On This Day In History : 4 February 1945

This day in 1945, 4 – 11 February: Yalta ‘Big Three’ Conference

‘Big Three’ at Yalta: Prime Minister Churchill; President Roosevelt; Premier Stalin.
Air Chief Marshal Portal is behind Churchill, talking to First Sea Lord, Admiral of the Fleet Sir Andrew Cunningham. Chief of the Imperial General Staff, General Sir Alan Brooke, is behind Cunningham. (National Archives INF 14/447)

The conference held in Yalta, Crimea, code-named ‘Argonaut’, opened on 4 February and was the second meeting between the leaders of the major Allied powers during the Second World War: United Kingdom; United States of America; and Soviet Union. And the last time Prime Minister Churchill, President Roosevelt and Premier Stalin would be together.

By this time, the end of the European war was in sight and the primary objective of Yalta was to plan for the final destruction of German military power and agreeing the immediate post-war world. But against Japan – despite the Allies overwhelming superiority – bitter fighting continued.

On the western European front, the Allies (Britain/Canada and United States) had recovered from the shock of the German Ardennes offensive (‘Battle of the Bulge’) but were still on the west banks of the Rhine – some 300 or more miles from Berlin. Whereas, on the eastern front, Soviet Armies had cleared virtually all of Poland and East Prussia and smashed into Germany on a 300-mile front. The Soviet tide swept over the River Oder into Silesia, surrounded Breslau, and reached within 35 miles of Berlin itself. Stalin taunted Marshals Ivan Koniev and Georgy Zhukov over whether Koniev’s First Ukrainian Front [Front = Soviet Army Group] or Zhukov’s First Belorussian Front would be the first to plant a Red Army flag on Berlin’s Brandenburg Gate.

In the Pacific, Japan’s position was dire: American submarines were imposing a crippling blockade on the vital oil and raw materials their war industries craved. And Boeing B29 Superfortress raids from the airfields in the Marianas were mounting. But still the Japanese fought on – literally suicidally – with Kamikaze attacks. Allied military planners envisaged an invasion of the Japanese main island, Honshu, in 1946 with the fighting potentially dragging on into 1947, with casualty counts on both sides in the millions.

The principal political outcome from the Yalta Conference was the reinforcement of the concept of European ‘spheres of influence’, first considered at their conference in Tehran in November 1943. Unconditional surrender was demanded of Germany, to be followed by division into zones occupied by four powers: Britain, America, Soviet Union and France. Likewise Berlin would be in four zones, despite being hundreds of miles inside the Soviet Zone, a Cold War flash-point for the next 44 years.

Poland’s borders were redrawn, transferring some territory in the east to Russia but gaining areas in the west from Germany. The Baltic states of Estonia, Lithuania and Latvia, together with Bessarabia [now Moldova and parts of Ukraine], were incorporated into the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics [USSR, CCCP in Russian].

The Soviets were to have ‘influence’ in eastern Europe through their respective national governments, permitting some non-Communists to be elected (but this part of the Agreement was ignored and by 1947, all those areas had exclusively Communist governments sympathetic to Moscow). Also the USSR was allowed massive reparations for the damage caused by the German invasion.

This division of Europe into two politically-opposed ideologies was a very major factor in the long Cold War which was to follow the end of the European war.

As for Japan, Stalin promised the Soviet Union would declare war on Japan three months after the end of the German war.

The reference in the published communiqué to ‘unconditional surrender’ dashed the fantasies of Hitler, Göring and other Nazi leaders of negotiating a separate peace with the Western Allies and then German forces fighting alongside them against the Soviets.

[AUTHOR’S NOTE: of necessity, the above commentary on the highly complex and contentious political elements of the Yalta Agreement has been shortened and simplified. The full text can be studied in the US Library of Congress, together with detailed minutes of every meeting – see Bibliography below.]

Air Chief Marshal Portal, Chief of Air Staff (IWM TR2)

Churchill was accompanied by the military Chiefs of Staff, with Air Marshal Sir Charles Portal, Chief of the Air Staff, leading the RAF team. This author has been unable to determine the exact size of the British delegation but a later analysis in The National Archives calculated it was not far short of 600, ranging from the then Foreign Secretary, Anthony Eden, Sir Alexander Cadogan, Under-Secretary of State, Foreign Office, through very senior officers – for example, Air Chief Marshal Sir Alfred Earle attended as part of the staff of the War Cabinet Office – to hundreds of more junior officers and other ranks on tasks such as coding, filing, cooks, security etc.

Many of the coders were WREN and WAAF officers. VVIPs and VIPs flew by Transport Command, usually stopping in Malta. Eden himself flew on York LV 633 Ascalon, leaving Northolt 29 January.

Log Book of Flight Lieutenant Oswald Morris piloting Foreign Secretary
and senior Foreign Office party (RAF Museum X004-4346-002)

Whereas a large contingent of lesser ranks went by sea on the SS Franconia, an impressed Cunard liner, which also served as a floating hotel at Sebastopol: only the most senior slept ashore in various villas which had been specially restored for the  occasion, following the devastation caused by the German occupation and subsequent Soviet liberation of the Crimea [at that time all Ukraine was an integral part of the USSR].

SS Franconia (above) with boarding pass for 1004391 AC 1 Finney below
(RAF Museum X004-1435-001)

Sadly, not all the journeys went without incident: on 1st February, 1945, Avro York MW 116, of No. 511 Squadron, en route for Yalta, came down off Lampedusa.(a small island between Malta and Sicily) owing to a navigational error. Eleven crew and passengers were killed, including four members of the War Office staff, four of the Foreign Office and one of Scotland Yard. (See Bibliography for complete list of casualties.)

Accident card for Avro York MW 116 (RAF Museum)

Personal recollections of those attending in any capacity give fascinating insights into  details of both work and social aspects: a luxury cruise liner serving dinners with wine; bright light of Malta where the war was by now far away in northern Italy. And poverty and desolation in Crimea. The BBC’s ‘World War 2 Peoples’ Stories’ series has two worthy of study (listed in Bibliography below).

Consolidated LB 30 serial AL 504 named ‘Commando’ with original B 24 style tail.
(USAAF via Smithsonian Museum, Washington DC.)

Churchill used mainly two aircraft for his personal transport during the Second World War: a Liberator named ‘Commando’ and an Avro York named ‘Ascalon’.

Churchill and Portal alighting from original ‘Commando’ of 24 Squadron RAF at Lyneham,
Wiltshire, on their return from the Casablanca Conference January 1943. (IWM CH 8550). 

The Liberator was a Consolidated LB 30 (the mark type allocated to RAF Liberator bombers, which were different in many details from the B24 bomber provided to the USAAF), RAF serial AL 504. Modifications were made for its VIP role, including a galley and bed for Churchill. It was later further modified by a fuselage extension and replacement of the standard twin-fin tail by a single fin of the type installed on the Privateer, the Consolidated PB4Y-2 variant of the B 24, as used by the US Navy.

Commando with Privateer-style single fin (IWM CH 14142)

The York was a passenger and freight derivative of the Lancaster, using the same wing and tail (with a third fin, as in the ill-fated Manchester) but with a large box-shaped fuselage; Churchill’s favourite York, named ‘Ascalon’, was serial LV 633.

Avro York ‘Ascalon’ arriving at RAF Algiers 5 June 1943 with Churchill and Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden. They were returning to UK from Washington via North Africa. (RAF Museum P018956).

Churchill is being met by General Eisenhower (Australian War Museum 4085306)

On more hazardous routes, Churchill’s aircraft was not alone. An example is his flight from Athens to RAF Aboukir (Alexandria, Egypt) after the conclusion of the Yalta  conference. This time, he used an RAF Transport Command Douglas C 54, with an escort of USAAF Lockheed P 38 Lightnings and an RAF Air Sea Rescue Warwick, complete with parachute-dropped lifeboat designed by the famous yachtsman, Uffa Fox.

RAF Aboukir magazine showing Churchill in the door of a C54

RAF Hassani from the watch-tower: the Lightnings in the foreground escorted Churchill and Roosevelt
through the Mediterranean en route to Yalta (RAF Museum PC73/62/41 signed by artist Julius Stafford-Baker)

Vickers Warwick carrying air-dropped lifeboat (RAF Museum P030)

Bomber crew exercising ASR procedures: transfer from aircraft dinghy
to lifeboat dropped by Warwick, circling overhead (RAF Museum P029399)

BIBLIOGRAPHY AND FURTHER READING

• Joint Statement: US Library of Congress, https://maint.loc.gov/law/help/us-treaties/bevans/m-ust000003-1005.pdf
• The Final Battle: Cornelius Ryan, William Collins 1966 (and subsequent reprints).
• Biennial Report of The Chief of Staff of the United States Army July 1, 1943. to the Secretary of War (Atlas of the World Battle Fronts in Semimonthly Phases to August 15 1945)
• BBC https://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ww2peopleswar/stories/14/a5658014.shtml
• BBC  https://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ww2peopleswar/stories/12/a4336012.shtml
• The Inner Circle, a view of war at the top. Joan Bright Astley. Multiple publishers
• Travels with Churchill: Graham Chandler Air and Space Magazine, Smithsonian Air Museum, Washington DC Museum, Washington DC. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/air-space-magazine/travels-with-churchill-136166507/
• National Archives
  FCO 12/260  Allied consultation and composition of delegations: practice of wartime leaders
  PREM 4/77/1B Argonaut (Yalta) conference – various
  WO 106/6016 “Jason”/”Fleece” Series of telegrams
  Loss of York MW 116 see https://ww2talk.com/index.php?threads/remembering-today-1-february-1945-avro-york-mw116.36813/