Jonathan Dimbleby

“the struggle for victory over Hitler hinged on getting men, weapons, fuel and food from Britain and the United States to every front line. For Dönitz, whose U-boats were attempting to sever the British lifeline across the Atlantic, it was a truth that gnawed at his very being.”
― Jonathan Dimbleby, The Battle of the Atlantic: How the Allies Won the War

“According to Eden’s personal secretary, Oliver Harvey, his master was ‘horrified’ by Churchill’s plan and tried to talk him out of it. He failed. In despair, he rang the US ambassador, John Winant, who, similarly taken aback, advised that such a visit would not be appropriate until the New Year at the earliest. Harvey too was appalled, noting, ‘I am aghast at the consequence of both [Churchill and Eden] being away at once. The British public will think quite rightly that they are mad.’ If Eden called off his Moscow mission, however, it would send the wrong message entirely to the Kremlin, since ‘it would be fatal to put off A.E.’s visit to Stalin to enable PM to visit Roosevelt. It would confirm all Stalin’s worst suspicions.’20 Eden persisted. He phoned the deputy prime minister, Clement Attlee, who agreed with him wholeheartedly and undertook to oppose the prime minister’s scheme at Cabinet. His objection had no effect: nothing would divert Churchill from his chosen course. When Cadogan spoke to him later that evening, to explain that Eden was ‘distressed’ at the idea of their both being out of the country at the same time, Churchill brushed him aside, saying, ‘That’s all right: that’ll work very well: I shall have Anthony where I want him.’21 Though he did not put it quite so bluntly when discussing this personally with Eden, Churchill left him in no doubt that ‘a complete understanding between Britain and the United States outweighed all else’.22 This conviction was reinforced by the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor and, according to the new CIGS, Brooke, the pressing need ‘to ensure that American help to this country does not dry up in consequence’.23 Eden’s opposition to Churchill’s visit had genuine diplomatic validity, but neither was he entirely disinterested, for, as Harvey put it, the prime ministerial trip would ‘take all the limelight off the Moscow visit’.24 The unfortunate Foreign Secretary was not only unwell but also disconsolate as HMS Kent set off into rising seas and darkening weather. The British party of Eden, Cadogan and Harvey, accompanied by Lieutenant General Sir Archibald Nye (the newly appointed Vice Chief of the Imperial General Staff) and a phalanx of officials, set foot on Russian soil on 13 December. Their arrival gave Cadogan (who was not a seasoned”
― Jonathan Dimbleby, Barbarossa: How Hitler Lost the War