World War Two and the Partisan Struggle 141
and west. The British, for their part, could not forget Tito’s rude behavior on
the occasion of his escape from Vis, despite the favorable development of the
Moscow Conference. Their foreign minister, Anthony Eden, complained about
this treacherous flight to Molotov, who tried to calm him down: “Tito is a
peasant, who does not understand politics and loves secrecy. Therefore he does
not inform anybody about his plans.”^472
The day the Tolstoy Conference began in Moscow, Tito sent a dispatch to
Šubašić, inviting him to return home and form a common government. He
decided to do this after nearly two months of hesitation, when he was finally
sure of his position and knew that the Soviets would not approve of any further
deterioration of his relations with the West. As soon as the negotiation between
the two started, the question of the role the king should play in the formation
of the government arose, since according to the law he was the one to name
the prime minister. Tito, undoubtedly entitled to this office, was not prepared
to accept it from his hands. Finally Velebit suggested a solution: during his
residence abroad, Petar II would transmit his powers to a regency composed
of three dignitaries. After complex discussions, on 1 November 1944, Tito and
Šubašić signed a document that stated that the regents would be named by the
king, but with the approval of the AVNOJ. This solution, and a solemn decla-
ration that political pluralism would be respected in Yugoslavia, would give the
new government the international recognition that was urgently needed as the
end of the war was approaching. Once the agreement was reached, however, it
was necessary to get the assent of the king and the Allied powers. This was not
an easy task, considering that at the end of 1944 relations between Belgrade and
London were deteriorating by the day.^473 The Soviets were not satisfied either,
as they were concerned about the British reaction, since it was evident that the
Tito-Šubašić agreement was a further blow against the monarchy. In order to
soothe Churchill, they invited both Tito and Šubašić to Moscow at the end of
November, hoping to restore the balance of forces in favor of Petar II.^474 The
marshal was prudent enough to decline the invitation, sending Edvard Kardelj
in his place. Although the latter was compelled to hear insults and scorn from
the angry Boss, Tito did not renounce his proposal to transform Yugoslavia
into a “Bolshevik” state. At home, he felt strong. “At the end of the war,” he said
later, “we had enormous revolutionary support, the class enemies were com-
pletely impotent.... It was so because we had a strong revolutionary base, never
seen before in the whole world.”^475 This attitude was why he was not ready to
accept the Churchill-Stalin deal regarding their mutual influence in his coun-
try. When Stalin mentioned the fifty-fifty agreement to Kardelj and Šubašić,