Editorial Note
According to the Log (ante, pp. 294–295), the following foreign persons called on the President during the forenoon of November 23: Vyshinsky; Mountbatten; Churchill and his daughter, Mrs. Sarah Oliver; Chiang and Madame Chiang; and the Chinese Generals Shang, Lin, and Chu. The calls were apparently of brief duration and were primarily of a courtesy nature. No memoranda of these conversations appear to have been made either by or for the President.
Vyshinsky was accompanied by Harriman and by Bohlen, who acted as interpreter. From correspondence with Harriman and Bohlen (023/5–2554; 023.1/4–1554) the editors obtained the following information concerning this conversation:
Vyshinsky was on his way to Algiers to serve as the Soviet representative on the Tripartite (Anglo-American-Soviet) Advisory Council for Italy set up at the Moscow Conference of Foreign Ministers in October 1943. He asked to see the President for the purpose of paying his respects. The President expressed to Vyshinsky the need for close cooperation between the three powers represented on the Council for Italy. The President explained the difficulties he was having with de Gaulle, and he touched on the idea of a trusteeship for immature countries, mentioning Morocco in this connection. Vyshinsky expressed general agreement with the views of the President and appeared impressed with the frank manner in which the President spoke.
For a subsequent reference by Roosevelt to his conversation with Vyshinsky, see post, p. 439.
Reilly (p. 171) implies that Vyshinsky conveyed an invitation for Roosevelt to stay at the Russian Embassy in Tehran. Hurley’s telegram of November 26 (post, p. 439) also suggests that Roosevelt had received such an invitation prior to that date. See also the Log, post, p. 461. It appears, however, that Roosevelt did not consider this invitation as fully official until it was repeated more formally with Stalin’s express approval. In one of the first Churchill–Roosevelt conversations at Cairo the Prime Minister apparently invited the [Page 311] President to stay at the British Legation at Tehran. The exact time of this invitation is not known, but it preceded the Russian one; see post, pp. 397, 461, 476.