Triumph and Tragedy (The Second World War) (111 page)

3. The Prime Minister realises that President Truman
would no doubt like to make the acquaintance of
Premier Stalin, the pleasure of which he has not
previously enjoyed. None of the Allies at these
meetings has sought to put the slightest restraint upon
the most free intercourse between the heads of
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Governments or between their Foreign Secretaries.

The Prime Minister has himself been looking forward to
making the personal acquaintance for the first time of
President Truman, and he has indulged the hope that
he might have some private talks with the President
before the general sittings commence. However, at
such meetings everything is perfectly free and the
principals meet together how they like, when they like,
and for as long as they like, and discuss any questions
that they may consider desirable. This does not of
course prevent certain lunches and dinners at which
the strong bonds of unity which have hitherto united the
three major Powers are vivified by agreeable
intercourse and often form the subject of congenial
toasts. The Prime Minister’s experience has been that
these matters work out quite easily on the spot.

4. It would of course be more convenient to the
Prime Minister if the meeting of the three major Powers
took place after July 5, when the British pollings will be
over. But he does not rate such a consideration as
comparable at all to the vital importance of having a
meeting at the earliest possible moment, before the
United States forces in Europe are to a large extent
dissolved. He would therefore be quite ready, if Premier
Stalin’s consent can be obtained, to meet as early as
June 15.

5. It must be remembered that Britain and the United
States are united at this time upon the same ideologies,
namely, freedom, and the principles set out in the
American Constitution and humbly reproduced with
modern variations in the Atlantic Charter. The Soviet
Government have a different philosophy, namely,
Communism, and use to the full the methods of police
government, which they are applying in every State
which has fallen a victim to their liberating arms. The
Prime Minister cannot readily bring himself to accept
the idea that the position of the United States is that
Britain and Soviet Russia are just two foreign Powers,
six of one and half a dozen of the other, with whom the
troubles of the late war have to be adjusted. Except in
so far as force is concerned, there is no equality
between right and wrong. The great causes and
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principles for which Britain and the United States have
suffered and triumphed are not mere matters of the
balance of power. They in fact involve the salvation of
the world.

6. The Prime Minister has for many years now gone
by striven night and day to obtain a real friendship
between the peoples of Russia and those of Great
Britain, and, as far as he was entitled to do so, of the
United States. It is his resolve to persevere against the
greatest difficulties in this endeavour. He does not by
any means despair of a happy solution conferring great
advantages upon Soviet Russia, and at the same time
securing the sovereign independence and domestic
liberties of the many States and nations which have
now been overrun by the Red Army. The freedom,
independence, and sovereignty of Poland was a matter
for which the British people went to war, ill-prepared as
they were. It has now become a matter of honour with
the nation and Empire, which is now better armed. The
rights of Czechoslovakia are very dear to the hearts of
the British people. The position of the Magyars in
Hungary has been maintained over many centuries and
many misfortunes, and must ever be regarded as a
precious European entity. Its submergence in the
Russian flood could not fail to be either the source of
future conflicts or the scene of a national obliteration
horrifying to every generous heart. Austria, with its
culture and its historic capital of Vienna, ought to be a
free centre for the life and progress of Europe.

7. The Balkan countries, which are the survivors of
so many centuries of war, have built up hard civilisa-tions of their own. Yugoslavia is at present dominated
by the Communist-trained leader Tito, whose power
has been mainly gained by the advances of the British
and American armies in Italy. Rumania and Bulgaria
are largely swamped by the fact of their proximity to
Soviet Russia and their having taken the wrong side in
several wars. Nevertheless these countries have a right
to live. As for Greece, by hard fighting by Greeks and
by the British Army the right has been obtained for the
Greek people to express at an early approaching
election, without fear of obstruction, on the basis of
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universal suffrage and secret ballot, their free,
unfettered choice alike of régime and Government.

8. The Prime Minister cannot feel it would be wise to
dismiss all these topics in the desire to placate the
imperialistic demands of Soviet Communist Russia.

Much as he hopes that a good, friendly, and lasting
arrangement may be made and that the World
Organisation will come into being and act with some
reality, the Prime Minister is sure that the great causes
involved in the above epitome of some of the European
relationships cannot be ignored. He therefore urges (a)
a meeting at the earliest moment, and (b) that the three
major Powers shall be invited thereto as equals. He
emphasises the fact that Great Britain would not be
able to attend any meeting of a different character, and
that of course the resulting controversy would compel
him to defend in public the policy to which His Majesty’s
Government is vowed.

The President received this note in a kindly and understanding spirit, and replied on May 29 that he was considering possible dates for the Triple Conference.

I was very glad to learn that all was well and that the justice of our view was not unrecognised by our cherished friends.

On May 27 Stalin suggested that “the Three” should meet in Berlin in “the very near future.” I replied that I should be very glad to meet him and the President in what was left of the city, and that I hoped this meeting would take place about the middle of June. I now received the following message:

Marshal

Stalin

to

30 May 45

Prime Minister

A few hours after I had received your telegram Mr.

Hopkins was with me, and told me that President
Truman thinks the most convenient date for the
meeting of the Three would be July 15. I have no
objections to that date if you also agree to it.

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I send you my best wishes.

About the same time as President Truman sent Mr. Davies to see me he had asked Harry Hopkins to go as his special envoy to Moscow to make another attempt to reach a working agreement on the Polish question. Although far from well, Hopkins, taking his bride with him, set out gallantly for Moscow. His friendship for Russia was well known, and he received a most friendly welcome. Certainly for the first time some progress was made. Stalin agreed to invite Mikolajczyk and two of his colleagues to Moscow from London for consultation, in conformity with our interpretation of the Yalta agreement. He also agreed to invite some important non-Lublin Poles from inside Poland.

“I feel,” said the President, “that this represents a very encouraging, positive step in the long-drawn-out Polish negotiations, and I hope that you will approve the list as agreed to in order that we may get on with this business as soon as possible.

“In regard to the arrested Polish leaders, most of whom are apparently charged only with operating illegal radio transmitters, Hopkins is pressing Stalin to grant amnesty to these men in order that consultations may be conducted in the most favourable atmosphere possible.

“I hope you will use your influence with Mikolajczyk and urge him to accept. I have asked Hopkins to remain in Moscow at least until I hear from you regarding this matter.”

We of course concurred in these proposals for what they were worth.

Prime

Minister

to

4 June 45

President Truman

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…. I agree with you that Hopkins’ devoted efforts
have produced a breaking of the deadlock. I am willing
that the invitation should be issued to the non-Lublin
Poles on that basis if nothing more can be gained at
this moment. I also agree that the question of the
fifteen or sixteen arrested Poles should not hamper the
opening of these discussions. We cannot however
cease our efforts on their behalf. I will therefore join
with you, either jointly or separately, in a message to
Stalin accepting the best that Hopkins can get, provided
of course that our Ambassadors are not debarred from
pressing for further improvements in the invitations
once conversations have begun again.

While it is prudent and right to act in this way at this
moment, I am sure you will agree with me that these
proposals are no advance on Yalta. They are an
advance upon the deadlock, but we ought by now,
according to Yalta and its spirit, to have had a
representative Polish Government formed. All we have
got is a certain number of concessions for outside
Poles to take part in preliminary discussions, out of
which some improvements in the Lublin Government
may be made. I cannot feel therefore that we can
regard this as more than a milestone in a long hill we
ought never to have been asked to climb. I think we
ought to guard against any newspaper assumptions
that the Polish problem has been solved or that the
difficulties between the Western democracies and the
Soviet Government on this matter have been more than
relieved. Renewed hope and not rejoicing is all we can
indulge in at the moment….

I sent Hopkins my congratulations. He replied next day:
Mr. Harry Hopkins

5 June 45

(Moscow) to Prime

Minister

Thanks so much for your nice personal message.

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I hope that you can agree to list as proposed and
will not make released prisoners [release of the sixteen
Polish prisoners] a condition to getting started with
consultations here. I am doing everything under
Heaven to get these people out of jug, but the more
important thing, it seems to me, is to get these Poles
together in Moscow right away.