Austrian guards in concentration camps had not
behaved with any less bestiality in the SS than
their German counterparts, nor can a distinction
be drawn between Austrian and German mem-
bers of the Wehrmacht. Austria was allowed to
establish a central government but was occupied,
like Germany, and divided into four zones,
American, British, French and Soviet, with
Vienna under joint control.
The Potsdam Conference established a
Council of Foreign Ministers which, it was
expected, would normally meet in London. Its
main task was the preparation of peace treaties
with Italy, Romania, Bulgaria, Hungary and
Finland. A peace settlement with Germany was
also mentioned, but it seemed a distant prospect
in 1945 since it required the prior establishment
of a German government with the consent of the
Allies. Only those countries that were signatories
to the terms of surrender of each state would be
allowed to participate, with the exception of
France, which was admitted to discuss peace
terms with Italy. During the eighteen months of
its existence and after much acrimony, peace
treaties with all these states except Germany were
agreed. The Council, which still represented the
wartime alliance, came to grief over the German
question, and the Cold War began.
Potsdam marked the beginning of the end of
any hope that the wartime alliance would outlast
the defeat of Germany, Italy, Japan and the minor
Axis allies and, as Roosevelt had hoped, continue
to safeguard the peace. It had achieved victory
over the most powerful and barbaric threat ever
faced by Russia and the Western democracies in
modern times. The year 1945 marks a division in
world history. This side of it the West once more
perceived the Soviet Union as its most dangerous
enemy. But this division should not obscure what
lies on the other side, what the civilised world
owes to the sacrifices made by the Soviet Union,
by China, by Britain and by the US, the great
powers of their day which saw the struggle
through together.
No one expected that the Japanese would be
forced to surrender within three months of the
Allied victory in Europe. In fighting as savage as
any in the Second World War, the US navy, the
marines and the army, under the command of
Admiral Nimitz, had pushed the Japanese back
from one tropical island base to the next. By the
summer of 1943 the Japanese had been forced on
to the defensive. A year later the Americans were
closing in on Japan, capturing Saipan, Tinian and
Guam. Meanwhile a Japanese offensive from
Burma into India was halted by British and
Dominion troops. In October 1944 General
MacArthur began the attack on the Philippines.
There ensued the last great naval engagement of
the Second World War – the battle of Leyte Gulf.
The Japanese navy had planned a counterblow to
destroy MacArthur’s supply line and then his
army. With the defeat of the Japanese navy in
Leyte Gulf the US had won command of the sea
in Japan’s home waters.
In the central Pacific, Nimitz advanced from
Saipan to the island of Iwojima and then in the
fiercest fighting of the war, lasting from April to
June 1945, attacked and captured Okinawa, an
island in the Ryukyu group just 500 miles from
Japan. Japan’s cities were being systematically
reduced to rubble by the fires caused by constant
air attacks. In south-east Asia, Admiral Lord
Louis Mountbatten commanded the Allied forces
which between December 1944 and May 1945
recaptured Burma from the retreating Japanese.
But, skilfully as this campaign was conducted, it
was secondary in its impact on the war. The
Americans in the Pacific were thrusting at the
heart of the Japanese Empire.
In 1944 the Japanese military and naval leaders
knew the war could not be won. Yet even as late
as May 1945 they hoped that the evidence of
Japan’s fanatical defence at Okinawa and else-
where would deter the Allies from invading Japan
itself, where the Allies, for the first time, would
have to come to grips with large Japanese armies.
Rather than lose thousands of men, might not the
Allies be prepared to offer reasonable terms?
Those advisers of the emperor who were in
favour of an immediate peace were not strong
enough to assert themselves openly against the
military and naval leaderships. But war supplies,
especially oil, were rapidly running out and
Japan’s situation was deteriorating fast. By July
1
THE VICTORY OF THE ALLIES, 1941–5 303
