Eight Days at Yalta

by Diana Preston

Meticulously researched and vividly written, Eight Days at Yalta is a remarkable work of intense historical drama.

In the last winter of the Second World War, Winston Churchill, Franklin D. Roosevelt and Joseph Stalin arrived in the Crimean resort of Yalta. Over eight days of bargaining, bombast and intermittent bonhomie they decided on the conduct of the final stages of the war against Germany, on how a defeated and occupied Germany should be governed, on the constitution of the nascent United Nations and on spheres of influence in Eastern Europe, the Balkans and Greece.

Only three months later, less than a week after the German surrender, Roosevelt was dead and Churchill was writing to the new President, Harry S. Truman, of ‘an iron curtain’ that was now ‘drawn down upon [the Soviets’] front’.

Diana Preston chronicles eight days that created the post-war world, revealing Roosevelt’s determination to bring about the dissolution of the British Empire and Churchill’s conviction that he and the dying President would run rings round the Soviet premier. But Stalin monitored everything they said and made only paper concessions, while his territorial ambitions would soon result in the imposition of Communism throughout Eastern Europe.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, World War II, Politics, War, Russia, European History

368 pages, Paperback

First published February 4, 2020

About the author

Born and raised in London, Diana Preston studied Modern History at Oxford University, where she first became involved in journalism. After earning her degree, she became a freelance writer of feature and travel articles for national UK newspapers and magazines and has subsequently reviewed books for a number of publications, including The Wall Street Journal and The Los Angeles Times. She has also been a broadcaster for the BBC and the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, and has been featured in various television documentaries.

Eight years ago, her decision to write "popular" history led her to The Road to Culloden Moor: Bonnie Prince Charlie and the '45 Rebellion (Constable UK, 1995). It was followed by A First Rate Tragedy: Robert Falcon Scott and the Race to the South Pole (Houghton Mifflin, 1998), The Boxer Rebellion (Walker & Company, 2000), Lusitania: An Epic Tragedy (Walker & Company, 2002) and now, Before The Fallout: From Marie Curie to Hiroshima.

In choosing her topics, Preston looks for stories and events which are both compelling in their own right and also help readers gain a wider understanding of the past. She is fascinated by the human experience-what motivates people to think and act as they do‹and the individual stories that comprise the larger historical picture. Preston spent over two years researching Lusitania: An Epic Tragedy. She did a remarkable amount of original research for the book, and is the first author to make full use of the German archives and newly discovered papers that illuminate both the human tragedy and subsequent plots to cover up what really happened. Preston traveled to all the key locations of the tragedy, experiencing firsthand how cold the water off the Irish coast near Cobh would have been in early May when the Lusitania sank, and how eerie it was to stand inside what remains of the U-20 (now at the Strandingsmuseum in West Jutland, Denmark) where the U-boat captain watched the Lusitania through his periscope and gave the order to fire. Of the many artifacts she reviewed, it was her extensive reading of the diaries and memoirs of survivors that had the biggest impact on her. The experience of looking at photographs and touching the scraps of clothing of both survivors and those who died when the Lusitania sank provided her with chilling pictures: The heartbreaking image of a young girl whose sister's hand slipped away from her was one that kept Preston up at night.

When not writing, Preston is an avid traveler with her husband, Michael. Together, they have sojourned throughout India, Asia, Africa, and Antarctica, and have climbed Mount Kinabalu in Borneo, Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania, and Mount Roraima in Venezuela. Their adventures have also included gorilla-tracking in Zaire and camping their way across the Namibian desert.


Diana and Michael Preston live in London, England.

Reviews

[Mary · Rating 3 out of 5]

For a history nerd like me, I found this to be so readable. It paints a picture of the main players, the venue, the issues. I know it's already on paper but in this I found so much more colour.
The future for the modern world is decided upon by three men: riveting stuff.

[Daniel · Rating 5 out of 5]

Engrossing, with great pacing and characterization.

[Faith · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a very readable, clear description of the pivotal meeting of Churchill, Roosevelt and Stalin at Yalta in February, 1945. Occasionally, it was a little gossipy. The first chapter sets the scene with a description of these leaders - their personalities, characters, habits, appearance and health (particularly relevant for Roosevelt who was dying). These three men plotted how to proceed with the war and how to deal with a post-war Germany. They also sparred over what was to become of Russian- occupied territory. Basically, at the end of their meetings they had set the course for huge chunks of the world for generations. Fortunately, a lot of people seem to have been taking notes during these negotiations because this book really felt like the reader was in “the room where it happened”. Amazingly, the subject of the bomb developed by America never came up in the negotiations. The book also covers the subsequent negotiations when Truman had become president.

I received a free copy of this book from the publisher.

[Adam · Rating 3 out of 5]

DNF. Too dense and boring. Really wanted to keep going, but I couldn't care less about what food they ate, get down to business damn it!

[David · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great new readable popular history by an Oxford academic who has apparently been producing readable popular history of various eras for many years, if the reviews of her other books are any indication.

I buzzed through the entire book in a couple of days and felt that reading it was diverting, informative, and entertaining from beginning to end.

The writer doesn’t seem to have any particular historical ax to grind -- she just wants to tell you what happened at Yalta, which was, like second marriages, the triumph of hope over experience.

This book may cause some dyspeptic reviews here and elsewhere, esp. by those who feel that Churchill and Roosevelt haven't been flogged sufficiently for failing to prevent Soviet domination of Eastern Europe.

This is not to say that C. and R. are found to be entirely blameless, for example:

His [Roosevelt's] remark again illustrated the common, entirely erroneous but persistent naive belief in the UK, and more particularly in the US administration, that Stalin was trustworthy but had to contend with powerful more extreme rivals within the Kremlin who were responsible for Soviet breaches of trust (Kindle location 4017).

but there isn’t a lot of wailing and gnashing of teeth about how all unjust and tragic it all was, which was very. When the author tells you that Polish partisans who had successfully sabotaged the Nazis for years were picked up by the Red Army at the end of the war and executed, she trusts that you will be able to gauge the size of the injustice for yourself.

Occasionally the focus shifts briefly from the prolonged speechifying and vodka-swilling of the Yalta conference to give glimpses of what other people, usually caught up in the fighting and chaos in Europe, were going through at the moment, which was a technique that I thought worked well. One tiny criticism: early on in the book (location 791), the author briefly chronicles the many failed marriages of the Churchill and Roosevelt offspring, which seems not really relevant to the matter at hand and could have been omitted.

Thanks to those nice people at Netgalley and Picador for a free advance egalley copy of this book for review.

[Henri · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a very readable and accurate work of history.

Having had to research Yalta45 for my MA i am thoroughly impressed with this book. When i saw it in bookshops i was ecstatic because this subject is of great interest to myself but also worried that it might not turn out great or it will be fantastic but put my understanding of the conference to shame. It is fantastic to finally see the conference get some popular historical interest as i haven't seen much popular writing on the subject even though the conference has changed so much and is invoked in works of history, politics and journalism over and over.

I am happy to report that Preston has thoroughly examined the conference day by day, meeting by meeting. She has not omitted anything important and everything that needs to be in this book is here. Interestingly i find that there seems to be little ideological direction from Preston throughout the book and that is definitely a positive. Plenty of historians often view Yalta subjectively and whilst it was lovely to see an opinionated epilogue of only a handful of pages it was even more pleasant to acknowledge that it was only that - a handful of pages whilst the rest of of the book was faily objective. This is definitely the strongest suit of the book - it's the ideal primer on everything that Yalta was - no less no more, you hear what happened and when. Perhaps the only slight negative was that i wanted to read more of the actual minutes interspersed with the narrative but i do appreciate that this would probably triple the book in size.

Highly recommend this to you folks. If you are interested in the subject of the conference another superb book on Yalta would be Yalta by Serhii Plokhy. If you would like to read more on the cooperation of the big three before and after Yalta45 i would say find a copy of The Big Three by Robin Edmonds. It is getting on a bit (published 1991) but is nonetheless a great primer.

Happy Reading!

[Ionia · Rating 5 out of 5]

First of all, what a great cover--It truly does represent the tense situations described in this book well.

Secondly, the book is just as great, especially if you are someone who is interested in WWII history and these important historical figures. The author did a tremendous job of researching and writing this illuminating book. It is not dry or boring as so many historical non-fiction works can be. I stayed up late two nights in a row reading this book because I found it so fascinating that I didn't want to put it down.

From reading this, you get more than a brief glimpse into the world of the main players and decision-makers. You almost feel, upon finishing this book, that you have come to know these people privately. I actually forgot for a while that these events transpired many years before. The author was so good at including her readers in the story, that I felt like I was right there with the group, struggling to get my point of view in there somewhere. (I couldn't quite pull off the Stalin moustache though, sadly.)

This is an excellent book that elaborates on many basic facts that have been proferred by other researchers and authors. Definitely worth the time to read.

This review is based on a complimentary copy from the publisher, provided through Netgalley, all opinions are my own.

[Karyn · Rating 4 out of 5]

The big three at Yalta.

“Whoever occupies a territory also imposes on it his own social system.”
~ Stalin, April 1945

“The problems of victory are more agreeable than those of defeat, but they are no less difficult.”
~ Churchill

“I didn’t say the result was good. I said it was the best I could do.”
~ Roosevelt

[Vlad_Mixich · Rating 1 out of 5]

În primul rând, oribilă traducerea. Atât de proastă că m-am uitat la numele traducătorului, ca ce să descopăr: traducere printr-un soft. Editura RAO m-a pierdut cu ocazia asta de client; ce nesimțire. Dincolo de traducere, Preston se pierde în tot felul de detalii inutile biografice și de decor care devin obositoare. Dacă ar fi de can-can, măcar ar face lectura amuzantă, dar nici măcar - la ce bun să descrii pe pagini întregi un drum plicticos cu mașina și o oprire la un ceai pe care Churchill a făcut-o, dar Roosevelt nu? Sau repetarea detaliului că generalii erau nevoiți dimineața să stea la coadă la toaletă - ok, poate fi un detaliu simpatic, dar e suficient să-l repeți o singură dată, nu să insiști o pagină cu el. Trebuie să ajungi la jumătatea cărții ca "să înceapă" în sfârșit conferința. Apoi Stalin pare un personaj de-a dreptul simpatic, Preston furnizează contextul istoric corect al personajului, dar insistența pe detalii îl transformă într-un tip aproape admirabil. Probabil o eroare de stil a dus în acest derapaj; sau (mai probabil) traducerea oribilă. Deci o dezamăgire cartea, abia am terminat-o. Poate dacă aș fi citit-o în original, mi-ar fi plăcut mai mult, dar nu cred că e mai mult de o carte ok.

[Preetam Chatterjee · Rating 5 out of 5]

Book: Eight Days at Yalta: How Churchill, Roosevelt, and Stalin Shaped the Post-War World
Author: Diana Preston
Publisher: ‎ Picador (16 October 2020); Pan Macmillan UK
Language: ‎ English
Paperback: ‎ 368 pages
Item Weight: ‎ 320 g
Dimensions: ‎ 13 x 2.9 x 19.6 cm
Importer: ‎ Pan Macmillan India
Price: 504/-

On the sunset of February 3, 1945, under cover of night, a fleet of Packards brought the two most authoritative leaders of the democratic world, Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill, to their target — a group of villas previously owned by the Russian tsar and high-flying aristocrats near the Black Sea resort of Yalta.

They called themselves the Argonauts, an allusion to the ancient warriors who had traveled to the Black Sea coast to recover the Golden Fleece from a dragon who never slept.

Their trophy was a resolution to the war that had engulfed the world; their dragon was their host, Joseph Stalin, once a promising Georgian poet and now a coldblooded dictator.

“Churchill, seventy in the previous November, was the oldest; Stalin, born in December 1878, was sixty-six; and Roosevelt, the youngest, would be sixty-three on 30 January 1945 as he journeyed to the conference……

The stresses and sprains of office and of the war had taken their toll on all three.

None was in predominantly good health, with that of Roosevelt being noticeably the poorest.

A stretch of polio in August 1921 had paralysed him from the waist down – a paralysis which he refused to believe was enduring and tried frequent therapies to assuage. Even in January 1945 he had a new masseur and healer, ex-prize fighter Harry Setaro, who told him ‘Mr President, you’re going to walk….”

Stalin suffered from constant psoriasis, tonsillitis, rheumatism and foot problems, among which was that two toes on his left foot were fused together.

His face was marked by boyhood smallpox. Following an infection his left arm hung stiff, adequately so for him to be declared out of shape for military service in the First World War.

In spring 1944 his aides had found him comatose at his desk from an unidentified cause. Although almost positively the fittest of the three, he had developed a hypochondriac’s sensitivity to any small health problem, almost certainly heightened by fears of poison and increasing paranoia in general.

Churchill was so overweight that in 1942 he had to have a new desk installed in his Cabinet war rooms beneath London’s Whitehall because he could not fit behind the previous one. All through his life he had been subject to melancholy which he likened to having ‘a black dog on one’s back’.

Churchill regularly took barbiturate sleeping pills. He had suffered a heart attack when visiting President Roosevelt over Christmas and New Year 1941/2 and had had several bouts of pneumonia.

Together the three men conducted the most enigmatic peace conference of the modern era.

They moved armies of millions and dispensed victors’ justice as they saw fit, deciding the fate of nations and sending millions of refugees east and west because they believed it would promote a lasting peace.

They created an institution to guard that peace and the interests of the victors. They left Yalta content but concerned.

Behind them lay thirty years ravaged by two world wars that had cost tens of millions of human lives. Before them was the indecision of the postwar world.

The contest of geopolitical aspirations, the clash of egos and value systems, and the jockeying for power among the most perceptive negotiators their nations could produce all played out in eight days at Yalta in February 1945.

The three leaders wondered about one another’s honesty and willingness to cooperate.

Would the alumni of the best private schools of Britain and America reach an understanding with the son of a Georgian shoemaker who had dropped out of an Orthodox seminary?

Would the two democratically elected leaders know how to handle the godfather of the Gulag?

The conference confronted its participants with never-ending moral dilemmas.

It was an emotional roller coaster that involved not only the leaders of the Grand Alliance but also their various subordinates, who fought for their countries’ interests and for the favor of their masters.

Long days and long nights ………………

Feelings of disappointment and regret dominated on both sides of the Cold War divide.

Yalta became a representation of mislaid chance, however differently perceived.

In the West, it came to be regarded as a milestone on the road to the “lost peace,” to cite a 1950s headline in Time magazine.

In the mainstream discourse of the McCarthy era, the word “Yalta” became a synonym for betrayal of freedom and the appeasement of world communism.

Who was accountable? Who was to be blamed?

That became a central question with the onset of the Cold War in the late 1940s, when the two sides blamed each other.

There were also heated domestic debates.

In the United States the decisions taken at Yalta divided Republicans and Democrats. President Roosevelt and his advisers were accused not only of selling out Eastern Europe and China to Stalin but also of promoting communism at home.

The highly publicized trial of Alger Hiss, a member of the U.S. delegation at Yalta who was accused of spying for the USSR, raised the temperature of the debate.

Interviewed after his retirement for a book about his life, General George C. Marshall declined to make any substantive mention about his role at Yalta, definite that whatever he said would be turned against him.

Why would you read this book way in 2021? Well for the following reasons –

1) Controversy continues to this day, as to whether the price the Western leaders paid for the ‘golden fleece’ that was peace was too great, whether the constancy of Western Europe was bought at the cost of the loss of freedom in the East and whether the terms Stalin won for his agreement to enter the war against Japan were too generous, providing Soviet Communism with a grip in East Asia, and on the Korean Peninsula specially.

2) Many have thought so and have dated the beginning of the Cold War from Yalta. In 2005, President George W. Bush, speaking in Latvia, compared the Yalta agreements to the 1938 Munich Agreement and the Nazi Germany–Soviet pact of a year later and suggested Yalta had left Europe ‘divided and unstable’.

3) Thereby it ‘had been one of the greatest wrongs of history. . . Once again, when prevailing governments negotiated, the freedom of small nations was somehow dispensable.’

4) Even today, public debate continues to revolve around the 1950s-era questions of who sold out Eastern Europe and whether it was in America’s interest to persuade the USSR to join the war on Japan—a fact attested by the reaction of American foreign-policy pundits to a statement made in May 2005 by President George W. Bush, who compared the Yalta agreements to the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact of 1939.

Public debate on the Yalta Conference has so far failed to take account of two major developments: the end of the Cold War and access to formerly unavailable Soviet documents. It has also largely ignored the progress made by professional historians of the Second World War and the Cold War in the last two decades.

This book provides you with all the essential insights and answers many of the hitherto unsettled riddles of the Second World War.

[Nancy Kennedy · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'm not a WWII buff at all, but I do like to read nonfiction that is character based. This story about the Yalta conference is spun around the three major characters, Churchill, Roosevelt and Stalin. The author gives sufficient background of these world leaders that you get a sense of them as persons before they're even adults, leaders or conference attendees.

At the conference, the author provides the kind of details that bring the event to life -- shared bathrooms and bedbugs! We learn of the support people that greased the wheels of the conference -- the interpreters, the secretaries, the government officials and advisors, the relatives -- and hear the leaders' own words in their letters home to their wives and friends. I think my favorite section was the one describing how the meeting ended, with the swift breaking down of the three palaces in which the delegations were housed and the departure of the "Big Three."

The author continues the story into the aftermath of the conference, the end of the war and the descent of the Iron Curtain. This is an enjoyable read whether you're a WWII expert or casual reader.

[Alberto · Rating 3 out of 5]

Very superficial. Instead of analysis of the issues raised at Yalta, we get in depth discussion of the dinner menus. She seems to have access to journals and other primary sources but uses them only to provide secretaries’ impressions as tourists and junior officials’ difficulties in accessing bathroom facilities. Alger Hiss is mentioned in all of two sentences. The Morgentheau plan is discussed only cursorily. Instead she provides lengthy digressions into the history of Poland and the discovery of fission.

[Kerry Pickens · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is interesting today in light of the subject of racism towards Jews as well as Asians. Churchill was in fact very racist towards Asians, and had no interest in changing that behavior. Stalin and Roosevelt were plotting behind Churchill's back even though he was the one responsible for rallying the other countries to defeat the Nazi invasion. None of these leaders really come off as being angels.

[Susan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent, fast read. The stamina required just to travel to Yalta is mind boggling as were the conditions under which FDR, Churchill and staff resided once there. Concise, well-written summary and assessment of the negotiations that took place and the ways in which Yalta shaped world events right up to the Brexit vote.

[Nikos · Rating 4 out of 5]

Λεπτομερές συγγραφικό έργο για την σύσκεψη στην οποία οι τρεις ηγέτες - νικητές του Β' Παγκοσμίου πολέμου καθόρισαν το μέλλον του κόσμου με τις αποφάσεις τους.Στα συν του βιβλίου οτι περιέχει και κεφάλαια μεταγενέστερα της διάσκεψης,για να δείξει στον αναγνώστη αν οι αποφάσεις των ηγετών εφαρμόστηκαν στην ουσία ή οχι.Ενδιαφέρον ανάγνωσμα για μια ξεχωριστή πτυχή του πολέμου και μια καλή αρχή για αναζήτηση περαιτέρω έργων στο ίδιο ύφος και θεματολογία.

[Karlee · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was glued to this. I found it heavy going, but I am glad to have read it.

[Lefki Sarantinou · Rating 5 out of 5]

Τι έχει να μας πει άραγε ένα βιβλίο ακόμη για τη Γιάλτα μετά από τόσους και τόσους τόνους μελάνης που έχουν χυθεί για την ανάλυσή της συγκεκριμένης Διάσκεψης;
Εύλογο ερώτημα θα υποθέσει, ίσως, κανείς για μία από τις πιο πολυσυζητημένες συναντήσεις του Δευτέρου Παγκοσμίου Πολέμου. Η απάντηση είναι όμως πως, είτε γνωρίζει αρκετά ο υποψήφιος αναγνώστης για τη Διάσκεψη της Γιάλτας τον Φλεβάρη του 1945, είτε όχι, δύσκολα θα αφήσει το βιβλίο από τα χέρια του.

Η καταιγιστική, μυθιστορηματική σχεδόν διήγηση για ένα ιστορικό βιβλίο, αποτελεί αδιαμφισβήτητα ένα τεράστιο πλεονέκτημα γι’ αυτό. Το ίδιο συμβαίνει και με τον πλούτο των πληροφοριών που αυτό διαθέτει, παρμένες από πολλές και διαφορετικές πηγές. Οι ορθές κρίσεις από την πλευρά του συγγραφέα ίσως υπόκεινται στη σφαίρα του υποκειμενισμού. Εντούτοις, όταν είναι ευλογοφανείς και λογικές, σίγουρα μπορούν και αυτές να προστεθούν στα ατού του ιστορικού βιβλίου.

Το βιβλίο της Diana Preston, καταξιωμένης ιστορικού και συγγραφέως, πληροί όλες τις προϋποθέσεις για να διαβαστεί, επομένως, από όλους, ιστορικούς και μη.

Η Diana Preston ξεκινά με ένα πορτρέτο των τριών πρωταγωνιστών της περίφημης Διάσκεψης που καθόρισε τη μοίρα του μεταπολεμικού κόσμου, του Γιόζεφ Στάλιν, του Φραγκλίνου Ρούσβελτ και του Ουίνστον Τσόρτσιλ. Δεν σκιαγραφεί, όμως, μονάχα αυτούς, αλλά και έτερες σημαντικές προσωπικότητες που έλαβαν μέρος σε αυτήν, όπως τις κόρες του Ρούσβελτ και του Τσόρτσιλ, τους Υπουργούς Εξωτερικών των τριών χωρών και άλλων, όπως π.χ. του Χάρι Χόπκινς, στενού συμβούλου του Ρούσβελτ.

Συνεχίζει, η αφηγήτρια, με όσα προηγήθηκαν της συνάντησης και είναι απαραίτητο να γνωρίζει ο αναγνώστης, προκειμένου να κατανοήσει το πλαίσιο μέσα στο οποίο έγινε αυτή. Η δύσκολη συμφωνία για τον καθορισμό του τόπου της συνάντησης -με τον Στάλιν να αρνείται να μπει σε αεροπλάνο-, οι προετοιμασίες των Σοβιετικών στα ανάκτορα της Κριμαίας για την υποδοχή, η άφιξη των καλεσμένων αντιπροσωπειών και οι μικρές γαργαλιστικές λεπτομέρειες της διαμονής τους, όλα αυτά παρουσιάζονται εναργώς και λεπτομερώς στο βιβλίο.
Η υπόλοιπη κριτική στο Literature.gr

[Aaron Finestone · Rating 5 out of 5]

In Eight Days at Yalta (Grove Atlantic Press) Diana Preston has written a detailed account of the Yalta Conference. The book reads like a biography, with accounts of the health of the three leaders, Soviet infiltration of the American delegation, and the menus of the endless banquets and rivers of alcohol.

Most interesting are Preston’s account of the negotiations over of the future government of Poland, repatriation of Soviet prisoners of war, forced laborers, and defectors and reparations to be paid by Germany.

The most common analysis is that Yalta confirmed the facts on the ground, conceding Soviet influence in areas which were or were about to be conquered by the Red Army. Preston leaves unanswered the tantalizing question of what damage was called by Soviet agents Alger Hiss, Nathan Gregory Silvermaster and Harry Dexter White.

A serious read for Cold War fans.

[Tanya · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book had two components: a day-by-day narrative of what went down during those eight days Churchill, FDR, and Stalin met at Yalta, and an analysis of what their agreement meant for the world. The itinerary chapters, complete with what they ate for meals, lots of passages from aides' journals, and discussion of the Russian palaces in which the "Big Three" were housed, got tiring. I don't care that much about the mundane details of that decisive week.

The analysis, however, matters a lot. I was especially intrigued by Preston's assertion that, had the conference taken place the previous summer as originally planned, the United States and UK would have been in a much stronger bargaining position. By February 1945 the Soviet armies had already occupied much of Eastern Europe, and were only miles from Berlin. Churchill and Roosevelt were so concerned that these Eastern countries, particularly Poland, have self-determined new governments, but this was impossible to implement when Communist Russia had on-site authority.

Another major objective at the conference was Russia's agreement to declare war on Japan. Up until this point the two countries had a mutual non-aggression pact in force. Prognosticators forecast that it would take another 2 years for America to completely defeat Japan, and counted on Russia opening a far eastern front against Hirohito. Interestingly, the date chosen for Russia to attack Japan was August 8, so the hurried atomic attack on Hiroshima on August 6 was clearly an attempt to preclude the Soviets from joining the war, and thus obviate the need to keep promises made in return. Stalin quickly moved troops into the Korean Peninsula and some far northern Japanese islands before the Japanese surrendered on August 15. As a result, a Communist foothold in the Koreas was established, leading the next decade to the Korean War.

Eight Days at Yalta gave me more insights into the unique personalities of Winston Churchill, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, and Joseph Stalin. I'm glad I read it, even though the middle of the book dragged a bit. 3.5 stars.

[Desiree · Rating 4 out of 5]

This summer I was lucky.
During the holidays I read the new biography of Churchill, a great piece of scholarship and readability. Then I was invited to join a conference in Potsdam (Germany), another lieu de mémoire where the post-war world was shaped. The outcome of Potsdam cannot be understood without having knowledge on what happened in Yalta, on the Crimean Peninsula. Here the leaders of the allied forces Roosevelt, Churchill and Stalin, and their delegations sat together and shaped the post-war world.
Diana Preston delivered a great read. Although you know the outcome of the negotiations, 8-days at Yalta develops like a film script. Not without reason Preston starts with an introduction of the dramatis personae.

Eight days of debates, dinners, political games, larded with heavy drinking and sharp rhetoric. Stalin proves to be the best negotiator and it is no coincidence that when president George Bush visited Latvia in 2005 he compared the outcomes of Yalta with the Munich Agreement of 1938. With hindsight, the western powers considered Yalta a mistake, leading to an unstable and divided Europe. In 2019, we celebrate the fall of the Berlin Wall. However, the period of great optimism has been replace by scepticism. The Russians are again the aim of a Cold War Revival. In order to understand the geopolitical controversies, history matters. This exciting good read of Preston helps the reader to unravel this.

I want to thank Netgalley for providing me with an Advanced Reader Copy of this book.

[Jim Kile · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book took me a long time to get through despite the focused subject matter and size. The information tended toward the superficial in many cases. The documentary aspect of the book leaves no doubt that the author made use of several first-person sources (in diaries, etc.) to ensure an accurate account of the Yalta conference between Roosevelt, Churchill, and Stalin in early 1945. It does open a slight window into the personalities of Roosevelt and Churchill; Stalin remains somewhat opaque in the narrative. Real analysis, though, does not take place until the aftermath chapter, and it seems like it may have been an afterthought. One thing that slowed me down was the frequently awkward wordings and sentence structure — missing commas, fragmented sentences, grammar issues, etc. It seemed like the editor gave up in several chapters. From a content standpoint, it was worth the read.

[Chris Aylott · Rating 3 out of 5]

Preston's history of the Yalta Conference doesn't offer much analysis, but it does provide insight in its almost hour-by-hour recounting of events. Based on that, it's hard to see Yalta as anything other than a disaster for the United States and the United Kingdom.

Stalin came in with a strong hand and played it well; Roosevelt and Churchill played weak hands badly and patted themselves on their backs afterwards. I'm not sure how much fault we can place on them for the outcome, especially Roosevelt, who was a dying man trying to build a new world organization in the ashes of Europe. But in 20/20 hindsight, this quote from Churchill verges on unforgivable:

On 23 February Churchill told more junior members of his administration, 'Poor Neville Chamberlain believed he could trust Hitler. He was wrong. But I don't think I'm wrong about
Stalin.'

Deep-Voiced Narrator Spoiler: Churchill was wrong.

[Christian Dibblee · Rating 2 out of 5]

I feel this book offers a ready narrative but very little analysis. It’s fun to feel yourself in the rooms with the Big Three. But otherwise, the author doesn’t tell us much that we don’t already know. One review described this as “an anniversary book” published only to remind readers of a previously explored historical event. I agree and ended the book without much greater knowledge about Yalta.

Another note - the writing isn’t very good. This might be an editing problem or a use of British conventions, but I re-read many sentences and found a verb missing. Or at the very least, a comma placed improperly (or not at all). It definitely took away from my enjoyment of the book.

[Scott · Rating 4 out of 5]

For far too many modern writers, '"Yalta" is invoked as a simplistic example of their perspective. For those of a jingoistic sort, "Yalta" is the equivalent of Neville Chamberlain's appeasement of Adolf Hitler, only this time with U.S. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt rolling over for Josef Stalin. Others use "Yalta" as an example of how FDR failed to understand the Soviet Union or its leader, or perhaps FDR's naivete. And still others use "Yalta" as the turning point in the collapse of the British Empire . . . simply because by Yalta, Britain was too exhausted to do anything in opposition to either the U.S. or the Soviet Union.

With "Eight Days at Yalta," Diana Preston attempts to refocus the debate on what actually happened at Yalta, the epic diplomatic session between "the Big Three" = FDR, Churchill, and Stalin in early February 1945. Preston seeks to put the reader back into the time period with the perspective of each leader. Churchill was representing the country that had fought longest against Nazi Germany. FDR represented the Western Country that was not only essential to defeating Hitler but was also facing the prospect of having to invade the Japanese homeland . . . at the cost of hundreds of thousands of American military casualties (if not more). And the A-Bomb was not yet proven. And Stalin represented the country that may have lost more than any other in World War II with well over 25 million dead.

Writing with an historian's reserve and with some judiciousness (this book could easily have exceeded 1,000 pages, but clocks in well below 400 pages, including index), Preston reminds the reader that the Big Three needed each other, desperately. FDR needed Stalin to declare war against Japan, both to isolate Japan and also to prevent Japan from reallocating military resources to oppose the American invasion. FDR needed Churchill to help build his vision of a United Nations securing post-WWII global peace. Stalin needed FDR and Churchill to keep the pressure on Germany from the West. Churchill needed both Stalin and FDR to win the war before Britain collapsed from exhaustion . . .. and he wanted their help in preserving the British Empire.

And even though by early February 1945 it looked like Germany was toast, nothing was certain. Hitler held out hope that the Alliance he was fighting would collapse and he would somehow be able to stave off defeat. And the Big Three did not trust each other. Stalin was afraid that the West would cut a separate deal with Hitler, for example.

At Yalta, great decisions were made that defined the second half of the 20th century . . . far too many to list here. Preston does a great service by remaining somewhat aloof in terms of favorites among the Big Three. Not all historians do this - for a different perspective, read Nigel Hamilton's recent "War and Peace," Volume III of his very pro-FDR WWII biography in which Hamilton all but accuses Churchill of trying to lose the war. Preston is more even-handed, but does make pointed observations about how Stalin used Churchill's unyielding devotion to the British Empire as a justification for building the Soviet Empire's network of satellite states, including but not limited to Poland and the Baltic states.

This is complex stuff. Preston ultimately agrees with FDR's assessment - to paraphrase, "I never said the agreement at Yalta was good. I said it was the best that I could do." The Yalta agreements did lead to the victory of the Big Three in WWII, but it also led to the Cold War. As someone said, history is complicated. Preston's book is a reminder that Yalta should probably only be used as short-hand for that sentiment. Highly recommended.

[Jack Glynne-Jones · Rating 5 out of 5]

Appeasement is always easy to criticise when one is not burdened with the primary responsibility of deciding whether to appease or not to appease, and there may be no better piece of evidence for this than the fact that the icon of anti-appeasement, Winston Churchill, later went on to shake hands and do business with a tyrant as evil as Hitler and as ruthless as Hirohito.

His excuse for this alliance with Stalin: 'If Hitler invaded hell, I would make at least a favourable reference to the devil in the House of Commons'. To some extent, fair enough. And at the time, which was February 1945, Russia was playing a more than vital role in the defeat of the Wehrmacht, and the US was eyeing them up for a role against Japan in the Far East too. The horrors of the concentration camps were being discovered as the Allied troops began to liberate them, and the Japanese army was making its vicious and suicidal nature clear against the American troops. The need for a swift defeat of Germany, and a resolution to the misery, became more pressing every day.

Eight Days at Yalta tells us of the conference which took place, against this global backdrop, between Churchill, Roosevelt and Stalin, where the topics for discussion were (most notably): what to do with Poland's borders and government, what to do with Germany after it had been defeated, and the forming of the UN.

The book is meticulous in its detail, and through this it transports you to the conference and makes you feel as if you were there; once you have read the book you are left feeling that there is not much more to know about the meetings. It also regularly reminds us of the situation in Europe and Asia at the time, and the writer has a particular liking (if you could call it that) for pointing out the especially shocking horrors of the conflict, with all the details included. A lot of it is almost unbearable to read, and provides constant reminders of the importance of the Yalta conference, and the pressure on each of the three leaders (well, maybe just two of them).

It is a relief to see a historian not afraid to consider the 'what ifs?', and she does not feel the need to offer tedious disclaimers before doing so, which is quite refreshing. It is the consideration of these questions that help one to critique and truly understand the history, particularly with regard to the competing interests and decisions made.

It is the competing interests which make the conference compelling, like a great debate, but one which had immediate consequences for millions of people across the world. The strategies and cunning of the three parties, and the fiery personalities involved, make it an entertaining debate, despite its seriousness. Not to mention the fact that, through the course of each meeting, you can see the threads emerging which have ended up shaping the history of Europe (and elsewhere) since then.

It is in many of these consequences that the dangers of appeasing and cooperating with tyrants become clear, and where the crux question arises of whether the way that peace was achieved can justify the subsequent 46 years in Eastern Europe (the final chapter is ominously titled 'The Iron Curtain Descends'). These considerations, and so many others like it, are evoked by this book and my mind has been racing on the topic ever since.

[Russell O. Redman · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Yalta Conference was one of the pivotal events in shaping the modern world. This is a detailed look at what was decided, what was left unmentioned, and what life was like for the participants. These critical negotiations were conducted in gutted palaces refurbished with furniture, decorations and staff dispatched on short notice from Moscow. Oh, and bugs in every room, both electronic and living. Stalin wanted assurance that Britain and America would not make a separate peace with the Nazis, Roosevelt wanted Soviet assistance in the fight against Japan, and Churchill wanted to preserve the British Empire intact. They all got what they wanted most in the short term, but all lost what they needed most in the post-War world. Stalin gained unchallenged supremacy in eastern Europe and earned the undying hatred of the people, which leaves the Russian Federation facing hostile nations along all its western borders. Churchill's Empire mutated into the Commonwealth, in part because of his eloquently expressed contempt for everyone in the empire who was not British. Roosevelt wanted a lasting peace, but got a cold war that was peaceful only in the sense that neither side dared to risk a nuclear war. Russian help against Japan may or may not have helped. Americans insist the the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki forced Japan to surrender; my Japanese friends insist that the Russian attack forced them to surrender to the Americans before the Russians imposed a communist regime and executed the Imperial family. Churchill, Roosevelt and his successor Truman all came to believe that Stalin was a trustworthy partner; his betrayal of the agreements he made at Yalta convinced later western leaders that he was a backstabbing psychopath interested only in his personal power. That shock created the modern world.

This is a fascinating look into power politics at the highest level under terrible strain. All three of the leaders were suffering from worsening health. Their trusted aides were also suffering from the strain. This is a sobering reminder of the very human limits of even the best leaders.

If I have a niggling complaint, it is in the title. Only a few of the agreements reached at Yalta had a major impact on the post-war world, chiefly the creation of the United Nations. As the summary chapters illustrate, the post-war world was shaped largely by considerations that were not discussed at Yalta, and sometimes were deliberately ignored.

[spen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Despite obviously patient scholarship and a narrative which allowed for day-by-day contextualisation and attention to the experiences of women in the Crimea, I felt this lacked analytical focus. The potential repercussions of Yalta get four and a half pages of fairly vague, apolitical reflection at the end. As charmingly human as this meeting can and should be depicted, Yalta represents a pissing contest between three great monsters of history.

Churchill has long since lost perspective, and rushes Roosevelt into the arms of Stalin by misreading the temperature of the room, or ranting in idiosyncratic mixed metaphor about the honour of his emperor's beloved extractative racially exploitative entrepôts. FDR, blinded by pet projects and visibly facing imminent death, dithers, leaving to his gungho greenhorn reactionary '44 running mate no guidance, and a bewildering mess he will clean up by dropping the bomb. Stalin plays for time so he can ensure impunity for his programme of land grab, mass rape, genocide and plunder. The best I could say about Yalta? The West ensured USSR engagement in the UN. I don't know enough to say whether the Russians might otherwise have stayed out. Certainly, their commitment wavered after 1945. I struggle to consider that a great victory. This concession cost Poland, Yugoslavia and East Germany their freedom. The only other Western victory here, of enshrining France's status in the peace, earned them no thanks from de Gaulle.

The US had huge leverage here. The USSR's advance had, and still in February 1945, derived its impetus from American cheap credit and machinery supplied through the Persian Corridor. Roosevelt's guilt at mass Soviet death, largesse and personal affection for the Vozhd disallowed suspension of these resources. Churchill's absurd imperial nostalgia seemed more threatening to the President than the glinting eyes of history's greatest villain. All three powers showered themselves in blood.

I appreciated the anecdotes about confiscated chocolate, Stalin watering down his vodka when he thought nobody could see, and trays upon trays of suckling pig in a land of 170 million starving peasants.

[Brian Williams · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a day-by-day account of the February 1945 conference of the soon-to-be victorious Allied Powers of WW2. U.S. President Franklin Roosevelt, British Prime Minister Churchill and Russian Marshall and dictator Joseph Stalin participated in the conference. (French General de Gaulle was expressly excluded from the conference.) It was the second summit meeting of the trio, following their meeting in Tehran in 1943. After considerable back-and-forth amongst the principals, Yalta in the Crimea, which had recently been liberated from Nazi occupation, was the chosen site. It was an arduous journey for Roosevelt and Churchill, and a long train ride for Stalin.

Each of the leaders came to the conference with a "wish list" for the agenda. For example, Churchill wanted to preserve the world affairs role of Britain and the British Empire as much as possible. Stalin on the other hand was the most determined (and best-prepared) of the three; he wanted to protect the Russian western borders by surrounding Russia with subordinate buffer states under Soviet control. Roosevelt in obvious poor health wanted to get the UN established and get the Soviets into the war in the Pacific to defeat Japan. Each succeeded to a significant degree and in the author's view, Stalin achieved the most: he had a strong hand, with Russian troops pushing into Germany and closing in on occupying Berlin. The exclusion of the de Gaulle from the conference was an issue for the Soviets but Britain wanted France as a buffer between it and Europe. The French general showed little or no gratitude for Churchill's strong support. Eventually Stalin relented to the extent that France was given a zone within Germany during the Allied Occupation.

"Eight Days at Yalta" is an informative narrative history, with plenty of anecdotes. (Bathroom facilities were in short supply at Yalta.) Diaries and memoirs are the source of significant amounts of the story. It's an entertaining read, a comprehensive overview of the Conference, uncluttered by detailed footnotes. The source notes and bibliography at the end of the book are helpful. I enjoyed having the several maps at the beginning of the book. Occasionally amusing, it focuses on the people: the list of attendees made for convenient reference as the narrative progressed.

The author includes as a tag end to this book, commentary about the Potsdam conference implicitly suggesting it was unimportant. By the time Potsdam ended two of the three participants had been replaced: Churchill by Attlee and Roosevelt by Truman. Potsdam, more than Yalta set the tone for future developments, and the Cold War, although decisions made at Yalta were more consequential. This book can serve as a good segue for a book focusing on Potsdam, such as Michael Neiberg's excellent "Potsdam: the End of World War II and the Remaking of Europe".

Recommended: "Eight Days at Yalta" is a good basic introductory text to the Yalta Conference, with a strong focus on the personalities involved.

NOTE: I requested and received an advance reading copy of this book from the publisher, Atlantic Monthly, via Netgalley. The comments about it are my own. I appreciate the opportunity to review the book.

[Jean Bonilla · Rating 4 out of 5]

Diana Preston draws on a multiplicity of excellent sources to write a very readable account of the run up, conference, and aftermath of Yalta. She captures each of the very different leaders in a personable way. Roosevelt worked 9am-5pm, with his dog Fala at his side. Stalin worked at night. When he slept, he kept the door locked so no one would see him asleep and vulnerable. Churchill worked constantly, even in his bath. He also had a weird-sounding sort of onesie made for himself to ease in getting out and into shelter for air raids. Not sure how that worked!

Roosevelt came to Yalta with one over-arching goal - the United Nations. He did not want to repeat the mistakes of Wilson with the League of Nations, so his plan was to create a body that had greater staying power and more tightly defined authority. He wanted the Soviets to commit to the war in the Pacific, also. Churchill’s goal for the post-war period was preservation of the Empire; he was an unreconstructed imperialist. Stalin’s goal was simply to take as much territory as possible to bring it all under the influence of the Soviet Union.

There were three issues Preston says were not addressed at Yalta. One was the Jews, including Palestine and the extermination camps. Reports passed by the future leader of the Polish government in exile to the western press as early as 1942 included “photographic evidence of the dead, stacked like cordwood.” They were almost certainly also provided to Churchill and FDR. But the reports seemed too exaggerated and fantastical. No one believed them. Even as they grew more credible, FDR said he was reluctant to “lend color to the charges of Hitler that we were fighting this war on account of and at the instigation and direction of our Jewish citizens.” Plans late in the war for bombing the railway lines to Auschwitz were abandoned after FDR opined that the Nazis would move the work “down the road” and the world would accuse us of bombing the camp itself. Preston doesn’t mention Stalin’s views, but she does comment that the Soviet troops who liberated Auschwitz were already numbed by the German atrocities they had seen inflicted on their own people, so didn’t react as much as westerners who arrived at other camps.

Two was the Baltic states. The Versailles Treaty had bestowed freedom on the three Baltic nations, but they were reincorporated into the Soviet Union in 1940. Both the US and the UK strongly objected, but realized that there was nothing they could do about it. So it was not on the Yalta agenda.

Finally, three was the atom bomb. Both the US and the UK did not want to bring Stalin in on the bomb at this point in the war. They didn’t trust him. Stalin had plenty of intel and knew what they were doing and what they were hiding. All the more reason he didn’t trust them!

Preston weaves Poland in as a constant theme throughout the book. Clearly its status and its borders were a topic of discussion in trying to determine a “fair” end to the war and sort out allocations of territory. She describes the humiliation of Poland at the end of the 18th century when Russia, Prussia, and Astro-Hungary divided it into three pieces and it ceased to exist. In the mid-1800s Marie Curie was one of those forced to study in Prussian and who risked arrest studying and then teaching in the Polish-language ‘Floating University.’ The Versailles Treaty restored it as a country, but its borders remained open for discussion.

People have debated for decades whether Churchill and FDR could have used Yalta to prevent the Cold War or limit Stalin’s aggrandizement of Europe. Preston offers no proof, but she does acknowledge that the only one of the three who had a clear picture of what he wanted was Stalin. FDR was dead three months later; Churchill was already conscious of Britain’s diminishing place in the world and he was voted out in the middle of the next conference. Nevertheless, the work there was toward peace and, although a compromise, it brought the world closer to that goal.

[Doros Grigoropoulos · Rating 5 out of 5]

Εξαιρετικά εμπεριστατωμένη καταγραφή των οκτώ ημερών της διάσκεψης της Γιάλτας τον Φλεβάρη του 1945. Μια πραγματικά ζωντανή αφήγηση, σχεδόν ώρα με την ώρα, που καθηλώνει. Το βιβλίο εκτός των ιστορικών στοιχείων που ο αναγνώστης έτσι κι αλλιώς περιμένει, παρουσιάζει με γλαφυρό τρόπο πικάντικες στιγμές, λεπτομέρειες και συμβάντα που σχεδόν σοκάρουν. Ένα ασταμάτητο παρασκήνιο και ένα όργιο διπλωματίας συνθέτουν το παζλ της διάσκεψης που διαμόρφωσε τον μεταπολεμικό κόσμο. Ατελείωτα παζάρια και συνδιαλλαγές πάνω και κάτω από τα τραπέζια για τις μεταπολεμικές αποζημιώσεις, την επόμενη μέρα σε Πολωνία και Ελλάδα, τις σφαίρες επιρροής και τα πετρέλαια του Ιράν, τη σύσταση του ΟΗΕ και τις τύχες της Γερμανίας και Ιαπωνίας. 

Μου άρεσε πολύ η επιλογή της συγγραφέως στο τέλος της κάθε ενότητας να αφηγείται ιστορικά γεγονότα και αθέατες στιγμές των ημερών αλά μηχανή του χρόνου. 
Η ευκολία με την οποία οι τρεις ηγέτες (Στάλιν, Ρούσβελτ και Τσόρτσιλ) «μοιράζουν» τον κόσμο αποτυπώνεται άψογα από την Diana Preston. Μια καταιγιστική διήγηση που στιγμές στιγμές κόβει την ανάσα μεταφέροντας περίτεχνα τον αναγνώστη στο κλίμα της εποχής. Από τη λήξη του Β' Παγκοσμίου πολέμου, στο «σιδηρούν παραπέτασμα» και τρία χρόνια μετά στην έναρξη του «Ψυχρού Πολέμου». 
Αν σου αρέσουν τα βιβλία ιστορίας (όπως και 'μένα), χτύπα το! Δεν θα το αφήσεις από τα χέρια σου.