Static – World History – Cold War – [3] | Focus

Notes for World History

The Yalta Conference [ February 1945):

This was held in Russia and was attended by the three Allied leaders- Stalin, Roosevelt and Churchill- so that they could plan what was to happen when the war ended.
Agreements were reached on the following points:
- A new organization 4 to be called the United Nations should be set up to replace the League of Nations.
- Germany was to divided into zones-Russian, American and British, while Berlin would be split into corresponding zones.
- Free elections would be allowed in te states of eastern Europe.
- Stalin promised to join the war against japan on condition that Russia received Sakhalin island and some territory in Manchuria.
- However, there were signs of trouble over what was to be done with Poland.

The Potsdam Conference (July 1945)

This conference, like Yalta, was attended by the three Allied powers: US, Britain and USSR.
Agreements were reached on the following points:
- Germany was to he disarmed
- Nazi party was to be disbanded
- Germany was to pay war reparations most of which would go to USSR
- Disagreement continued over Poland.

Establishment of Communism in eastern Europe:

Russians interfered in the countries of eastern Europe to set up pro-communist govts. For example, in Hungary.
By 1947, every state in that area except Czechoslovakia had a fully communist govt
The West was irritated by Russia’s treatment of eastern Europe, which disregarded Stalin’s promise of free lections, made at Yalta.

The Truman Doctrine and the Marshall Plan

Truman doctrine
- This sprang from the events in Greece, where communists were trying to overthrow the monarchy.
- Britain who wanted to help Greece against the communists appealed to USA for help.
- US President Truman in his doctrine made it clear that USA had no intention of returning to isolation as she had after First World War; she was committed to a policy of containing communism, not just in Europe, but throughout the world.
Marshall Plan
- Announced in 1947, this was an economic extension of the Truman Doctrine.
- Under Marshall Plan, US produced Economic Recovery Programme which offered economic and ﬁnancial help to western Europe.
- A prosperous Europe would provide lucrative markets for American experts, but its main aim was political: communism was less likely to gain control in flourishing western Europe.
- Russia described the idea of Marshall Plan as ‘dollar imperialism’.
- The USSR did not allow her satellite States nor Czechoslovakia to take advantage of Marshall Plan

The Cominform

The Communist Information Bureau or Cominform was the Soviet response to the Marshall Plan.
Set up by Stalin in 1947, it was an organization to draw together the various European communist parties.
Stalin’s aim was to introduce Russian style communism in satellite nations through Cominform.
Eastern Europe was to he industrialised, collectivised and centralised; states were expected to trade primarily with Cominform members, and all contacts with non communist countries were discouraged.
When Yugoslavia objected she was expelled from the Cominform.
Cominform was followed by the Moltov Plan and Comecon to aid eastern European nations.

The communist takeover of Czechoslovakia (1943)

This came as a great blow to the Western bloc, because it was the only remaining democratic state in eastern Europe and acted as a bridge between east and west.
The bridge between East and West was gone; the ‘iron curtain’ was complete.

The Berlin Blockade and Airlift

This brought the Cold War to its ﬁrst great crisis.
It arose out of disagreements over the treatment of Germany.
At the end of the war, Germany and Berlin were divided into four zones. Unlike the western powers who worked for recovery of their zones, Russia drained the resources of her zone.
The three western zones merged in 1948 to form a single economic unit. Western nations wanted reunion of all four zones, but Russia resisted.
The West introduced a new currency and ended price controls in their zone and in West Berlin. This furiated Russia as she could not accept a island of capitalism inside the communist zone.
Russia responded by closing all road, rail and canal links between West Berlin and West Germany with the aim to force the West to withdraw from West Berlin by reducing it to starvation point
The western powers decided to fly supplies in.
In 1949, Russia admitted her failure by lifting the blockade.
lmpact:
- It gave psychological boost to western powers.
- Relations with Russia became the worst ever.
- NATO was formed by western powers to coordinate their defences.

The formation of NATO

The formation of NATO took place in 1949.
It was the outcome of the Berlin blockade which showed West’s military unreadiness.
NATO’S policy was to regard an attack on any of the member countries as an attack on all of them and placing their defence forces under a joint organization which would coordinate the defences of the west.
This was a highly signiﬁcant development as the Americans had abandoned their traditional policy of ‘no entangling alliances.

The two Germanies

The western powers set up the West Germany in their zone and Russia set up East Germany in her zone. Germany remained fully divided until 1990.

More nuclear weapons

When it became known in 1949 that the USSR had successfully exploded an atomic bomb, an arms race began to develop.

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