On may 11, 1945, Prime Minister Winston Churchill proposed the defeated Germany meeting of the “big three”, during which was established the Council of foreign Ministers, whose task was to reach agreements on the postwar world. In the USSR the line of the new borders and spheres of their influence were developed in 1941, shortly after, began a counteroffensive Soviet troops near Moscow. And among advanced during the war, proposals were those that did not lost its relevance until now.”Although the war in full swing”December 26, 1941, in the midst of the battle of Moscow, Deputy people’s Commissar of foreign Affairs of the USSR the old Bolshevik S. A. Lozovsky wrote to the Chairman of the State defense Committee I. Stalin:”Although the war is in full swing and nobody knows when it will end, but the outcome of the war is already clear. Germany, Japan, Italy and their allies will be defeated. In this regard, it is time to begin preparing the peace conference, which will be much more difficult tasks of the Paris peace conference, gathered after Germany’s defeat in the war of 1914-1918″.Lozovsky rightly believed that during the future reconstruction of the world the Soviet Union will not be easy to defend their interests:”the complexity of the situation will be that failure will be the four great powers (Germany, Japan, Italy and France) and solve the case have of the Soviet Union, great Britain and the United States.We’ll have against yourself at the conference not only block the United States and great Britain, and other capitalist States (Poland, Czechoslovakia, etc.), which together will first and foremost take care to preserve the capitalist system, including in the defeated countries, and the retention of the Soviet Union in whatever was in the old pre-1939 borders. Not be the slightest doubt that at the peace conference breaks out with great force the contradictions between the United States and great Britain, between small States and large and between small States, but still it is necessary to anticipate that the most significant issues we will have against themselves the United front of capitalist powers.”Deputy people’s Commissar wrote that the preparation of the Soviet position at the upcoming peace conference should be addressed urgently:”we Must now proceed to the development of a number of issues in order so we don’t have coming to the conference to make amendments and additions to those proposals already being conditioned by the UK…Roosevelt and Churchill had already announced the program for the future structure of Europe and the world.The British set up under the chairmanship of Leith-Ross’s special Bureau, which deals not only with the study of the distribution of raw materials after war, but also the future of Europe”.In addition to issues of compensation caused by enemy damage and the neutralization of Germany and its allies militarily for years to Lozovsky proposed to study the issue of post-war borders:”we Have to consider the whole question of our borders. We cannot continue to tolerate that Japanese warships could at any moment to cut us off from the Pacific ocean and from our ports and to close Laperuza Strait, Kuril Straits Sangarski Strait and Tsushima Strait. No way to leave the old situation in the Baltic and Black seas. Question about our land and sea borders will have to think in terms of security and freedom of communications.”Photo: RGAKFD / Rosinform, Kommersant”without firing a single shot”Offer Lozovsky Stalin considered timely and efficient, and on 28 January 1942, the Politburo of the CPSU(b) adopted the decision about creation of the Commission on post-war projects of the state order of the countries of Europe, Asia and other parts of the world. Its members were to study the materials of all the peace conferences held after the First world war. And collect all the data about the ongoing negotiations in different countries on borders and economic relations after the peace, and reached their agreements.”The closest phase of the Commission,— was stated in the decision of the Politburo, should be drafting within the period to be set by the Commission, the synthesis report on the existing plans of the postwar political and economic structure of the world.”In September 1943 to develop the Soviet project of the postwar world joined I. M. Maisky, who had returned from London, where he since 1932 represented the Soviet Union. New Deputy people’s Commissar of foreign Affairs of the USSR differed in-depth knowledge of British, American and European realities (see “the Weakening of the Soviet Union from the beginning included in the plans”) and for 11 January 1944 presented to the people’s Commissar of foreign Affairs of the USSR V. M. Molotov with a lengthy response with my concern.May have expressed their views on hotly debated then in the anti-Hitler coalition the question on necessity of division of Germany into small independent States, and the methods and timing of obtaining reparations from the vanquished. He wrote about the necessity of detention after the war with bordering and nearby countries in the cooperation agreements and the establishment of a long-term Soviet military bases.Special attention was paid to the diplomat and future borders. He proposed to include part of the Soviet Union strategically and economically important area of Pechenga (Petsamo). And, as Lozovsky, may considered very important change in the Soviet borders in the far East:”South Sakhalin, which is currently VL��the your deetsya Japan, should be returned to the Soviet Union…Receive southern Sakhalin and the Kuril Islands is not necessarily associated with the involvement of the USSR into war with Japan.”How to obtain the desired bloodless, the diplomat wrote:”the USSR is not interested in the outbreak of war with Japan, but he’s very interested in the military defeat of Japan, for without this latter condition, we cannot expect the lasting peace in Asia. Until the final victory over Germany, the allies, in all likelihood, will not be formally put before us the question of entering the war with Japan. But almost certainly, after the defeat of Germany they do (especially the US). Our tactic, obviously, should be to ensure, through skillful maneuvering to avoid open us involvement in the war with Japan. Much more profitable from the point of view of the USSR would provide “honor” the defeat of Japan the British and Americans. It would save us the human and material losses, however, would force the US and the UK a few to portrati its human and material resources. Thus the imperialist fervor of the US in the postwar era would be somewhat chilled… It would also be our revenge for the position of the Anglo-Americans in question of the second front.The Soviet Union should learn from the war in the far East, South Sakhalin and the Kuril chain of Islands… it is Quite possible that at the peace conference at the General surveying the map of the world and complex maneuvers great and small powers, the USSR could get just the named entities, without firing a single shot in the far East, of course, on the precondition that the United States and England do defeat Japan. After Japan should be set to approximately the same type as that for Germany.”Photo: Alexander Ustinov / photo Archive of the magazine “Ogonek” / merchant”in Order to prevent strengthening”Wrote may and how policy in relation to European and Asian countries, from his point of view, should follow the Soviet Union. For example, of France in its note said:”the Soviet Union, in my view, it is advantageous to contribute to the restoration of France as a more or less major European powers, however, disadvantageous to make a special effort to revive its former military power. This has two main reasons.First, if the creation of a strong French army in the postwar period was even possible, that to a certain extent only weaken the position of the USSR as the only powerful land power in Europe and could facilitate the formation of any anti-Soviet groups…secondly, the possibility in this period, the creation of a strong French army, and in General the revival of France as a truly great power is very doubtful-in.��ranks of the objective order, and therefore the policy that such targets would not in real politics, can bring the Soviet Union only frustration and danger.One of the main reasons is the objective nature of the problem of population in France”.Moreover, as may believed that the problem is insoluble:”the Population of France during the 19th century, grew very slowly, and in the years before the current war, it became quite stationary. The problem of population is primarily underpinned the gradual fall of the political role of France in Europe…the Population of France according to the census of 1936 amounted to 41,9 mil.The population of Germany (without Austria) in the 1939 census was 69.6 mil.In other words, on the eve of the present war the population of Germany by 70% exceeded the population of France. If the German population to add the population of Austria included with Germany in 1938, the difference becomes even more striking, reaching almost 90%.The current war, despite the insignificance of the purely military losses of the French army in France will cost probably 3-4 million people taking into account factors such as prolonged stay in Germany, 2 million French prisoners of war and the deaths of about half a million of them, as a huge number of children dying due to malnutrition, an even greater number of children who are suffering in the same causes tuberculosis, a General increase in mortality of the civil population in France and Before France, so after the war will be a task to block during the life of the nearest generation of such a huge loss. Will it be able to do it? The experience of the last 150 years argues against this possibility”.Depending on the situation, as I thought the diplomat was to build relations with China:”the Soviet Union will seek to possible deeper penetration of Soviet influence in China and to strengthen perhaps a more friendly relationship with China, but the degree of assistance of the USSR the emergence of China as a genuine superpower (in the field of economic, political and military) needs will be determined mainly by the processes of its internal development. If the trend of this development will go in the direction of enhancing and strengthening in China and his government a truly democratic, progressive, national, friendly to the USSR items, our support will, of course, more intensive than otherwise”.But in other two countries position May differed categorically:”Soviet Policy towards Turkey after the war should be reduced to prevent the strengthening of Turkey and completely eliminate its interference in Balkan Affairs…And in Poland he is considered the only true following approach:”the Aim of the Union should be to create��tion of an independent and viable Poland, but we are not interested in the birth of too big and too strong Poland. In the past Poland was almost always an enemy of Russia, will become the future of Poland valid friend of the Soviet Union (at least over the life of the nearest generation), no one with certainty can not say. Many doubt it, and justice demands to say that such doubts are sufficient grounds. In view of the above careful shaping of postwar Poland in the possible minimum size, strictly pursuing the principle of ethnographic borders.”Photo: photo Archive of the magazine “Ogonek” / merchant”, the American expansion of a new type”But the achievement of goals, as may believed, depended on the position of the United States:”What will be the likely US position after the war, especially in the early postwar period? Everything speaks for the fact that the United States will come in this period the stronghold highly dynamic imperialism, which will vigorously seek broad expansion in different parts of the world — in America and in Asia, Australia and Africa. This expansion did not pass, and probably Europe, although here it will have to be somewhat different than in other places. It goes without saying that American expansion is the expansion of a new type: weapon is not so much territorial annexation (although in certain cases and it is not possible), how much financial and economic annexation… After all, the US will emerge from the current struggle against the world’s greatest commercial and air forces and with almost limitless technical possibilities of their further increase. The war has contributed to a strong increase of the production capacity of the United States — this means that after the war they to a much greater extent than before the war, will be interested in expanding its foreign trade, finding new and profitable markets. Not casually now the Americans are trying to take root in West and North Africa, in Arabia, in Iran. Especially high hopes they associate with China.And since it is not visible symptoms, talking about the possibility of the rise of the United States a strong internal opposition against such a policy, all the other Nations of the five continents will have very seriously to consider the imperialist tendencies of America as a major factor in the post-war international situation.”Britain, as stated, may, during the war, has lost much of its former role:”England, of course, come out of the war greatly impoverished and weakened compared to last. Over the years it ate, for example, almost all of its foreign investments and was forced to do in the US debt and to pay for the American destroyers bases and territories. The food and weapons England now receives fromoverseas right loan rent, and does not know how she would have to pay for it. Influential American circles are going to demand from England for compensation in the form of the abolition of the Imperial preferences, i.e., open US the gates to the conquest of the markets of the British Empire… the General economic situation in Britain after the war will be difficult and fraught with various dangerous consequences, including mass unemployment. Next to Britain in the postwar period in all growth will be the very problem of population, which played such a fatal role in France.”But to discount it, as did the expert on British politics was premature:”England is far superior to the US that is one of the most important factors in the fight world’s forces, in the presence of a huge historical experience and perfectly trained staff for needs of international policy.”Will the United States and Britain after the war to use its potential against the Soviet Union, depended, by assumption, May, one, but very important circumstances:”If the first post-war period would lead to the outbreak in Europe of proletarian revolutions, the relationship between the USSR on the one hand, the United States and England on the other hand will have to accept a stressful and even daunting. The basic contradiction of capitalism—socialism will come to the fore. This is especially true contradiction will be found in the relations between the USSR and the USA, because in the case of both these countries are the two opposite poles of social tension”.Photo: RGAKFD / Rosinform, Kommersant”don’t want us near the Japanese cases,”Each of the proposals May was thoughtful and bringing the Soviet government considerable benefits. But experience has shown that to bring his ideas to life simultaneously.The formation of long-term non-hostile zone, and ideally a Union of States around the Soviet Union demanded the creation of them loyal to the Soviet Union leadership. Such a government — the Committee of national liberation was, for example, formed on 21 July 1944 in Poland. However, to create the “post-war Poland in the possible minimum sizes”, as advised by may, it was unreal.Located in the London Polish government in exile demanded the restoration of the Eastern borders of the country, which existed until 1939, that is, including Western Ukraine, Western Belarus and Wilno (Vilnius). And in addition, as compensation for damage the Nazis insisted on the transfer to Poland of the German territories (see “STALIN: We do not sell Ukrainian land”.)So the Pro-Soviet government, which was agreed on the Eastern border, corresponding to the line of 1941, was to obtain considerable territoryvery high compensation in the West at the expense of Germany. Otherwise would not have been able to create even the illusion of public support for Poland’s new leadership. However, the United States and Britain, knowing that we are talking about long-term expansion of the zone of Soviet influence, in various ways obstructed the implementation of Soviet plans. Stalin, irritated this endless diplomatic and political struggle at the Potsdam conference in the summer of 1945, and during other discussions on Polish issues, wrote to Molotov:”We should not be more poles than the poles themselves”.No less important for the Soviet leadership was the creation of obstacles to the inclusion of China in the sphere of influence of the United States. After all, warns may, “American technology plus Chinese living force could become a big threat to the Soviet Union.”But this task was not possible without entry into the war against Japan. Starting the offensive, the Soviet troops defeated on Chinese territory by the Japanese Kwantung army and took control of Manchuria. While captured weapons were secretly transferred to the Chinese Communists who waged war against recognized by all allies, including the USSR, the government of China. Along with other Soviet help, it contributed to the military success of the supporters of Mao Zedong and eventually led them in 1949 to win.Enlisting in the war with Japan, the Soviet leadership decided the issue of the far Eastern borders, when the Soviet troops occupied the southern part of Sakhalin and the Kurils. But it turned out that to achieve recognition that new boundaries will not be easy. At the first session of the Council of foreign Ministers (CFM), which began on 11 September 1945 in London, the Americans refused to make the questions concerning Japan in the agenda. Special resistance caused the Soviet proposal on the establishment of the allied Control Council for the control of this defeated country, similar to what existed in Germany. September 26, 1945, Stalin wrote who represented the Soviet Union at the session of the Council of foreign Ministers Molotov:”I think the height of arrogance of the British and Americans who consider themselves our allies, that they did not want to hear us properly on the issue of the Control Council in Japan. One of the allies — the Soviet Union declares that he is dissatisfied with his position in Japan, and people who call themselves our allies, refuse to discuss our statement. This suggests that they lack a basic sense of respect for its ally…We have information that the Americans have laid your hands on the gold reserves of Japan, being estimated at one to two billion dollars, and took them as partners of the British.You need to hint to them that, making it clear that here lies the reason WH�� the Americans and British opposed the organization of the Control Board in Japan and don’t want us near the Japanese cases, despite the fact that the British had themselves recently been proposed to host in Japan the Control Board”.But the Americans, despite the objections of the Molotov, he chose to discuss the establishment of Pro-Soviet governments in Romania. And let the consideration offered to the Soviet Union issues that could lead to the weakening of Turkey.The British, in turn, using, as warned may, his enormous experience in the conduct of international Affairs, created in the course of negotiations, the procedural trap, which caught the Soviet Commissar for foreign Affairs. The discussion of the peace Treaty with Italy in addition to the French unexpectedly joined the delegation of the Chinese government, which is due to Soviet aid to the Chinese Communist party supported the Anglo-American proposals. Then suddenly it became clear that on matters of principle, decisions should be made by a majority of votes, Molotov remained in the minority and then spent a lot of effort to revise the voting rules.So the contradictions between the United States and the Soviet Union escalated and without proletarian revolutions in Europe. Division of spheres of influence sharply worsened relations between the two countries and led to the appearance in the world of opposite poles of social tension even faster.Evgeny Zhirnov
