The Grand Alliance (127 page)

2. In view of above you should not offer ten
squadrons at present time. Everything is in flux with
United States supplies, and I cannot tell where we are
till I get there.

3. Hope you are better. We are having a jolly [sic]

time here. Will start for Washington Thursday.

And further, as I embarked:

Prime Minister to Mr.

12 Dec. 41

Eden (at sea)

The loss of the Prince of Wales and Repulse,togeth-er with United States losses at Pearl Harbour, gives
Japanese full battle-fleet command of Pacific. They can
attack with any force overseas at any point. Happily
area is so vast that the use of their power can only be
partial and limited. We think they will go for Philippines,
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Singapore, and the Burma Road. It will be many
months before effective superiority can be regained
through completion of British and American new battleships. The United States, under shock of Pacific disaster and war declarations, have embargoed everything
for the present. I hope to loosen this up, but in present
circumstances, with a Russian victory and our new
dangers, we cannot make any promises beyond our
agreed quota of supplies. You should point out what a
grievous drain the airplanes are to us, with all these
demands for fighters in the East. On the other hand,
accession of United States makes amends for all, and
with time and patience will give certain victory….

Am just off.

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13

A Voyage Amid World War

Our Voyage in the “Duke of York” — My Party —

Our Signals and Contacts with Home — Should
We Press the Soviets to Declare War on Japan?

— Mr. Eden’s Conversations with Stalin and
Molotov, December
16/18
— Stalin’s Views on the
Post-War Settlement — Soviet Claim to the Baltic
States — My Protests Are Supported by the
Cabinet — Further Moscow Conversations —

Russia and Japan — Friendly Parting — Our
Relations with Vichy: Blessing or Cursing — The
Japanese Attack on Hong Kong — Devoted
Resistance of the Garrison — Capitulation —

Japanese Landings in Malaya — My Telegram to
Wavell, December
12
— A Grave Strategic Issue

— Duff Cooper’s Advice and My Convictions —

Progress of the Desert Offensive — Rommel
Retreats to Agheila — The German Air Force
Returns to the Mediterranean — Anxieties About
United States Policy — Lord Beaverbrook’s
Optimism — Unfounded Fears.

M
ANY SERIOUS REASONS required my presence in London at this moment when so much was molten. I never had any doubt that a complete understanding between Britain and the United States outweighed all else, and that I must go to Washington at once with the strongest team of expert advisers who could be spared. It was thought too risky for us to go by air at this season in an unfavourable direction.

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Accordingly we travelled on the 12th to the Clyde. The
Prince of Wales
was no more.
The King George V
was watching the
Tirpitz.
The newborn
Duke of York
could carry us, and work herself up to full efficiency at the same time.

The principals of our party were Lord Beaverbrook, a member of the War Cabinet; Admiral Pound, First Sea Lord; Air-Marshal Portal, Chief of the Air Staff; and Field-Marshal Dill, who had now been succeeded by General Brooke as Chief of the Imperial General Staff. I was anxious that Brooke should remain in London in order to grip the tremendous problems that awaited him. In his place I invited Dill, who was still in the centre of our affairs, trusted and respected by all, to come with me to Washington. Here a new sphere was to open to him.

With me also came Sir Charles Wilson, who had during 1941 become my constant medical adviser. This was his first voyage with me, but afterwards he came on all the journeys. To his unfailing care I probably owe my life.

Although I could not persuade him to take my advice when he was ill, nor could he always count on my implicit obedience to all his instructions, we became devoted friends. Moreover, we both survived.

It was hoped to make the passage at an average of twenty knots in seven days, having regard to zigzags and détours to avoid the plotted U-boats. The Admiralty turned us down the Irish Channel into the Bay of Biscay. The weather was disagreeable. There was a heavy gale and a rough sea.

The sky was covered with patchy clouds. We had to cross the out-and-home U-boat stream from the Western French ports to their Atlantic hunting grounds. There were so many of them about that our captain was ordered by the Admiralty not to leave our flotilla behind us; but the flotilla could not make more than six knots in the heavy seas, and we paddled along at this pace round the South of Ireland

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for forty-eight hours. We passed within four hundred miles of Brest, and I could not help remembering how the
Prince
of Wales
and the
Repulse
had been destroyed by shore-based torpedo-aircraft attack the week before. The clouds had prevented all but an occasional plane of our air escort from joining us, but when I went on the bridge I saw a lot of unwelcome blue sky appearing. However, nothing happened, so all was well. The great ship with her attendant destroyers plodded on. But we became impatient with her slow speed. On the second night we approached the U-boat stream. Admiral Pound, who took the decision, said that we were more likely to ram a U-boat than to be torpedoed by one ourselves. The night was pitch-black. So we cast off our destroyers and ran through alone at the best speed possible in the continuing rough weather. We were battened down and great seas beat upon the decks. Lord Beaverbrook complained that he might as well have travelled in a submarine.

Our very large deciphering staff could of course receive by wireless a great deal of business. To a limited extent we could reply. When fresh escorts joined us from the Azores they could take in by daylight Morse signals from us in code, and then, dropping off a hundred miles or so, could transmit them without revealing our position. Still, there was a sense of radio claustrophobia – and we were in the midst of world war.

All our problems travelled with us, and my thoughts were with the Foreign Secretary, also at sea and hastening in the opposite direction. The most urgent question was our policy The Grand Alliance

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about asking the Soviet Government to declare war on Japan. I had already sent Mr. Eden the following telegram: Prime

Minister

to

12 Dec. 41

Foreign Secretary

Before you left you asked for views of Chiefs of Staff
on the question whether it would be to our advantage
for Russia to declare war on Japan. Chiefs of Staff
considered views arc as follows: Russian declaration of
war on Japan would be greatly to our advantage,
provided, but only provided, that the Russians are
confident that it would not impair their Western front
either now or next spring.

They then set forth in considerable detail the pros and cons.

On the balance they emphasised the prime importance of avoiding a Russian breakdown in the West.

I continued to the Foreign Secretary:
2. If your discussions lead you to the opinion that the
Russians would be prepared to declare war on Japan, it
is for consideration whether the exercise of any pressure required should be by the Americans rather than
ourselves.

As a postscript to him after his arrival in Moscow I added:
In view of evident strong wish of United States,
China, and I expect Australia, that Russia should come
in against Japan, you should not do anything to discourage a favourable movement if Stalin feels strong
enough to do so. We should not put undue pressure
upon him, considering how little we have been able to
contribute.

And the next day:

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It may well be that recent successes on the Russian front may make Stalin more willing to face a war with Japan. The situation is changing from day to day in our favour, and you must judge on the spot how far and how hard it is wise to press him.

During our voyage I received from Mr. Eden, soon at Moscow, a series of messages setting forth the Soviet ideas on other matters with which he had been confronted on arrival.

The substance of these messages is summarised in his own words in the full dispatch, dated January 5, 1942, which he wrote on his return:

5 Jan. 42

… At my first conversation with M. Stalin and M.

Molotov on December 16 M. Stalin set out in some
detail what he considered should be the post-war
territorial frontiers in Europe, and in particular his ideas
regarding the treatment of Germany. He proposed the
restoration of Austria as an independent state, the
detachment of the Rhineland from Prussia as an
independent state or a protectorate, and possibly the
constitution of an independent State of Bavaria. He
also proposed that East Prussia should be transferred
to Poland and the Sudetenland returned to Czechoslovakia. He suggested that Yugoslavia should be restored, and even receive certain additional territories
from Italy; that Albania should be reconstituted as an
independent state, and that Turkey should receive the
Dodecanese, with possible adjustments in favour of
Greece as regards islands in the Aegean important to
Greece. Turkey might also receive certain districts in
Bulgaria, and possibly also in Northern Syria. In general
the occupied countries, including Czechoslovakia and
Greece, should be restored to their pre-war frontiers,
and M. Stalin was prepared to support any special
arrangements for securing bases, etc., for the United
Kingdom in Western European countries – e.g., France,
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Belgium, the Netherlands, Norway, and Denmark. As
regards the special interests of the Soviet Union, M.

Stalin desired the restoration of the position in 1941,
prior to the German attack, in respect of the Baltic
States, Finland, and Bessarabia. The “Curzon Line”

should form the basis for the future Soviet-Polish
frontier, and Rumania should give special facilities for
bases, etc., to the Soviet Union, receiving compensation from territory now occupied by Hungary.

In the course of this first conversation M. Stalin
generally agreed with the principle of restitution in kind
by Germany to the occupied countries, more particularly in regard to machine tools, etc., and ruled out money
reparations as undesirable. He showed interest in a
post-war military alliance between the “democratic
countries,” and stated that the Soviet Union had no
objection to certain countries of Europe entering into a
federal relationship, it they so desired.