London Conference (1941) LONDON CONFERENCE (1941) An early meeting of Soviet, British, and Commonwealth representatives, along with governments-in-exile, to discuss mutual interests in the war with Germany It was occasioned by the Soviet Union’s entry into the war LONDON CONFERENCE (1945) An immediate postwar conference of the major Allies convened to discuss occupation issues and future peace treaties with the defeated Axis states Held from September 11 to October 2, 1945, it broke up in serious disagreement Most notably, the erstwhile Allies could not agree over seating Chinese or French representatives, while the Western powers protested exclusionary Soviet occupation policy already emerging in parts of eastern Europe, notably in Rumania and Poland LONDON NAVAL DISARMAMENT CONFERENCE (1930) See London Naval Treaty LONDON NAVAL TREATY (1930) The London Disarmament Conference convened in 1930 as a follow-up to the successful Washington Conference of 1922 and a later failed Geneva disarmament conference A naval treaty was agreed by Britain, Japan, and the United States that extended variations of the 1922 Five Power Naval Treaty ratio for battleships (5:5:3 in ships) to heavy cruisers (18:15:12 in ships), light cruisers (1:1.5:0.75 in tonnage), destroyers (1:1:0.66 in tonnage), and full parity in submarines It also committed naval powers to abstain from unrestricted submarine warfare and instead abide by traditional rules of cruiser warfare This apparent victory for arms control and international moderation was short-lived in Tokyo Senior naval officers split between “fleet” and “treaty” factions, with the latter sharply and even violently opposed to treaty limitations A number of key political assassinations followed signature of the London Treaty on April 22, 1930 It was formally abrogated by Japan in 1936 See also London Submarine Agreement; Mukden incident; Yamamoto, Isoroku LONDON POLES Unofficial term for the Polish government-in-exile in Paris, then in London, from 1939 to 1945 The “London Poles” were officially recognized by the Western Allies They broke relations with the Soviet Union over revelation and investigation of the Katyn massacre and, later, over Soviet policies toward Poland in 1944–1945 See also Lublin Poles; Poland; Polish Army; Yalta Conference LONDON SUBMARINE AGREEMENT (1936) A procés-verbal whereby submarine nations, by then including Germany, recommitted to rules of the London Naval Treaty governing the conduct of submarine warfare The essential terms applied modified rules of cruiser warfare, or prize rules, to all submarines operating 680