Churchill Defiant: Fighting On 1945–1955. Barbara Leaming

to enter Vienna and overrun Austria, should they also be permitted to take Berlin it would strengthen their conviction, already alarmingly in evidence, that they were chiefly responsible for Hitler’s defeat and that the spoils were rightly theirs.

      Churchill had no doubt that Stalin, whom Eisenhower had also informed of his intentions, well understood the symbolic and political significance of the Reich capital falling into Soviet hands. So when Stalin fulsomely complimented Eisenhower and assured him that the Soviet Union would send only second-rate forces to Berlin – which, he underscored, had ‘lost its former strategic importance’ – Churchill’s worst suspicions were confirmed. Churchill implored Eisenhower to pay particular attention to what was obviously a lie on Stalin’s part. But Eisenhower flatly refused. Eisenhower had Roosevelt’s backing when he declined even to attempt to race the Russians to Berlin. The Americans were not a little annoyed at Churchill’s insinuations about their Soviet ally’s postwar designs. Roosevelt had long insisted that Stalin was a man of good will and good faith who wanted nothing but security for his country, and that if the US gave him whatever he asked for, he could be counted on to work for a world of democracy and peace after the war and to refrain from annexing any territory. Meanwhile, on the very day – 1 April 1945 – that Stalin had written to congratulate Eisenhower on his sound thinking, he ordered two of his top military chiefs to capture Berlin post-haste.

      Driving through the ruins of the former Reich capital, Churchill sat in silence. His car passed endless rows of saluting Russian soldiers, directional signs printed in Cyrillic characters, and red-bordered posters bearing the sayings of Stalin translated into German above his signature etched in vivid red. It was as if Stalin had branded Berlin, fashioned it into his personal war trophy. The Russians all seemed ‘high as kites’, convinced, as Churchill had predicted they would be, that they were principally responsible for having won the war. The shattered capital, where street after street had been reduced to rubble and where the stench of putrefying corpses and broken sewer lines fouled the air, was an image of the collapse of the Nazi empire. Churchill grimly perceived something more. To his eye, the ubiquitous, overpowering Red Army presence augured the rise of Soviet power in postwar Europe.

      Hardly had Berlin surrendered to the Russians, on 2 May 1945, when Churchill had hatched a plan. Experience had taught him that Stalin was not a man to be swayed by arguments based on abstract principles. ‘Force and facts’ were his only realities. Brutal and unscrupulous, Stalin would do whatever he perceived to be in his own interest. The Americans had penetrated 120 miles deeper into Germany than originally planned. Churchill believed that gave him the leverage he needed to settle things peacefully with Stalin. The trick was to postpone pulling American troops back to the previously agreed-upon lines until Churchill was satisfied about both the temporary character of the Soviet occupation of Germany, and conditions in the countries liberated by the Red Army. Germany as a whole had yet to surrender when Churchill urgently contacted President Harry Truman, who had succeeded to office upon Roosevelt’s death in April. He urged the former vice president that they invite Stalin to a heads of government meeting to take place as soon as possible and that in the interim they maintain their troops in existing positions in order to show the Soviets ‘how much we have to offer or withhold’. From this point, everything depended on Truman. Roosevelt and Eisenhower had failed to listen to Churchill about Berlin. Could he hope for a better response from Truman, whom he had not yet met?

      Churchill’s telegram was sent on 6 May. The following day, German generals signed the act of unconditional surrender of all German land, sea, and air forces in Europe. On 8 May, Victory in Europe Day, Churchill announced in a radio broadcast that the German war was at an end; only Japan remained unsubdued. London exploded in a paroxysm of celebration. From first to last, the Prime Minister was at the centre of the festivities. When he cried out to a vast crowd assembled beneath his balcony, ‘This is your victory,’ the people roared back, ‘No, it’s yours!’ A tender man easily moved to tears whether of joy or sorrow, Churchill made no secret of his pleasure in lapping up the affection and admiration, yet he remained oppressed by forebodings as he awaited Truman’s answer. He ended the long, emotionally charged day by sharing his concerns with a friend, the newspaper proprietor Lord Camrose, who had come to dine at 10 Downing Street.

      While the noisy celebrations continued in the streets, Churchill spoke sombrely and confidentially of what would happen if Truman turned him down and the troops were withdrawn. Stalin would control seven European capitals in addition to Berlin: Prague, Budapest, Warsaw, Belgrade, Bucharest, Sofia, and Vienna. As far as Churchill was concerned, that could not be permitted.

      When Truman replied the next day that he preferred to wait for Stalin to propose a meeting, Churchill refused to take no for an answer. He wanted a leaders’ meeting as soon as possible and suggested that he and Truman confer first in London in order to present a united front. The new president, who seemed to have in -herited his predecessor’s unrealistic view of Stalin, demurred on the grounds that he wished to avoid any impression of ‘ganging up’. Churchill warned bluntly that the Soviets had drawn down an ‘iron curtain’ upon their front and that the rest of humanity had no idea of what was going on behind it. He argued that surely it was vital to come to an understanding with the Soviet Union or at least see how things stood before American troops retired to the agreed zones of occupation.

      Truman sent an emissary to London to convey what he did not wish to put in writing: Truman wanted to see Stalin first – without Churchill. The British Prime Minister could join them later. When Churchill waxed indignant, the emissary, Joseph Davies, went so far as to blame him for having provoked Stalin with his abiding hostility towards the Soviet Union. Truman’s representative maintained that in fact it was Churchill’s attitude that ‘placed not only the future, but possibly the immediate peace in real danger’.

      Furious at being told that he, not Stalin, was threatening the peace, Churchill reminded Truman that a shared love of freedom ought naturally to align their two nations against the Soviet Communists, who followed a different philosophy. With Churchill threatening to break publicly with Washington if Truman dared to see Stalin alone, the President appeared to back down. He agreed to three-power talks, but at the last minute he declined Churchill’s pleas to postpone the retreat of the American army at least until after the conference.

      When Churchill returned to his rose-pink, lakeside villa in Potsdam following the visit to Hitler’s bunker, he learned that Stalin had arrived in Germany. The leaders were to meet the following day at 5 p.m. in the former palace of the German crown prince. Due to Truman’s decision to withdraw his troops, however, Churchill was to face Stalin without the bargaining counter he had been hoping for. As he prepared to go into the talks, he was further wrong-footed by the fact that he had no idea of how much time he had to get what he wanted from Stalin. Prior to coming to Potsdam, Churchill – who had promised the British people a general election as soon as Hitler was defeated – had fought the first general election campaign in a decade. Polling day had been 5 July, but three weeks had been allotted to permit the service vote to come in before the total vote was counted. On 25 July, while the Potsdam Conference was still in progress, Churchill was due to fly back to Britain (briefly, he hoped) to learn his political fate.

      The rapturous reception he had received in the course of his thousand-mile electoral tour strongly suggested to him that he would still be prime minister when the second round of talks began. Everywhere Churchill had travelled that spring, multitudes had come out to see and thank him for what he had done in the war. Standing nine and ten deep, enthusiasts had waved flags, sung patriotic songs, and cried out, ‘Good old Winnie!’ Repeatedly they had closed in on the hero’s open car and the progress of the motorcade had been slowed to a walking pace. Churchill had commented at the time that no one who had witnessed his reception could have any doubt about the outcome of the poll.

      But what if there was an upset? What if poor Conservative showings in recent by-elections foretold a general swing to the left in British politics, as certain commentators were suggesting? Churchill had encountered some heckling, particularly in the last days of the campaign. Had these been isolated incidents, or did they reflect broad sentiment for change as Britons considered what they wanted their lives to be like after the war? Churchill had brought his Labour oppon -ent, Clement Attlee, to Potsdam to make it clear that all of Britain was being represented at the