Another outcome of this conference was that the growing tension between the US, the UK and the USSR increased. The US President, Franklin D Roosevelt, had died and been replaced by his Vice-President, Harry S Truman. The Germans had laid down the arm on 7th and 8th May 1945 and conference was held in July. Just as the 1960s started swinging and a new US President entered the White House, the Cold War entered its most critical phase, when the world would be pushed to the brink of nuclear war. Although Stalin already knew details about the Manhattan Project through his spy networks, he was able to complain at this treatment and the fact that there were secrets between supposed Allies. Just before the Conference began, on 16 July 1945, the USA had successfully exploded an atomic bomb at their test site in the New Mexico desert. How would this change in leadership affect relations between East and West? It was during this conference that major differences between the Soviet and other western nations emerged. As a politician in the inter-war period, Truman had been a committed ‘Wilsonian’ and had admired Woodrow Wilson’s hopes for American intervention in Europe. The tension between the Soviet and western countries came to a head after the conference. U.S. Pres. The USA and Britain agreed to invade France, joining the Russians fighting on land in Europe. There was already no love lost between the Soviet and the other Allies; and the Potsdam Conference brought this to a peak. While in Potsdam, Truman told Stalin about the United States’ “new weapon” (the atomic bomb) that it intended to use against Japan. The USSR would fight Japan once Germany had been defeated. It was attended by the Soviet, U.S., and British heads of government and foreign ministers: respectively, Stalin…, …forces surrendered, he met at Potsdam, Germany, with Stalin and Churchill (who was succeeded at the conference by Clement Attlee) to discuss future operations against Japan and a peace settlement for Europe. at their test site in the New Mexico desert. The main points of the three Conferences are summarised in the table below: To remember the things that were discussed at each conference, use the mnemonic PEER. The Potsdam Conference held between 17th July and 2nd August 1945 was attended by the heads of state of the UK, the US, France and the USSR. This remained a source of disagreement, with the Western Allies worried that they were repeating the mistakes of the Treaty of Versailles after World War One. Question: Why did the Potsdam Conference further increase tensions? Little was accomplished, and there would not be another meeting between Soviet and American heads of state for…, …was to be consummated at Potsdam, the last meeting among the Big Three. It was agreed that the Soviets could take whatever they wanted from the Soviet controlled zone and 10 per cent from the Western zones. Each Allied power was to seize reparations from its own occupation zones, although the Soviet Union was permitted 10–15 percent of the industrial equipment in the western zones of Germany in exchange for agricultural and other natural products from its zone. The US President, Franklin D Roosevelt, had died and been replaced by his Vice-President, Harry S Truman. Its policies were dictated by the “five Ds” decided upon at Yalta: demilitarization, denazification, democratization, decentralization, and deindustrialization. Updates? The Potsdam Conference (German: Potsdamer Konferenz) was held in Potsdam, Germany, from July 17 to August 2, 1945. Potsdam Conference, (July 17–August 2, 1945), Allied conference of World War II held at Potsdam, a suburb of Berlin. Harry S. Truman (centre) shaking hands with British Prime Minister Winston Churchill (left) and Soviet Premier Joseph Stalin on the opening day of the Potsdam Conference. In the midst of the conference, however, the British electorate rejected Churchill at the polls, and the Labour Party leader Clement Attlee replaced him in the councils of the great. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Origins_of_the_Cold_War. The Soviet Union was represented by Joseph Stalin, Britain by Winston Churchill, and the United States by President Harry S. Truman. Hence, it can be said that the foundation for the cold war that began after the Second World War was laid during the Potsdam Conference. The protocols of the Potsdam Conference suggested continued harmony among the Allies, but the deeply conflicting aims of the Western democracies on the one hand and the Soviet Union on the other in fact meant that Potsdam was to be the last Allied summit conference. Little real progress was made at Potsdam beyond an agreement to put into action the commitments made at Yalta. At Yalta in February 1945, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, American President Franklin D Roosevelt and Soviet Premier Joseph Stalin had agreed to meet again following the defeat of Germany, principally to determine the borders of post-war Europe. Churchill (replaced midway by Attlee), Truman and Stalin, Military decisions took precedence over anything else, Stalin to have a ‘sphere of influence’ over Eastern Europe but all countries freed from Nazi occupation would be allowed free elections to choose their own governments, There was no sign of Stalin allowing free elections in Eastern Europe and a communist government was being set up in Poland. By signing up for this email, you are agreeing to news, offers, and information from Encyclopaedia Britannica. These views have since been challenged but certainly, Truman found it very difficult to get along with Stalin in the way Roosevelt had. However, with Roosevelt's demise, the office was taken over by Harry S. Truman. In fact the, was in control of Poland and the USSR was in the process of setting up a. Truman had automatically succeeded to the Presidency as he was Vice President when Franklin D Roosevelt died on 12 April 1945, just weeks before the end of World War Two. At Potsdam, Truman chose to inform Stalin that the US possessed a new weapon of unusual destructive force. The chief participants were U.S. President Harry S. Truman, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill (or Clement Attlee, who became prime minister during the conference…
Although Stalin already knew details about the Manhattan Project through his spy networks, he was able to complain at this treatment and the fact that there were secrets between supposed Allies.