The Last 100 Days

by David B. Woolner

  Yet FDR pressed on, driven by his faith in his persuasiveness and by the conviction, as he expressed to Chaim Weizmann in March 1944, that in the end “full justice will be done to those seeking a Jewish National Home, for which our Government and the American people have always had the deepest sympathy.” Armed with the maps that Stettinius supplied him, FDR went to sleep on board the Quincy on the night of February 12, 1945, in a hopeful mood, not knowing that the next two days would be among the most fascinating and frustrating of his entire twelve years in office.27

  Chapter 11

  Failure at Bitter Lake

  BECAUSE THE QUINCY WAS MOORED IN EGYPTIAN WATERS, DIPLOMATIC protocol dictated that FDR’s first caller on the morning of Tuesday, February 13, 1945, was that nation’s young King Farouk, a ruler whose lavish lifestyle and ambivalent relationship with the British had made him a somewhat controversial figure during the war. Though this visit was not supposed to amount to more than a courtesy call, the two men seemed to enjoy each other’s company as they sat on the deck under a bright but cool sky. They talked about cotton and trade, and about American tourism, which FDR predicted would explode after the war, necessitating an increase in air travel to the Nile region. After a leisurely lunch of American-style fried chicken and a tour of the ship, the king departed at 3:30 p.m.1

  In the two hours that followed King Farouk’s departure, FDR worked on his correspondence and took a few moments to review the briefing materials the State Department had prepared in advance of his next visitor, Emperor Haile Selassie of Ethiopia. Selassie was catapulted to fame when he went before the League of Nations to plead for international support in the wake of Italy’s unprovoked attack on Abyssinia in the fall of 1935; his petitions—though they largely fell on deaf ears—represented the first real test of the world body. FDR had been at sea on a four-week fishing cruise off the coast of California when word of the Italian assault reached him, and although the conflict was confined to the Horn of Africa, the tensions it aroused among the major powers led to fears that war might break out in Europe. As the crisis dragged on, it became clear that the League would not be able to act with the decisiveness needed to meet the emergency. FDR, Admiral Wilson Brown later recalled, “had an uninterrupted month to study what was going on, and how aggressors might be opposed more effectively by world forces in the future”—a critical period in what Brown called “the education of Franklin Roosevelt.”2

  The first thing that struck FDR as he watched Selassie being piped on board the Quincy was his small stature. Yet even though the emperor stood no more than five feet three inches tall, he possessed a quiet, dignified manner that made quite an impression on all who witnessed his arrival. For the first half hour or so, the two leaders exchanged pleasantries, conversing entirely in French, without the aid of an interpreter. After tea—and with the emperor switching to his native Amharic—the two men touched on territorial and economic concerns that had long plagued Ethiopia, including the country’s need for a port, in either Djibouti or Eritrea, and the possibility that an American company might build a railroad to the latter, which FDR assured the emperor would not cost too much.3

  They also discussed Italian Somaliland, the territory whose disputed borders had been used as the pretext for Mussolini’s brutal incursion in 1935. As the conversation drew to a close, FDR invited the emperor to send a delegate to the San Francisco conference so that Ethiopia might be represented as one of the founding members of the United Nations—a suggestion the emperor appreciated immensely. After an exchange of gifts, Selassie left. Like many leaders in what we today call the developing world, he never forgot the gesture accorded to him by the US president; on his first official trip to the United States years later, he traveled to Hyde Park to lay a wreath on the grave of Franklin D. Roosevelt.4

  The vibrant political and cultural exchanges that FDR had engaged in during his first full day on the Great Bitter Lake had certainly been memorable. But as much as he enjoyed meeting King Farouk and Emperor Selassie, these encounters would pale in comparison to what the president and the men of “his ship” would experience the next morning when the destroyer, the USS Murphy, hove to alongside the Quincy.

  At 1,620 tons, compared to the Quincy’s 13,600, the Murphy seemed almost tiny. Sprouting a green shamrock welded to its funnel, the latter had a well-deserved reputation as a “good” and lucky vessel. Few destroyers had in fact seen more action than the Murphy, from convoy duty in the treacherous North Atlantic to active participation in four of the most important amphibious landings of the European and Mediterranean theaters during the war, including operations Torch, Husky, Overlord, and Anvil. But of all the Murphy’s wartime assignments, nothing compared with the unusual operational orders the ship’s captain received on the evening of February 9, 1945. Having accompanied the Quincy on its historic voyage across the Atlantic, and now moored with the latter in the eastern stretches of the Great Bitter Lake, the Murphy was to proceed “with upmost secrecy and dispatch” south through the remaining portion of the Suez Canal to the Arabian port of Jidda on the Red Sea, where it would embark King Ibn Saud and return him immediately to the Quincy for a conference with the president of the United States.5

  Ibn Saud had never before left his kingdom, and given the size of his entourage, and the myriad supplies and other requirements, transporting him from Jidda to the Great Bitter Lake proved a most challenging experience for the captain and crew of the Murphy. When the ship arrived in Jidda on February 12, the Saudi prime minister, who supervised such matters, first indicated that the king could not be expected to travel with fewer than two hundred followers! Then there was the problem of the king’s proposed accommodations, the Murphy’s commodore’s stateroom, which, with its spartan bunk, desk, and private bath, was deemed “wholly unacceptable.” So, too, were the Murphy’s steel decks, as the king suffered from arthritis and could not possibly walk on such a hard surface. After a period of intense negotiations skillfully handled by Colonel William Eddy, the American minister to Saudi Arabia, the two parties agreed that the total number of the king’s entourage should be capped at forty-eight, including an astrologer, a food taster, two ceremonial coffee-servers, the king’s physician, ten guards, three valets, and nine “miscellaneous slaves, cooks, porters, and scullions.” To accommodate the king’s infirmity the deck of the Murphy would be covered with oriental rugs, and in lieu of the commodore’s stateroom it was agreed that a large tent would be constructed over the ship’s forecastle just as if the king were making a pilgrimage somewhere in the vast desert regions of his homeland.6

  The Murphy was soon a bustle of activity as colorful dhows drew up alongside to unload the king’s supplies. All seemed to be going well when the American sailors spied an unforgettable sight: a barge approaching with what appeared to be upward of a hundred sheep. Because it was the king’s custom “to eat freshly slaughtered lamb on a daily basis,” and to share his bounty with his hosts—in this case, the entire crew of the ship—his aides had determined this was the minimum number required. In the end, the Murphy’s captain agreed to take seven ewes on board, to be corralled on the ship’s fantail, with the flagstaff used as a kind of “gallows” where twice a day, to the amazement of the crew, one of the unfortunate ewes would be hoisted, slaughtered, and prepared for the king’s repast.7

  Thus the Murphy, the first American warship ever to visit the port of Jidda, received its important guest, weighed anchor, and set off for its rendezvous with FDR. As the men worked in and around their Arab guests, the king and his party frequently offered them coffee. Near the end of the voyage the king revealed that he had brought a gift of ten pounds sterling for each member of the crew—a gesture that was hastily reciprocated by the captain’s impromptu presentation of two of the ship’s Browning submachine guns to the king and his delighted “security detail.”8

  IN THE MEANTIME, BACK ON THE QUINCY, ANNA WAS BUSY MAKING arrangements for the visitor who, “suffice it to say,” as she wrote to her husban
d, “cannot be in the company of women outside of his own!” In light of this, Anna spent the evening of February 13 typing out “all instructions as to who was to lunch at which mess and the menu for the visitors” (an important task given the king’s dietary restrictions) and making arrangements to go into Cairo first thing the next morning, well before their illustrious visitor arrived, since, as her father joked, “those women he does see, he confiscates!” As planned, Anna departed at 8:30 a.m. It was another bright sunny morning, and so FDR was soon out on deck, sitting in his wheelchair and enjoying the fresh air and the company of his longtime Secret Service agent, Michael Reilly. Shortly after 10:00 a.m., Reilly spied the Murphy approaching from the south—presenting, as it came nearer, “the most fantastic pageant.” From his seated position away from the rail, however, FDR could not see the destroyer, so Reilly turned to him, saying, “Mr. President, you must see this. It’s sensational.” FDR “wheeled himself across the deck, and hiding behind a stanchion… watched the Murphy and her gay crew approach.” Reilly could not help but notice how unusual an occurrence this was. Here was the president of the United States, hiding behind a post, “peeking at something, like a small boy sneaking a look at a ball game through a knot-hole,” murmuring all the while “This is fascinating. Absolutely fascinating.”9

  High on the Murphy’s superstructure deck sat a huge man, on a large gilded throne, surrounded by dozens of retainers and members of the royal family in their flowing Arabic robes. Even more fantastic was the sight of what Reilly soon made out as the king’s “secret service detail,” who, lining the rail in their elaborately brocaded robes, made no “secret” of their profession, armed as they were with long files, curved scimitars, and the two Browning submachine guns the Murphy’s captain had presented to them. Then there was the rolled-up tent, the rugs, and the small flock of sheep nibbling away in the small coral that enclosed the slaughtering scaffold. One Quincy sailor, standing at attention as part of the ship’s welcome party, and apparently unable to help himself, broke the disciplined silence by yelping, “For God’s sake, look at those sheep!”10

  Ever so slowly, the Murphy pulled up alongside the Quincy. Thanks to the ingenuity of one of the Murphy’s crew, the king, who was unable to climb a ladder, had been hoisted up to the destroyer’s superstructure deck in a bosun’s chair, bringing him to a height roughly level with the forecastle deck of the much larger Quincy and thus making it possible for him to navigate the gangplank that had been carefully lowered between the two vessels. Cutting an enormous figure at six feet four inches tall and well over two hundred pounds, the king, having been accorded full honors by the crew, slowly made his way over the gangplank. Thereupon he immediately approached the seated FDR, who reached up a warm hand in an enthusiastic welcome.

  Sitting in the bright sunshine, the two leaders spent the next hour or so getting acquainted with one another. They quickly developed a strong rapport, with the king observing that he felt as if he were the “twin brother” of the president, “in years, in responsibility as Chief of State, and in physical disability.”

  “But you are fortunate,” said a clearly touched FDR, “to still have the use of your legs to take you wherever you choose to go.”

  “No, it is you, Mr. President, who are fortunate,” replied the Saudi ruler. “My legs grow feebler every year, with your more reliable wheelchair you are assured that you will arrive.”

  FDR, Ibn Saud, and Colonel William Eddy in conversation on board the USS Quincy, February 14, 1945. (Courtesy of the Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library)

  “I have two of these chairs, which are also twins,” FDR said. “Would you accept one as a personal gift from me?”

  “Gratefully,” said the king. “I shall use it daily and always recall affectionately the giver, my great and good friend.”11

  The two leaders then retired to the president’s private quarters for a more serious discussion over lunch. In keeping with Arab custom, the king—as the guest—did not broach any topics himself, with the exception of one question. He wanted to know whether the president would “greet with displeasure” his accepting Prime Minister Churchill’s invitation to meet him—a meeting that Churchill had no doubt arranged as a means to remind the king of British influence in the region. FDR made no objection, saying, “Why not? I always enjoy seeing Mr. Churchill and I’m sure you will like him too.” But he then went on to discuss “the English,” whom he emphasized had a particular way of doing business.

  “You and I,” FDR said to the king, “want freedom and prosperity for our people and their neighbors after the war. How and by whose hand freedom and prosperity arrive concerns us little.” He noted that the English shared this goal, but only “on the condition that it be brought by them and marked ‘Made in Britain.’” The king smiled at this and asked the president, “What am I to believe when the British tell me that my future is with them and not with America?” What was he to think of their insistence that America’s concern for Saudi Arabia is “a transitory war-interest, her aid as short-lived as Lend-Lease,” and that “the security and economic stability” of Saudi Arabia “are bound up with British foreign policy?”12

  In response, FDR expressed his conviction that the postwar world would see “a decline of spheres of influence in favor of the Open Door.” In this new world the United States hoped that the door to Saudi Arabia would be open “for her and for other nations, with no monopoly for anyone,” as only by “the free exchange of goods, services and opportunities can prosperity circulate to the advantage of free peoples.” After discussing the imminence of the German defeat and the two leaders’ mutual “compassion for the multitudes rendered destitute through oppression or famine,” FDR decided it was time to broach the matter that had brought him to this point in the first place.13

  FDR began the delicate conversation over Palestine by indicating that “he had a serious problem in which he desired the King’s advice and help; namely the rescue and rehabilitation of the remnant of Jews in Central Europe who had suffered indescribable horrors at the hands of the Nazis: eviction, destruction of their homes, torture and mass murder.” FDR said that he felt “a personal responsibility and indeed had committed himself to help solve this problem. What could the King suggest?”14 To this, the Saudi ruler replied immediately, “Give them and their descendants the choicest lands and homes of the Germans who had oppressed them.” “But,” FDR interjected, “the Jewish survivors have a sentimental desire to settle in Palestine, and quite understandably would dread remaining in Germany where they might suffer again.”15

  The king understood that the Jews “have good reason not to trust the Germans,” but surely the Allies will destroy German power forever, “and in their victory will be strong enough to protect [the] Nazi victims.” Indeed, “if the Allies do not expect to firmly control future German policy, why fight this costly war? He, Ibn Saud, could not conceive of leaving an enemy in a position to strike back.” Still pressing, FDR said he “counted on Arab hospitality and on the King’s help in solving the problem of Zionism.” To this the king replied with some force, “Make the enemy and the oppressor pay; that is how we Arabs wage war. Amends should be made by the criminal, not by the innocent bystander, what injury have Arabs done to the Jews of Europe? It is the ‘Christian’ Germans who stole their homes and lives. Let the Germans pay.”

  Frustrated, FDR complained that “the King had not helped him at all with his problem,” at which point the Saudi leader, having lost all patience, stated that this “over-solicitude for the Germans was incomprehensible to an uneducated Bedouin with whom friends get more consideration than enemies.” In the Allied camp, he noted, “there are fifty countries, among whom Palestine is small, land-poor and has already been assigned more than its quota of European refugees.”

  FDR tried a less direct tack. Calling himself “a farmer at heart,” he suggested that the Arabs could profit from irrigation and other methods of development that would increase the amount of l
and under cultivation, which would in turn make possible a larger population. Not willing to take the bait, the king thanked the president for promoting agriculture so vigorously, but said he could not support any expansion of agriculture and public works “if this prosperity would be inherited by the Jews.” What he desired for his people, the king said, was independence, for without independence he and his country “could not seek an honorable friendship, because friendship is possible only with mutual and equal respect.” The king also professed his sincere desire for FDR’s friendship, because the president was known as the champion of the Four Freedoms, and the king had found that the United States “never colonizes or enslaves.”16

  FDR assured the king that he personally, as president, would never do anything that might prove hostile to the Arabs and—in line with the traditional State Department formula for the region—said that the Allies would make no decision on Palestine without first consulting both the Jews and the Arabs.17

  At this point FDR indicated that the captain of the Quincy felt it would soon be time for the ship to get under way. Clearly disappointed that he would not be able to return the gesture of offering the president a meal (of fresh lamb) on board the Murphy, the king asked if the president would at least offer him the chance to serve him coffee. FDR readily agreed, and with the help of the two ceremonial coffee-servers, the president received two cups of a thick black liquid, which he later described as “godawful.”