George F. Kennan: An American Life (126 page)

43
GFK to Bullitt, April 4, 1944, Bullitt Papers, 30:15; GFK,
Memoirs,
I, 171–74. See also the documentation in
FRUS: 1944
, I, 207–9. The map containing the JCS proposal is in
ibid.,
facing p. 196.

44
Quoted in GFK handwritten memorandum, no date but probably March 1944, GFK Papers, Box 1R, “1944” folder. The Gibbon reference is from
Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire,
II, 373. Kennan’s airplane reading is confirmed in GFK to JLG, October 18, 1995, JLG Papers.

45
GFK handwritten memorandum, probably March 1944, GFK Papers, 231:12.

46
Ibid
.; GFK paper on “The Treatment of Germany,” enclosed in GFK to Bullitt, April 4, 1944, Bullitt Papers, 30:15; GFK to James W. Riddleberger, June 13, 1944, GFK Papers, 140:6. This memorandum is cited incorrectly in GFK,
Memoirs,
I
,
175–78, as dating from 1943.

47
GFK interview, August 25, 1982, pp. 11–12; Bohlen interview by Wright.

48
JEK unpublished memoir, JLG Papers; ASK to GFK, December 24, 1943, DSR-DF 1940–44, 123K/463.

49
Winant to State Department, January 17, 1944,
ibid.,
123K36/471; S. C. Jalecki memorandum, March 30, 1944,
ibid.,
“123Kennan, George F.” folder; GFK,
Memoirs,
I, 171.

50
GFK to Bullitt, April 23, 1944, Bullitt Papers, 30:12; GFK to Eugene Hotchkiss, April 18, 1944, GFK Papers, 140:6; GFK to ASK, April 4 and 24, 1944, DSR-DF 1940–44, 123K36/489 and 495. For the speculation about GFK’s ulcer, see Cumming interview, p. 2.

51
GFK to Follmer, May 14, 1944, GFK Papers, 140:6.

1
GFK to Eugene Hotchkiss, April 18, 1944, GFK Papers, 140:6; G. Howland Shaw to GFK, May 22, 1944, DSR-DF 1940–44, Box 474, 123K36/507.

2
The fullest biography of Harriman is Abramson,
Spanning the Century;
but see also Harriman and Abel,
Special Envoy
. The first Kennan’s biography is
E. H. Harriman: A Biography
.

3
Harriman interview, September 24, 1982, p. 1. See also Harriman and Abel,
Special Envoy,
p. 229n; and Bohlen,
Witness to History,
pp. 132–33, as well as the extensive correspondence regarding Kennan’s Moscow assignment in his State Department personnel file, DSR-DF 1940–44, 123K36/470–81.

4
GFK,
Memoirs,
I, 180–81, 233–34, GFK to Thomas A. Julian, March 31, 1965, GFK Papers, 58:4–8; Harriman interview, pp. 1–3; GFK interview, August 25, 1982, p. 10.

5
GFK remarks to the officer staff of the American legation in Lisbon, June 1944 [specific date not given], GFK Papers, 298:9.

6
GFK Diary, June 15, 1944; ASK to GFK, June 25, 1944, JEK Papers. See also GFK,
Memoirs,
I, 181.

7
Gibbon,
Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire,
III, 49. The Belisarius account is in
ibid.,
II, 559–61.

8
GFK Diary, June 15–18, 1944; GFK to ASK, June 21, 1944, GFK Papers, 23:10.

9
GFK,
Memoirs,
I, 181–85.

10
GFK Diary, June 23–25, 1944; Henderson interview, pp. 4–6.

11
GFK Diary, July 1, 1944.

12
Ibid
., July 31, 1944; GFK memorandum, “Russia—Seven Years After,” September 1944, in GFK,
Memoirs,
I, 504, 522.

13
“Post Report, American Embassy, Moscow, U.S.S.R.,” July 11, 1944, Department of State, Record Group 84, Moscow 1944, Box 30, “124—Post Report.” See also Abramson,
Spanning the Century,
pp. 351–52.

14
GFK to JKH, October 8 and November 18, 1944, GFK Papers, 23:10; ASK interview, September 8, 1983, p. 3; GFK and ASK interview, December 13, 1995, pp. 8–9; JEK to JLG, April 7, 2008, JLG Papers.

15
ASK to JKH, October 6, 12, and November 24, 1944, JEK Papers; John and Patricia Davies interview, December 7, 1982, p. 3.

16
Hessman interview, September 24, 1982, p. 2; Mautner interview, September 24, 1983, p. 1; and John and Patricia Davies interview, December 7, 1982, pp. 4–5. See also Roberts interview, pp. 5–6, and Roberts,
Dealing with Dictators
, p. 94.

17
ASK to JKH, November 24, 1944, JEK Papers. See also Newman,
Cold War Romance of Lillian Hellman and John Melby,
especially pp. 21, 33–34. Hellman’s own account is in her
Unfinished Woman,
pp. 125–65.

18
John Hersey to Frances Ann Hersey, December 25, 1944, Hersey Papers, Box 7. I am indebted to my Yale student Kimberly Chow for finding this letter.

19
GFK to JKH, October 8, 1944, GFK Papers, 23:10.

20
Kathleen Harriman to Mary Harriman, July 3, 1944, Harriman Papers, Box 173; GFK Diary, July 2, 1944; S. K. Tsarapkin to Molotov, July 7, 1944, Russian Federation Foreign Policy Archive, Molotov Fond, Opis 6, Papka 46, Delo 610, L 46; Meiklejohn Diary, July 3, 1944, Harriman Papers, Box 11.

21
GFK memorandum, “Comments on the Polish-Russian Question,” July 3, 1944, Department of State, Record Group 84, Moscow 1944, Box 39, “711–Poland” folder.

22
Harriman handwritten notes, July 3, 1944, Harriman Papers, Box 173. Roberts,
Stalin’s Wars,
pp. 31–117, provides a recent—if charitable—assessment of Stalin’s intentions. For the importance of the Atlantic Charter, see Gaddis,
United States and the Origins of the Cold War,
pp. 1–31.

23
Abramson,
Spanning the Century
, pp. 361–63; GFK,
Memoirs,
I, 207–8. The Soviet government finally admitted its responsibility for the Katyn murders in 1990.

24
Harriman handwritten notes, July 3, 1944. Harriman Papers, Box 173; Edward Page memorandum, Harriman-Molotov conversation, June 3, 1944, Department of State, Record Group 84, Moscow 1944, Box 39, “711—Poland” folder.

25
GFK to Harriman, undated but late July 1944, Harriman Papers, Box 173, “July 26–31, 1944” folder; GFK Diary, July 27 and August 1, 1944.

26
GFK diary, August 6, 1944; Harriman to Roosevelt, two cables, August 15, 1944, in
FRUS: 1944,
III, 1374–77; GFK,
Memoirs,
I, 210–11. Kennan erroneously recalls Harriman and Clark Kerr as having been received on this occasion by Stalin himself.

27
Ibid.,
p. 211; GFK interview, September 7, 1983, p. 18.

28
GFK to Harriman, September 18, 1944, GFK Papers, 140:6. GFK misdates this memorandum as December 16, 1944, in his
Memoirs,
I, 222.

29
GFK to Harriman, October 3, 1944, with Harriman annotation, Harriman Papers, Box 174; GFK interview, August 25, 1982, p. 19; Berlin interview, November 29, 1992, p. 1; Harriman to JLG, September 23, 1982, JLG Papers; Harriman interview, p. 5.

30
The full text, dated “September, 1944,” is in DSR-DF 1940–44, 861.00/2–1445, although the date stamp shows that it was not received in the department until February 1945. It also appears in GFK,
Memoirs,
I, 503–31; and excerpts were published in
FRUS: 1944,
IV, 902–14. GFK’s comments on the background of the paper are in a letter to R. Gordon Wasson, December 7, 1949, GFK Papers, 140:1; and in a note to Harriman’s aide, Robert Meiklejohn, attached to the copy in the Harry Hopkins Papers, Box 217, “1st Russia” folder. I am indebted to Vladimir Pechatnov for this last reference.

31
The actual figure, it is now clear, was closer to 27 million.

32
GFK,
Memoirs,
I, 230–31; GFK to Wasson, December 7, 1949, GFK Papers, 140:1. See also note 30.

33
GFK to JKH, January 25, 1945, GFK Papers, 28:10; Betty MacDonald,
Egg and I
(Philadelphia: Lippincott, 1945).

34
GFK to Bohlen, January 26, 1945, Bohlen Papers, Box 1, “Personal Correspondence, 1944–46,” National Archives; Hessman interview, September 24, 1982, pp. 2–3.

35
Bohlen’s undated reply, together with his comments on the Kennan letter, are in
Witness to History,
pp. 174–77. See also
ibid.,
pp. 208–9; Bohlen interview by Wright; and GFK interview, August 25, 1982, p. 8.

36
John and Patricia Davies interview, December 7, 1982, pp. 1–2, 12.

37
Sulzberger Diary, March 23, 1945, in Sulzberger,
Long Row of Candles,
p. 250; Mautner interview, p. 2; Roberts interview, p. 5; John Paton Davies interview, December 8, 1982, p. 1; Davies,
Dragon by the Tail
, p. 390.

38
Harriman to Hopkins, September 10, 1944, in
FRUS: 1944,
IV, 988; Harriman interview, p. 2. See also GFK,
Memoirs,
I, 221.

39
GFK to Louis Fischer, October 4, 1954, GFK Papers, 13:8. Harriman’s memorandum, drafted on April 10, 1945, is quoted in Miscamble,
From Roosevelt to Truman,
p. 83.

40
JEK to JLG, April 7, 2008, JLG Papers.

41
Bohlen notes, Truman-Harriman conversation, April 20, 1945, in
FRUS: 1945,
V, 232–33.

42
Bohlen notes, Truman-Molotov conversation, April 23, 1945,
ibid.,
pp. 256–58. See also Harriman and Abel,
Special Envoy
, pp. 453–54; and Miscamble,
From Roosevelt to Truman,
pp. 113–23.

43
Gaddis,
United States and the Origins of the Cold War,
pp. 205–15, 224–30; also MacLean,
Joseph E. Davies,
pp. 133–49.

44
GFK to State Department, April 20, 1945, Department of State, Record Group 84, Moscow Harriman Telegrams, Box 4, #111, OWI; GFK to State Department, April 23, 1945,
ibid.,
Box 1, #23 China; GFK to State Department, April 27 and 28, 1945,
ibid.,
Box 6, #155, Reparations Commission; GFK to State Department, April 30, 1945,
ibid.,
Box 1, #8 Austria; GFK to Elbridge Durbrow, May 4, 1945,
ibid.,
Box 5, #118 Poles; GFK to State Department, May 8, 1945,
ibid.,
Box 6, #161A Rumania. See also Roberts,
Dealing with Dictators
, pp. 85–86.

45
GFK,
Memoirs,
I, 240–41. See also C. L. Sulzberger, “Moscow Goes Wild over Joyful News,”
New York Times,
May 10, 1945.

46
Bullitt to Roosevelt, January 29, 1943, in Bullitt,
For the President,
pp. 576–90; Forrestal to Homer Ferguson, May 14, 1945, in Millis,
Forrestal Diaries,
p. 57; Churchill to Truman, May 12, 1945, quoted in Gilbert,
“Never Despair,”
p. 7.

47
“Russia’s International Position at the Close of the War with Germany,” May 1945, in GFK,
Memoirs,
I, 532–46.

48
Ibid.,
pp. 247, 251, 293; GFK interview, January 30, 1991, p. 5.

49
GFK,
Memoirs,
I, 271. GFK’s first request probably came in a meeting with Foreign Ministry official Semyon K. Tsarapkin on July 6, 1944, at which he mentioned the elder Kennan’s Siberian connection, as well as his popularity with the Russian revolutionaries of that era. See Tsarapkin to Molotov, July 7, 1944, Russian Federation Foreign Policy Archive, Molotov Fond, Opis 6, Papka 46, Delo 610, L 46.

50
“Trip to Novosibirsk and Stalinsk, June, 1945,” GFK Papers, 231:13. See also GFK,
Memoirs,
I, 271–75; GFK,
Sketches from a Life,
pp. 91–110. GFK’s postcard to JKH, dated June 18, 1945, is in the JEK Papers.

1
GFK to JKH, June 6, 1945, GFK Papers, 23:10. The Finnish legation rental agreement is summarized in GFK to State Department, April 26, 1945, Department of State, Record Group 84, Moscow Harriman Telegrams Box 3, #74 Housing. Kennan’s promotion is confirmed in Julius C. Holmes to GFK, June 1, 1945, DSR-DF 1945–49, Box 786, “123 Kennan” folder.

2
GFK interview, August 25, 1982, p. 9; Harriman interview, p. 1. See also GFK,
Memoirs,
I, 293.

3
Kennan’s name appeared in
The New York Times
only twelve times from the beginning of 1940 through the end of 1945, in each case in connection with stories on other subjects.

4
GFK,
Memoirs,
I, 256.

5
Ibid.,
pp. 212–13. Robert Meiklejohn’s diary for June 5, 1945, Harriman Papers, Box 11, contains a succinct summary of Kennan’s thinking at the time of the Hopkins visit.

6
Miscamble,
From Roosevelt to Truman,
pp. 125–71, provides a comprehensive account of Truman’s views and those of his key advisers during this period.

7
GFK to Byrnes, August 20, 1945, DSR-DF 1945–49, Box 786, “123 Kennan” folder; GFK to Matthews, August 21, 1945, GFK Papers, 140:5. For Kennan’s objections to the Potsdam agreements, see GFK,
Memoirs,
I, 258–66.

8
Roberts interview, pp. 13–14; GFK to JKH, January 25, 1945, GFK Papers, 23:10; GFK to Charles E. Bohlen, January 26, 1945, Bohlen Papers, Box 1, “Personal Correspondence,” National Archives.

9
ASK to GFK, July 29 and September 4, 1945, JEK Papers.

10
GFK Diary, “Journey to Leningrad and Helsinki, September, 1945,” in GFK,
Sketches from a Life,
pp. 113–16. See also GFK,
Memoirs,
I, 275–78, 281–83.

11
An American diplomat with long service in Moscow admitted to me in the mid-1980s that he dreamed regularly of Helsinki, especially Stockmann’s Department Store.

12
GFK to Harriman, July 25, 1945, Harriman Papers, Box 181.

13
GFK to State Department, July 11, 1945, Department of State, Record Group 84, Moscow Harriman Telegrams, Box 2, #35 Czechoslovakia; GFK to State Department, July 21, 1945,
ibid.,
Box 5, #119 Poles; GFK to State Department, July 21, 1945,
ibid.,
Box 5, #137 Press; GFK to Harriman, July 25, 1945,
ibid.,
Box 6, #167 Russia; GFK to State Department, August 2, 1945, in
FRUS: 1945,
VIII, 624.