Just been reading an account of how Rooservelt betrayed everyone by thinking he

Question:

Just been reading an account of how Rooservelt betrayed everyone by thinking he could controll Stalin , any .?

more comprehensive writings than Alan Clarke`s Barbarosa on this subject?

the very fact that USA brought about the cold war on them selves deserves close study with view to modern events.

Best Answer - Chosen by Asker: Yes it is true that Roosevelt felt that he could "temper' Stalin with certain concessions and he was advised not to by Churchill. Roosevelt was wrong but it wasn't done at Yalta As Peter252350 said because Roosevelt was dead when Yalta was held and Truman was Prez. It was at Tehran in 44 the deed was done. Roosevelt felt that he use a carrot and stick approach with Stalin in diplomacy with him but he didn't realize how wily Uncle Joe could be. Stalin bugged the rooms of the other allied teams and knew what the plan was from day one.

You must remember that the aim of Stalin and the Soviet Union was always to expand communisuim to the world and his post war policies bear it out. Stalin wouldn't have blockaded Berlin in 1948 if he had not though that the Allies would retreat from Berlin. The idea that you could supply a city from intierly for the air had never been done. The plan to spread communist idea's was under threat from the Marshall and Truman Plans and the attempts to keep places suppled by air in WWII had been small scale, Chindit support in Burma 1943-44, short Term ,Demyansk pocket support 1942, or outright failure, Stalingrad 1943. What he didn't plan for was the total commitment of the Western Powers and the growth in the American Aircraft industry before and during the war.

Read any book like "Allies at War" by Reynold, Kimball and Chubarian which looks at the Second World War much more pragmatically and from a diplomatic POV. Remember also that Roosevelt and Churchill were two different sides of the same coin; Churchill was a conservative patrician who didn't trust the Communist government of the USSR ,nor England's more liberal policies, he believed that the class system was necessary as the salvation of order and government. Roosevelt was a liberal patrician who believed that the wealthy and the powerful had to protect and help the people. From the start of their friendship Churchill tried to control the war effort and could up to the Casablanca meeting when it became clear that Great Britain was the subserviant member of the Western Alliance and was not to be relied upon as much. Also remember that the politics of Europe are convoluted and Byzantine. Old rivalries and friendships drove diplomacy at all times.

Roosevelt was only a human being. Since the warwe have placed him on a pedistal that seems to make him inviolate . Yet, he was human and made mistakes Post War Europes problems can be placed at the feet of all the people involved in it's inception. Churchill, Stalin and even DeGaulle played ther parts in it. I hope that this tells you more about it .

Years of 30 years of studing World History in the 20th Century.