Are disappointed in Stalin not keeping to he agreement which he had made. In December 1944 British Greece, under General Scobie, began heir attack on the positions of the Greek Communist Party — a country in which the USSR was supposed to have only a 10 per cent interest. Churchill recorded: and faithfully to our agreement of October and in all the fighting the communists in the streets of Athens not one word of reproach came from Pravda and Izvestia.' Further west, where Churchill had taken it for granted British, American and French interests would prevail, the story was the same.
In Italy an enormous working class insurrection liberated the northern part of the country in Longo, one of the central leaders of the Italian Communist Party, described the situation in terms which have never been challenged:
TAt the beginning of April - Jan 300,000 partisans began fighting in northern Italy and liberated one after the other the towns Modena, Parma, troops 'Stalin adhered strictly long weeks of French April 1945. Luigi more OI Bologna, modern Piacenza, Genoa.
Socialist Action 15 February 1985 In France the pattern was similar. Large areas of the country in 1944 were liberated dominated resistance. As de Gaulle admitted in his "The fighting elements was in the hands of the Communists'.
De Gaulle therefore acted swiftly to re-establish bourgeois order and as head of the French government on 27 October 1944 signed a decree dissolving the resistance militias. He followed this mitting the return to France of Communist Maurice Thorez. On his France on 27 November Thorez issued the slogan 'One state, one police force, one army.' The Communist Party began issuing instructions for the band. On 2 December de Gaulle went to Moscow. met Stalin, and signed a Franco-Soviet treaty.
The meeting of Churchill and Stalin in October 1944, and the Yalta con: ference of February 1945, in short at first glance, cemented division of Europe. eastern part of Europe was formally acby the of the the Tente return to practical capitalism in Europe.
militias to disin place the The cepted by the Britishu utArnerna 1944 and early 194/oman fought Soviet sphere of infli to keep on strike. thing : this strike is Europe was not carr means Survival sterfield - 9 March In Asia a similar, limited, pattern was of the Yalta confereet Theatre * Speakers Corner by the USSR to ent, Saltergate Football Ground, 11.30 America anı took it for granted maintain their predoChesterfield 79729, Kath on Sheffield 381954 - and the French th Book Women a Pl Closure, and it was written by a woman called Betty, from Darlington:
MEN AGAINST PIT CLOSURES GreENAL MARCH TO CELEBRATE ERNATONAL WOMEN'S DAY Exhibitions * Stalls For more information contact: vii "el. apported the ule in China e world' that Apress articles ebrating the ta. → rhetoric -Pint of thi ›v muele lored. Yalta Fireflected the tiocoexistence' belist states on we ureaucracy to verse is the suI to re imposed me Wat the time. antain had no ing to them
d reality in the intermediate or long run. Soviet bureaucracv turn, was incapable of maintaining the accords it had reached at Yalta. sooner had the 'accords of Yalta' been arrived at than they began to break up - although the speed of the break up differed very greatly paris or une woria. I laila set une scal on the end of World War Il then the history of the post-war world may precisely be seen, from a certain angle, as the 'break up of Yalta'.
In order to see what is involved in this process, consider what actually would have been the shape of the postwar world if the agreements made in October 1944 and at adhered to. First the only countries to which Churchill acceeded a majority Soviet Welc Rumania. Yet by October 1944 and The Stalin, in No part of Germany.
in the different Influence In tain offered precisely Yalta had been Bulgaria rurthermore February 1945 it was already clear that. the war would end with Soviet troops not only in possession of Bulgaria and Rumania but also of Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Austria, and a large short the first demand of Chuchill was that the Soviet Union actually give up its influence, and hand over to the United States and Britain, a large part of what it had taken in the war. In return for this the US and Brinothing indeed insisted that Stalin aid them by stabilising capitalism in Greece, Italy, France and Western Europe.
British Americans made it quite clear that they accepted Soviet influence in Eastern Europe as a purely temporary development. When on 11 May 1945 all US lease-lend supplies to the USSR were abruptly cut off this was explicitly explained by United States Secretary for Economic Affairs Will Clayton as being due to the fact that: 'the lend-lease programme USSR should be so flexible that it could be cut off at any time.' The US War Department noted the decision as, weapon in difficulties in Central Europe.' US President the Potsdam summit conference of July 1945. explained his policy towards the USSR succinctly when 'Unless they (the USSR) did something lo remeay lal. slualion (le Europe) promptly they faced extensive starvation Truman argued that he hac 'the cards in American hands' and that proposed, play American cards.' He concluded that, 'We didn't have to go to the Russians for anything and the Russians very definitely had to come to us for many things.' The use of the atomic bomb against Japan in August 1945 was intended by the Americans as a further pressure on the USSR The first successful test of the atom bomb, on 16 July in New Mexico, itself already hardened American position at the Potsdam conference. Churchill noted of Truman after he had received the news of the test that: "He was a changed man. He told the Russians just where they got on and off and generally bossed this entire meeting.
By January 1946 the American attemot to secure its positions in casterr Europe was well underway. Despite the agreements of Stalin and Churchill the US government refused the recognition of the Bulgarian governments 'unless they comply with our requirements.' On Truman outlined that Russia must be faced 'with an iron fist'.
Rhetoric Despite US rhetoric the situation it found itself confronted with in Western and Eastern Europe in 1945-46 was very far from being directly to its advantage. Although by mid-1945 the Communist Parties policies in Western Europe had allowed the rebuilding of some political stability, and broken any immediate post-war revoluionary breakthrough, nevertheless complete dislocation and social instability continued to exist in most of Europe.
Agricultural production in 1945 in the European continent was only half pre-war level. million people in Europe were receiving less than biologically minimim rations. More than three quarters of the major bridges in Western Germanv had been destroyed. Industrial France in 1945 was only one third of its pre-war level and only thirty five per cent of its railway locomotives had survived the war Walter Laquer accuratel Europe since Hitler, nomy in 1945 had ceased to be viable. Recovery in 1946 was followed by a new crisis in 1947.
In Eastern Europe the destruction was even greater than the west. Poland had lost one in five of its population. Yugoslavia had lost 10 per cent of its people. Soviet losses are estimated at 20 million dead. Germany had lost five million people.
rurtnermore, in additon threat of political upheaval due to the continuing economic crisis in Europe, United States ened by a mass movement own army. American troops in Europe demonstrated for an immediate return to the US. United States forces in the ree reacted mutiny to secure the same demands.
In this political situation the chief weapon adopted by the United States to attempt to secure its goals in Eastern coupled situation permitted.
Assistant billior for the $1 billion loan.
with standards.' preparing The said:
US refused them OOLE Moscow, palatable alternatives significantly the possibility of economic penetration The econome oy Rumanian tempt January pressure The similarly economic man army.
the Even in 1946 100 the exact opposite production in the agreement faithfully until 1947.
As ue Do-amerca put it in his 'The European ec- abandoned the Testan Europe Caspar reminded us recently.
•workers' to the and Western Europe was threatof a negotiated class forces cond World War.
Socialist Action Europe was economic blackmail with relaunching of remilitarisation as soon as the political Already in January 1945 the United States had refused a Soviet request for a 1945 the Americans 'lost' a similar request for a The US government made it known that it would only agree to these loans if the USSR agreed to 'work cooperatively with us on international problems in accordance with our When in June 1947 the conference to commence Marshall Aid to Europe was held the Soviet Union participated in the conference and proposed that each country draw up a recovery plan to discuss with the United States. The point blank and insisted that the plan must be adopted only on a Europe-wide basis, ie. that Eastern Europe be considered with Western Europe and that the United States would be able to determine policy in As the American ambassador General • Smith, put it the Soviet's were: 'confronted with two unto refrain from participation in the Paris conference would be tantamount to forcing the formation of such a (western) bloc.' If on the other hand they attend. ed the Paris conference and accepted Marshall Aid 'they would create the La certain amount of ... among tha oviet salculile slalcs.
In short while Stalin kept faithfull! to his part of the agreements at Yalta the United States and Britain had no intention whatever of keeping to theirs.
destruction of the capitalisi the Soviet Union after 1947 was a direct response to the atthe States economically undermine them through threats economic one major move by Stalin which clearly went beyond anything established at Yalta, the coup d'etat carried through by the Communist Party in Czechoslovakia in February 1948 came only after the United States, Britain and their allies had made it quite clear by the Marshall Plan that they intended to overthrow everything agreed at the end of World War II. The Soviet leadership, quite rightly, had not the slightest intention of allowing a rerun of World War II - only this time with a nuclear armed United States on its Western border instead of the GerIn short, it is false to see Yalta as somehow a stable agreed 'division of between the imperialist states and the Soviet leadership. It was - an unstable temporary agreement which was imposed by the relation of forces of the time and which imperialism would have attempted to overthrow it it had the chance Stalin intended to stick to his part of - and did so extremel!
The US and Britain had no inten tion whatever of sticking to their side Indeed until this day they have never perspective the of capitalism Haster as Ronald Reagan and Weinberger have graciously Yalta was a temporary equilibrium created hv the clash of two competel contradictory and opposed class forces. On the one side was the non-capitalist state of the USSR with its allies in the working class of Eastern . On the other side were the great imperialist powers of the United States, Britain and France. The division of Europe was not the product 'agreement' between imperialism and the Soviet bureaucracy but the result of an enormous clash of — a clash that continues to the present day in Europe Behind Yalta lay not Churchill and Stalin but the greatest class struggle of the entire twentieth century. The Se15 February 1985
Socialist Action AT THE MOMENT Eritrea is a northern province of Ethiopia. Its 15 February 1985 That war has try extended with the ELF-PLF still carrying on in its mainly diplomatic role.
----- pull-quotes -----
ase capitalist eac capitalist econod