The Pittsburgh Press (December 6, 1943)
Nazis reported massing near border of Turkey
Germans say President Inönü and aides have gone to Cairo to see Roosevelt, Churchill
By J. Edward Murray, United Press staff writer
London, England –
German troops are massing in Bulgaria near the Turkish border, a Stockholm dispatch said today as speculation mounted that the Roosevelt-Churchill-Stalin conference may bring a Balkan invasion and draw Turkey into the war.
The German movement toward the Turkish border began during the weekend and continued at a rapid rate, Hungarian circles in Stockholm said. A large troop concentration was reported at Haskovo in southeastern Bulgaria, while a Nazi motorized detachment and two cars of officers continued on to Svilengrad, only six miles west of the border, yesterday.
Trip to Cairo reported
The purported shifting of German troops coincided with a German radio report that President İsmet İnönü, Foreign Minister Numan Menemencioğlu and Marshal Çakmak of Turkey had gone to Cairo to meet President Roosevelt and Prime Minister Churchill, presumably to discuss their country’s position in the light of the Tehran Conference.
Allied and neutral sources have speculated ever since the tri-power conference at Moscow a month ago that the Allies might prevail upon Turkey at least to provide bases under the terms of her mutual aid pact with Britain for an Allied offensive in the Balkans, even if not actively entering the war.
Eisenhower has meeting
Speculation increased following disclosure that Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower, Supreme allied commander in the Mediterranean, had presided at a meeting of his command at Cairo about 10 days ago, after the Roosevelt-Churchill-Chiang Kai-shek meeting.
It was theorized that British and possibly U.S. troops might thrust across the Adriatic from bases in southern Italy, or move into the Aegean from Africa or the Levant. A Russian amphibious landing from the Black Sea might also be planned.
British Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden was believed to have given Menemencioğlu details of the Moscow Conference as they affected Turkey and the Turkish Minister later won his Parliament’s approval of his conduct of the negotiations.