Foreign Relations of the United States Diplomatic Papers, 1941, General, The Soviet Union, Volume I

740.0011 Eupropean War 1939/8959: Telegram

The Ambassador in the Soviet Union (Steinhardt) to the Secretary of State

Moscow, March 11, 1941—8 p.m.
[Received 11 p.m.]

483. In the course of a conversation with the German Ambassador last night he said that he had heard the rumors current in Moscow that Germany contemplated an attack on the Soviet Union and that he could categorically state that there was “absolutely nothing to them.”

The Rumanian Minister³⁶ later told me that after a long talk with the British Ambassador³⁷ yesterday, he had come to the conclusion that the rumors of an impending German attack on the Soviet Union were of British origin³⁸ and that they resulted from “a stubborn continuation of the policy of wishful thinking which has misguided the destinies of Britain for the past 5 years”.

Steinhardt

36. Grigore Gafencu.
37. Sir Stafford Cripps.
38. For correspondence on the wartime relations of Great Britain and France with the Soviet Union, see pp. 155 ff.