Potential Threats to European Stability

Abstract

In October 1944 Winston Churchill and Anthony Eden visited Moscow for talks with Joseph Stalin. Without the knowledge of the Americans, the British and the Soviet leaders appear to have reached an informal agreement for the division of much of Europe into spheres of influence — the so-called percentages agreement. According to the first draft of the record by Sir Archibald Clark-Kerr, then British Ambassador in Moscow,

The Prime Minister [Churchill], then produced what he called a ‘naughty document’ showing a list of Balkan countries and the proportion of interest in them of the Great Powers. He said that the Americans would be shocked if they saw how crudely he had put it. Marshal Stalin was a realist. He himself was not sentimental while Mr. Eden was a bad man. He [Eden] had not consulted his cabinet or Parliament.