[Annex]
Memorandum of Trans-Atlantic Telephone
Conversation Between the Chief of Staff of the United States
Army (Marshall), in Washington, and the Ambassador in the United Kingdom
(Winant), in
London
Marshall: Yes, Mr. Ambassador, this is
General Marshall.
Winant: This is Winant, General. I wanted
to talk to you about a matter that has to do with the unconditional
surrender terms.
[Page 224]
Marshall: Yes.
Winant: You remember that when you were
here with the Chiefs of Staff we went over those terms. I am calling
you today because I thought that you were the only one whom I could
catch at the Pentagon Building. I sent over the Military Advisors to
the European Advisory Commission to see General Eisenhower and
General Smith41 this past week, and they have
returned, and I think you know about the Bern incident.42
Marshall: Yes, the Bern; I know that.
Winant: Just at that time, Sir William
Strang, who represents the British on the European Advisory
Commission, introduced a paper which suggested that we should be
prepared to issue a proclamation to take the place of the
unconditional surrender terms, provided there was no German
political authority or military authority in Germany to agree to
surrender. Unfortunately in that paper Strang did not use, or the
British did not use the phrase “unconditional surrender”. They also
so changed the unconditional surrender terms as to include other
matters on which we had not come to complete agreement. That added
to a feeling of distrust on the part of the Russians, and they felt
that we meant to change our general policy.
Marshall: That we meant to change our
general policy. They, being the Russians?
Winant: Yes. That they thought that the
British meant to change their general policy. For that reason I sent
a message to the State Department explaining the situation, and I
got a reply from them quoting a message to me from the President. It
was a single sentence. It reads as follows: “I do not wish any
document or proposal changing the unconditional surrender
terms.”
Marshall: I have that.
Winant. In talking with Ambassador Gusev,
the Russian Ambassador, I had previously explained that the United
States had no intention of changing the unconditional surrender
terms. All military advisors who have been talking with General
Eisenhower and General Smith. …
Marshall: All military authorities who
have been talking with General Eisenhower and General
Smith------
Winant: and with General Smith tell me
that they believe that we should get agreement within the European
Advisory Commission
[Page 225]
with
the British, the Russians and the French, that if conditions are
such that there is no political or military authority in Germany to
accept the responsibility of surrender, we should be in a position
to issue a proclamation on which all are agreed, calling for, or
rather, declaring an unconditional surrender. The urgency of this
matter is from a negotiation point of view, and not from an
immediate military operational point of view. If there are changes,
to be made in the unconditional surrender terms, we want to keep
them to a minimum. The details of changes in bringing the
unconditional surrender terms document into alignment with a
proclamation document I shall forward to the Department of State. I
wanted to talk to you only on the changes in substance. One of those
changes will be the following:
“And Germany having been rendered powerless to continue organized
resistance.”
That is one of the additions that we would make to the preamble. And
then there is another substitute [substantive?] change. It’s to be added the end of Article
I, the following:
“Further resistance to the Forces of the United Nations or failure to
comply with such requirements or orders will be considered as
violations of the laws of war and will be dealt with
accordingly.”
Now it is our idea that this document should be issued by the four
governments after consultation with and after attaining the consent
of the Soviet Supreme Command and SHAEF.
Marshall: Are you making a distinction
there between the Soviet Government and the Soviet Supreme
Command?
Winant: Yes, I am.
Marshall: All right.
Winant: The document should not be issued
in our opinion until these two Supreme Commanders have agreed that
the military situation permits. The document calls for “complete
defeat”. If you issue the document, before organized resistance was
destroyed, we believe it would have a bad effect on the morale of
our troops and the whole … on morale at home, and it might also
affect war production at home. All three of these. The reactions
would be equally true in Great Britain. I want to tell you what my
problem is. All I have to date is the President’s direction to me,
stating: “I do not wish any document or proposal changing the
unconditional surrender terms.” What I would like to do is to follow
the recommendations, the suggestions from SHAEF that I negotiate a
proclamation document in line with the unconditional surrender terms
already agreed upon which were recommended by the European Advisory
Commission and accepted by the three governments. The Russians, the
British and ourselves. Now, we also are instructed to include the
French
[Page 226]
Republic and we
have got agreement so far as the amendment of unconditional
surrender terms are concerned. Therefore, I would negotiate to work
out a proclamation calling for the declaring unconditional surrender
with the three governments, namely, the Russians, the British and
the French. I would like permission to do that because I do not want
to bring the matter forward until I have clearance from home.42a
Washington: General Marshall has gone and
he wanted to know if there was anything further. He said he had gone
along to take care of what you had already told him.
Winant: I want to ask one other thing. And
I will address them to General Marshall if I may.
Washington: All right. Fine.
Winant: I would also like you to do what
you could to expedite agreement on the French zone of occupation in
Germany and the Austrian agreement which are before the European
Advisory Commission, on zoning and control. We shall forward
recommendations and these questions over the weekend. Did the
General understand-------------
Washington: He understood perfectly, Mr.
Ambassador. He said he got all of that information and we are giving
him a copy of it and he said he was leaving and he was going to go
to work on the problem right away.
Winant: I understand. I felt that he would
be more familiar with it than anyone I could talk with and that more
than anyone else he would realize the significance of it.
Washington: Certainly.
Winant: Therefore, I thought it was proper
to talk with him.
Washington: Yessir, he waited here about
five minutes but we hadn’t any prediction whether it would be five
minutes or half an hour before the circuit would be back in.
Winant: Will you thank him for me.
Washington: I will thank him, yes, sir.
And that is everything now you have?
Winant: That is right.
Washington: Because he said anything else
that you had to just give us and we would take it right up to
him.
Winant: All right. Thank you.
Washington: We have that. Thank you very
much.
