Message to F. Roosevelt (Correspondence Vol. 2, No. 279)

I am in receipt of your message about the evacuation of former U.S. prisoners of war from Poland. With regard to your information about allegedly large numbers of sick and injured Americans in Poland or awaiting evacuation to Odessa, or who have not contacted the Soviet authorities, I must say that the information is inaccurate. Actually, apart from a certain number who are on their way to Odessa, there were only 17 sick U.S. servicemen on Polish soil as of March 16. I have today received a report which says that the 17 men will be flown to Odessa in a few days.
With reference to the request contained in your message I must say that if it concerned me personally I would be ready to give way even to the detriment of my own interests. But in the given instance the matter concerns the interests of Soviet armies at the front and of Soviet commanders who do not want to have around odd officers who, while having no relation to the military operations, need looking after, want all kinds of meetings and contacts, protection against possible acts of sabotage by German agents not yet ferreted out, and other things that divert the attention of the commanders and their subordinates from their direct duties. Our commanders bear full responsibility for the state of affairs at the front and in the immediate rear, and I do not see how I can restrict their rights to any extent.
I must also say that U.S. ex-prisoners of war liberated by the Red Army have been treated to good conditions in Soviet camps - better conditions than those afforded Soviet ex-prisoners of war in U.S. camps, where some of them were lodged with German war prisoners and were subjected to unfair treatment and unlawful persecutions, including beating, as has been communicated to the U.S. Government on more than

one occasion.
March 22, 1945