Big Three to meet in Kaiser’s palace
Opening session set for tomorrow
By Merriman Smith, United Press staff writer
WITH PRESIDENT TRUMAN ABOARD USS AUGUSTA (UP, July 14) – The Big Three conference will begin Monday in the former Potsdam palace of Kaiser Wilhelm, Germany’s World War I leader, it was learned tonight as President Truman and his party neared Antwerp, Belgium.
Mr. Truman will step ashore at Antwerp tomorrow, ending his eight-day Atlantic trip. Then he will make a one-hour motor trip to Brussels, where he will board a plane for Potsdam.
First historic meeting
At Potsdam, a suburb of Berlin, Mr. Truman will live in an American compound about 10 minutes away by car from the site of the formal conference sessions.
He will sit down in the Kaiser’s palace Monday for his firs historic meeting with British Prime Minister Winston Churchill and Generalissimo Joseph Stalin – a conference which the President hopes will promote an early end to the Pacific War and mold the foundation of a lasting peace.
No formal ceremony
Mr. Truman goes to the conference armed with concrete assurance that the United States wants to help maintain international peace – an assurance which is expected to aid him considerably, as a bargaining power, in his dealings with the British and Russian leaders.
The President’s quarters during the parley will be a 30-room house once inhabited by a citizen of Berlin. The dwelling was stripped of its furnishings during the war, but the Russians have refurnished it.
Russian troops will patrol the entire conference area, including Soviet, British and American residential compounds, but U.S. troops will guard the Chief Executive’s quarters.
At Mr. Truman’s request, there will be no formal ceremonies when he lands tomorrow.
Dodge channel mines
The President spent most of today watching the convoy of seven British warships which chaperoned the USS Augusta up the English Channel.
The channel trip was not without danger. Lookouts spotted at least two loose mines before noon.
The British ships – the cruiser HMS Birmingham and six destroyers – met Mr. Truman’s two-cruiser task force early today as it entered British waters.
The approval which the Senate Foreign Relations Committee yesterday gave to the United Nations Charter drafted by the San Francisco Conference is expected to strengthen Mr. Truman’s hand considerably in his dealings with the British and Russian leaders.
The committee’s action, together with the prospect of ratification of the Charter by the full Senate about August 1, is regarded as assurance that this country now is prepared to help its Allies to keep peace throughout the world – by force, if necessary.
That assurance is expected to constitute a substantial bargaining power in the President’s talks with Mr. Churchill and Stalin.