OK, so Stalin lied. FDR was naive. Churchill was fuming. So what?
Really, what could have been done to prevent or alter what wound up happening? In all of the wrangling and handwringing over FDR having “given away Poland,” I always ask how, after June 22, 1941, it could have been prevented. I have come to the conclusion that it could not. It’s settled by asking one simple question: Tell me the date when the United States Army left Poland and turned it over to the Red Army? Simple; it never happened.
All you have to do is look at the maps that have been posted in the New York Times every day for the past several months. The geopolitical reality is that in order to defeat Nazi Germany, the Red Army WILL occupy Poland. We cannot get there before they do. And as the Poles well knew in 1939, once the Red Army is there, it’s not leaving. The only way to get the Red Army out of Poland in 1945 is by forcible ejection through war with the USSR. And there is no way you will get the American or British public to support it. And what applied to Poland applied to all of Eastern Europe.
This outcome was decided when Churchill decided to support Stalin on June 22, 1941. It was confirmed by adoption of a strategy to defeat Nazi Germany with the combintation of British technology, American industry, and Russian blood. The only other alternative was to back Hitler against Stalin, or stay neutral, and in that event, Auschwitz and Treblinka become ongoing business operations. Not much choice in those outcomes, but those are the only two outcomes that were possible.
We didn’t give Poland away because we never possessed it to begin with.
This reality is also why Churchill so persistently argued for a Balkan front, to try to get to some East European countries before the Russians. I have reluctantly concluded, however, that could only be done by cancelling Overlord, which Churchill was apparently prepared to do, but I certainly wouldn't, and neither would Roosevelt and Marshall. It also would have been much more difficult to fight through the mountainous Balkan peninsula to get at Austria and Hungary, presumably the prizes he wanted in addition to Greece and Yugoslavia. But then we would have had to fight through the Alps to get to Germany.
Indeed, Churchill really hadn't thought the problem through. The reason for American and British influence in post-war Europe is because we overran France and the Benelux countries and got to most of Germany first. A Germany entirely occupied by Russia and leading to a Communist state would have presented enormous challenges to us. It would have been much more dangerous than the Warsaw Pact.
I think you missed my point on your way to make your own.
I was not hand wringing over Poland, (you brought that up) merely pointing out that Socialists always lie so judge them by their actions not their words.
There was no political will to liberate Poland, Prussia, Latvia, Estonia, or Lithuania. So wether we could or not is moot.
I misspoke about Poland. Churchill never accepted a Communist Poland. What he eventually accepted was Stalin was never going to give back his slice of Poland, which therefore needed more land to be a viable state between Germany and Russia. Thus, Oder-Neisse.