The article deals with the position of the USSR and the USA on the Korean issue at the final stage of the World War II and during the early postwar years. It shows the place of the Korean issue in the policies of Moscow and Washington at that time, it also analyses their approaches to the political future of the Peninsula. The authors come to the conclusion that during 1945–1946 both great powers supported, albeit to varying degrees, the idea of a single Korean state. Even after the political split of the Peninsula conflict of the North and South was not inevitable until the first months of the year 1950.