VIII. Austria
The Conference examined a proposal by the Soviet Government on the extension of the authority of the Austrian Provisional Government to all of Austria.
The three Governments agreed that they were prepared to examine this question after the entry of the British and American forces into the city of Vienna.
IX. Poland
The Conference considered questions relating to the Polish Provisional Government and the western boundary of Poland.
On the Polish Provisional Government of National Unity, they defined their attitude in the following statement:
A-- We have taken note with pleasure of the agreement reached among representative Poles from Poland and abroad which has made possible the formation, in accordance with the decisions reached at the Crimea Conference, of a Polish Provisional Government of National Unity recognized by the Three Powers. The establishment by the British and United States Governments of diplomatic relations with the Polish Provisional Government has resulted in the withdrawal of their recognition from the former Polish Government in London, which no longer exists.
The British and United States Governments have taken measures to protect the interest of the Polish Provisional Government as the recognized government of the Polish State in the property belonging to the Polish State located in their territories and under their control, whatever the form of this property may be. They have further taken measures to prevent alienation to third parties of such property. All proper facilities will be given to the Polish Provisional Government for the exercise of the ordinary legal remedies for the recovery of any property belonging to the Polish State which may have been wrongfully alienated.
The three Powers are anxious to assist the Polish Provisional Government in facilitating the return to Poland as soon as practicable of all Poles abroad who wish to go, including members of the Polish Armed Forces and the Merchant Marine. They expect that those Poles who return home shall be accorded personal and property rights on the same basis as all Polish citizens.
The three Powers note that the Polish Provisional Government in accordance with the decisions of the Crimea Conference has agreed to the holding of free and unfettered elections as soon as possible on the basis of universal suffrage and secret ballot in which all democratic and anti-Nazi parties shall have the right to take part and to put forward candidates, and that representatives of the Allied press shall enjoy full freedom to report to the world upon developments in Poland before and during the elections.
B-- The following agreement was reached on the western frontier of Poland:
In conformity with the agreement on Poland reached at the Crimea Conference the three Heads of Government have sought the opinion of the Polish Provisional Government of National Unity in regard to the accession of territory in the north and west which Poland should receive. The President of the National Council of Poland and members of the Polish Provisional Government of National Unity have been received at the Conference and have fully presented their views. The three Heads of Government reaffirm their opinion that the final delimitation of the western frontier of Poland should await the peace settlement.
The three Heads of Government agree that, pending the final determination of Poland’s western frontier, the former German territories east of a line running from the Baltic Sea immediately west of Swinemunde, and thence along the Oder River to the confluence of the western Neisse River and along the western Neisse to the Czechoslovak frontier, including that portion of East Prussia not placed under the administration of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics in accordance with the understanding reached at this conference and including the area of the former free city of Danzig, shall be under the administration of the Polish State and for such purposes should not be considered as part of the Soviet zone of occupation in Germany.
X. Conclusion of peace treaties and admission to the United Nations Organization
The Conference agreed upon the following statement of common policy for establishing, as soon as possible, the conditions of lasting peace after victory in Europe:
The Three Governments consider it desirable that the present anomalous position of Italy, Bulgaria, Finland, Hungary and Rumania should be terminated by the conclusion of Peace Treaties. They trust that the other interested Allied Governments will share these views.
For their part the Three Governments have included the preparation of a Peace Treaty for Italy as the first among the immediate important tasks to be undertaken by the new Council of Foreign Ministers. Italy was the first of the Axis Powers to break with Germany, to whose defeat she has made a material contribution, and has now joined with the Allies in the struggle against Japan. Italy has freed herself from the Fascist regime and is making good progress towards the reestablishment of a democratic government and institutions. The conclusion of such a Peace Treaty with a recognized and democratic Italian Government will make it possible for the Three Governments to fulfill their desire to support an application from Italy for membership of The United Nations.
The Three Governments have also charged the Council of Foreign Ministers with the task of preparing Peace Treaties for Bulgaria, Finland, Hungary and Rumania. The conclusion of Peace Treaties with recognized democratic Governments in these States will also enable the three Governments to support applications from them for membership of the United Nations. The three Governments agree to examine each separately in the near future, in the light of the conditions then prevailing, the establishment of diplomatic relations with Finland, Rumania, Bulgaria, and Hungary to the extent possible prior to the conclusion of peace treaties with those countries.
The three Governments have no doubt that in view of the changed conditions resulting from the termination of the war in Europe, representatives of the Allied press will enjoy full freedom to report to the world upon developments in Rumania, Bulgaria, Hungary and Finland.
As regards the admission of other states into the United Nations Organization, Article 4 of the Charter of the United Nations declares that:
Membership in the United Nations is open to all other peace-loving States who accept the obligations contained in the present Charter and, in the judgment of the organization, are able and willing to carry out these obligations;
the admission of any such State to membership in the United Nations will be effected by a decision of the General Assembly upon the recommendation of the Security Council.
The Three Governments, so far as they are concerned, will support applications for membership from those States which have remained neutral during the war and which fulfill the qualifications set out above.
The Three Governments feel bound however to make it clear that they for their part would not favor any application for membership put forward by the present Spanish Government, which, having been founded with the support of the Axis Powers, does not, in view of its origins, its nature, its record and its close association with the aggressor States, possess the qualifications necessary to justify such membership.
XI. Territorial trusteeships
The Conference examined a proposal by the Soviet Government concerning trusteeship territories as defined in the decision of the Crimea Conference and in the Charter of the United Nations Organization.
After an exchange of views on this question it was decided that the disposition of any former Italian territories was one to be decided in connection with the preparation of a peace treaty for Italy and that the question of Italian territory would be considered by the September Council of Ministers of Foreign Affairs.
XII. Revised Allied Control Commission procedure in Rumania, Bulgaria, and Hungary
The Three Governments took note that the Soviet Representatives on the Allied Control Commissions in Rumania, Bulgaria and Hungary, have communicated to their United Kingdom and United States colleagues proposals for improving the work of the Control Commission, now that hostilities in Europe have ceased.
The Three Governments agreed that the revision of the procedures of the Allied Control Commissions in these countries would now be undertaken, taking into account the interests and responsibilities of the Three Governments which together presented the terms of armistice to the respective countries, and accepting as a basis the agreed proposals.
XIII. Orderly transfers of German populations
The Conference reached the following agreement on the removal of Germans from Poland, Czechoslovakia and Hungary:
The Three Governments, having considered the question in all its aspects, recognize that the transfer to Germany of German populations, or elements thereof, remaining in Poland, Czechoslovakia and Hungary, will have to be undertaken. They agree that any transfers that take place should be effected in an orderly and humane manner.
Since the influx of a large number of Germans into Germany would increase the burden already resting on the occupying authorities, they consider that the Allied Control Council in Germany should in the first instance examine the problem with special regard to the question of the equitable distribution of these Germans among the several zones of occupation. They are accordingly instructing their respective representatives on the Control Council to report to their Governments as soon as possible the extent to which such persons have already entered Germany from Poland, Czechoslovakia and Hungary, and to submit an estimate of the time and rate at which further transfers could be carried out, having regard to the present situation in Germany.
The Czechoslovak Government, the Polish Provisional Government and the Control Council in Hungary are at the same time being informed of the above, and are being requested meanwhile to suspend further expulsions pending the examination by the Governments concerned of the report from their representatives on the Control Council.
XIV. Military talks
During the Conference there were meetings between the Chiefs of Staff of the three Governments on military matters of common interest.
Approved:
J. V. STALIN
HARRY S. TRUMAN
C. R. ATTLEE
List of delegations
For the United States
-
The President:
Harry S. Truman -
The Secretary of State:
James F. Byrnes -
Fleet Admiral William D. Leahy, USN, Chief of Staff to the President
-
Joseph E. Davies, Special Ambassador
-
Edwin Pauley, Special Ambassador
-
W. Averell Harriman, Ambassador to the USSR
-
General of the Army, George C. Marshall, Chief of Staff, United States Army
-
Fleet Admiral Ernest J. King, USN, Chief of Naval Operations and Commander in Chief, U.S. Fleet
-
General of the Army, H. H. Arnold, U.S. Army Air Forces
-
Lieutenant General Brehon B. Somervell, Commanding General, Army Service Forces
-
Vice Admiral Emory S. Land, War Shipping Administrator
-
William L. Clayton, Assistant Secretary of State
-
James C. Dunn, Assistant Secretary of State
-
Ben Cohen, Special Assistant to the Secretary of State
-
H. Freeman Matthews, Director of European Affairs, Department of State
-
Charles E. Bohlen, Assistant to the Secretary,
-
(together with political, military and technical advisers).
For the United Kingdom
-
The Prime Minister:
Mr. Winston S. Churchill, MP
Mr. C. R. Attlee, MP -
The Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs:
Mr. Anthony Eden, MP
Mr. Ernest Bevin, MP -
Lord Leathers, Minister of War Transport
-
Sir Alexander Cadogan, Permanent Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs
-
Sir Archibald Clark Kerr, H.M. Ambassador at Moscow
-
Sir Walter Monckton, Head of the U.K. Delegation to Moscow Reparations Commission
-
Sir William Strang, Political Adviser to the Commander-in-Chief, British Zone in Germany
-
Sir Edward Bridges, Secretary of the Cabinet
-
Field Marshal Sir Alan Brooke, Chief of the Imperial General Staff
-
Marshal of the Royal Air Force, Sir Charles Portal, Chief of the Air Staff
-
Admiral of the Fleet Sir Andrew Cunningham, First Sea Lord
-
General Sir Hastings Ismay, Chief of Staff to the Minister of Defence
-
Field Marshal Sir Harold Alexander, Supreme Allied Commander, Mediterranean Theatre
-
Field Marshal Sir Henry Maitland Wilson, Head of the British Joint Staff Mission at Washington
-
and other advisers
[For the Soviet Union]
-
[The Chairman of the Council of People’s Commissars:
J. V. Stalin -
People’s Commissar for Foreign Affairs:
V. M. Molotov -
Fleet Admiral N. G. Kuznetsov, People’s Commissar, the Naval Fleet of the USSR
-
A. I. Antonov, Chief of Staff of the Red Army
-
A. Ya Vyshinski, Deputy People’s Commissar for Foreign Affairs
-
S. I. Kavtaradze, Assistant People’s Commissar for Foreign Affairs
-
I. M. Maisky, Assistant People’s Commissar for Foreign Affairs
-
Admiral S. G. Kucherov, Chief of Staff of the Naval Fleet
-
F. T. Gusev, Ambassador of the Soviet Union in Great Britain
-
A. A. Gromyko, Ambassador of the Soviet Union in the United States of America
-
K. V. Novikov, Member of the Collegium of the Commissariat for Foreign Affairs, Director of the Second European Division
-
S. K. Tsarapkin, Member of the Collegium of the Commissariat for Foreign Affairs, Director of the United States Division
-
S. P. Kozyrev, Director of the First European Division of the Commissariat for Foreign Affairs
-
A. A. Lavrishchev, Director of the Division of Balkan Countries, Commissariat for Foreign Affairs
-
A. A. Sobolev, Chief of the Political Section of the Soviet Military Administration in Germany
-
I. [M.] Z. Saburov, Assistant to the Chief of the Soviet Military Administration in Germany
-
A. [S.] A. Golunsky, Expert consultant of the Commissariat for Foreign Affairs
-
and also political, military, and technical assistants.]