The Potsdam Conference SLIDESHOW

The Potsdam Conference - July 1945

• The following points were agreed:-
• - Germany would be divided as agreed at Yalta.
• - Poland's eastern border would be moved west to the rivers Oder and Neisse.
• - The Nazi Party was banned and its leaders were to be tried as war criminals.
• - Germans living in Poland, Hungary and Czechoslovakia would be sent back to Germany.
• Although there was several disagreements:
• - The Soviet Union wanted to impose (force) severe reparations on Germany. Truman blocked this.
• - The Soviet Union wanted to share in the occupation (action) of Japan once it was defeated.
• - Britain and the USA wanted a greater say in Eastern Europe.
• - ^ They did not accept that Stalin had the right to set up pro-Soviet governments (relating to the Soviet Union)in these countries. Stalin said this is what they agreed at Yalta.
• -Potsdam showed how divided the former wartime Allies were.
• Stalin feared that the USA might use the threat of the bomb to prevent (ensure this doesn't happen) the spread of communism. He ordered his scientists to work flat out to develop a Soviet atomic bomb.