740.00119 PW/6–1845
No. 159
Memorandum by the Acting Secretary of State
Memorandum of Conversation
Subject: Appointment with the President, 9:30 a.m.
| Participants: | The President; |
| The Acting Secretary, Mr. Grew. |
I went to the President at 9:30 this morning and took up the following matters:
1. The President said that he had carefully considered yesterday the draft statement which I had given to Judge Rosenman calling on Japan for unconditional surrender to be considered for release at the moment of the announcement of the fall of Okinawa1 but that while he liked the idea he had decided to hold this up until it could be discussed at the Big Three meeting. I said to the President that I merely wished to square my own conscience at having omitted no recommendation which might conceivably result in the saving of the lives of [Page 178] thousands of our fighting men so long as we did not recede an inch from our objectives in rendering Japan powerless to threaten the peace in future. I wanted to see every appropriate step taken which might encourage a peace movement in Japan and while it was all guesswork as to whether such a statement would have that effect I nevertheless felt very strongly that something might be gained and nothing could be lost by such a step and in my opinion the sooner it was taken the better. The President having ruled against the step at this time there was of course nothing more to be done but I felt that this question should be kept prominently in mind. The President asked me to have the subject entered on the agenda for the Big Three meeting and I so informed Mr. Matthews. The President had before him the Secretary’s telegram No. 7 of June 15.2
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- For an account of Grew’s recommendations and consultations on this subject, see Grew, Turbulent Era, vol. ii, pp. 1421–1438.↩
- Document No. 153.↩