The recipe for the Cold War read, “Simmer. Bring to a boil occasionally:
do not boil over.” Decades later, the surprising line “return to boil”
was added. The table for both servings of the Cold War was set by broken American
promises.
Perhaps the most ironic event in post-World War Two history is that it was
the villain of the narrative, Joseph Stalin, who kept his promise, and the heroes,
Franklin Roosevelt and Winston Churchill, who broke theirs. The accepted narrative
is a fiction. The historical record reveals that, in the true story it’s based
on, FDR and Churchill steal the villain’s spotlight from Stalin.
In February 1945, the three great World War Two leaders met, also ironically
it now turns out, in the Crimean resort of Yalta to draw the lines of the post-Second
World War world. This time, the map was not to be redrawn in secret. But it
was. The agreement that Roosevelt revealed to congress and shared with the world – the
one that still dominates the textbook accounts and the media stories – is not
the one he secretly shook on with Stalin. Roosevelt lied to congress and the
American people. Then he lied to Stalin.
In exchange for Soviet support for the creation of the United Nations, Roosevelt
secretly agreed to Soviet predominance in Poland and Eastern Europe. The cold
war story that the Soviet Union marched into Eastern Europe and stole it for
itself is a lie: Roosevelt handed it to them.
So did Churchill. If Roosevelt’s motivation was getting the U.N., Churchill’s
was getting Greece. Fearing that the Soviet Union would invade India and the
oil fields of Iran, Churchill saw Greece as the geographical roadblock and determined
to hold on to it at all cost. The cost, it turned out, was Romania. Churchill
would give Stalin Romania to protect his borders; Stalin would give Churchill
Greece to protect his empire’s borders. The deal was sealed on October 9, 1944.
Churchill says that in their secret meeting, he asked Stalin, “how would
it do for you to have ninety percent predominance in Romania, for us to have
ninety percent predominance in Greece? . . . He then went on to offer a fifty-fifty
power split in in Yugoslavia and Hungary and to offer the Soviets seventy-five
percent control of Bulgaria. The exact conversation may never have happened,
according to the political record, but Churchill’s account captures the spirit
and certainly captures the secret agreement.
Roosevelt also clearly told Stalin that he understood Soviet concerns about
security in Eastern Europe. The final wording of the Yalta agreement never mentioned
replacing Soviet control of Poland.
Contrary to the official narrative, Stalin never betrayed the west and stole
Eastern Europe: Poland, Romania and the rest were given to him in secret. Then
Roosevelt lied to congress and the world.
The necessity…