Showdown in San Francisco

Abstract

As Vijaya Lakshmi Pandit was landing in New York, President Roosevelt was consumed by preparations for meetings between the Big Three, the United States, Russia and Great Britain, that would take place in Yalta, in the Crimea. The Yalta Conference was meant to follow up on an earlier 1943 conclave in Tehran, where the overall camaraderie between Roosevelt, Stalin and Churchill had produced fruitful dialogue. In Tehran, the three had tentatively agreed that some kind of post-war world organization was necessary to maintain the peace.1 The Allies needed to meet again to discuss this matter in greater detail, in the context of the latest developments in the war.