World War II threw Britain and the Soviet Union together as unlikely allies. This book examines British policy-makers' attitudes to cooperation with the USSR and shows how views of internal developments in the USSR and of Stalin himself influenced Churchill, the War Cabinet and the Foreign Office to believe that long-term collaboration was a desirable and achievable goal. In particular, it was assumed that a shared concern to prevent future German aggression would be a lasting bond. Such attitudes significantly shaped Britain's wartime policy towards the USSR, and for many individuals, including Churchill, played a more important role than their long-standing anti-Communist attitudes.

World War II threw Britain and the Soviet Union together as unlikely allies. This book examines British policy-makers' attitudes to cooperation with the USSR and shows how views of internal developments in the USSR and of Stalin himself influenced Churchill, the War Cabinet and the Foreign Office to believe that long-term collaboration was a desirable and achievable goal. In particular, it was assumed that a shared concern to prevent future German aggression would be a lasting bond.

This book draws on the latest archival releases – including those from the secret world of British intelligence – to offer the first comprehensive analysis of Anglo-Turkish relations during the Second World War, with a particular emphasis on Turkey's place in the changing relationship between Britain and the Soviet Union.

Throughout his presidency, Franklin Roosevelt was determined to pursue a peaceful accommodation with an increasingly powerful Soviet Union, an inclination reinforced by the onset of world war. Roosevelt knew that defeating the Axis powers would require major contributions by the Soviets and their Red Army, and so, despite his misgivings about Stalin's expansionist motives, he pushed for friendlier relations. Yet almost from the moment he was inaugurated, lower-level officials challenged FDR's ability to carry out this policy. Mary Glantz analyzes tensions shaping the policy stance of the United States toward the Soviet Union before, during, and immediately after World War II. Focusing on the conflicts between a president who sought close relations between the two nations and the diplomatic and military officers who opposed them, she shows how these career officers were able to resist and shape presidential policy-and how their critical views helped shape the parameters of the subsequent Cold War. Venturing into the largely uncharted waters of bureaucratic politics, Glantz examines overlooked aspects of wartime relations between Washington and Moscow to highlight the roles played by U.S. personnel in the U.S.S.R. in formulating and implementing policies governing the American-Soviet relationship. She takes readers into the American embassy in Moscow to show how individuals like Ambassadors Joseph Davies, Lawrence Steinhadt, and Averell Harriman and U.S. military attachs like Joseph Michela influenced policy, and reveals how private resistance sometimes turned into public dispute. She also presents new material on the controversial military attach/lend-lease director Phillip Faymonville, a largely neglected officer who understood the Soviet system and supported Roosevelt's policy. Deftly combining military with diplomatic history, Glantz traces these philosophical and policy battles to show how difficult it was for even a highly popular president like Roosevelt to overcome such entrenched and determined opposition. Although he reorganized federal offices and appointed ambassadors who shared his views, in the end he was unable to outlast his bureaucratic opponents or change their minds. With his death, anti-Soviet factions rushed into the policymaking vacuum to become the primary architects of Truman's Cold War "containment" policy. A case study in foreign relations, high-level policymaking, and civil-military relations, FDR and the Soviet Union enlarges our understanding of the ideologies and events that set the stage for the Cold War. It adds a new dimension to our understanding of Soviet-American relations as it sheds new light on the surprising power of those in low places.

A dramatic and timely account of Stalin’s failed invasion of Finland in 1939, and the decade of wars and fraught relations that followed In November 1939, Stalin directed his military leaders to launch an invasion of Finland. In what became known as the Winter War, the full might of the Soviet army was pitted against this small Nordic republic. Yet despite their vastly superior military strength, the Soviets suffered heavy losses and failed to mount Stalin’s intended full-scale invasion. How did Finland evade Stalin’s crosshairs—not once, but three times more? In this groundbreaking account, Kimmo Rentola traces the epochal shifts in Soviet-Finnish relations. From the Winter War to Finland’s exit from World War II in 1944, a possible Soviet-backed coup in 1948, and Moscow’s designation of Finland as an enemy state in 1950, Finland was forced to navigate Stalin’s outsize political and territorial demands. Rentola presents a dramatic reconstruction of Finland’s unlikely survival at a time when the nation’s very existence was at stake.

Framing China sheds new light on Western relations with and perceptions of China in the first half of the twentieth century. In this ground-breaking book, Ariane Knüsel examines how China was portrayed in political debates and the media in Britain, the USA and Switzerland between 1900 and 1950. By focusing on the political, economic, cultural and social context that led to the construction of the particular images of China in each country, the author demonstrates that national interests, anxieties and issues influenced the way China was framed and resulted in different portrayals of China in each country. The author’s meticulous analysis of a vast amount of newspaper and magazine articles, commentaries, editorials, cartoons and newsreels that have previously not been studied before also focuses on the transnational circulation of images of China. While previous publications have dealt with the occurrence of the Yellow Peril and Red Menace in particular countries, Framing China reveals that these images were interpreted differently in every nation because they both reflected and contributed to the discursive construction of nationhood in each country and were influenced by domestic issues, cultural values, pre-existing stereotypes, pressure groups and geopolitical aspirations.

War is often described as an extension of politics by violent means. With contributions from twenty-eight eminent historians, Volume 2 of The Cambridge History of the Second World War examines the relationship between ideology and politics in the war's origins, dynamics and consequences. Part I examines the ideologies of the combatants and shows how the war can be understood as a struggle of words, ideas and values with the rival powers expressing divergent claims to justice and controlling news from the front in order to sustain moral and influence international opinion. Part II looks at politics from the perspective of pre-war and wartime diplomacy as well as examining the way in which neutrals were treated and behaved. The volume concludes by assessing the impact of states, politics and ideology on the fate of individuals as occupied and liberated peoples, collaborators and resistors, and as British and French colonial subjects.