virginia. american history tv tonight beginning at 8:00 p.m. eastern on c-span3. next, a panel of world war ii scholars looks at the february 1945 yalta conference in which leaders roosevelt, churchill and stallin met to look ahead. panelists compare yalta to previous meetings between the three leaders, explore some of the smitmyths surrounding it. the national world war ii in museum in new orleans hosted the event. welcome back. as we begin to silence our conversations, please remember to silence your cell phones as well. so i was thinking that with yalta being an eight-day conference, we've almost made a

full eight hours talking about it. [ laughter ] the last session is often one of our favorites, and that is a round table discussion where we get all of the speakers up together to talk about some themes, to ask each other questions or ask questions of themselves, and to give you all one last time to pepper one, some or all of the panelists with your own questions. i would ask that when you have a question, if it is for a specific panelist, please name that panelist or if you want to throw it open to some or all. we are going to ask dr. gunter bish-off to chair this panel discussion. again i'd like to thank gunter for coming in and filling in for dr. stole on such short notice. [ applause ] but before i leave the podium, i would like to introduce for the last time today dr. gunter

pitch-off, dr. rob satino, and mr. michael bishop. ladies and gentlemen, gunter will start it and i'll run around with the microphone. >> thank you very much. jeremy. let me just throw a few general questions out that we could discuss, i thought. the issue came up first with sergi and was raised with rob too, opening statements about his growing up in cleveland, and that is what callers have called the yalta myths. namely keep in mind there was a very good question from the audience, is this sort of the same thing that is selling out of eastern europe, the same thing as the selling out of china? that peaked debate in american politics. keep in mind the context is that the republicans had been out of office since 1932. they had won big in the '46 election. and they wanted to win the white

house. and this seemed to be the issue where you could blame the democrats for really doing bad things, meaning selling out china, selling out eastern europe at yalta. and that's how it became a bad word in the immediate post-war period. these yaulta myths, i think that as rob told us, echoed all the way into the 1970s in his ohm town, cleveland, being sold down the river. i think that's sort of an important part of the long life of yalta, particularly in american politics. i might also add that charles degall, the french president who was not inskrooited and was smarting under that for a long time, he made yalta a bad word too. and in 1968 after the soviets invaded checkoselovakkia blamed

what was going on on yalta. that's how long it was working inside. so i think the yalta myths are important topic that we out to be talking about. which is to say that the domestic politics of u.s. foreign policy. i think rob rightly made a good point. if you recall his conclusion was yalta was the blueprint for allied victory. and he made a good point to remind us that halting of the he willby was an issue that embryos already picked up even though it was discussed. i just might add to that that a very important reason for eisenhower to halt was he was afraid that the nazis were building a fortress down in the alps. so he sent armies down to the south to make sure that alton

feston would not come into being. this alpine fortress, they had no time to prepare for such a last stand. but that's what they were afraid of, also because nazi intelligence fed them that, meaning fed it to the oss, that that's happening in the alps. there was another reason to halt would be to get quickly down to the alps. and then the issue that was raised by someone online, we might discuss too, it's a very general issue, that person said, yalta, is it so different from previous conferences? isn't this the game of diplomacy? that whatever you call quid pro quo or tit for tat, is that's what's being done? i think that's a fair question to be discussed too. that's what i'd like to throw out there as potential discussion issues. but i'm sure there is many more. >> if you don't mind, i'll hop

on one of those. you talked about the yalta myths, selling out of eastern europe, the selling poland down the river or any of the other ethnic groups, east european ethnic groups that lived in cleveland with me. there's also the roosevelt was sick, and that's why -- he just wasn't up to it. there's stalin looking, church shill depressed, and then there's roosevelt. clearly the man looks on death's door, as he was. but i love that fact that you sent a graduate student a task of writing a research paper on this, looking at word counts and looking at the death and size of roosevelt's interventions. i think that's another one we can stand here and write, didn't matter that much. people are still going to ask you, was the fact that roosevelt was sick at yalta, was that issue? >> regarding the poles in

particular, on the one hand it's not a myth that the big three gathered together and decided the future of europe without much consultation with the rest of the world. so that's a reality. and that created a lot of resentment. but where mythology starts really, that the western allies were there in position, really, to get a much better deal, and didn't do that for whatever reason, either fdr was sick or there was spies in the american delegation, or that roosevelt was trying to get to cause with stalin to get the united nations, his main international project and his legacy going. that's where the mythology starts. again, poles are important there because pour poles, yalta was a turning point. that's where it was agreed that whatever government that they had in london would be replaced.

and they were losing territories in the east. the mala tov line was accepted by the western allies, and that was the loss of the city in today's ukraine, which is lieu vive, which was known as lambbard, depending on the controlling power. the western borderers, what they got from germany was not supported. that was at paotsdam. that was a major turning point and disappointment. and yalta was pronounced as yalta, was a word for betrayal even into the 1980s. >> maybe one more issue that was also raised throughout the

conference and particularly in the paper is german reparations. so stalin demanded $20 billion of german reparations to be evenly divided between the soviet union and the western powers. that's how evenly he wanted to divide it. he had a point. the soviet union was destroyed very badly, as roosevelt and churchill could see as they traveled to yalta through the crimea. and in order to reconstruct, german reparations were needed. however there was a lesson to be learned from world war i, that if you insist on german reparations on reparations, it might create bad flicks as it did in germany. that was one of the big issues that the nazis picked up. dr. plokhy remarked correctly, stalin got his $10 million, even

though it was not granted yet at yalta, eventually he got it through various means. first of all, removal of industries from east germany, the same thing you did in man churia, we heard. removal of industries. and when they realized that was not really such a good deal for them since they often didn't know how to put these industries back together in the soviet union or they became rusty in polish railiards, it is being said to, then they decided to take reparations out of current production in germany. and that's how the soviets got their 10 billion, and i might just remind you they actually took reparations from austria too. and i'vesort of found out a remarkable thing. the soviets took about as much reparations out of the eurozone out as into austria. that would almost make you think

the u.s. paid reparations to the soviet union. >> no such thing as a coincidence. [ laughter ] >> that figure i thought remarkable. they took reparations the same way from german assets for removal and then reparations out of current production. and that lasted in austria all the way until 1960. austraya delivered oil to the soviet union all the way up until 1960. but what historian has reminded us recently often, dr. plokhy briefly mentioned it, we need to keep that in mind too, is the fact that the americans got reparations too from germany, even though they didn't demand any at yalta. how did they get it? in a smart way. they sent teams into germany to take prediction methods, to take patents out of german corporations. and apparently that then saved companies like dupont, who took many of these production plants

billions of dollars. so it is assumed by historians that this smart way of intellectual reparations actually netted the united states 10 billion or so too. so we say it was turned down at yalta. but in the long run, both sides got what they wanted. >> i would like to throw in one thing also, gun ther, about this notion of myths. they're easiest to sell when there's a kernel of truth. i don't believe in the big lie. you just invent some crazy thing and say it enough times. let me talk about poland. we've taught under gradwats. i love them. they often bring certain wisdom to the table. i was in a university class for

years. a student said wasn't. crazy this war was fought after poland? that ironic nature of what happened to the polish state after the war, feeling that it had come from one form of tyranny to the other, the germans got liberated, they got to live under the benefits of a democratic way of life at least in western germany. but the poles didn't. who's brave stand against nazi aggressioned started the war. i know we know why it happened and i think everyone in the room knows why it happened. but you do see, that's something you can make some political -- what kind of foreign policy is that? that when poland winds up under the yokee, i looked at those casualty statistics, and poland is shocking. not only the first to fall, but probably one of the biggest suffererers percentage wise in terms of the war as well.

i'm just throwing that out there. maybe i am still channelling my youth reading those angry letters about the yalta conference. but it's still there for me. >> of course it was winston churchill who was very aware of the fact that great britain went to war over poland. and that's why at yalta he kept insisting that he was going to bat for poland and that polish government and declaration of liberated europe, as it was called, guaranteeing freely-elected governments in ev eastern europe which didn't work out, because he was mindful of the fact we went to war for poland. >> churchill is the mastermind between the growth of the myth. >> he sat across the cabinet table in 10 downing street from michael collins, the great issuer irish revolutionary, who when he signed the anglo irish

treaty said i have signed my own death warrant. that proved to be the case. he was killed the following year during the irish civil war. i think when we look back, we have to say that ultimately the decision on his part and his fellow gauche yairlgnegotiators was inevitable. they didn't have any choice. the british wouldn't have accepted the notion of an irish republic at that time. and the british war machine was primed and ready to assault ireland even more viciously than it already had. that's a very long-winded and round about way of saying, is it the conference itself that we're talking about? or is the yalta conference simply a symbol of or a ratification of these inevitable facts on the ground and forces? or could it conceivably have gone another way on the coast of crimea? >> yeah.

well, i would like to return to lend this question in line of argument to the question that gunter posed earlier about whether yalta is just another place where it's a lot of horse trading has taken place. or there is something particular about yalta. and i would say that it's not much different from the conferences that were happening before that in the world international history, with one exception. and that exception was the quite a -- this liberal view of president roosevelt, who of course was following in the footsteps of president wilson. this idea of liberal order and international organization. and when fdr comes back and aggresses the joint session of

congress and senate and says that the old world of this spheres disappeared, we are in a completely different, different world where there is no any more secret agrievance done. so it's -- he announced in u.n. and diplomatic relations. then things start popping up, there is a secret agreement on the soviet participation in the war with japan. and by the way, there are problems in eastern europe with poland. and that's where the reality of the old sphere of influence world and the vision of the new liberal world come and clash. and from that point of view, the expectation interests yalta become much, much more higher

than for any other conference, partially because the participants themselves and fdr in particular put them on that level. and one more comment on the internal politics of eastern europe and whether it was sold down or not, is that churchill comes back from yalta to a revolt in his own conservative party. so there are attacks on the government policy and the concessions yalta in the parliament. because again for a lot of people in britain, britain went to far for poland. it's a major issue. and exactly as you said, what britain was getting as a result of that or the world, what was getting as a result of that? with fdr, the polish he was

talking about, it seems to me, 3 to 4 million polish voters in the united states. and again, i'm not sure about the number. but that's what he was talking about in tehran, and he was saying, i'm not against in change of the polish borders, but i can't commit to that publicly before the presidential elections. because the poles whose letters you read before that, they were the staunchest supporters of the democratic party that ever existed in the world. and my guess, they didn't stay so dedicated. >> that's my guess as well. >> to after that ended. >> i think the secrecy of the agreement was an important point that historians have paid attention to, that it sort of trickled out what happened at yalta. you know, in the course of the spring. and i think the secret agreement on what the u.s. had to give for

the soviet union to get involved in the war in the far east, you talked about it, rob, that i think came out in february '46, if you will, a year after yalta. it was that secrecy that of course gave them the republicans the means to create the yalta myths that eastern europe sold down the river, which became bigger and bigger into the later 1940s. i'm glad that dr. plokhy went a bit into the history. this is how yalta was being discussed throughout the 1950s. i think it was very early, like ten years after yalta, like 1955, that foreign relations volumes was published, which is one of our principle source on the american side of what actually came to pass. >> uh-huh. it was 55. >> 55. usually takes 30 years before it is published on any given event.

>> i don't think you're on, jeremy. >> two questions. one for any or all of you, and then one very specific. the general question is that everyone's used language like, u.s. gave, or churchill gave, and so on and so forth. specifically about eastern europe, can you tell me one thing that was quote given away that stalin had not already earned through military means? that's my first question, more generally. the second is very specific to mr. bishop. and i'm not sure whether you were defending churchill or setting up sort of theory about why he thought this and so on. but it seems to me there's an inhernt contradiction between your later interpretation of his being appalled at what's happening in the eastern europe and the fact that he wrote on

the napkin. in other words, his famous napkin as i understand it was initiated by him. so either you're arguing that there was some sort of epiphany after yalta or perhaps he had guilt feelings or something. but it's certainly tue that he contributed mightily to what happened after the war by his acwiessence in moscow. >> get that one first. >> sure. >> we'll come to the other one. >> that's a tough crowd. >> yeah, it is. >> you make a very good point. i mentioned it only because i didn't want to present churchill as being somehow unrealistically above all of the sordid compromises involved in diplomacy and with yalta in particular. but i mean, all i can say is, he wasn't ceding complete control to stalin even on that paper, there was that symbolic 10% say for the west in romainia. i don't think that he wished for

or forsaw what was going to happen later. i just think it was an example of his commitment to empire and his vision for what the world should look like in the future becoming dominant, because he was there alone with stalin, and fdr wasn't there at the time. and the irony of course is that things changed in greece so very quickly. i mean, here he forged an agreement with stalin, which ironically enough stalin kept, obviously for his own reasons, and of course britain intervenes in the civil war, but they can't main taib this commitment as i mentioned earlier, and they stepped back, and the americans step in. it wasn't churchill's finest movement. let's put it that way. and he himself said it was a naughty document and he felt somewhat uncomfortable about it. churchill lived to be 90. he had a seven-decade almost

political career. some of his views shifted over time. although i think he's a lot more consistent that most people give him credit for.but the fact remains even though he was horrified by the yalta settlement he also was alert to any sign there might be an opportunity for a breakthrough in relations with the soviets. and i quoted some of the things he wrote and said about the aftermath of the death of stalin and how he saw that as an opportunity to bring about a peaceful settlement to the cold war. >> before we get to the other question, isn't it possible to have -- to hold both those positions, to hand you a spheres of influence agreement and later rail on it against communism? because he was an imperialist and under stood, and he was a bedrock anticommunism. i guess as i've gone through life i've realized we're complex and one of our obsessions comes

to the foreand later it's replaced. i can posit a churchill who goes one way then the other. >> if of -- >> if churchill is your hero it could be uncomfortable to read that he vastly preferred stevenson say in the presidential election of 1952. that he was disappointed at eisenhower and eisenhower's comment was the same horror in a different dress. to be off putting and he couldn't abide, the american secretary of state who he said was the only man -- the only bull he knew who carried his own china shop with him. so you read some of the stuff and it makes you wonder. the fact is having been so adam ant and sincere and consistent throughout his career regarding his hatred of communism.

he was horrified by the idea that the world might consume itself in nuclear war and wanted to avert that. so he was capable of change. maintained and the consistent principles throughout and was able sometimes more than he's given credit for to adapt to changing circumstances. >> and if i can add i wouldn't advise anybody to take at face value what you read in churchill's memoirs. that famous story about napkin, there were one week of negotiations there and so on and so forth. and so, yes, maybe there was a moment with the napkin but it was the top of the iceberg of negotiations. churchill was much closer to starting than roosevelt in terms of understanding how the world should be organized and the spheres of influence.

what he didn't like, it wasn't sphere of influence, he didn't like where poland was going as a result of that. so in that sense he was consistent, the sphere of influence. but he wanted more as the world was coming to an end. so, again, some of his ideas certainly were -- and he goes to yalta and he understands that he has a weak end and then he writes that chamberlain was wrong to trust hitler and i don't think i'm wrong to trust stalin. and this is after yalta. and he's in a situation where there is very little for him to go on apart from stalin's word which probably addresses also to a degree your question about

what did he, fdr had to given to stalin but there was something that stalin wanted from them in eastern europe. in the eastern it was clear, he wanted territory and prepared to send his army into battle. in eastern europe he made legitimacy and national recognition for his territorial acquisitions and that is what they could give him or play some sort of games and that is what the negotiations about polish government were about. that is why he tried to say, i didn't interfere with what you did in paris or france, but there was still a veneer of diplomacy and negotiations and so on and so forth because he needed international legitimacy. >> let me add to what michael

said. there might have been a bit of guilt on churchill's fault, and you brought the story up to 43 and that could be fleshed out more. so stalin dies on i think march 5th, 1953. and then churchill fairly soon comes out and said this is a good opportunity to meet new leadership at the high level, meaning another kind of summit meeting and i think he was trying to resolve the cold war right then and there if he could. but the problem was now eisenhower was president since january. and eisenhower gave a speech in april of 1953, right at this time, saying, well he was not so excited about a summit because the soviets would first need to make major concessions. korean armies and the austria treaty and maybe a german peace treaty. so he very specific conditions

that he said, the soviets need to make concessions before we sit down with them in a summit meeting. churchill fell sick i think and nothing happened for the next few weeks and then the summit that happened actually was at bermuda and that was late in 1953 and it was the french/british/american summit and that is when eisenhower made the remark saying about the woman in the street that is the same horror underneath talking about the soviet union. so this tension between churchill and eisenhower carried into the era with eisenhower was president and when some historians think a great opportunity was missed, maybe to bring the cold war to the end. because, remember, this is a time when the nuclear arms race expanded with the first h-bombs

being detonated and churchill was horrified about the tests in '54 and so forth. so it was also an effort possibly to keep the nuclear arms race in check if such a meeting could be affected with the soviets. but they weren't prepared to meet yet either finally because they needed to figure out who would be stalin's successor. the beauty about the democratic governments here in the united states, is we have an election every four years. if we don't like the guy in the white house, we can vote him out. the soviets didn't have clear succession procedures. it took them two years to find a new leader. previously it was mallen cough and buria and eventually crushef appeared and that is when things started to move again. >> rob, did you have a point to

add. >> didn't bobby have two questions. oh, what we had to give. did we give them anything we probably dealt with that. >> one thing that puzzles me is what are all of these percentages, percentages of what? >> good question. what does 10% of greece mean. >> people and resources. i mean, i've always wondered exactly what churchill was thinking about when he was doing these percentages of influence. >> i could see myself jotting down to note to myself. maybe all of us can. you work on ideas in your own head as an act of policy, this is a week or ten days of discussion of who would have what spheres of influence. but again the wisdom of the typical american undergraduate. and someone would say what does 10% of greece actually mean. >> it could have been effort to at least symbolically say, hey, we're not going to withdraw

entirely and give you, stalin, an entirely free hand even if the there wasn't a lot of thought behind it and a idea of a 10% role in what happened to romania didn't mean anything. obviously didn't mean anything. >> i think that the understanding of the spheres of influence against stalin and roosevelt were influence guys but the standard of influence means something different and as michael said for churchill that was also the way that neither west full withdraws from the area and the soviet union so it is predominantly your area but we could be there and our observers could be there, our businesses could be there and so on and so forth. for stalin, that was unacceptable. and molotov, who knew what stalin was thinking until he was doing that, later said that,

well, the only way for us to coexist is for the west to decide this is yours and this is ours. because they know they were very very -- very insecure and they knew they couldn't compete with the united states. so their way was to -- the iron curtain. and that is where complexity of churchill's position is. he's not against spheres of influence but he's against iron curtain. so the exclusive sphere of influence, this is not how he understands the world. >> gentleman, jim to the right has a question and then i'll get to the other side of the room. >> it is a -- question. i shared statistics about the casualties, in a related question what was the west's perception of those numbers? did they trust them and did they know it or thought it was stalin

pontificating and later did they perceive that the soviets could continue and did that make a difference. >> i'll start and others can chime in. from the start of american u.s. involvement in world war ii in 1941 it was clear who was bearing the burden of fighting the germans. roosevelt knew it. roosevelt's people knew it. whether the exact statistics were known. that is a good question. they're still be questioned today. with the fall of stalin and opening up archives and we're still not sure what the soviet casualties were in world war ii, but the idea is they were bearing the biggest burden for fighting the germans, it was well-known for roosevelt's strategy for winning the war. >> well, i certainly agree with what rob just said.

and it seems to me five times stalin appeared on the cover of "time" magazine. so that reality was clear. in terms of the actual numbers, the soviets didn't know them themselves. >> good point. >> the first time crushoff came up with the number so stalin never gave the number. it was 20 million and it was he emerged as successor to stalin and today's -- again estimate, is 27 million. but for stalin was not talking about the numbers because that was put in himself in a bad light. in his end of the war to his generals he said that any other people but russians would kick us out for what happened during the war. so he was not eager to do the numbers or give those numbers to

anybody. >> i must remind you that the national world war ii museum has a movie "beyond all boundaries" and there the number is still 20 million. >> 20 million. okay. >> gentlemen, to your left please. >> this is mark mccain. one of you brought up that there was 15 minutes or so spent on a document which was signed about the democracy that blossomed into something in the future. would this be a good time to discuss what that was? how did that have an impact on the soviet union after the -- >> the declaration on liberated europe. >> yeah. >> there was like ten minutes of talk about this. >> yeah. there were major concerns on the american side that stalin would not sign that.

and the declaration was put together, there was a long preparation for something like that that would have actual teeth the way how there could be a body that would oversee that, there would be ways how the policies can be implemented. eventually it was decided that stalin would not go for that. so it was about -- it became a declaration as opposed to an agreement per se. which put us certainly lower than other agreements or specific agreements that were reached at yalta in terms of its power. and stalin said let's sign. molotov was really horrified by that. he said, we shouldn't do that. that will give them an instrument. and stalin, according to molotov's memoirs, but not memoirs but telling to somebody

in the 60s and 70s in interviews, stalin responded don't worry we'll figure that out. what really matters is actually this position of the forces on the ground. let them have the declaration. and, again, it was a few minutes and it was signed. americans were surprised. but again that was a lar -- a declaration without teeth. and when the world went into the cold war mode, that was the only document where someone could argue that stalin violated the promises given at yalta. because everything else, the language was so careful there was no specific violations per se. and when herman was returning from crimea to moscow, it seems he was talking to one of the military commanders again.

i don't remember who it was. but he said, well, it looks like the documents that we signed are lasting that they could be stretched from here to washington. and the other said, yeah, it looks like we have to start negotiation on poland from scratch all over again. but that document, the declaration, that was also the way for roosevelt to come back to his polished electorate and say i brought something. they promised to honor democratic principles. it didn't help us as we know. but that was more political document for domestic consumption back in the united states. >> well i think we should also add that the polish issue at yalta had two sides to it. number one, the borders and moving the country westward. this is something that mark would remind us of, mark stoller

and a future polish government. the fact is that stalin had created conditions on the ground by setting up the so-called lub lynn polish government that he had back in moscow that came to eastern poland where he set up the government. and this sort of the west fdr and churchill were afraid of the future mode of establishing governments in eastern europe for countries that are being liberated. and they kept insisting that they wanted the polish government in exile the so-called lantin polls and in that context the liberation of europe came up, mainly as a means to save face for roosevelt back home with the polish voters, that in fact he had batted for poland with this declaration.

but it was indeed, as dr. plokhy said, it never did the trick of enabling free elections to be held in europe to guarantee a democratic future for those countries. >> let's wait for the microphone, sir. nobody could hear you. i'll bring it back. >> but wasn't it a cede that was used for organizations like solidarity or am i thinking of another document? you know, once in the '80s -- >> probably it is a helsinki act of 1975. >> i think that is -- >> yes. and human rights part of the agreements that were reached there. that jump started also help to start the dissident movement,

organized dissident movement, human rights watch and so on and so forth. >> mindful of our time limit, i'm going to ask the subsequent questions to direct -- to be directed at one individual panelists. if that is okay. to try to get to all of the hands that are up. there is about three of them still. >> so i just want to point out that this is government that ran with their hands about democracy in europe, especially americans, had no problem interfere in latin america knocking governments, the government and after they were -- puerto rico or whenever you wanted. but the other thing is that poland was dismembered by germany, destroyed as an entity and reconstructed. so there was some -- you could say that churchill -- world war ii went to recover poland and poland was recovered.

meaning politically because under the guise and control of stalin but in the end it was unity which was lost in the nazi-ism. and germany removed part of the country under germany and created so we could say there was a little end -- happy ending to this world war ii episode if we want for the polish nation in one step. and the question is whether the opposition had -- the government of russia not being communist, would churchill have been so opposed to the control from russia. was it lack of democracy because again i don't see churchill being very bothered by democracy in india or by democracy in egypt or other places, right? >> britain has always stood for the rights of small nations except ireland.

it's the world of politics. there are moments when you could afford idealism and other moments where realism is the order of the day. that is my comment. i don't really know you had a question so much. but that is my comment on that. >> michael, do you have anything since there was a churchill slant to that question. >> well, i think that -- one could only speculate what would churchill's views be if russia was a noncommunist state. this has been said before, both churchill and stalin were more comfortable with the whole influence way of looking at the world than, say, roosevelt was. so it is possible if you took communism out of the equation churchill would have been more comfortable with russian influence in poland. but keep in mind he was one of those warning against appeasement, arguing for

re-armament in britain and ultimately it became first lord of the admiralty for the second time and rejoined the government only after the invasion of poland. so i think that the saving poland was something that would have been important to him and was important to him from the beginning. >> gentlemen, to your left in the front row here, please. >> this question is for dr. sattina, so you talked about looking at yalta in different lenses, correct. my question is really based on looking at it through the lens from bottom to top, instead of top to bottom. how did reactions from, say, domestic, political ideas from each of the big threes respective countries, how did they react to the yalta conference, if they had any reaction at all. >> it is a very good question.

and information about what happened at yalta leaked out in dribs and drabs over course of several years. and so eventually this narrative, which i would call it is still the standard narrative on yalta of selling people down the river, it still comes back no matter how many times you try to slay it and that is formed in a domestic political context in the united states over the course of several years. so i can't really say that there was a major -- some major public reaction or dominant public reaction to -- reaction to yalta. and in a smithsonian sense you have a back room diplomacy because there are still secret agreements being made at yalta. and this negative or anti-yalta narrative is the course of several years. likewise germans are being bombed from the sky and cities overrun and not many public

meeting to express from the german people about what they thought about yalta. >> gentlemen, back to your left, please. >> this question is to mr. bischof, i would like what you would like to know what winston churchill would say or do and we talked about the winning of the cold war and the rise of democracy in eastern european countries, what he would say in response to putin in crimea and ukraine and the loss of democracy in pole and and hungary and the other eastern european countries, would we have another iron curtain speech? >> a friend of mine, a lincoln scholar was on the radio in boston back in the '70s for a call-in program and someone called in and said what wro lincoln think about busing and my historian friend responded by saying what is a bus?

so it is always dangerous -- it is always dangerous to try and devine these sort of things. i do think churchill would have viewed russia and putin with the same jaundice and weary eye that he always did, the soviet union, and i think he would be dismayed that this resort destination where he spent a glorious week on the riviera of haitis that fellow leaders would be cedeed back to ukraine and seized again by put in in 2013 or 14. i would like to think he would be vigilant and on guard and making inspirational speeches while at the same time pursuing the interests of the united

kingdom in a kanni and effective way. >> panelists in the back center, please. >> i'm wondering in terms of the perception of the united states of yalta immediately after the end of the war where the soviet union had been presented as a stout ally and then the soviet union has seen wars fought on its territory twice in 30 years, that giving them a set of buffer states is understandable and legitimate and therefore it wasn't perceived as a sellout by the average american at that point. >> sorry, dr. bischof. >> yeah, i mean, we've heard lots about how the information trickled out slowly. so the american perception is in

some quarters, particularly among republicans it was beginning to change as it was known what kind of agreements were made secretly. because i think the tradition of open democracy even though you expect that in the democratic parties since fdr took that over from wilson, that was sort of a stark reminder and i think that is where the percentage agreement comes in too. that was traditional old-fashioned european diplomacy, to present the agreement the way americans and wilson-yan didn't want to see it. but the american public didn't know a lot about what happened at yalta. that only came out in little spurts as i said. all the way down to 1946 and even 1955. so it took a long time to really find out what had been agreed to at yalta. but the agreement on poland particularly then led to this myth as theo harris, he was a

historian in the '70s who wrote a big book about the yalta myth and took hold of the republican party that uh-huh, there you have it, the democrats and roosevelt are up again to the old things and not defending democracy as they should, they're selling nations like poland down the river and i think that is why the perception slowly set in. but in a partisan way. i think that is sort of the importance of the yalta myth, the way they analyzed it, it is a partisan kind of myth and not all america would share that. >> paul has a question in the front row, gentlemen. >> you talk about post-war politics in america, you can't miss a comment about the house unamerican activities committee and how it came into being probably because of the slow leakage of information about

yalta. >> the house unamerican committee came into being in 1940 under congressman martin diocese of texas and at that time it was persecuting nazis or trying to find nazi spies in the united states. and only after world war ii was unamerican activities committee redirected toward chasing communists out of the american government. so the house unamerican activities committee you could say was subverted after the war towards the new purpose of anti-communist activity that wants to be investigated. and truman himself started to investigate such anti-communist activity in the federal government in 1947. and people were fired from the federal government. but then, of course, came a fellow mentioned names joe mccarthy who needed an issue in 1950 to be re-elected and he

went to the president of georgetown university, joe walsh, and said what would be a good issue today that would rile the american public and the president said the saint lawrence seaway is a big topic. and mccarthy said that is boring, nobody is interested in that. >> i just fell asleep. >> then joe walsh said well anti-communism in government, from a catholic perspective is a big issue and that is what mccarthy picked up and a few days later he held lincoln day speech in west virginia and talked about 57 communists in the state department. and from there mccarthyism took sort of its strange fate, if you will. i know that stuff, i should mention it pretty well because i wrote any master thesis at uno under professor ambrose on the relationship of eisenhower and

mccarthy and he said you have to give him enough rope to hang himself. >> [ inaudible ]. a chairman from louisiana for a while on the house of you acbut it was a communist in every bed. >> well, ladies and gentlemen, let's give a round of applause to gunther bischof, dr. plokhy and michael bischof. before everyone gets up, i have a couple of closing remarks and then i will cede the podium to rob. thank you in the audience for a great day, for your questions both online but especially you all being here physically with us. and seeing for maybe the first time our brand-new higgins hotel. i hope this isn't the last time we see you this year. we have wonderful programming throughout the year.

keep in mind and look on our website for the september memory wars conference, world war ii at '75. we've talked about the legacy of world war ii or yalta today. this conference in september will be discussing how the war is remembered throughout the world and how it is very relevant to current political and diplomatic affairs. it is looking at it through public memorials, through museums, monuments. so that's going to be one in september. and then the week after vj day or the anniversary of the surrender ceremony on september 2nd. so the next one is our international conference on world war ii. that is in november, the weekend before thanksgiving. so let me ask for the final time for one of our speakers dr. rob sateeno to come to the stage and make closing remarks as our senior historian. thank you. >> thanks, jim.

[ applause ] >> i promise -- thank you. i promise to keep this short. i'm all that is left between you and the door and i realize that. as i was listen to all of the talks today, i think we had a great and rich day of discussion on yalta. two issues just crystallized in my mind as i say what does yalta mean and why is it important and this view of foreign policy, either real politic or someone asked isn't this typical, we're redrawing the boundaries with not considering the people involved and that is how it has always been and stalin said that is not how it should be. and we sometimes say wilsony um idealism. that we could work together by common good. a book called the wisonian moment, i would urge you to read it about the post world war i

period and then draw conclusions about world war ii. but i will end this with. i think the meaning of yalta is how important it is to end your wars, to think about how you end wars. they're surprisingly easy to get into but wrapping them up successfully in any kind of conclusive fashion is often a very, very difficult thing. close vits tells us the fill os fear of war, war is the continuation of politics by other means and you have to consider that from the beginning of the war. why are we fighting and what do we hope to get out of it and how could be get that thing out of the war. there is also the british military analyst basil littlehart and you fight wars for a better peace. you didn't like it so much you decided to go to war and spend billions of dollars of treasure and lose hundreds of thousands of lives in america, millions in the case of the soviet union. and so i think that maybe on that note, let's us leave our

discussion of the yalta conference and think of about what a better piece might have been in 194 and as i always do i will end with the words of douglas mcarthur on the deck of uss missouri. these proceedings are closed. thank you. >> weeknights we're featuring american history tv programs has a preview of what is available every weekend on c-span 3. tonight civil war scholar rod greg discusses the battle of fort fisher which occurred in december of 1864 and january 1865. then civil war scholar timothy smith explores the 1863 battle of champion hill part of the vixberg campaign. followed by jeffrey hunt detailing the movements of general george mead and union forces as they followed confederates through virginia. american hist tv beginning at

8:00 p.m. eastern on c-span 3. coming up on american history tv, the focus is the 1945 yalta conference that occurred during world war ii. first a u.s. war documentary on the conference and then examine of the summit in tehran, quebec and moscow which preceded the conference in 1945 followed by discussion of the major issues and decisions of the yalta conference which took place at a crimea resort in ukraine. you're watching american history tv on c-span 3. ♪ ♪