European Advisory Commission

Establishment and Composition

The European Advisory Commission (EAC) was established by agreement on 30 October 1943 at the Moscow Conference of Foreign Ministers between Cordell Hull (United States), Anthony Eden (United Kingdom), and Vyacheslav Molotov (Soviet Union), and confirmed at the Tehran Conference in November 1943. Seated at Lancaster House in London, the Commission held its first formal meeting on 14 January 1944. The American representative was Ambassador John G. Winant, the British representative was William Strang of the Foreign Office, and the Soviet representative was Ambassador Fedor Gusev. In November 1944 France joined through its representative René Massigli, expanding the Commission to four members.

Key Decisions

During 1944 the EAC drafted the core framework for the postwar treatment of Germany. On 12 September 1944 it adopted the Protocol on the Zones of Occupation in Germany and the Administration of Greater Berlin, which divided Germany into three occupation zones, Berlin into three sectors, and provided for the establishment of an Allied Control Council (ACC). The Protocol defined Germany within its 31 December 1937 borders, with territory east of the Oder–Neisse line to be transferred to Poland and the Soviet Union. The EAC also drafted plans for the partition and occupation of Austria and Vienna, an Allied Commission for Italy, and the instrument of Germany's unconditional surrender.

Relationship to the Yalta Conference

The EAC's work was reviewed at the Yalta Conference in February 1945, where France was granted a seat on the ACC and a future occupation zone carved out from the British and American zones. Crucially, the EAC had already completed the basic architecture of Germany's occupation (the zone boundaries and Berlin sector plan) by September 1944, months before Yalta. The Protocol entered into force on 6 February 1945 and was implemented through the Four-Power Declaration of 5 June 1945 following Germany's unconditional surrender.

Dissolution and Legacy

The EAC was dissolved at the Potsdam Conference in August 1945 and its functions transferred to the newly created Council of Foreign Ministers. The occupation zone framework it established became the physical basis for Germany's Cold War division: by giving each occupying power full control over its zone and denying the ACC overruling authority, the EAC's design effectively anticipated the partition into East and West Germany.