In the days immediately following the surrender of Germany in May of 1945, new concerns gripped the victorious Allied forces.

The Alliance had always been one of convenience.

Dimetically opposing political and economic systems joined forces to defeat a common foe.

But now that the foe had been vanquished, what was next?

Would the former allies now become enemies?

Learn more about Operation Unthinkable and the plans for how the Allies would fight each other

in the immediate aftermath of the Second World War on this episode of Everything Everywhere

Daily. There is an old adage that says the enemy of my enemy is my friend and

there's probably no better example of this than the Allied

powers in World War II. Prior to 1941, the Soviet Union was not at all friendly

with the capitalist countries of the West. They had a belief in a worldwide communist

revolution and at the top of their list were countries like the United States, the United Kingdom,

and France. That isn't to say that the Soviets were fond of Nazi Germany either.

Stalin and the Soviet press had plenty of bad things to say about Hitler and the Nazis too.

However, Stalin did end up signing a treaty with Hitler in 1939, which resulted in the invasions of Poland, Finland,

Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, and Bessarabia, A.A. Moldova.

When the Axis power signed the Tripartite Treaty, the Soviets

actually wanted to join the Alliance and become one of the Axis Powers. In April

1941, the Soviets signed a non-aggression pact with the Japanese, largely as a gesture of goodwill towards the Germans.

It wasn't until June 22, 1941, with the start of the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union when Hitler

reneged on his deal with Stalin, the Soviets suddenly found themselves in need

of new allies. Just a few weeks later on July 12, 1941, the British and the Soviet signed the Anglo-Soviet

...