| − | On [http://www.trumanlibrary.org/whistlestop/study_collections/coldwar/index.php?action=chrono February 4, 1945], Hiss accompanied [[FDR]] to his meeting with [[Joseph Stalin|Stalin]] and [[Winston Churchill|Churchill]] at [[Yalta conference|Yalta]], in [[Soviet]] [[Crimea]]. The Soviets bugged the U.S. quarters, and [https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-publications/csi-studies/studies/vol49no3/html_files/FDR_Teheran_12.htm listened avidly]. With less than three months to live, Roosevelt suffered "occasional blackouts of memory, and loss of capacity for mental concentration." According to one source, "At Yalta [Roosevelt] could neither think consecutively nor express himself coherently."<ref>William Henry Chamberlin, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=JGQhAAAAMAAJ&pgis=1 America's Second Crusade]'' (Regnery, 1950) ASIN 0865977070, p. 206. At Teheran, Roosevelt actually chose to stay in the Soviet embassy, because it had [http://www.britannica.com/bps/additionalcontent/18/22491229/The-Yalta-Myth larger quarters].</ref> | + | On New Year's Day, 1945, Stettinius told [[Harry Hopkins]] (whom [[Iskhak Akhmerov|Akhmerov]] called "the most important of all Soviet war-time agents in the United States," according to Gordievsky)<ref>Herbert Romerstein and Eric Breindel, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=mVpWH51F7toC The Venona Secrets: Exposing Soviet Espionage and America's Traitors]'' (Washington, DC: Regnery Publishing, 2001) ISBN 0895262258, p. 212; cf. Thomas Fleming, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=EyZ3AAAAMAAJ The New Dealers' War: Franklin D. Roosevelt and the War Within World War II]'' (Basic Books, 2001) ISBN 0465024645, pp. 320-321; Christopher Andrew and Vasili Mitrokhin, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=9TWUAQ7Xof8C The Sword and the Shield: The Mitrokhin Archive and the Secret History of the KGB'' (New York: Basic Books, 2000), ISBN 046500312, p. 111</ref> that he had a meeting scheduled for the next day with [[Franklin Roosevelt|Roosevelt]], to which he was to bring "people who would be involved in the forthcoming [[Yalta conference|conference" at Yalta]], in [[Soviet]] [[Crimea]]. According to the Secretary, [[FDR]] "did not want to have anyone accompany him in an advisory capacity, but he felt Messers. Bowman and [http://images.library.wisc.edu/FRUS/EFacs/1945/XL/0525.gif Alger Hiss ought to go]." "Bowman" was Isaiah Bowman, the president of Johns Hopkins University [http://www.jhu.edu/~jhumag/0900web/red.html who hired] [[Owen Lattimore]] ("a conscious articulate instrument of [ the Soviet conspiracy]" according to the [[Senate Judiciary Committee]]),<ref>Senate Judiciary Committee, Report: [http://ia360610.us.archive.org/0/items/instituteofpacif1952unit/instituteofpacif1952unit_bw.pdf Institute of Pacific Relations] (Washington: Government Printing Office, 1952), pp. 214-218 (PDF pp. 222-226)</ref> whose "intimate friend and patron at the [[White House]]" was [http://www.salon.com/news/col/horo/1999/12/06/weisberg/index3.html Soviet spy] [[Lauchlin Currie]]. |
| | Hiss served as [https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-publications/csi-studies/studies/vol48no4/alger_hiss.html aide to] [[Secretary of State]] [http://history.state.gov/departmenthistory/people/stettinius-edward-reilly Edward R. Stettinius, Jr.], who was considered in some quarters to be "not very bright," according to Ambassador Ellis Briggs.<ref>Ellis Briggs, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=2pflY3LYw88C Proud Public Servant: The Memoirs of a Career Ambassador]'' (Kent State University Press, 1998) ISBN 0873385888, p. 197</ref> State Department [http://pqasb.pqarchiver.com/washingtonpost/access/468607241.html?dids=468607241:468607241&FMT=ABS&FMTS=ABS:FT chief of security and consular affairs] Samuel D. Boykin agreed that Stettinius "was not brilliant." But, he added, the Secretary had the ability to utilize [http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/r?ammem/mfdip:@field(DOCID+mfdip2004boy03) "other people's brains"]. Among those whose brains Stettinius had the ability to use was his [http://www.johnearlhaynes.org/page63.html aide], the [http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/hiss/pumpkinp.html brilliant] Alger Hiss. According to [http://www.trumanlibrary.org/hstpaper/panuchja.htm J. Anthony Panuch], Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Administration, "Hiss exercises [http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/svengali Svengali]-like influence over the mental processes of Junior Stettinius."<ref>Panuch to Russell, March 7, 1946, Subcommittee to Investigate the Administration of the Internal Security Act and Other Internal Security Laws, Committee on the Judiciary, United States Senate, Eighty-Third Congress, First Session, June 25, 1953 [http://ia311318.us.archive.org/0/items/interlockingsubv13unit/interlockingsubv13unit_bw.pdf Interlocking Subversion in Government Departments, Part 13] (Washington: U. S. Government Printing Office, 1953), p. 853. (Cf. Louis Francis Budenz, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=IkqboMAiCkkC The Techniques of Communism]'' (New York: Ayer Publishing, 1977) ISBN 0405099428, p. 287) Dean Acheson subsequently forced Panuch, not Hiss, out of the State Department. (Subcommittee on Internal Security, Committee on the Judiciary, U. S. Senate [http://ia360635.us.archive.org/3/items/interlockingsubv1953unit/interlockingsubv1953unit_bw.pdf Interlocking Subversion in Government Departments] [Washington: U. S. Government Printing Office, 1953], pp. 9-10)</ref> Indeed, Stettinius gave Hiss control over [[FDR]]'s access to information, directing that "all memoranda for the President on topics to be discussed at the Meeting of the Big Three should be [http://digicoll.library.wisc.edu/cgi-bin/FRUS/FRUS-idx?type=goto&id=FRUS.FRUS1945&page=42&isize=XL in the hands of Mr. Alger Hiss] not later than Monday, January 15."<ref>Rothwell to Rockefeller, January 10, 1945, United States Department of State, ''[http://digicoll.library.wisc.edu/cgi-bin/FRUS/FRUS-idx?type=header&id=FRUS.FRUS1945 Foreign Relations of the United States. Conferences at Malta and Yalta, 1945]'' (Washington, DC: United States Government Printing Office, 1945), [http://digicoll.library.wisc.edu/cgi-bin/FRUS/FRUS-idx?type=turn&id=FRUS.FRUS1945&entity=FRUS.FRUS1945.p0124&isize=XL&q1=January%2010,%201945 p. 42], cf. [http://digicoll.library.wisc.edu/cgi-bin/FRUS/FRUS-idx?type=goto&id=FRUS.FRUS1945&page=441&isize=XL p. 441] (University of Wisconsin Digital Collections)</ref> | | Hiss served as [https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-publications/csi-studies/studies/vol48no4/alger_hiss.html aide to] [[Secretary of State]] [http://history.state.gov/departmenthistory/people/stettinius-edward-reilly Edward R. Stettinius, Jr.], who was considered in some quarters to be "not very bright," according to Ambassador Ellis Briggs.<ref>Ellis Briggs, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=2pflY3LYw88C Proud Public Servant: The Memoirs of a Career Ambassador]'' (Kent State University Press, 1998) ISBN 0873385888, p. 197</ref> State Department [http://pqasb.pqarchiver.com/washingtonpost/access/468607241.html?dids=468607241:468607241&FMT=ABS&FMTS=ABS:FT chief of security and consular affairs] Samuel D. Boykin agreed that Stettinius "was not brilliant." But, he added, the Secretary had the ability to utilize [http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/r?ammem/mfdip:@field(DOCID+mfdip2004boy03) "other people's brains"]. Among those whose brains Stettinius had the ability to use was his [http://www.johnearlhaynes.org/page63.html aide], the [http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/hiss/pumpkinp.html brilliant] Alger Hiss. According to [http://www.trumanlibrary.org/hstpaper/panuchja.htm J. Anthony Panuch], Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Administration, "Hiss exercises [http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/svengali Svengali]-like influence over the mental processes of Junior Stettinius."<ref>Panuch to Russell, March 7, 1946, Subcommittee to Investigate the Administration of the Internal Security Act and Other Internal Security Laws, Committee on the Judiciary, United States Senate, Eighty-Third Congress, First Session, June 25, 1953 [http://ia311318.us.archive.org/0/items/interlockingsubv13unit/interlockingsubv13unit_bw.pdf Interlocking Subversion in Government Departments, Part 13] (Washington: U. S. Government Printing Office, 1953), p. 853. (Cf. Louis Francis Budenz, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=IkqboMAiCkkC The Techniques of Communism]'' (New York: Ayer Publishing, 1977) ISBN 0405099428, p. 287) Dean Acheson subsequently forced Panuch, not Hiss, out of the State Department. (Subcommittee on Internal Security, Committee on the Judiciary, U. S. Senate [http://ia360635.us.archive.org/3/items/interlockingsubv1953unit/interlockingsubv1953unit_bw.pdf Interlocking Subversion in Government Departments] [Washington: U. S. Government Printing Office, 1953], pp. 9-10)</ref> Indeed, Stettinius gave Hiss control over [[FDR]]'s access to information, directing that "all memoranda for the President on topics to be discussed at the Meeting of the Big Three should be [http://digicoll.library.wisc.edu/cgi-bin/FRUS/FRUS-idx?type=goto&id=FRUS.FRUS1945&page=42&isize=XL in the hands of Mr. Alger Hiss] not later than Monday, January 15."<ref>Rothwell to Rockefeller, January 10, 1945, United States Department of State, ''[http://digicoll.library.wisc.edu/cgi-bin/FRUS/FRUS-idx?type=header&id=FRUS.FRUS1945 Foreign Relations of the United States. Conferences at Malta and Yalta, 1945]'' (Washington, DC: United States Government Printing Office, 1945), [http://digicoll.library.wisc.edu/cgi-bin/FRUS/FRUS-idx?type=turn&id=FRUS.FRUS1945&entity=FRUS.FRUS1945.p0124&isize=XL&q1=January%2010,%201945 p. 42], cf. [http://digicoll.library.wisc.edu/cgi-bin/FRUS/FRUS-idx?type=goto&id=FRUS.FRUS1945&page=441&isize=XL p. 441] (University of Wisconsin Digital Collections)</ref> |