Office of the Historian

Defense Files: Telegram

The Secretary of State to the Ambassador in France (Caffery)
top secret

Argonaut 149. Secret and personal for the Ambassador from Secretary of State Stettinius.

You should concert with your British and Soviet colleagues and arrange to deliver to General de Gaulle the following two telegrams from the three heads of Government as soon as possible after 8:30 p. m. Paris time, Monday, February 12.

1.
Quote: You will observe that the communiqué which we are issuing the end of this Conference contains a Declaration on Liberated Europe. You will also see that, in the last paragraph of the Declaration, we express the hope that your Government may be associated with us in the action and procedure suggested. Had circumstances permitted we should have greatly welcomed discussion with you of the terms of this Declaration. The terms are, however, less important than the joint obligation to take action in certain eventualities; and we feel that it is of the highest importance, in the interests of Europe, that the Provisional Government of the French Republic should agree, jointly with her three allies, to accept such an obligation. Signed Winston S. Churchill, Franklin D. Roosevelt and I. V. Stalin. Unquote and end of first telegram.
2.
Quote: We have been considering the question of the control of Germany after her defeat and have come to the conclusion that it will be highly desirable for the Provisional Government of the French Republic, if they will, to accept responsibility for a zone of occupation and to be represented on the Central Machinery of Control. We should be glad to learn that the French Government are prepared to accept those responsibilities. Signed Winston S. Churchill, Franklin D. Roosevelt and I. V. Stalin. Unquote and end of second telegram.1

Argonaut, February 11, 1945.

  1. British drafts of these telegrams in the form of undated and unsigned carbon copies are in the Hiss Collection, among a group of working papers pertaining to the Foreign Ministers’ meeting on February 11, 1945. See ante, p. 933.

    Ambassador Caffery reported in telegram No. 798 from Paris, dated February 21, 1945 (740.00119 Control (Germany)/2–2145) that the two messages were delivered to De Gaulle on February 12.

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