The Last 100 Days

by David B. Woolner

  Chapter 9

  The Final Turn

  BECAUSE THERE WERE NO ELEVATORS IN THE LIVADIA PALACE, FDR spent the entire week of the Yalta summit on the ground floor of the building. Isolated in his suite of rooms, and focused on his own efforts to prepare for the daily plenary sessions, or to meet with his aides, the president was largely unaware of the comings and goings of the dozens of military aides and State Department personnel who inhabited the upper floors of the palace and whose job it was to ensure that the conference ran smoothly. Over the first few days of the summit, the consensus among much of the staff, including Ambassador Harriman’s personal assistant, Robert Meiklejohn, was that the administrative side of the conference was functioning extremely well—much better, in fact, than it had at Tehran. It was Meiklejohn’s responsibility to oversee the transcription of the various “unofficial” notes taken by FDR’s interpreter, Charles Bohlen, and two other members of the State Department staff, into an official record for the president and secretary of state. Although Meiklejohn and his assistants had to put in long hours, they were pleased that they found themselves able to keep up with the work—that is, until the morning of Friday, February 9, when “all hell started popping,” as the meetings got longer and more frequent, and the notes began to fall farther and farther behind.1

  Much of this frenzied activity could be attributed to the intense negotiations over Poland, which by this point had already absorbed more attention than any of the other issues discussed at Yalta. This lack of progress—what Anna termed “one of the many worrisome things attached to this trip” in a letter she wrote to her husband that day—was clearly troubling FDR, who by this point had decided that it was time to take a different tack and make explicit what he had alluded to the day before: that the discussions over Poland should shift away from the exact makeup of the interim regime and toward the proposed elections that would follow.

  This move had two important consequences. First, it expanded the time frame in which the three powers might achieve a final settlement of the “Polish question.” Both Churchill and Roosevelt had in fact traveled to Yalta under the expectation that they might be able to establish a new provisional government for Poland while the conference was still in session. Hence, each delegation arrived in the Crimean peninsula with a list of possible candidates to be included in the new regime. After achieving this goal, both governments assumed that they would then be able to recognize the new authority and send ambassadors and/or observers to Warsaw to oversee the transition via the electoral process from a provisional to a permanent government. Neither man was so naïve as to think that the Poland born out of this process would stand as a shining example of democracy, or that the nation would not fall under the sway of a degree of Soviet influence. But each hoped that the government that would emerge would be stable, reasonably democratic, and willing to accept—as Eduard Benes had been—the reality of Soviet power. Most important, such an arrangement would provide an example of Soviet good faith that Churchill and Roosevelt could then point to upon their departure from Yalta.

  The second consequence of FDR’s decision to stress the importance of the coming elections—and in essence abandon all hope of establishing a provisional government while the Yalta conference was in session—is that it rendered the composition of whatever authority would be in power in the intervening period less important. This made the earlier Soviet proposal for the “expansion” of the existing Lublin regime, which up to this point FDR had rejected, much more palatable—so long as language could be found to ensure that the end result would meet the expectations of American public opinion. It was with this in mind that FDR instructed Stettinius in their session that morning to draft a new proposal that the secretary could then present to his counterparts at the noon meeting of the foreign ministers. Using the six-point plan that Molotov had presented earlier as the basis for an agreement, the new formula called for the existing Lublin government not to be “expanded” but “reorganized into a fully representative government based on all democratic forces in Poland and including democratic leaders from Poland abroad.” It also stipulated that the existing regime, which the Soviets referred to as the “Provisional Government of the Republic of Poland,” should change its name to the “Provisional Government of National Unity.” The primary task of the provisional government would be to hold free elections as soon as possible. FDR also agreed that since it would take a minimum of thirty days to organize the elections, the required reorganization would not take place immediately, at Yalta, but instead, as suggested by Molotov the day before, would be handled by a committee in Moscow composed of Soviet Foreign Minister Molotov, British Ambassador Archibald Clark-Kerr, and American Ambassador W. Averill Harriman.2

  FDR’s decision to postpone a full and final settlement of the Polish question during the conference—or even to come to an agreement about which Poles should be called upon to orchestrate the reorganization—would turn out to be the most important decision he made on Poland at Yalta. The creation of the Moscow committee provided the Soviets with an excellent mechanism to delay, stall, and obfuscate the exact makeup of the “reorganized regime.” This in turn made it impossible for either the British or the American government to extend recognition and, hence, send their respective ambassadors to Warsaw to oversee the proposed elections—in essence leaving the Polish question unresolved during the critical months to follow.

  Nor did Roosevelt’s new approach come as welcome news to Churchill and Eden. Indeed, as Eden explained at the Foreign Ministers meeting at noon that day when Stettinius presented the plan, the British had not given up their preference for a new interim regime. After all, at some point the British government would have to transfer recognition from the London Poles (whom they had had relations with since the very start of the war) to a new Polish government. It would be much easier for the British government to do so if they were transferring recognition to an entirely new authority, not to an expansion of the present one. Furthermore, even though Eden supported the American call for free and fair elections, he remained convinced that if the proposed elections were controlled by the Lublin government, which, he implied, was an obvious risk under FDR’s new proposal, “they would not be free… or represent the will of the Polish people.”3

  Molotov was certainly pleased at the direction in which the talks were heading. But other than pointing out to Eden the advantages that would accrue from the expansion of the Lublin regime—which he characterized as a much more efficient means to get to the elections as soon as possible—he made no comment on the new proposal. Instead, he asked to have it translated so that he could study Stettinius’s new formula before the start of the plenary session later that afternoon.

  In the meantime, FDR and Churchill held a last meeting with the Combined Chiefs of Staff, followed by a luncheon where the main focus of conversation between the two leaders was on the voting procedure for the United Nations General Assembly. FDR also made reference to his anticipated departure in two days’ time—a fact that Churchill would find more and more disconcerting as the day wore on.4

  It was in the midst of all this frenetic activity that Churchill, Roosevelt, and Stalin gathered at just before 4:00 p.m. in the Italianate courtyard of the Livadia Palace for the renowned photo session that would immortalize this most famous of all the wartime conferences. In preparation for the shoot, three chairs were carefully placed on a series of oriental carpets laid at one end of the courtyard, while a throng of Soviet cameramen jostled for position at the other—accompanied by Robert Hopkins, the sole American photographer, whose father, Harry Hopkins, remained in bed. As at Tehran, FDR took the middle seat, Stalin sat on the left, and Churchill, who arrived after his two counterparts wearing a Russian fur cap and smoking one of his ever-present cigars, took the seat to the president’s right. FDR was unable to rise to greet the prime minister but seemed to take great delight in Churchill’s headgear, as the latter, perhaps in deference to FDR’s senior position within t
he Alliance, or perhaps as a means of drawing attention away from FDR’s disability, stood at attention and saluted the president, while Stalin jumped to his feet to extend his hand.

  As Robert Hopkins later reported, the mood among the three leaders and their advisers in the courtyard that overcast afternoon seemed upbeat. Perhaps this stemmed from the historic nature of the occasion, or from the relief all three delegations felt at having a moment to put aside the remaining issues, while they milled about the courtyard, just moments before they would resume their efforts to finally come to an agreement over the Polish problem.5

  The “Big Three” with Foreign Ministers Eden, Stettinius, and Molotov in the background, Livadia Palace, February 9, 1945. (Courtesy of the Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library)

  As the sixth plenary session got under way, it was clear that the American position on the Polish question was now closer to that of the Russians than that of the British. Not surprisingly, Churchill, who, like FDR, remained deeply concerned about British public opinion, found this tremendously frustrating. In a veiled reference to FDR’s stated intention to leave the conference in two days’ time—and perhaps thinking of his admonition to Roosevelt in January that the five to six days he had allotted for the conference were inadequate—Churchill noted that despite their desire “to put a foot in the stirrup and be off… [w]e could not allow the settlement of these matters to be hurried, and the fruits of the conference lost, for the lack of another twenty-four hours.” He added that “[a] great prize was in view” and “these might well be among the most important days of the lives of those present.” FDR concurred on the importance of the moment, but, in his view, because Poland remained an “urgent, immediate, and painful problem” driving the three parties apart, the sooner they could put the Polish problem behind them, the better.6

  Delighted at FDR’s change of heart, Stalin and Molotov presented only three small but still significant amendments to FDR’s counterproposal. These were in keeping with their aim to ensure that the reorganized Lublin regime—not to mention the final government that would be put in place following the elections—would include Polish politicians prepared to accept the Curzon Line and willing to work with the Soviets and their communist allies. Unwilling to admit that the Lublin Poles did not enjoy the support of the Polish people, the Soviets requested that the phrase setting forth that the existing regime would be reorganized “into a fully representative government based on all democratic forces in Poland” be changed to “reorganized on a broader democratic basis.” Molotov also requested the addition of the phrase “non-fascist and anti-fascist” to the reference to democratic parties as well as the elimination of the requirement that the three powers’ ambassadors be “charged with the responsibility of observing and reporting… on the free and unfettered elections.” The reference to the ambassadors, Molotov argued, would insult the Poles, and was unnecessary in any case, since reporting to their superiors at home was one of their normal functions.7

  Arriving at an agreement on the final language proved no easy task. By this point, Churchill and Eden recognized that they had no choice but to fall in behind FDR’s new plan. But they stood fast on the final wording regarding the composition of the “reorganized” Polish government and the requirement that the ambassadors be specifically tasked with observing the elections. As a result, there would be no settlement of the question on February 9, even though the three foreign ministers, at the request of FDR, met for a special late-night session at 10:30 p.m. in search of one.8

  The inability of the three foreign ministers to reach a late-night accord (Eden would not arrive back at the Vorontzov Palace until 2:00 a.m.) meant that on the second-to-last day of the conference, Saturday, February 10, FDR would once again find himself engaged in an intense mid-morning meeting with Secretary Stettinius on the subject of Poland. At issue was the last sentence of FDR’s protocol, with its specific reference to the requirement that the three ambassadors observe and report on the elections. No longer willing to risk the possibility of an impasse, particularly in light of his impending departure, FDR decided to withdraw this reference, but only on the condition that Stettinius make it eminently clear that even though he had granted this concession, “the Russians… must understand our firm determination that the Ambassadors will observe and report on the election in any case.”9 Unhappy with FDR’s decision, Eden and Churchill insisted in the subsequent plenary session that rather than remove any mention of reporting altogether, the sentence should at least indicate that the recognition of the newly reorganized government would be accompanied by an exchange of ambassadors “by whose reports the respective governments will be kept informed about the situation in Poland.” This would signify that the British and American governments fully expected to be able to report on the degree to which the agreements on Poland achieved at Yalta were being followed. After further debate, the Soviets finally agreed to these last emendations, which cleared the way for the three parties to arrive at an agreement over how to settle the Polish problem.

  In a concession to Churchill, the final declaration stated at the outset that because the Red Army had liberated the country, “a new situation existed in Poland”—an acknowledgment that in spite of Whitehall’s long-standing relationship with the London Poles, there was very little the British could do to shape developments in Poland. The declaration also called for the reorganization of the existing Lublin/Warsaw regime “on a broader democratic basis” and for the holding of “free and unfettered elections as soon as possible on the basis of universal suffrage and secret ballot.” But there were no strict enforcement mechanisms, and because the selection of the proposed candidates to make up the new regime depended on the subsequent deliberations in Moscow, the Anglo-Americans had little power to enforce these provisions.10

  As Charles Bohlen observed, the overall intent of the plan—which was designed to promote free elections and ensure that the government that emerged from this process was reasonably democratic—is clear. But as he later admitted, its terms were not specific enough and it bore the hallmarks of “hasty drafting.” The Soviets approached the wording of the final agreement with intense scrutiny; to them, “even the last comma had meaning.” But the Western Allies left much of the language intentionally vague, and, as a consequence, the Anglo-Americans would find their ambitions in Poland frustrated. The agreement makes no mention, for example, of the exact number of non-Lublin Poles to be included in the provisional government, and unlike the proposals circulated earlier in the week, there is no reference to potential candidates or to the inclusion of representatives from specific Polish political parties.11

  In the months and years following Yalta, FDR would come under heavy criticism for the decisions he made over the critical twenty-four-hour period from February 9 to February 10, 1945. The limited agreement he achieved on the Polish question—particularly in light of Soviet behavior in subsequent weeks and months—would increasingly be seen as tantamount to a sellout, and his call for free and unfettered elections as little more than a desperate attempt to paper over the harsh reality of the Soviet domination of the Polish people. In seeking an explanation for this turn of events, some of his contemporaries and later historians would speculate that FDR’s health was to blame, or that his Russian adversaries had duped him.

  But as FDR’s forceful directions and instructions to Stettinius over these two days make clear, FDR was not only engaged but in charge. He made the decision to relent to the Soviet call for the expansion of the existing Lublin regime, and thus shifted the focus of the attention toward the proposed elections. FDR also agreed to the Soviet proposal to abandon any attempt to establish or at the very least select the Polish candidates involved in the proposed provisional government while the conference was still in session. These facts belie the notion that FDR was not in control of his faculties at Yalta. They also render him responsible for much of what took place.

  Yet FDR’s apparent acquiescence on the Polish question c
annot be understood outside the context of his overall foreign policy agenda. This may have been small comfort to the Poles and the other peoples of Eastern Europe, but FDR never took his eye off the larger prize: the creation of the United Nations and maintenance of Great Power cooperation. While he hoped to be able to achieve an agreement with the Russians that would allow the Poles, like the Czechs, a measure of independence from Moscow, he had no intention either before, during, or after Yalta of allowing the Polish question to undermine his broader ambitions.

  Nor should his decision to follow this approach at Yalta be viewed as an abrupt departure from his earlier stance on the Polish question. On the contrary, it was entirely consistent with his earlier efforts to orchestrate some sort of rapprochement among the communist and noncommunist Poles and Moscow. As he said to British Ambassador Halifax in a conversation the two of them held in early January, just after the news broke that the Soviet government had recognized the Lublin Poles, the only sensible thing to do now was to convince Mikolajczyk (who remained FDR’s preferred representative of the non-Lublin Poles) “to join up with the Lublin party and form a single government.” Indeed, “all Poles must be brought to see that they could only exist by the good favor of Stalin. Benes had been wise enough to see this and had therefore managed to get along very well.”12