Roosevelt Papera: Telegram
President Roosevelt to Prime Minister Churchill 1
priority
Number 676, Personal and Top Secret, from the President for the Prime Minister.
I am today sending to Harriman the following message in regard to our projected three party meeting with U. J.
Please let me have your opinion as to the possibilities of this plan from your point of view.
“If Stalin cannot manage to meet us in the Mediterranean I am prepared to go to the Crimea and have the meeting at Yalta which appears to be the best place available in the Black Sea having the best accommodations ashore and the most promising flying conditions.
We would arrive by plane from some Mediterranean port and would send in advance a naval vessel to Sevastopol to provide necessary service and living accommodations if it should be necessary for me to live on board ship.
I would plan to leave America very soon after the inauguration on a naval vessel. You will be informed later of a date of arrival that will be satisfactory to Churchill and to me. My party will be numerically equal to that which was present at Teheran, about 35 total.
I still hope the military situation will permit Marshal Stalin to meet us half way.”
- Sent to the United States Naval Attaché, London, via Navy channels.↩