished Journey: America since World War II" New York Oxford,

Oxford University press, 1991.

2. David Caute "The Great Fear", 1978

3. Michael Belknap "Cold War Political Justice", 1977

4. Allen D. Harper "The politics of Loyalty", 1959

5. Robert Griffin "The politics of Fear", 1970

6. James Wechler "The Age Suspicion" 1980

7. Alistair Cooke "A Generation on Trial", 1950

8. An outline of American History

9. World Book

10. Henry Borovik "Cold War", 1997

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