860C.01/5–945: Telegram
The Secretary of State to the Acting Secretary of State
[Received May 9—9:01 p.m.]
9. It is proposed that Ambassadors Harriman and Clark Kerr proceed to London to explore in conversations with the Prime Minister and Mikolajczyk the possibility of agreeing directly upon a new provisional government of national unity based on agreement as to the actual persons making up the government and the cabinet positions they would occupy. It would, in any event, be useful to know what Mikolajczyk’s minimum requirements are. Harriman would report back to Washington, and, upon the basis of his reports, he would be given instructions concerning further conversations in Moscow. Harriman will discuss this more fully with you and the President.
In preliminary conversations here on the suggested talks in London, Eden seemed to be favorable, subject to the approval of the President and Prime Minister.
Please inform the President of the foregoing.
[For documentation during May 1945 with respect to the deadlock in the negotiations between the United States and the United Kingdom and the Soviet Union regarding the establishment of a Polish Provisional Government of National Unity as a factor in the convocation of a tripartite conference of the Heads of Government at Potsdam, see Foreign Relations, The Conference of Berlin (The Potsdam Conference) 1945, volume I, pages 3–20, passim.]