[Zemper]

I believe the Americans and Russians agreed to divide the occupation of Korea before the war with Japan had ended, with the Russians in the North and Americans in the South. Negotiations set the dividing point at the 38th parallel. Korea had been occupied by the Japanese for some time before this. What were the Americans after? I imagine it was for more influence, control and a stronger military presence in the region. The same as the Russians.

IMHO, the Americans did not trust the Russians for some time before the official start of the cold war.

The sale of the British Rolls Royce turbojet engines to the Russians was a very strange incident. Clement Atlee had replaced Winston Churchill as British PM, and approved of the sale of (I believe 3) sample engines along with all the technical data to the Russians as a "good will gesture". Despite the protests of the British Defense Ministry of the sale, Atlee was not as suspicious of the Russians. Much to Stalin's surprise, who was quoted before this as saying "What fool will sell us his secrets?" the sale went through. Upon receiving the British turbojet engines, the Russians reversed-engineered them and created their own copies of the engines, in disregard to the licensing agreement with the British.

Churchill is quoted as once calling Atlee "a sheep in sheep's clothing"

-Eric Z