Quebec Conferences

meetings held in Quebec, Canada, between US president F. Roosevelt and British prime minister W. Churchill during World War II (1939–45).

The first Quebec Conference, in which the US and British chiefs of staff participated, took place on Aug. 14–24, 1943. At the conference the two countries confirmed their intention to open a second front in Europe no earlier than May 1944—a decision that represented an infringement of the Allies’ obligations to the USSR. For presentation to the governments of the USSR and China, the participants in the conference worked out the text of a declaration on the creation of a permanent United Nations Organization and on the responsibility of the four great powers to preserve peace in the postwar period. Consideration was also given to the question of the diplomatic recognition of the French Committee of National Liberation and to the conditions for Italy’s capitulation, departure from the fascist coalition, and joining the Allies. Also concluded at the first Quebec Conference was a secret agreement on Anglo-American collaboration on the creation of an atomic bomb—a move which in fact preserved for the USA a dominant position in the development and production of nuclear weapons.

The second Quebec Conference was held on Sept. 11–16, 1944. Among the participants were US secretary of the treasury H. Morgenthau, British foreign secretary A. Eden, and the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Questions related to the further conduct of the war against fascist Germany and militaristic Japan were considered. Striving to prevent the countries of central and southeastern Europe from being liberated by the Soviet Union, the Anglo-American command decided to develop an offensive in the direction of Trieste and Vienna, after northern Italy had been cleared of fascist troops. It also undertook efforts to secure occupation of as large a part of German territory as possible at the end of the war. Participants in the second Quebec Conference approved a plan for partitioning Germany and placing the Ruhr and Saar areas under the control of a special international body. Furthermore, the plan provided for the de-industrialization of Germany, where the postwar emphasis was to be on agriculture. (This plan, however, was repudiated by the US and British governments soon after the end of the conference.) Roosevelt and Churchill also reached an agreement on undertaking military operations against Japan.