Joseph E. Davies - The Second Mission To Moscow

The Second Mission To Moscow

In May 1943 Roosevelt sent Davies on a second Mission to Moscow. He was gone 27 days and traveled 25,779 miles, carrying a secret letter from the President to Stalin. Because of the war raging in Europe, Davies could not fly over Europe, and so flew from New York to Brazil, to Dakar; Luxor, Egypt; Baghdad, Iraq; Teheran, Iran; Kuibyshev, Russia; Stalingrad, Russia and on to Moscow. He returned to the States via Novosibirsk and Alaska.

FDR wanted to discuss matters with Stalin—one on one—and felt that setting up such a meeting could be done more easily through a mutual and trusted friend—Davies. In the letter, FDR was asking for a visit between himself and Stalin where they could talk over matters without restraint. It would only include an interpreter and stenographer. Prime Minister Churchill and Foreign Minister Eden had often met with Stalin and Molotov. FDR and Secretary Hull had not. Stalin agreed to a meeting in Fairbanks, Alaska on July 15 or August 15. He asked that Davies stress to FDR that Hitler was massing his armies for an all-out drive and that they needed more of everything through Lend-Lease.

Davies was surprised to find much the same hostility and what he regarded as prejudice in the Moscow Diplomatic Crops (toward the Russians) as when he was in Moscow between 1937-1938. He urged them that public criticism of America's ally (Russia) might be harmful to the war effort.