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{
    "localId": "4708719",
    "label": "Letter from Eleanor Roosevelt to Harry S. Truman, accompanied by a memo of conversation between Eleanor Roosevelt and Jean Monnet",
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    "id": "4708719",
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    "contentType": "document",
    "title": "Letter from Eleanor Roosevelt to Harry S. Truman, accompanied by a memo of conversation between Eleanor Roosevelt and Jean Monnet",
    "citationUrl": "https://catalog.archives.gov/id/4708719",
    "identifierLocal": "hst19510506",
    "collections": [
        "President's Secretary's Files (Truman Administration)",
        "Personal Files"
    ],
    "subjects": [
        "Monnet, Jean, 1888-",
        "Voyages and travels",
        "International relations"
    ],
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    "productionDates": [
        {
            "day": 6,
            "logicalDate": "1951-05-06",
            "month": 5,
            "year": 1951
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    "seq": 5,
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    "type": "document",
    "url": "https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/opastorage/live/19/7087/4708719/content/arcmedia/nlhst/eleanor/hst05-06-1951.pdf",
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    "ocrText": "Mrs. Franklin D. Roosevelt\nThe Park Sheraton Hotel\n202 Fifty Sixth Street West\nNew York 19, N.Y.\nGeneva\nMay 6, 1951\nDear Mr. President:\nThank you very much for your very kind\nletter. I do hope you will not bother to answer\nmy letters because I know how busy you are.\nI am enclosing this report of a conver-\nsation which I had with Mr. Jean Monnet. I thought\nMARRY ARCHIVES NATIONAL TRUMAN RECEIRDS AND LIBERTY\nSERVICE\nyou might be interested.\nU.S. GOVERN THE\nI will come to Washington to see you\nshortly after my return.\nVery cordially yours,\nBreran Rorsevela\nTRUMAN\nBARRY\nNATIONAL\nARCHIVES AND\nRECORDS\nLIBRARY\nU.S.\nSERVICE\"\nGOVERNMENT\nMr. Jean Monnet was kind enough to invite me, with my son, Elliott\nand his wife, to dine on Saturday night at his country home which is about\nthirty-five minutes out of Paris. He retires there every night. He\nseemed cheerful and relaxed and ready to talk.\nThe Far East is, of course, on everybody's mind and I was rather\ninterested in the things he said. He thinks France should give up\nIndo-China. If they did so, the expenses for re-armament at home could\nbe easily absorbed without making any great sacrifices in their own\nstandard of living. He does not think that anything of the kind should\nbe done in North Africa because France has been much longer in North\nAfrica, and in addition, it is right at their backdoor. Of course, if\nthe wave of nationalism succeeds, there is no assurance that it will\nnot spread. France has been so long in North Africa and accomplished\nso little in raising the standard of living and in giving the people\neducation that I do not know how long they can hope to keep their power\nunchallenged.\nIn Asia Mr. Monnet feels that all of us play into the hands of the\ncommunists. We should long ago have recognized the great movement for\nnationalism which is sweeping over that whole area and even though there\nwas infiltration by the communists and nationalism was used by them, we should\nnot be fighting against it.\nHe also said we should have offered our\nhelp in the economic field or in any field that they desired and cheerfully\nhave assured them that it was their business as to what kind of a govern-\nment they set up. He feels that because of the fact that Russia could\nnot supply the whole area with the things they need, like locomotives and\nmachinery, they would undoubtedly have turned to the west and we would\nhave had a better chance to keep them free from communist domination\nthan we have had in fighting them in a way which the communists have been\n- 2 -\nable to capitalize on by saying that we were fighting their desire for\nfreedom. He does not think they can possibly get on without help from\nWestern Europe and the United States, and he thinks as the hardships\ngrow greater, the communists will play more and more on the fact that\nwe are to blame. The bitterness which has been building up for a long\ntime, first because they have felt themselves treated as racial inferiors\nand then because they have been exploited colonially and by business groups\nin our country, will intensify instead of growing less.\nMr. Monnet was very guarded, of course, on what we were doing but we\nput the question bluntly as to whether he felt the United Nations should\nget out of Korea since he felt that the French should get out of Indo-\nChina. He said, no, that was quite a different situation, that the\nUnited Nations would have to stay until some solution was found, but he\nfelt we should try to hold the line rather than go forward to conquer the\nwhole area and that the effort to come to any agreement with the Chinese\nshould not be given up. I gather that he thought it would have been wiser\nif the United Nations had never committed itself in Korea, but having\ndone so, there was no turning back.\nMr. Monnet said he was not a pessimist in the present situation.\nBy that I gathered that he meant that he did not think the USSR would\nprovoke a war but he did say he felt she would continue to be as\nirritating as she possibly could be.\nIn view of Gromyko's outbursts I am wondering whether the USSR\nis not a little afraid that China may force her under their treaty agree-\nment to come to China's aid and whether the USSR is loathe to do this and\nis trying to warn us by their statements on Korea that this may happen.\nIf it does, it means total war.\nTROMAN\n- 3 -\n\"NATIONAL\nARCHIVES AND\nRECORDS\nLIBRARY\nSERVICE\"\nOn the other hand, Mr. Monnet seemed to feel GOVERNMENT China would not\ntry to draw the USSR into her own territory. Though their bonds with the\nUSSR might be close, he did not think they trusted them enough to want\ntheir military strength actually within their borders. He said it did\nnot make much difference to the Chinese if they have to send armies into\nKorea to be killed because man-power was the one thing they did not lack,\nand our \"meat grinder\" policy could be used to awaken their resentment\nagainst us and all the white peoples of the world so as to build up their\nown nationalist feeling.\nMr. Monnet is an able businessman and has probably saved France\nfinancially so I imagine his thinking carries some weight. He lived in China\nfor a short time and has a good many Chinese friends. He also, as you know,\nspent a good many years in America and speaks excellent English. He lives\nsimply and hates the city. Perhaps there is a peasant background. In any\ncase, he was close to Mr. Blum and is close to President Auriol and Mr.\nSchumann. I speak of Blum simply because Madame Blum was there, and she has\nalways been at President Auriol's when I have gone there \"en familee\". In\nspite of her husband's death, I think her thinking probably carries some\nweight with them all because of their affection for her husband and for her.\nCurious for a financier, almost a financial genius to have been such a close\nfriend of socialists.\nIn talking to some of the best informed Swiss people, namely, Professor\nRappard, I find there is a feeling that the USSR does not want war now, and\nI think they are going ahead here in business in a way which indicated that\nthey feel a certain amount of stability is to be expected for the next\nfew years."
}