860C.20/102: Telegram
The Chargé in the Soviet Union (Thurston) to the Secretary of State
[Received December 9—7:40 a.m.]
2024. Embassy’s 2012, December 4, 5 p.m.,32 and 2018 of December 6th. I have been informed by members of the British Embassy that the agreement entered into by Sikorski during his recent visit to Moscow is unsatisfactory to the British Government inasmuch as, if put into operation, it would place too great a burden upon the transport and other services involved in equipping and maintaining the Polish forces on Soviet territory while at the same time depriving the British of the use of some fifteen or more thousand Polish troops in the Near Eastern field.
I judge that Sikorski did as he apparently had been requested to do in London, endeavor to obtain Stalin’s consent to the transfer of Poles of military age to India and other places in the Near East for equipment and training but that he quickly gave way before Stalin’s insistence that the Poles should remain within Soviet jurisdiction. As Sikorski, who is slightly indisposed at present, plans to return to Moscow after visiting Polish troop concentrations within the next few days it is possible that at that time he may attempt, with the aid of the British, to modify the agreement.33
- Not printed.↩
- The British Ambassador in the Soviet Union, Sir Stafford Cripps, soon explained to the American Chargé why, in his own opinion and in that of General Sikorski, it seemed inadvisable to make any attempt to seek a modification of this agreement. See telegram No. 2031, December 9, 3 p.m., from the Chargé in the Soviet Union, p. 195.↩