Office of the Historian

093.612/64: Telegram

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

Washington, July 12, 1944—7 p.m.

1676. For your information, a Soviet Embassy note of July 696 indicates a desire to confer “the highest Soviet military orders” on [Page 892] Lt. General Omar Bradley,97 Lt. General Leonard Gerow,98 Lt. General Mark Clark,99 and Maj. General James Collins1 in connection with successful Allied operations in France and Italy. The approval of the War Department is being requested in accordance with former practice.

With reference to your 1480, April 28,2 has the Soviet Government been informed of our new policy regarding decorations, particularly paragraph (a) of Department’s 837, April 8?

Hull
  1. Not printed.↩
  2. Commanding General, 1st U. S. Army, Normandy campaign.↩
  3. Commander, U. S. Forces in England.↩
  4. Commander, 5th U.S. Army in Italy.↩
  5. In a note from the Secretary of State of July 24, 1944, approving the acceptance of the offered awards, the Soviet Chargé, Alexander Nikolayevich Kapustin, was advised of a possible error; it was presumed that Maj. Gen. J. Lawton Collins, commanding the VII Corps in France, was intended as the recipient of an award rather than Maj. Gen. James L. Collins, who was on duty in the United States (093.612/7–1844).↩
  6. Not printed.↩