Foreign Relations of the United States, Conference at Quebec, 1944

Roosevelt Papers: Telegram

The Ambassador in the United Kingdom (Winant) to the President¹

secret

London, 18 September 1944.

To the President from Winant.

Immediately following your directive that a mission to drop supplies on Warsaw was authorized² clearance was obtained from Moscow and the project organized. Bad weather has delayed the mission. I thought you would like to know that I just received a message which was flashed back stating that one hundred and seven ships today in clear weather had dropped supplies over Warsaw.³

1. Sent to the White House Map Room at Washington by the United States Military Attach, London, via Army channels; forwarded to Roosevelt, at Hyde Park, as telegram No. MR-out-420, September 18, 1944.
2. See ante, p. 397.
3. This mission of B–17’s of the Eighth Air Force, using shuttle-bombing bases in the Soviet Union at the end of the flight, dropped 1,284 containers of arms, food, and medical supplies intended for the Warsaw insurgents. Of the supplies dropped, not more than 288 containers (and perhaps as few as 130) reached Polish hands. A second proposed mission was not cleared by the Soviet authorities. See Craven and Cate, pp. 316-317.