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happened after the First World War. The French government then decided to participate in the conference as host country.

The Moscow Conference caused friction not only with the British and French but between Truman and Byrnes. Truman apparently believed Byrnes in December 1945 and become soft on the Soviets and resented that he had not kept him informed while in Moscow. He seems to have told Byrnes this in a meeting late in December on the yacht Williamsburg, and again at the White House on January 5, 1946, when he read from a handwritten letter addressed to Byrnes (but not given to him). The letter concluded: ''I'm tired of babying the Soviets."29

Deputies of the foreign ministers began work in London on January 18, 1946, and the several decisions accepted at the first conference of the council formed the basis of their deliberations, which strictly followed the 4-3-2 rule. They discussed primarily such issues as the fate of the Italian colonies, the Italo-Yugoslav frontier, the Trieste problem, and reparations. Soviet draft treaties for the Danubian countries were put forward in a session of the deputies in early March. The texts were shorter than the armistice agreements and contained sketchy economic and military clauses; territorial provisions were not included, with exception of restoration of northern Transylvania to Rumania. The United States delegation proposed that the council either make an investigation of the boundary problem or ask the Rumanian and Hungarian governments to take up the dispute. The Soviet delegation refused to discuss the matter.30

The Council of Foreign Ministers met again in Paris, for a second session--which itself was in two parts, the first on April 25-May 16 and the second on June 15-July 12, 1946. Molotovproposed at the outset that the four foreign ministers participate in all sessions, quietly eliminating the stumbling block he had created at the London session. France being the host country, Bidault chaired the opening meeting, and the French noticed with satisfaction Molotovs changed attitude. Except for this gesture, the Soviet delegation returned to wrangling on procedural matters. Time-consuming Soviet tactics exasperated the Western delegations, and on one occasion Bevin became so irritated when Molotovattacked Britain for past sins in international affairs that he

rose to his feet, his hands knotted into fists, and started toward Molotov saying, ''I've had enough of this, I ,ave,'' and for one glorious moment it looked as if the Foreign Minister of Great Britain and the Foreign Minister of the Soviet Union were about to come to blows. However' security people moved in. . . 31

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The United States proposed in February 1946 that the Austrian treaty be prepared along with other treaties, and Byrnes submitted a treaty draft to the council on April 26, entitled, ''For the Reestablishment of an Independent and Democratic Austria.,'32 Byrnes at last had realized that as long as Soviet troops were stationed in Austria, Danubian Europe would remain under Soviet occupation. Two days later a bilateral American-Soviet meeting took place, before and after a dinner given by Byrnes for Molotov in which they discussed the Austrian Treaty and a twenty-five-year quadripartite treaty on disarmament and demilitarization of Germany. Byrnes told the Russians that in December 1945 he had discussed the German treaty with Stalin who had expressed himself strongly in favor, but the Soviet government did not even acknowledge the draft treaty transmitted to the foreign ministry in Moscow. Despite Stalin's alleged approval, Molotovwas reluctant to discuss Austrian and German matters. He felt that the five peace treaties were more than enough for that session of the council. He argued that in Germany an immediate disarmament was the important task, although in principle he favored twenty-five-year treaties for demilitarization of Germany and Japan. Vyshinsky added that in Austria de-nazification had not progressed far enough to consider a final settlement with that country. In the council, Bidault and Bevin supported the American initiative concerning the Austrian and German treaties the debate continued through several sessions, and Molotoveventually agreed to discussion of Austrian questions, not the treaty, after completion of drafts of the five peace treaties. This meant a postponement until November. Byrnes argued politely with the Russians but did not pUt Up a fight, though he noted the anomaly of leaving Austria in a worse situation than the ex-enemy countries, particularly in view of the Moscow Declaration. Molotovindicated it might be necessary to leave troops in Austria for another year--that is, two years after the end of hostilities .33

The council examined thoroughly boundary disputes outside the Soviet zone, such as the controversy between Yugoslavia and Italy. Both governments argued their cases before the council four times. There were hearings on the Franco-Italian and Italo-Austrian boundaries, in addition to spot investigations of all three boundary disputes affecting Italy. Even Australia, New Zealand, and the Union of South Africa presented their views to the council concerning the Itato-Yugoslav boundary quarrel. While Italy was permitted to present its case orally before the council, similar requests by other ex-enemy states were turned down.

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Amidst controversies, during a short period of concessions, Byrnes wanted to give satisfaction to the Russians, and in the council on May 7 proposed the annulment of the Vienna Awardand restoration of the 1938 frontier between Hungary and Rumania.34 He had realized that the Russians were unwilling even to study boundary changes between these countries and decided to eliminated conflicts so as to expedite the convocation of the Paris Conference.

The deputies of the foreign ministers met again between May 16 and June 15, 1946, to prepare for resumption of meetings of the CFM, and eventually the council reached agreement upon a large number of treaty articles. The Soviet delegation insisted that the conference could not be convoked before agreement on all treaty clauses. The American delegation explained that the Potsdam and Moscow conferences had charged the council to prepare treaty drafts and submit them to a conference of Allied nations, but complete draft treaties were not required. As soon as agreement was reached on Italy's reparation deliveries to the Soviet Union, the Soviets agreed to set the opening date of the conference for July 29.35 This was another example of a procedural objection dropped when the Soviet Union received a concession. There remained twenty-six points upon which members of the council could not agree, which delayed the sending of invitations to the conference. The Soviet delegation opposed dispatching invitations until the council had accepted the Soviet draft of conference procedure. Byrnes explained repeatedly that the council could not impose rules of procedure on an assembly of sovereign states. Molotovinsisted that conference recommendations be made by two-thirds majority. Eventually a compromise was reached; draft rules of procedure, enclosed with the invitations, suggested decisions of the conference by a two-thirds majority vote.36 Byrnes emphasized that the suggested procedural rules did not represent a hard-and-fast agreement comparable to agreed treaty clauses--an essential distinction because the foreign ministers agreed to support at the conference the treaty clauses they accepted in the council. The Soviets were convinced that the only important task of the Conference of Paris was prompt approval of the council's agreements. After further argument on organizational questions, the council recommended a commission structure for the conference.

Delegations of twenty-one nations at long last assembled at the Luxembourg Palace onJuly 29, 1946, and as agreed by the foreign ministers of the Big Three at their Moscow meeting in December, 1945, the participating states were the United States, United Kingdom, Soviet Union, France, China, Australia, Belgium, the Byelorussian

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Soviet Socialist Republic, Brazil, Canada, Czechoslovakia, Ethiopia, Greece, India, the Netherlands, Norway, New Zealand, Poland, the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic, the Union of South Africa, and Yugoslavia. Separate representation of the Ukraine and Byelorussia was in accord with the Yalta arrangement whereby Britain and the United States promised to support a proposal to admit to original membership in the United Nations these two Soviet Socialist Republics.

Machinery of the conference consisted of a General Commission, a Legal and Drafting Commission, Military Commission, five Political and Territorial Commissions, and two Economic Commissions-- one for Italy, and the other for Finland and the three Danubian countries. The General Commission (which never met), the Military Commission, and the Legal and Drafting Commission were composed of representatives of the twenty-one nations participating in the conference. Five Political and Territorial Commissions had representatives from those nations actively at war with the enemy states concerned. In these commissions, Communist states and non-European countries prevailed. Members of the Hungarian Political and Territorial Commission were the United States, United Kingdom, the Soviet Union, France, the Byelorussian SSR, the Ukrainian SSR, Australia, Czechoslovakia, India, New Zealand, Canada, the Union of South Africa, and Yugoslavia.

The conference set up the usual Credentials Commission and elected a Commission on Procedure. Debates on procedure lasted over a week. The majority of delegates opposed the council's proposal that required a two-third majority for a recommendation and agreed on majority decision. Byrnes and Bevin supported the majority's desire to allow the conference to make recommendations to the council by two-thirds vote or by majority. After long argumentative sessions this motion was accepted by a 15-to-6 vote; the ''Slav bloc,, (Soviet Union, Byelorussia, Ukraine, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia) voted against it, and Molotovaccused Byrnes and Bevin of violating council agreements. Byrnes explained again that there was no obligatory agreement on procedural questions and announced that at the forthcoming meeting of the council the United States would support any recommendation accepted by two-thirds vote even if the American delegation voted against it at the conference. Subsequently the conference accepted fifty-three recommendations by two-thirds majority and forty-one by simple majority.

On Byrnes's proposal the press was admitted to all meetings of commissions and the plenary sessions, an unfortunate innovation in

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peacemaking as most speakers addressed their remarks to public opinion in their own country, and some sessions became unproductive examples of public diplomacy. In the United Nations, propaganda speeches are boring and ineffective but usually harmless rhetorical exercises, but the Paris Conference of 1946 had to discuss issues to be settled by treaty provisions.

The conference had a narrow focus, and it was almost out of context if a delegate brought up constructive ideas. Herbert V. Evatt of Australia introduced several amendments to bring the treaties more in line with concepts of peace and justice. Among them was the establishment of a European Court of Human Rights that could have given realistic meaning to treaty clauses on human rights and fundamental freedoms. The proposed court could have extended protection to minorities under alien rule. Evatt proposed commissions to study rerritorial disputes and convocation of a conference within five years to consider revision of the peace treaties. Such proposals were in harmony with American thinking, but the United States delegation voted against them because of a council agreement. Molotovaccused the Americans and British of being behind amendments he did not like, apparently believing that the United States controlled small states in the same fashion as he controlled the ''Slav Bloc.,, Reasoned discourse between the two blocs seldom was possible. Quiet diplomacy facilitates compromises, but was rarely used in Paris. Propaganda speeches at open meetings had the opposite effect; once a public stand is taken, it is difficult for governments to make concessions. Open meetings widened the gulf between East and West. Mansist oratory did not serve the cause of understanding, and it became clear that Moscow's goals were incompatible with those of the Western Allies. World opinion was excited by propaganda speeches that took little account of the substance of issues and application of principles accepted by the Allies during the war.

Negotiation at the council and the Conference of Paris was part of a worldwide struggle that could not be divorced from the political ambitions and events dominating the world scene. A Communist objective was to increase tension because it was easier to obtain concessions in an atmosphere of uncertainty and surprises, tactics included obscuring issues by emphasis on procedural questions and irrelevancies. The Soviet idea about peacemaking was simple: Moscow wanted to transform the armistice agreements into peace treaties. Molotovmade clear that he considered the armistice agreements as final settlements and proposed that the peace treaties confirm them. As noted,

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the Soviet government would have preferred a peace settlement exclusively by the Big Three.

Although the Paris Conference did not discuss German affairs, an unusual incident concerning Germany almost caused Byrnes's resignation. During the summer the controlled press in the Soviet zone misrepresented American views on Germany, referring to the so-called Morgenthau Plan that would have turned Germany into agricultural land' and Communists spread rumors in Berlin that the United States had decided to withdraw from Europe. To make clear American policy' Byrnes delivered an address in Stuttgart on September 6 in which he said that ''Germany is part of Europe, and European recovery . . . will be slow if Germany with her great resources of iron and coal is turned into a poor house.'' He expressed hope for an economically united and democratic Germany and assured his audience that American forces would remain in Germany for a long time. The United States, he said, wanted to return the government of Germany to its people and ''help them win their way back to an honorable place among the free and peace-loving nations of the world.,'37 The speech had wide repercussions. On September 12, Secretary of Commerce Henry A. Wallace delivered an address in New York in which he denounced Byrnes's ''Get tough with Russia policy." The speech caused consternation and had a bombshell effect at the Paris Conference because it was unprecedented that the policy of a foreign secretary negotiating abroad was publicly attacked by a member of the cabinet. Byrnes asked the president to accept his resignation, but Truman asked for and received Wallace's resignation.38

The non-cooperative Soviet attitude stirred crises and blocked serious negotiation. A member of the American delegation, Philip E. Mosely, remarked retrospectively that in negotiation of this kind the most reluctant government determines the maximum rate of progress.39 In this bewildering atmosphere even minor Soviet concessions brought relief. Fundamental problems were avoided, and participants limited the issues and range of discussion. Most delegations were in a hurry to attend the General Assembly of the United Nations in New York, postponed from September 23 to October 23. The CFM decided that the closing session of the conference should be on October 15. Byrnes and Molotovin a private meeting on October 3 agreed on a simplified procedure for the forthcoming plenary sessions and Byrnes inquired what Molotovthought would be done if despite all efforts the conference had not voted on all questions before it by October 15." Molotovsaid the work ''must be finished

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by that day." Byrnes raised the possibility that the work would not be finished. He recognized that Molotovwanted to return to Moscow before coming to New York but felt that ''if absolutely necessary the conference should stay in session a few days more in order to complete its work.,' Molotovrepeated that ''they should make sure that the conference complete its work by the fifteenth.''40 That is what happened.

A British observer of the Paris Conference of 1919 and veteran member of his country's foreign service, Harold Nicolson was present throughout the Paris Conference of 1946. He had devoted his life to the study and practice of diplomacy and characterized the pace of negotiations as follows:

It is the way of every conference to begin like a tortoise and to end like a greyhound. But no conference that I have ever attended showed a greater disparity of progress between the commencement and the finish. During the first six weeks the Conference dragged itself along painfully at the rate of an inch an hour; during the last four weeks there was a breathless scramble to conclude. In frantic haste the delegates rattled off their final speeches, the concluding votes were registered in an indecent rush, and so anxious were the statesmen not to miss the Queen Elizabeth that there was no time at the end for the customary courtesies and farewells.41

The final text of the five peace treaties was drawn by the third session of the CFM in New York on November 4-December 12, 1946. At the outset, Molotovs cordial and cooperative attitude seemed to show he was satisfied. Then for weeks he repeated Soviet proposals he had offered at previous meetings, disregarding recommendations of the Paris Conference. During the fourth week of the exasperating New York session, in a private meeting, he asked Byrnes what could be done to make progress, and Byrnes replied that since Molotovhad rejected practically all recommendations of the Paris Conference, he saw no hope to agree upon the treaties and nothing remained but to admit failure and disband. Molotovin bewilderment said Byrnes was unduly pessimistic and asked him not to take hasty action and observe developments at the next meeting. Because Moscow had much to gain by concluding the treaties, Molotovthen reversed his policy and at subsequent meetings ''handed out concessions like cards from a deck."42 The council approved forty-seven of the fifty-three recommendations adopted by two-thirds majority at the Paris Conference and twenty-four of forty-one adopted by a simple majority.43

Here was another demonstration that Molotovunder pressure reversed inflexible policies, and the sudden volte-face raised the question

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of lost opportunities because of lack of Western assertiveness. If Byrnes had taken a firm attitude earlier, say at the Potsdam Conference, concerning primacy of a state treaty with a liberated country, Austria, peacemaking could have taken a more constructive turn for the Danubian nations, even within the narrow Potsdam scheme.

The peace treaties signed on February 10, 1947, implicitly gave the stamp of legality to the Soviet position established in Eastern Europe at the close of hostilities. The gradual seizure of power by the Communists in Hungary in 1947, incorporation of Czechoslovakia into the Soviet sphere in February 1948, and exclusion of the Western powers from the Danube by the Russian-dictated Danubian convention signed at the Belgrade Conference in the same year--all these were logical consequences of a determined Soviet policy. As Stalin explained it to Milovan Djilas in April 1945; ''This war is not as in the past; whoever occupies a territory also imposes on it his own social system. Everyone imposes his own system as far as his army can reach. It cannot be otherwise."44

In postwar planning it probably was a major mistake to conclude peace treaties with the five less important ex-enemy states before concluding a treaty with Austria and reaching at least a policy agreement on Germany.45 The German question was by far the most difficult issue between the Western democracies and Russia, but according to conventional wisdom, an agreement on its solution should have created better conditions to tackle less difficult problems. The assumption that conclusion of peace with the lesser enemy states would help the settlement of the German question was an illusion because it disregarded the nature and purpose of Soviet foreign policy.

One of the consequences of the Potsdam schedule of peacemaking was postponement of the major peace conference ad Graecas Calendas, and this meant shelving if not burying a basic policy assumption of the Roosevelt administration. Peace preparations in the State Department had assumed that a major conference would follow hostilities. This plan was abandoned and replaced by a piecemeal approach at Potsdam, and this change was favorable for Soviet designs. Little give-and-take was possible because four out of five ex-enemy states were in the Soviet sphere. The CFM decided that Italian sovereignty should be restored at the conclusion of peace and consequently foreign troops should be withdrawn. Molotov in turn, reluctantly agreed to withdraw troops from Bulgaria. A better arrangement would have been a linkage between the Italian peace treaty and an Austrian state treaty and simultaneous withdrawal of foreign troops from both countries.

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The Moscow Declaration of 1943 had recognized that Austria was an occupied country to be liberated, and a treaty with Vienna should have brought simultaneous evacuation of foreign troops from Danubian Europe.

If Moscow would not have accepted a reasonable order of peacemaking, the Western powers could have concluded a separate peace with Italy, as they did with Japan in 1951 , and the British and American sections of the ACC would have remained in the Danubian ex-enemy countries. In this way the West could have preserved a bargaining chip lost by conclusion of peace treaties. In the framework created by the Potsdam and Moscow Conferences in 1945, the Western powers were primarily interested in consolidation of Italy's international position. Nominal sovereignty was of little value for states in the Soviet orbit. Independence of Hungary and Rumania remained fictitious because the peace treaties authorized the Soviet Union to keep unlimited forces in those countries for maintenance of lines of communication with the Soviet army in Austria.46 In early September 1946, Ambassador Walter Bedel Smith assured Prime Minister Ferenc Nagy that withdrawal of occupation forces was the ''foremost objective" of the United States. Although Secretary Byrnes emphasized this policy goal even in private sessions of the American delegation, he did not take a stand to achieve this objective. Western acceptance of the Soviet timetable and priorities in peacemaking helped consolidate Soviet power in East Central Europe.

During the period between the Yalta Conference and the Japanese surrender, the United States was the strongest world power, but at the time of the Paris Conference of 1946 the demobilized Western nations had only weak occupation forces in Europe, and more importantly, lacked political will to make a meaningful European settlement. They wanted to finish an unpleasant business in Paris. Even in this mood and with restrictions of the Potsdam and Moscow agreements, Western peacemaking was less than satisfactory. Despite Soviet occupation of the Danubian area and presence of a strong Soviet army in Central Europe, it was frustrating to witness the overcautious attitude of Western delegates. Wartime concessions to Moscow were understandable. But at the peace table only determined resistance to unjustified Soviet demands could have a result. There were exceptional delegates like Evatt of Australia, but their proposals were like voices in the wilderness. The approach of the Western Great Powers was similar at best to the old Austrian policy of weiterwursteln-- muddling through.

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The monotonous repetition of Communist views throughout the negotiations in the council and at the Paris Conference was far different from the Atlantic Charter and the Declaration on Liberated Europe, documents endorsed by the USSR. Elevation of public discussion to a higher level might not have impressed Molotov but it would have provided appealing and uniting ideas and swayed public opinion of countries participating in peacemaking. Separate handling of issues coupled with separate votes in committees and plenary sessions of the Paris Conference, without reference to overriding principles proclaimed in the war years, offered a chance for a field day for Molotov Time and again he merely repeated slogans, while bickering about procedure exhausted Western representatives; they were relieved by any small Soviet concession. Negotiation about freedom of navigation on the Danube is a case point. At dozens of meetings the CFM discussed Danube River problems, and eventually Molotovs stubbornness prevailed. Western delegates withdrew elaborate proposals, and Molotovrejected the article on the Danube adopted by the Paris Conference. At the New York session, the CFM accepted a general declaration on freedom of navigation on the Danube without provision for enforcement or reference to the 1921 Danubian Convention. The council agreed on a special Danubian conference of representatives of riparian states and the four council members. The apparent nonchalance of Western diplomacy prepared the way for a Soviet-dictated Danubian treaty at the Belgrade Conference in 1948, a treaty that practically abolished the international regime of the Danube first established by the Treaty of Paris, nearly a century before, in 1856.

Wartime agreements and especially the Yalta Declaration on Liberated Europe were made in the hope that the Soviet Union would keep its promises. Philip Mosely, a member of the American delegation at wartime and postwar conferences, noted:

By the end of 1946, against unyielding Soviet insistence on transforming East Central Europe into a closed preserve, the American government had a heap of broken Soviet promises to point to as a reminder that hope divorced from power is not a policy.47

It is clear that the weak negotiating position of the Western Allies was one of the consequences of wartime strategy and policy. The ex-enemy states could not influence the course of events; they were at the receiving end of the system of peacemaking established at the Potsdam and Moscow conferences.

Notes

STEPHEN D. KERTESZ - Between Russia and the West