U.S. State Department (January 7, 1944)
Prime Minister Churchill to President Roosevelt
London, 7 January 1944
Secret
No. 536
Prime Minister to President Roosevelt. Personal and most secret.
Bedell Smith and Devers came through here morning of 5th. Bedell told me that he and Montgomery are convinced that it is better to put in a much heavier and broader OVERLORD than to expand ANVIL above our pre-Tehran conception and that he is putting this to Eisenhower and your Chiefs of Staff…
It also seems to me from what I heard very probable that the Y Moon (see my immediately following) will be at the earliest practicable date. I do not see why we should resist this if the Commanders feel they have a better chance then. At Tehran, however, COS recommendation was Y1 or one day earlier which you and I agreed to express more agreeably as “During May.” In conversation with UJ we never mentioned such a date as May 5 or May 8 but always spoke to him around 20th. Neither did we at any time dwell upon the exact phase of the operation which should fall on any particular day. If now the Y date is accepted as final I do not feel that we shall in any way have broken faith with him. The operation will anyhow begin in May with feints and softening bombardments and I do not think UJ is the kind of man to be unreasonable over 48 hours.
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