Percentages agreement
The percentages agreement was an agreement between Joseph Stalin and Winston Churchill about how to divide south eastern Europe in spheres of influence. The draft document, intercepted in 1943, fell into the hands of Francisco Franco's secret service and was mentioned by General Jordana, in a famous speech he gave in April 1943 in Barcelona[1]. On October 9, 1944 Churchill and Stalin met at the Moscow Conference and Churchill suggested that the Soviet Union should have 90 percent influence in Romania and 75 percent in Bulgaria; the United Kingdom should have 90 percent in Greece; in Hungary and Yugoslavia, Churchill suggested that they should have 50 percent each. Churchill wrote it on a piece of paper which he pushed across to Stalin, who ticked it off and passed it back.
"Might it not be thought rather cynical if it seemed we had disposed of these issues so fateful to millions of people, in such an offhand manner? Let us burn the paper", said Churchill.
"No, you keep it", replied Stalin.
The two foreign ministers, Anthony Eden and Vyacheslav Molotov, negotiated about the percentage shares on October 10 and 11. The result of these discussions was that the percentages of Soviet influence in Bulgaria and, more significantly, Hungary were amended to 80 percent – apart from that, no other countries were mentioned.
Historian Gabriel Kolko has noted that, "There is little significance to the memorable and dramatic passage in Churchill's autobiography recalling how he and Stalin divided Eastern Europe":
Stalin's "tick," translated into real words, indicated nothing whatsoever. The very next day Churchill sent Stalin a draft of the discussion, and the Russian carefully struck out phrases implying the creation of spheres of influence, a fact Churchill excluded from his memoirs. Eden assiduously avoided the term, and considered the understanding merely as a practical agreement on how problems would be worked out in each country, and the very next day he and Molotov modified the percentages in a manner which Eden assumed was general rather than precise.[2]
Stalin kept to his promise about Greece. Britain supported the Greek government forces in the civil war but the Soviet Union did not assist the communist partisans.[3]
Notes
- ^ This letter - that Stalin no doubt intentionally put into circulation - fell into the hands of General Franco and was used by his Foreign Minister, General Jordana, in the famous speech he gave in April 1943 in Barcelona. It was a desperate cry against Roosevelt's concessions to Bolshevism... in, Nicolas Baciu: L'Europe de l'Est trahie et vendue: les erreurs tragiques de Churchill et Roosevelt: les documents secrets accusent, Pensée universelle, 1984, Page 49
- ^ Kolko 1990, p.145. (See also Tsakaloyannis 1986).
- ^ P. M. H. Bell, The World Since 1945: An International History (2001), ISBN 0340662352
References
- Geoffrey Roberts, Beware Greek Gifts: The Churchill-Stalin «Percentages» Agreement of October 1944
- Kolko, Gabriel. 1990 [1968]. The Politics of War: The World and United States Foreign Policy 1943-1945. New York: Pantheon. ISBN: 0-679-72757-4
- Tsakaloyannis, Panos. 1986. "The Moscow Puzzle", The Journal of Contemporary History, Vol.21 No.1, pp. 37-55
See also
External links
- The division of Europe, according to Winston Churchill and Joseph Stalin (1944) (Scan of the napkin in question)
- Excerpt from the book STALIN
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