In our BYOD (bring your own device) day, we were asked to watch a presentation and a video on the outbreak of the cold war. Then we were asked to answer some questions with the help of looking some information, these are my answers and the links to the videos and the presentation.
Slideshare.
Video.
1) Why did the wartime Alliance fall apart?
2) What were the major differences between the superpowers?
3) The importance of Yalta and Potsdam conferences.
4) The roles of Stalin and Truman.
1) Wartime alliance fell apart since different things were agreed on after and before the war with different people. Before the war ended Roosevelt was still alive and Churchill was still the prime minister, but after, Churchill was replaced and so was Roosevelt. Russia did not follow her words when she freed Europe from Germany, the big three did not agree on the same things, the ideas weren’t clear and there wasn’t a clear point of view.
2) Stalin wanted to cripple Germany fully to prevent future attacks to the USSR but Truman did not want to repeat the same mistakes as the Treaty after the first war.
Stalin wanted compensation from Germany since she caused many deaths in the USSR but Truman still did not agree, he was determined to prevent the same mistakes as after WW1.
Truman did not like the fact that Stalin could place pro-soviet government in eastern Europe.
3) Both Yalta and Potsdam conferences are very important since they both stated what would happen with Germany after the war.
The Yalta conference stated that Germany was to be divided in four and so was its capital. Also Russia had promised to fight against Japan once Germany surrendered. The big three agreed to hunt down Criminals from the Genocide, also countries would be able to choose their government after they were liberated from Germany.
The Potsdam Conference stated was a failure for me, five months after Yalta, so many things had changed that decisions weren’t the same. Roosevelt was dead and Truman came into power, the issue was that Truman was more anti-soviet than Roosevelt. Churchill was defeated in Elections and a new prime minister was elected, so we had 2 new opinions and ideas that did not match the previous leaders, which preoccupied Stalin. Also, Stalin did not follow his words, he stayed in the placed he freed from Germany not giving the population the option to choose the government they wanted.
4) Stalin wanted power, he did not care about others opinions or attitudes, he just wanted what «belonged» to him. he had a communist country so he knew he was threatening to others and that he was powerful
Truman was very anti-soviet, he didn’t like Stalin one bit neither his actions, he was determined to find out what Stalin’s plans were.