Foreign Relations of the United States, Conferences at Washington and Quebec, 1943

740.0011 EW/29737

Memorandum by the Secretary of State¹

confidential

[Washington,] May 22, 1943.

The British Ambassador called at his request. He inquired if I had seen Mr. Churchill and I proceeded to give him the substance of what was said between Churchill and myself:²

I said that I had brought up our trade agreements program and our entire commercial and related policies, such as monetary exchange and others. It is not necessary here to repeat any of these statements in detail.

I then took up Russia and said that Great Britain and the United States must by persistent effort talk Mr. Stalin out of his shell, so to speak, that is, out of his aloofness, secretiveness and suspicion. I elaborated on what I had said on previous occasions with respect to each of these points, including the vital step of calling off all communistic activities in other countries under the direction of the Third Internationale at Moscow.³

Mr. Churchill had expressed the view that Russia would aid us in defeating Japan after Germany is defeated. I stated that I hoped she would, but added that this illustrates her secretive attitude compared with that of Great Britain and the United States; that Russia has not, so far as I knew, intimated even in a confidential way what she may have in mind in this connection.

The Ambassador said that the President requested him to talk to me about de Gaulle. I thereupon related substantially what I had said during my recent conversation with the Prime Minister,⁴ which need not be repeated here.

C[ordell] H[ull]

1. In addition some topics covered in this memorandum, Hull and Halifax apparently also discussed the possibility of establishing a camp in North Africa for refugees from Spain. See Halifax’s telegram of May 22 to Eden, post, p. 342, footnote 3.
2. For the record of the Hull–Churchill meeting of May 13, 1943, see the Secretary of State’s memorandum of conversation of the same date, ante, p. 49.
3. Regarding Hull’s views on the necessity for the dissolution of the Third International, see the memorandum of his conversation with Beneš, May 18, 1943, Foreign Relations, 1943, vol. iii, p. 529. For documentation regarding the announcement in Moscow on May 22, 1943, of the decision to dissolve the International and Hull’s reaction to that decision, see ibid., pp. 531–536.
4. See ante, p. 50.