The Grand Alliance (93 page)

The Soviet Government understands and appreciates the readiness of the British Government to make
partial compensation for the damage sustained by the
Soviet Union in case the Soviet vessels at Leningrad
should actually be destroyed. There could be no doubt
that such a course will be adopted should the necessity
arise. However, the responsibility for this damage
would not be Britain’s, but Germany’s. I think therefore
that the damage after the war should be made good at
the expense of Germany.

I sent the best answer I could to this message.

Prime

Minister

to

17 Sept. 41

Monsieur Stalin

Many thanks for your message. The Harriman
Mission has all arrived, and is working all day long with
Beaverbrook and his colleagues. The object is to
survey the whole field of resources so as to be able to
work out with you a definite programme of monthly
delivery by every possible route, and thus help repair
as far as possible losses of your munitions industries.

President Roosevelt’s idea is that this plan should
cover up till the end of June, but naturally we shall go
on with you till victory. I hope the conference may open
in Moscow on the 25th of this month, but no publicity
should be given till all are safely gathered. The routes
and method of travel will be signalled later.

2. I attach great importance to opening the through
route from Persian Gulf to Caspian, not only by railway,
but by a great motor road, in the making of which we
hope to enlist American energies and organisation.

Lord Beaverbrook will be able to explain the whole

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scheme of supply and transportation; he is on the
closest terms of friendship with Harriman.

3. All possible theatres in which we might effect
military cooperation with you have been examined by
the Staffs. The two flanks, north and south, certainly
present the most favourable opportunities. If we could
act successfully in Norway the attitude of Sweden
would be powerfully affected, but at the moment we
have neither the forces nor the shipping available for
this project. Again, in the south the great prize is
Turkey; if Turkey can be gained, another powerful army
will be available. Turkey would like to come with us, but
is afraid, not without reason. It may be that the promise
of considerable British forces and supplies of technical
material in which the Turks are deficient will exercise a
decisive influence upon them. We will study with you
any other form of useful aid, the sole object being to
bring the maximum force against the common enemy.

4. I entirely agree that the first source from which the
Russian Fleet should be replenished should be at the
expense of Germany. Victory will certainly give us
control of important German and Italian naval vessels,
and in our view these would be most suitable for
repairing losses to the Russian Fleet.

On October 25 I replied to the Ambassador about the fantastic proposals of twenty-five to thirty British divisions being landed at Archangel or Basra.

Prime Minister to Sir

25 Oct. 41

Stafford

Cripps

(Moscow)

You were of course right to say that the idea of
sending “twenty-five to thirty divisions to fight on the
Russian front” is a physical absurdity. It took eight
months to build up ten divisions in France, across the
Channel, when shipping was plentiful and U-boats few.

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570

It is with the greatest difficulty that we have managed to
send the 50th Division to the Middle East in the last six
months. We are now sending the 18th Division by
extraordinary measures. All our shipping is fully engaged, and any saving can only be made at the expense of our vital upkeep convoys to the Middle East or
of ships engaged in carrying Russian supplies. The
margin by which we live and make munitions of war has
only narrowly been maintained. Any troops sent to
Murmansk now would be frozen in darkness for the
winter.

2. Position on the southern flank is as follows:
Russians have five divisions in Persia, which we are
willing to relieve. Surely these divisions should defend
their own country before we choke one of the only
supply lines with the maintenance of our forces to the
northward. To put two fully armed British divisions from
here into the Caucasus or north of the Caspian would
take at least three months. They would then only be a
drop in the bucket.

Meanwhile the Beaverbrook-Harriman talks in London were completed, and on September 22 the Anglo-American Supply Mission set off in the cruiser
London
from Scapa Flow through the Arctic Sea to Archangel, and thence by air to Moscow. Much depended upon them. I furnished Lord Beaverbrook with general instructions, which were approved by my War Cabinet colleagues on the Defence Committee. This document, which is of importance, will be found among the Appendices.
3
In addition I gave Lord Beaverbrook the following letter to deliver personally to Stalin:

21 Sept. 1941

My dear Premier Stalin,

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The British and American Missions have now
started, and this letter will be presented to you by Lord
Beaverbrook. Lord Beaverbrook has the fullest confidence of the Cabinet, and is one of my oldest and most
intimate friends. He has established the closest
relations with Mr. Harriman, who is a remarkable
American, wholeheartedly devoted to the victory of the
common cause. They will lay before you all that we
have been able to arrange in much anxious consultation between Great Britain and the United States.

President Roosevelt has decided that our proposals
shall, in the first instance, deal with the monthly quotas
we shall send to you in the nine-months period from
October, 1941, to June, 1942, inclusive. You have the
right to know exactly what we can deliver month by
month, in order that you may handle your reserves to
the best advantage.

The American proposals have not yet gone beyond
the end of June, 1942, but I have no doubt that considerably larger quotas can be furnished by both countries
thereafter, and you may be sure we shall do our utmost
to repair as far as possible the grievous curtailments
which your war industries have suffered through the
Nazi invasion. I will not anticipate what Lord Beaverbrook will have to say upon this subject.

You will realise that the quotas up to the end of
June, 1942, are supplied almost entirely out of British
production, or production which the United States
would have given us under our own purchases or under
the Lend-Lease Bill. The United States were resolved
to give us virtually the whole of their exportable surplus,
and it is not easy for them within that time to open out
effectively new sources of supply. I am hopeful that a
further great impulse will be given to the production of
the United States, and that by 1943 the mighty industry
of America will be in full war swing. For our part, we
shall not only make substantially increased contributions from our own existing forecast production, but
also try to obtain from our people an extra further effort
to meet our common needs. You will understand
however that our Army and its supply which has been
planned is perhaps only one-fifth or one-sixth as large
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572

as yours or Germany’s. Our first duty and need is to
keep open the seas, and our second duty is to obtain
decisive superiority in the air. These have the first
claims upon the manpower of our forty-four million in
the British Islands. We can never hope to have an army
or army munitions industries comparable to those of the
great Continental military Powers. None the less, we
will do our utmost to aid you.

General Ismay, who is my personal representative
on the Chiefs of Staff Committee, and is thoroughly
acquainted with the whole field of our military policy, is
authorised to study with your commanders any plans
for practical co-operation which may suggest themselves.

If we can clear our western flank in Libya of the
enemy we shall have considerable forces, both air and
army, to co-operate upon the southern flank of the
Russian front.

It seems to me that the most speedy and effective
help would come if Turkey could be induced to resist a
German demand for the passage of troops, or, better
still, if she would enter the war on our side. You will, I
am sure, attach due weight to this.

I have always shared your sympathy for the Chinese
people in their struggle to defend their native land
against Japanese aggression. Naturally we do not want
to add Japan to the side of our foes, but the attitude of
the United States, resulting from my conference with
President Roosevelt, has already enforced a far more
sober view upon the Japanese Government. I made
haste to declare on behalf of His Majesty’s Government
that should the United States be involved in war with
Japan Great Britain would immediately range herself on
her side. I think that all our three countries should, as
far as possible, continue to give aid to China, and that
this may go to considerable lengths without provoking a
Japanese declaration of war.

There is no doubt that a long period of struggle and
suffering lies before our peoples, but I have great
hopes that the United States will enter the war as a
belligerent, and if so I cannot doubt that we have but to
endure to conquer.