22.1 Notes

Aftermath of the War in Europe

Wartime Conferences and Postwar Problems• Victory over the Axis powers brought on a whole new set of problems for

Allied leaders• To a degree, these problems were the result of decisions they had made

during the war• February 1945- Churchill, Roosevelt, and Stalin had met at the Black Sea

resort town of Yalta• Three leaders agreed to divide Austria into zones of military occupation

• Berlin would lie entirely within the Soviet zone- divided into four parts• Soviets control East Berlin• Western Allies would create their own zones in West Berlin• Allied leaders saw division of Germany temporary- final peace

settlement later

Wartime Conferences and Postwar Problems (continued)

• Poland and territories that Soviets had already taken in Eastern Europe• Churchill and Roosevelt believed these countries should be

allowed to determine own futures• Roosevelt, Churchill, and Stalin also were considering how to

prevent another war• Roosevelt proposed United Nations• Organization that would keep the peace through collective

security arrangements• Eventually, at Yalta, the three leaders would discuss their future

Plans

Potsdam

• July 1945- Allied leaders met at Potsdam, outside Berlin, to discuss a postwar settlement• At Potsdam- the three leaders agreed on several basic principles• Germany should remain a single country- for time being, it would

be divided • Germany must be demilitarized • The Nazi party must be outlawed• German political structure should be rebuilt on a democratic basis• Individuals responsible for war crimes should be brought to trial

Potsdam (continued) • To oversee the occupation governments, the Allied leader established the

Allied Control Council• They also agreed that a Council of Foreign Ministers representing China,

France, Great Britain, the Soviet Union, and the United States should write the peace treaties • It became clear Western democracies and Soviet Union had very different

plans for settlement• Major disagreements between the two countries centered around two

points: • The boundaries of Postwar Germany• War reparations

Redrawing Borders

• The Allies agreed on a new western border for Poland• Both Poland and the Soviet Union took parts of East Prussia• This transfer of territory stripped Germany of one fourth

of its land• Poles and Soviets evicted Germans from the lands they

required• Czechoslovakia insisted that Sudeten Germans who had

supported Hitler’s invasion in 1938 leave the country

Demilitarization and Reparations

• Allies swiftly disbanded all German land, air, and sea forces• They also demanded that all factories used in the war industry be

dismantled• This plan proved hard to enforce

• The Allies disagreed on German economic recovery• United States and Britain concluded that German industry

must be revived if Europe was to become prosperous again• France initially wanted to keep German industries weak-

prevent future rearmament • Soviets demanded Germany pay them 10 billion dollars in

reparations

Demilitarization and Reparations (continued)

• In the end, Western leaders agreed that the Soviets could claim reparations•mostly in the form of industrial equipment from all the

military zones• The Soviets dismantled and moved hundreds of industrial

plants from Germany to Soviet Union• This severely hurt German industry’s chances to recover• Eventually, Western Allies halted the flow of reparations to

the Soviet Union• The Allied Control Council found it increasingly difficult to

reach decisions

The Nuremberg Trials• Many Nazi leaders were captured after the war• The Allies were determined to bring them to trial• 1945 and 1946- a special international court met at Nuremberg,

Germany• Nuremberg trials- court charged 22 Nazi leaders with crimes

against peace & humanity• 12 were sentenced to death• 7 were sentenced to life imprisonment• 3 were acquitted

• The court declared the Nazi Party a criminal organization

The United Nations•April 1945- representatives from 51 nations met in San Francisco •Primary purpose of the UN was to maintain international peace and security•Also designed to foster international cooperation to solve cultural, economic, and social problems

•Many Americans looked with skepticism at the UN

The United Nations (continued)• The two most important bodies within the UN were the General Assembly

and the Security Council • Any nation that wished to join would be admitted to the General Assembly• Each nation in the Assembly would have same amount of rights and voting

powers• General Assembly responsible for drawing up the UN budget and

determining each member’s cost • Security Council- included 10 temporary members elected from the

General Assembly• 2 year rotating terns• Britain, China, France, the Soviet Union, and the United States-

permanent members• Each permanent member had veto power

Peacemaking Problems• The war undermined or destroyed many governments in Europe• Eastern Europe- Soviets established governments dominated or

controlled by Communists • It became clear Soviet Union and Western Allies had conflicting

goals for postwar Europe• Peace negotiations also exposed growing differences between the

Soviet Union and the Western Allies• A compromise reached- Soviets agreed to allow a few representatives

of noncommunist parties to participate in new Eastern European governments