Origins of the Cold War: Big Three War Aims Flashcards
US: Trade
• Make the world one large free trade area:
- Establish democratic states
- No tariffs or economic nationalism
- Decolonisation
- Controlled by UN and the superpowers
US: Security
• Improve security after Pearl Harbour:
- Chain of bases across the Pacific and Atlantic oceans
- This also gave the US access to raw materials and markets around Western Europe and Asia
FDR’s post war aims
Wanted post-war construction though unity and cooperation of victorious powers (USA, UK, USSR)
Championed the right to self-determination, which was crucial to a US president’s image
Wanted reconstruction and reeducation of Germany
Stalin’s post war aims
Wanted initial cooperation w/ other powers to negotiate on things like Poland
Wanted to guarantee the USSR’s security
To use Eastern Europe as a buffer zone
For Germany to remain weak for foreseeable future- possibly for communist takeover?- conflicting w/ FDR
Economic reconstruction of the USSR at Germany’s expense, reparations
Churchill’s post war aims
Suspicious of USSR
Unity among capitalist powers
Percentage agreements with Stalin to control Soviet Expansion
USSR
• Set up friendly regimes through fully/partial communist governments and reparations
- Wanted to give Poland annexed land from Nazi territories as reparations
• Envisioned a post-war Europe with 3 different areas:
- Direct Soviet control - Poland, Romania, Bulgaria and part of Germany
- Intermediate zones - neither fully communist or capitalist; power would be shared with liberals, moderate socialist and peasant parties
- Non-communist western Europe - shows allies that USSR was not interested in a global revolution
UK
• Maintain status as a Great Power:
- Keep its empire
- Alarmed by spread of Soviet influence in central Europe and eastern Mediterranean - disrupt trade and control
- Wanted a democratic government in Warsaw
