US-Soviet Dialogue on the Korean Settlement in 1943–1947: Basic Principles and Results

• Main Author: Denis Andreevich Sadakov
• Format: Article
• Language: Russian
• Published: Ural Federal University Press 2018-06-01
• Series: Известия Уральского федерального университета. Серия 2: Гуманитарные науки
• Subjects: Корея; СССР; США; И. Сталин; Ф. Рузвельт; Г. Трумэн; Совместная советско-американская комиссия; Московское совещание министров иностранных дел.
• Online Access: https://journals.urfu.ru/index.php/Izvestia2/article/view/3215

This article considers the history of Soviet-American relations on the Korean issue in the period of their development in the format of bilateral negotiations (1943–1947). The author aims to characterise the content and principles of the organisation of the dialogue between Moscow and Washington on the Korean issue during World War II and the postwar settlement, and to reveal the influence of this interaction on the fate of Korea. The author analyses the content of the dialogue between Moscow and Washington at the Tehran, Yalta and Potsdam conferences, describes the decision-making process on Korea at the Moscow meeting of foreign ministers in 1945, and examines the work of the Joint Soviet-American Commission, and the interaction between the Soviet and American occupation zones on the peninsula. The analysis is carried out with reference to published and unpublished documents of the diplomatic departments of the USSR and the US (including materials of the Foreign Policy Archive of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Fede­ration, and Internet archives), declassified CIA materials, and memoirs of political establishment members. The research allows the author to conclude that the fixation of the Korean division in 1948 occurred despite the original aspirations of the superpowers, but it became a logical outcome of the Korean settlement process. After the liberation of Korea, the USSR and the United States failed to build effective cooperation in the complex internal political conditions of the peninsula. In the end, Washington decided to choose the path that led to the implementation of a fundamentally new scenario, i.e. the formation of an independent South Korean state.