Back to the full dot-point answer
NSWModern HistoryQuick questions
Section IV (Change in the Modern World): The Cold War 1945-1991
Quick questions on Origins of the Cold War, Yalta and Potsdam 1945: HSC Modern History
6short Q&A pairs drawn directly from our worked dot-point answer. For full context and worked exam questions, read the parent dot-point page.
What is the wartime alliance?Show answer
The Grand Alliance was formed by necessity, not ideology. The Anglo-Soviet Treaty (26 May 1942) and the Declaration by United Nations (1 January 1942) bound the three powers to the defeat of the Axis. Roosevelt described the relationship as "the four policemen" who would keep the post-war peace. The alliance contained latent tensions from the start: Soviet resentment at the delayed Second Front (Anglo-American forces landed at Normandy on 6 June 1944, three years after Operation Barbarossa), Anglo-American suspicion of Soviet intentions in Eastern Europe, and ideological enmity dating to the 1917 revolution and the 1918 to 1920 Allied intervention in the Russian Civil War.
What is the Potsdam Conference, 17 July to 2 August 1945?Show answer
The Big Three met at the Cecilienhof Palace in Potsdam, outside ruined Berlin. Truman replaced Roosevelt; Attlee replaced Churchill on 28 July after Labour's election win. Stalin alone remained.
What is stalin's view, Truman's view?Show answer
Stalin's reading: the war had cost 27 million Soviet dead; "friendly governments" in Eastern Europe were a security necessity; the Anglo-American powers had delayed the Second Front for three years; the atomic bomb had not been shared.
What is q1?Show answer
Source A is the Yalta Declaration on Liberated Europe (11 February 1945) on "free and unfettered elections." Using Source A and your own knowledge, explain why Yalta failed to settle the future of Eastern Europe. [5 marks]
What is q2?Show answer
Evaluate the extent to which the wartime conferences of 1945 made the Cold War inevitable. [25 marks]
What is q3?Show answer
Compare the views of John Lewis Gaddis and Melvyn Leffler on the origins of the Cold War. [10 marks]
Have a question we have not covered?
This dot-point answer is short enough that we have not extracted many short questions yet. Read the full dot-point answer or ask Mo, our study assistant, in the chat for follow ups.