The Oder-Neisse Line
The Oder-Neisse Line

Author: Debra J. Allen

Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA

Published: 2003-07-30

Total Pages: 320

ISBN-13: 0313052441

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When the United States and its World War II allies met at the Potsdam Conference to provisionally establish the Oder-Neisse line as Poland's western border and to acknowledge the removal of Germans from the area, they created a controversial Cold War issue that would not be resolved until 1990. American policy makers throughout those decades studied and analyzed materials and reports to determine whether the border should be adjusted or recognized to promote the well being of Europe and the United States. This is the first study to cover the full history of the Oder-Niesse line and its impact on U.S. relations with Poland and the Federal Republic of Germany, as well as its domestic implications, throughout the Cold War years. As with many diplomatic questions, the State Department did not have the luxury of addressing this issue in a vacuum. Instead, the foreign policy bureaucracy had to keep its focus on the border issue while scrutinizing Soviet words and actions regarding its satellites in East Germany and Poland, and to address members of Congress and the public (including various groups of Polish Americans) who wanted specific, but often differing, actions taken in respect to the border. This work reveals how the diplomats and policy makers handled such internal conflict, the sometimes skewed perceptions of America held by Europeans, and how the State Department interacted with the public.

Stalin and the Fate of Europe
Stalin and the Fate of Europe

Author: Norman M. Naimark

Publisher: Belknap Press

Published: 2019-10-08

Total Pages: 369

ISBN-13: 067423877X

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Winner of the Norris and Carol Hundley Award Winner of the U.S.–Russia Relations Book Prize A Financial Times Best History Book of the Year The Cold War division of Europe was not inevitable—the acclaimed author of Stalin’s Genocides shows how postwar Europeans fought to determine their own destinies. Was the division of Europe after World War II inevitable? In this powerful reassessment of the postwar order in Europe, Norman Naimark suggests that Joseph Stalin was far more open to a settlement on the continent than we have thought. Through revealing case studies from Poland and Yugoslavia to Denmark and Albania, Naimark recasts the early Cold War by focusing on Europeans’ fight to determine their future. As nations devastated by war began rebuilding, Soviet intentions loomed large. Stalin’s armies controlled most of the eastern half of the continent, and in France and Italy, communist parties were serious political forces. Yet Naimark reveals a surprisingly flexible Stalin, who initially had no intention of dividing Europe. During a window of opportunity from 1945 to 1948, leaders across the political spectrum, including Juho Kusti Paasikivi of Finland, Wladyslaw Gomulka of Poland, and Karl Renner of Austria, pushed back against outside pressures. For some, this meant struggling against Soviet dominance. For others, it meant enlisting the Americans to support their aims. The first frost of Cold War could be felt in the tense patrolling of zones of occupation in Germany, but not until 1948, with the coup in Czechoslovakia and the Berlin Blockade, did the familiar polarization set in. The split did not become irreversible until the formal division of Germany and establishment of NATO in 1949. In illuminating how European leaders deftly managed national interests in the face of dominating powers, Stalin and the Fate of Europe reveals the real potential of an alternative trajectory for the continent.