1943 Casablance Conference Showed Shakiness Of Alliance With Stalin
"On January 24, 1943, Franklin Roosevelt and Winston Churchill announced they had met in secret at Casablanca in Morocco for a week-long conference, code-named SYMBOL. Stalin had been on the original invitation list, but the Soviet armies were bearing the bulk of the fight against Hitler, and Stalin declined to attend. He was, nonetheless, very clear about what he wanted from his allies: an immediate Second Front against Hitler, which most Soviet and American strategists thought entailed a cross-Channel invasion of Europe.
"Although by January 1943, the Allies had secured North Africa, Great Britain and the United States had not been able to seriously divert Hitler’s attention from the Eastern Front, and some strategists feared that if Stalin was left to fight alone for too long, he might seek a separate peace. Roosevelt and the Joint Chiefs of Staff thought the urgency of relieving the pressure on the Soviets meant an invasion of France in 1943, just as they had contemplated a desperate invasion in 1942. Churchill and his advisers thought the contrary: any cross-Channel invasion in 1943 would prove disastrous; and to the disgust and, at times fury, of the American military, British strategy prevailed at Casablanca."
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