Bohlen Collection
Bohlen Minutes
| Subjects: | Reparations from Germany |
| Communiqué | |
| British and American Politics | |
| Jewish problems |
At the beginning of dinner the conversation was general.
The Prime Minister then proposed a toast to the King of England, the President of the United States, and to Mr. Kalinin, President of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union, and he asked the President as the only Head of State present to reply to this toast.
The President replied that the Prime Minister’s toast brought back many memories—that he recalled the first year as President of the United States in the summer of 1933. His wife had gone down in the country to open a school, and on the wall there had been a map on which there had been a great blank space. He said the teacher had told his wife that it was forbidden to speak about this place, and this place had been the Soviet Union. He said he had then decided to write a letter to Mr. Kalinin asking him to send someone to the United States to open negotiations for the establishment of diplomatic relations.
Marshal Stalin, in his conversation with Prime Minister Churchill, emphasized the unsatisfactory nature of the reparations question at the conference. He said he feared to have to go back to the Soviet Union and tell the Soviet people they were not going to get any reparations because the British were opposed to it.
[Page 922]The Prime Minister said that, on the contrary, he very much hoped that Russia would receive reparations in large quantities, but he remembered the last war when they had placed the figure at more than the capacity of Germany to pay.
Marshal Stalin remarked that he thought it would be a good idea to put some mention of the intention to make Germany pay for the damage it had caused the Allied Nations, and also some reference to the Reparations Commission, in the communiqué.
The Prime Minister and The President agreed to the inclusion of these statements in the communiqué.
The Prime Minister then proposed a toast to the health of Marshal Stalin. He said he hoped that the Marshal had a warmer feeling for the British than he had had, and that be felt that the great victories which his armies had achieved had made him more mellow and friendly than he had been during the hard times of the war. He said he hoped that the Marshal realized that he bad good and strong friends in those British and American representatives assembled here. We all hoped, he continued, that the future of Russia would be bright, and he said he knew Great Britain, and he was sure the President, would do all they could to bring this about. He said he felt that the common danger of war had removed impediments to understanding and the fires of war had wiped out old animosities. He said he envisaged a Russia which had already been glorious in war as a happy and smiling nation in times of peace.
Mr. Stettinius then proposed a toast to his predecessor, Mr. Cordell Hull, who he said had been an inspiration to us all in his labors for the creation of a peaceful and orderly world. He concluded by saying that Mr. Hull was a great American and great statesman.2
The President then said that he recalled that there had been an organization in the United States called the Ku Klux Klan that had hated the Catholics and the Jews, and once when he had been on a visit in a small town in the South be had been the guest of the president of the local Chamber of Commerce. He had sat next to an Italian on one side and a Jew on the other and had asked the president of the Chamber of Commerce whether they were members of the Ku Klux Klan, to which the president had replied that they were, but that they were considered all right since everyone in the community knew them. The President remarked that it was a good illustration [Page 923] of how difficult it was to have any prejudices—racial, religious or otherwise—if you really knew people.
Marshal Stalin said he felt that this was very true.
After considerable discussion between the Prime Minister and Marshal Stalin as to English politics, in which the latter said he did not believe the Labor Party would ever be successful in forming a government in England, The President said that in his opinion any leader of a people must take care of their primary needs. He said he remembered when he first became President the United States was close to revolution because the people lacked food, clothing and shelter, but he had said, “If you elect me President I will give you these things”, and since then there was little problem in regard to social disorder in the United States.
The President then said he desired to propose a toast to the Prime Minister. He said that he personally had been twenty-eight years old when he entered political life, but even at that time Mr. Churchill had had long experience in the service of his country. Mr. Churchill had been in and out of the government for many, many years, and it was difficult to say whether he had been of more service to his country within the government or without. The President said that he personally felt that Mr. Churchill had been perhaps of even greater service when he was not in the government since he had forced the people to think.
The Prime Minister said that he would face difficult elections in the near future in England since he did not know what the Left would do.
Marshal Stalin said that he felt that Left and Right now were parliamentary terms. For example, under classical political concepts, Daladier, who was a radical socialist, had been more to the left than Mr. Churchill, yet Daladier had dissolved the trade unions in France, whereas Mr. Churchill had never molested them in England. He inquired who, then, could be considered more to the left?
The President said that in 1940 there had been eighteen political parties in France and that within one week he had had to deal with three different prime ministers in Prance. He said that when he had seen de Gaulle last summer he had asked him how this had happened in French political life, and de Gaulle replied that it was based on a series of combinations and compromises, but he intended to change all that.
The Prime Minister remarked that Marshal Stalin had a much easier political task since he only had one party to deal with.
Marshal Stalin replied that experience had shown one party was of great convenience to a leader of a state.
[Page 924]The Prime Minister said if he could get full agreement of all the British people it would greatly facilitate his task, but he must say that during the Greek crisis he had lost two votes in Parliament and the opposition had consisted of only eleven votes against him. He said he had accosted those Members of Parliament who had deserted him and had asked them to have the courage of their convictions. He added that they had been very unhappy because they had had this stand against the government. He concluded that he didn’t know what would be the result of the election in England but he knew he and Mr. Eden would continue to support the interests of Russia and the United States no matter who was in power.
The Prime Minister then remarked that although he had had great difficulty with Mr. Gallacher, the Communist member in the House of Commons, he nevertheless had written him a letter of sympathy when he lost his two foster children in the war. He added that he felt that British opposition to Communism was not based on any attachment to private property but to the old question of the individual versus the state. He said that in war the individual of necessity is subordinate to the state and that in England any man or woman between the ages of eighteen and sixty was subject to the government.
Marshal Stalin remarked that he did not believe the Labor Party could ever form a government in England. He asked the President whether there was any labor party in a political sense in the United States.
The President replied that labor was extremely powerful in the United States but there was no one specific party.
•••••••
Marshal Stalin then said he thought more time was needed to consider and finish the business of the conference.
The President answered that he had three Kings waiting for him in the Near East, including Ibn Saud.
•••••••
Marshal Stalin said the Jewish problem was a very difficult one— that they had tried to establish a national home for the Jews in Virovidzhan but that they had only stayed there two or three years and then scattered to the cities. He said the Jews were natural traders but much had been accomplished by putting small groups in some agricultural areas.
The President said he was a Zionist and asked if Marshal Stalin was one.
Marshal Stalin said he was one in principle but he recognized the difficulty.
[Page 925]During the course of the conversation, Marshal Stalin remarked that the Soviet Government would never have signed a treaty with the Germans in 19393 had it not been for Munich and the Polish-German treaty of 1934.4
Marshal Stalin came over and spoke to the President and said he did not think they could complete the work of the conference by three o’clock tomorrow.
The President replied that if necessary he would wait over until Monday, to which Marshal Stalin expressed gratification.
It was tentatively agreed that there would be a plenary session tomorrow at twelve noon, after which the Prime Minister and Marshal Stalin would lunch with the President.5
- The following
morning Stettinius sent this message to Hull (Defense Files,
Argonaut 143, February 11, 1945):
“‘We have missed you at our Conference and send you our affectionate greetings and wish for you a speedy recovery in order that we may all have the benefit of association with you again. Signed: Roosevelt, Stalin, Churchill, Molotov, Eden and Stettinius.’
“I was instructed to send the above message to you on behalf of the above who were guests of the Prime Minister at dinner this [last] evening.”
↩ - For the text, in English translation, of the treaty of non-aggression between Germany and the Soviet Union signed at Moscow August 23, 1939, see Nazi-Soviet Relations, 1939–1941, Department of State publication 3023, pp. 76–78.↩
- Presumably the declaration of non-aggression and understanding between Germany and Poland which was signed at Berlin January 26, 1934. For the text, in English translation, see British and Foreign State Papers, vol. cxxxvii, pp. 495–496.↩
- Stettinius (p. 206) says that it was during this dinner meeting that he informed Molotov and Eden of the choice of San Francisco as the site of the United Nations Conference scheduled to open on April 25, 1945.↩