Office of the Historian

123 Harriman, W. Averell/74

Memorandum by the Under Secretary of State (Stettinius)64

[Washington,] May 23, 1944.

In talking to me yesterday afternoon before preparing to leave to return to his post, Ambassador Harriman said the President requested him to do the following:

1.
Tell Stalin the President is still hopeful that he can find a satisfactory solution to the Polish problem, that it will be kept out of [Page 874] “politics” and to express the hope that the Soviets would give the Poles “a break”.
2.
Discuss with Molotov the Finnish situation66 in an endeavor to ascertain if there is any other possible action which could be taken which has not already been attempted.

E[dward] S[tettinius]
  1. Addressed to the Director of the Office of European Affairs (Dunn) and the Deputy Director (Matthews).↩
  2. For correspondence regarding the failure of Finland to withdraw from the war with the Soviet Union, see vol. iii, pp. 556 ff.↩