Nova Scotia/Nunavut Command of The Royal Canadian Legion www.ns.legion.ca 181 VJ Day and the end of the Second World War continued ... From a conference in San Francisco-attended by fifty nations, emerged The United Nations Organization (UN). In the preamble to the UN charter the hope was expressed that “…that armed force shall not be used, save in the common interest…” The way the world began to be reshaped in the years following the Second World War, owed more to politics and considerations of national interest, than the ideals embodied within the UN charter. The leader of the Soviet Union Stalin, wanted to install communist governments in the nations of Eastern Europe, to prevent a future invasion, from the west. In October 1944, Churchill had visited Stalin in Moscow – President Roosevelt had remained in the United States, campaigning for re-election. Churchill agreed to the post-war Soviet control of Romania and Bulgaria, in exchange for Stalin promising not to support the communist insurgents in Greece. In March 1946, Winston Churchill gave a speech in Fulton Missouri, in the presence of United States President, Harry Truman. Churchill described Soviet domination of Eastern Europe, “From Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste on the Adriatic, an iron curtain has descended across the continent.” The speech was the opening blast in the confrontation known as the Cold War. U.S. President Harry Truman speaks at United Nations conference in San Fransico, 25 April to 26 June 1945.
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