The Yalta Conference, February 1945
Learn more about the development of the Cold War and the Yalta-Potsdam conferences in this podcast.
Listen to the full series on BBC Sounds.
In February 1945, ‘the Big Three’ – Churchill, Roosevelt and Stalin - met at Yalta in the Crimea region of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics - collection of states, also known as the Soviet Union..
With an Allied victory looking likely, the aim of the Yalta Conference was to decide what to do with Germany once it had been defeated. Each of the three leaders had different priorities:
| Leaders | The main priorities of the leader for the post-war settlement |
| Churchill | To maintain Britain’s global empire and prestige. Withstand pressure from the USA and the USSR to end Britain’s colonial empire. |
| Roosevelt | To ensure world peace after the war finished, so that the USA could rebuild its connections with the global economy. Roosevelt believed that world peace and global free trade would ensure an event like the Great Depression wouldn’t happen again. He firmly believed that a United Nations organisation would be an effective peacekeeping force. |
| Stalin | To guarantee Soviet security against western imperialist aggression. Russia had been invaded three times from the west between 1914 and 1941: twice in the world wars and once after the Russian Revolution by anti-revolutionary forces. Stalin wanted a buffer zone of communist countries in eastern Europe to give Russia that security. |
| Leaders | Churchill |
|---|---|
| The main priorities of the leader for the post-war settlement | To maintain Britain’s global empire and prestige. Withstand pressure from the USA and the USSR to end Britain’s colonial empire. |
| Leaders | Roosevelt |
|---|---|
| The main priorities of the leader for the post-war settlement | To ensure world peace after the war finished, so that the USA could rebuild its connections with the global economy. Roosevelt believed that world peace and global free trade would ensure an event like the Great Depression wouldn’t happen again. He firmly believed that a United Nations organisation would be an effective peacekeeping force. |
| Leaders | Stalin |
|---|---|
| The main priorities of the leader for the post-war settlement | To guarantee Soviet security against western imperialist aggression. Russia had been invaded three times from the west between 1914 and 1941: twice in the world wars and once after the Russian Revolution by anti-revolutionary forces. Stalin wanted a buffer zone of communist countries in eastern Europe to give Russia that security. |
In many ways the Yalta Conference set the scene for the rest of the Cold War in Europe.
Outcomes
- Germany would be divided into four zones of occupation with the USSR, Britain, France and the USA each controlling a zone. France had been liberated from Nazi Germany is a common name of a period of history in Germany between 1933 to 1945, under the control of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party. and was included at the conference partly due to pressure from the French leader, General de Gaulle, but also because Britain wanted a European ally with whom it could share the cost of the post-war reconstruction of Germany.
- The German capital, Berlin, was deep inside the Soviet zone and it too was to be divided into four zones, each controlled by one of the Allied powers. Berlin would be a source of tension throughout the Cold War.
- All countries freed from Nazi control were to be guaranteed the right to hold free elections and choose their own governments. However, Stalin was offered a ‘sphere of influence’ over Eastern Europe.
- Stalin once again promised to join the war against Japan, once Germany was defeated.
- All the leaders made a commitment to hunt down Nazi war criminals.
- The Allies agreed to the setting up of the The successor to the League of Nations, the United Nations was established in 1945 as an international organisation designed to keep peace, uphold international law and set standards in human rights., an organisation with the objectives of ensuring international cooperation and preventing future wars.
Revision tip
- List the Big Three at the Yalta conference and what each one’s main priority was.
- Explain how the Big Three needed each other to fulfil their priorities.
- Explain how the priorities of the Big Three might have been difficult to fulfil at the same time.
