When General Marshall Threaten To Abandon Churchill in 1942

[00:00:00]July 15th, 1942.

[00:00:03]The Pentagon, Washington, D.C.

[00:00:06]11:41 at night.

[00:00:08]Marshall had been at his desk since 5:00 in the morning.

[00:00:12]He had been at his desk for 18 hours because 18 hours was the kind of day the summer of 1942 required.

[00:00:20]The Pacific was a disaster managed one island at a time.

[00:00:24]North Africa was a debacle. The German summer offensive in Russia was producing casualties that made every other number in the war look manageable. And the strategic debate about what America was going to do in Europe in 1942 had been unresolved for 4 months.

[00:00:43]Unresolved was a professional word for something Marshall found personally intolerable.

[00:00:50]The British had said no.

[00:00:52]Not finally, not formally, but they had said no in the specific way that experienced coalition partners said no when they wanted to defer rather than refuse.

[00:01:03]They had expressed concern about timeline, about readiness, about the German defensive posture on the French coast, about the availability of landing craft, about the wisdom of committing to an operation that if it failed would set the war back 2 years.

[00:01:20]Every concern was legitimate. Every concern was also, in Marshall's judgment, a reason to delay indefinitely if indefinitely was where you were trying to go.

[00:01:31]He had submitted the American case 4 months earlier, the April memorandum, a comprehensive plan for a cross-channel operation in 1942 or 1943.

[00:01:44]Churchill had received it with warmth and apparent enthusiasm and had then spent 4 months finding reasons why 1942 was too soon and 1943 might also be complicated.

[00:01:57]The memo Marshall was writing at 11:41 was not the April memorandum. It was a different kind of document. It was the kind of document you wrote when you had spent four months watching the diplomatic softening of a military necessity and had decided softness was no longer the appropriate instrument.

[00:02:17]He wrote for 40 minutes. He wrote without aid or secretary, his own hand.

[00:02:24]He addressed it to the president, not to Churchill, to Roosevelt. Because what needed to be said needed to be said to the person who had the authority to require a decision, rather than the person who was managing the deferral.

[00:02:38]The memo was seven pages. It began with the military situation. Marshall was precise about this. He did not argue from emotion or from the accumulated frustration of four months of managed delay. He argued from the military position as it existed in July 1942.

[00:02:58]The Soviet Union was absorbing losses that the Soviet Union could not absorb indefinitely. German forces were in the Caucasus. German forces were at Stalingrad. If the Soviet front collapsed, Germany controlled the resources of the East and the war's duration extended by years in a direction that American production capacity could not resolve.

[00:03:22]The second German front was not a strategic preference. It was a military requirement. The question was when.

[00:03:31]The British argument was 1943 at the earliest, probably 1944.

[00:03:37]Marshall's argument was 1942 or the British needed to explain in writing, specifically and on the record, what conditions would produce a commitment to 1943.

[00:03:50]Not assurances, conditions. Specific, measurable, committed.

[00:03:56]The memo said that the pattern of the previous four months had produced neither a plan nor a condition for a plan. It had produced a rolling series of expressions of concern that deferred the decision without resolving it.

[00:04:10]Then it said something that Marshall had not put in writing before. It said that if the British government would not commit to a specific timeline and specific conditions for a cross-channel operation, the American government should reconsider its strategic priorities.

[00:04:27]Specifically, it should reconsider its Europe first commitment.

[00:04:32]The Pacific was a war in progress.

[00:04:34]American forces were fighting in the Pacific. If Europe was not going to be the theater where American power was decisively applied in the near term, the strategic logic of Europe first required reexamination.

[00:04:48]This was not a bluff. Marshall had been thinking about it for two weeks. He handed the memo to his aide at midnight.

[00:04:56]He said, "Get this to the president in the morning. Personal, not through the staff routing." He went home. For the first time in 18 hours, Roosevelt read the memo at 8:00 in the morning on July 16th. He read it twice. He read the final section three times. Then he called Harry Hopkins. Hopkins arrived within the hour. He read the memo. He set it down. He said, "He's threatening to pivot to the Pacific." Roosevelt said, "He's telling me the current situation is unresolvable through the current approach." Hopkins said, "Which is true." Roosevelt said, "Yes." Hopkins said, "The British aren't going to agree to 1942.

[00:05:42]Brooke has been telling Churchill it's not feasible since April." Roosevelt said, "I know."

[00:05:48]Hopkins said, "If we make the pivot Marshall is suggesting, we abandon Europe first. We give Germany time. We give Russia no relief."

[00:05:58]Roosevelt said, "I know that, too."

[00:06:01]Hopkins said, "So, what do you do with the memo?" Roosevelt said, "I use it."

[00:06:06]He said, "Marshall has given me an instrument. He's told Churchill through me that the current deferral strategy has consequences, that America doesn't have infinite patience for British strategic caution."

[00:06:21]He said, "I'm going to London." Hopkins said, "When?" Roosevelt said, "Next week, and I'm taking Marshall." He said, "Churchill needs to hear this from both of us in the same room." Roosevelt and Marshall arrived in London on July 18th.

[00:06:38]Churchill received them at Chequers, the country residence, the informal setting that Churchill used for conversations that required privacy and the specific atmosphere of a house rather than a government building.

[00:06:53]The first evening was social.

[00:06:55]Churchill's hospitality was genuine and elaborate, and the conversation ranged across everything except the specific question that had brought them there.

[00:07:05]Marshall found this professionally managed. He had been in Churchill's presence before, and he understood the social architecture. The warmth was real. It was also a medium for the strategic management of difficult conversations.

[00:07:21]The second day was different. They sat down in the library.

[00:07:26]Churchill, Roosevelt, Brooke, Marshall, Hopkins.

[00:07:31]Roosevelt spoke first. He described the American situation, the Pacific war, the pressure on the American public for visible results in a theater where American sailors were dying. The political difficulty of maintaining Europe first in the face of a European front that did not yet exist.

[00:07:51]He said, "Winston, I need something I can show the American people. A commitment, a timeline, something that allows me to tell them that the sacrifice they are making in the Pacific is the price of a decisive blow against the primary enemy in Europe." He said, "The sacrifice will be rewarded."

[00:08:11]Roosevelt said, "When?"

[00:08:14]The room was quiet.

[00:08:16]Roosevelt said, "I need a when."

[00:08:19]Churchill said, "The conditions for a successful cross-channel operation require I've read the conditions. I've been reading conditions for 4 months.

[00:08:28]I'm asking for a when."

[00:08:31]He said, "Winston, I need to be direct with you. General Marshall has advised me that the current strategic situation may require reconsideration of the Europe first priority."

[00:08:43]He said, "That reconsideration has consequences for this alliance that neither of us wants to address."

[00:08:50]He said, "I'm asking you to give me something that makes that reconsideration unnecessary." Brooke spoke before Churchill could respond. He said, "Mr. President, General Marshall, I want to address the cross-channel question specifically.

[00:09:07]He said, "The British military's assessment of a 1942 operation is that it cannot be executed successfully with the forces available and the German defensive posture as it currently stands.

[00:09:21]He said, "A failed cross-channel operation in 1942 does not set the war back. It ends the possibility of a successful operation until 1944 or 1945.

[00:09:36]The German response to a failed landing would produce coastal defenses that make a subsequent attempt significantly more costly.

[00:09:45]He said, "I understand the Soviet situation. I understand the political pressure. I understand that 4 months without a commitment is producing exactly the frustration that General Marshall has described.

[00:09:59]>> [snorts] >> He said, "What I cannot do is recommend an operation that I believe would fail."

[00:10:06]He said, "What I can offer is this."

[00:10:10]He described North Africa, Operation Torch, Anglo-American landings in French North Africa, a theater where the forces available were sufficient, where the German defensive posture was not at full strength, where a successful operation produced strategic benefits to the Mediterranean and the Italian campaign and the pressure on Germany from the south.

[00:10:36]He said, "North Africa does not replace France. It does not solve the Soviet situation directly, but it keeps the alliance fighting together. It produces results. It maintains the Europe first priority in a theater where Europe first can succeed in 1942."

[00:10:56]Marshall said, "North Africa does not relieve Soviet pressure."

[00:11:01]Brooke said, "Not directly, no."

[00:11:04]Marshall said, "A German front in France relieve Soviet pressure."

[00:11:09]Brooke said, "A failed German front in France produces no pressure on anyone and removes the possibility of a successful front for 2 years." He said, "I am not arguing for delay indefinitely. I am arguing for North Africa in 1942 and France in 1943 or 1944 with the forces and preparation that give us a reasonable chance.

[00:11:36]Marshall said, "What specific conditions produce the 1943 commitment?"

[00:11:42]Brooke said, "The conditions are the same ones I've been describing."

[00:11:47]Marshall said, "Specifically, in writing, signed." Marshall produced a document from his briefcase. It was not the July 15th memo to Roosevelt. It was a different document, shorter, five paragraphs.

[00:12:02]He placed it on the table.

[00:12:04]He said, "This is a draft conditions document for a 1943 cross-channel operation.

[00:12:12]It identifies six specific conditions.

[00:12:15]Each condition is measurable. Each has a target date for assessment. He said, "I am asking British military leadership to review these conditions and either agree that when they are met, a 1943 operation is committed, or identify additional conditions that they require."

[00:12:34]He said, "I am not asking for a commitment to 1943 today. I am asking for a commitment to the conditions that produce 1943."

[00:12:45]He said, "The distinction is this one.

[00:12:48]Conditions can be worked toward. Vague assurances cannot."

[00:12:53]He said, "Four months of vague assurances has produced exactly what you see in front of you."

[00:13:00]Brooke picked up the document. He read it.

[00:13:04]He passed it to Churchill.

[00:13:06]Churchill read it.

[00:13:07]He looked at Roosevelt.

[00:13:09]Roosevelt said, "I would like to see that document signed before we leave London."

[00:13:15]Churchill said, "You are asking me to commit to an invasion of France."

[00:13:20]Roosevelt said, "I am asking you to commit to the conditions under which you will commit to an invasion of France. He said, "The distinction is the same one Marshall described."

[00:13:32]He said, "Winston, the memo from Marshall that I am not showing you, but that you should know exists, contains a suggestion that I do not want to have to act on. I will not act on it if I leave London with something that means something."

[00:13:47]He said, "Help me leave London with something that means something." They negotiated for two days. The five-paragraph conditions document became a seven-paragraph conditions document after Brooke's staff identified two additional requirements.

[00:14:05]The target dates were adjusted. The language was refined.

[00:14:10]On July 20th, 1942, the document was signed.

[00:14:15]It was not called a commitment to a 1943 invasion of France. It was called the London Agreement on cross-channel operations. A working document describing the conditions that British military leadership assessed as necessary prerequisites for a successful major cross-channel operation and the timeline under which those conditions would be assessed.

[00:14:40]It was not the commitment Marshall wanted. It was closer to one than anything the previous four months had produced.

[00:14:48]Churchill signed. Brooke signed.

[00:14:51]Roosevelt and Marshall signed.

[00:14:54]The document was classified. It did not become public during the war.

[00:14:59]North Africa proceeded. Operation Torch launched in November 1942.

[00:15:05]It succeeded.

[00:15:06]The Italian campaign followed. It was brutal and slow and expensive.

[00:15:12]France came in June 1944.

[00:15:16]D-Day.

[00:15:17]Not 1943.

[00:15:20]The conditions document had included an assessment clause that British military leadership used to conclude in 1943 that the conditions for a 1943 operation were not fully met.

[00:15:34]Marshall had disagreed. He had been overruled.

[00:15:38]France was 1944 and not a day earlier.

[00:15:43]Whether the Soviet Union would have survived another year if France had been 1943 is a question that cannot be answered because France was not 1943.

[00:15:54]What can be answered is this. The July 15th memo produced the London meetings.

[00:16:00]The London meetings produced the conditions document. The conditions document produced a specific written framework that was the first written commitment of any kind from the British side to the cross-channel question.

[00:16:15]It was not sufficient. It was the most that existed. Marshall kept a copy of the July 15th memo in his personal files.

[00:16:25]He kept a copy of the London agreement.

[00:16:28]He kept them for the rest of his life.

[00:16:31]He was asked about the 1942 strategic debate in multiple interviews after the war.

[00:16:38]He was consistent in his description.

[00:16:41]He believed the British had delayed the cross-channel operation by at least a year beyond what was militarily feasible.

[00:16:49]He believed the delay had extended Soviet suffering unnecessarily.

[00:16:55]He believed the German fortification of the Atlantic Wall during the 1942-1943 period had made D-Day more costly than it needed to be.

[00:17:06]He said these things without accusation as professional assessments.

[00:17:12]He was asked once whether he blamed Churchill.

[00:17:15]He said, "Churchill was protecting his country. He had seen what the First World War cost Britain in France.

[00:17:24]He would not risk another Somme until he was certain the conditions for success existed."

[00:17:30]He said, "I understand that calculation.

[00:17:34]He said, "I did not agree with the timeline that calculation produced."

[00:17:39]He said, "We ended up in France in 1944.

[00:17:44]It worked. The war ended in 1945.

[00:17:48]He said, "Whether 1943 would have produced a different outcome is not something I can answer. He said, "I believed it would have. Brooke believed it would not."

[00:18:01]He said, "He turned out to be the more cautious man. Caution in warfare is sometimes correct."

[00:18:09]He said, "I have thought about it for 30 years.

[00:18:12]He said, "I still believe I was right about 1943.

[00:18:18]He said, "I acknowledge that believing you are right is not the same as being right."

[00:18:24]Brooke wrote about the 1942 debate extensively in his diary.

[00:18:30]He wrote that Marshall had been the most formidable military mind he had encountered in the war and the most difficult opponent in a strategic argument.

[00:18:40]He wrote, "Marshall argued from facts and timelines. He did not argue from emotion or nationalism.

[00:18:48]He saw a military problem and he proposed a military solution and he pursued it with a persistence that I found professionally exhausting.

[00:18:59]He wrote, "I believe I was correct that a 1942 or 1943 operation would have failed. I believe the conditions Marshall eventually accepted for 1944 produced the only timeline that could have worked.

[00:19:16]He wrote, "I have considered many times whether my belief is correct or whether I was more cautious than the situation required."

[00:19:25]He wrote, "I believe I was right. I acknowledge the acknowledgement is insufficient."

[00:19:32]He wrote, "Marshall believed he was right. He was the more aggressive man.

[00:19:38]In some wars, that is the determining quality."

[00:19:42]He wrote, "In this war, I believe patience determined more than aggression."

[00:19:48]He wrote, "We disagree. We will always disagree."

[00:19:52]He wrote, "The war is over. France was liberated. Germany was defeated."

[00:19:58]He wrote, "We achieved the same objective through different timelines."

[00:20:04]He wrote, "I do not know whose timeline was correct." He wrote, "I know which one we used."

[00:20:12]The July 15th memo is in the National Archives. The London Agreement is in the National Archives. They sit in folders, in boxes, on shelves.

[00:20:24]Two documents from a summer when a war's shape was being decided by men in rooms arguing about what was possible and when and at what cost.

[00:20:35]Neither man got exactly what he wanted.

[00:20:38]The war ended. That was the outcome both men had been working toward, not the timeline, not the specific sequence, the outcome. Germany defeated, Europe liberated, the alliance holding to the end.

[00:20:54]That was what the memo produced eventually through the long path of 1942 and 1943 and 1944 and the beaches of Normandy and everything that followed.

[00:21:08]The midnight memo and the London agreement and the argument that neither man fully won and the war that both men helped win.