Moscow criticized the allies for trying to conclude a separate peace in Italy

Joseph Stalin wrote a letter to U.S. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt. In it, he sharply protested against the negotiations that the Allies were conducting with the Germans in Switzerland without the participation of the USSR.

"We, the Russians, think that in the current situation on the fronts, when the enemy is facing the inevitability of surrender, at any meeting with the Germans on the issues of surrender, representatives of one of the allies should be ensured that representatives of another ally participate in this meeting," the text of the letter says.

At the same time, Stalin stressed that he had never doubted the honesty and reliability of Roosevelt and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill.

There were exactly 32 days left until the Great Victory.

The reason for the letter was the so—called Operation Sunrise, secret negotiations between representatives of the United States and Great Britain with representatives of the SS and the Wehrmacht on the surrender of German troops in Northern Italy. The incident was resolved after the Soviet command was invited to participate in the signing of the surrender in the region on April 26.

The material was published as part of the Izvestia special project "80 days to Victory."

All articles of Izvestia during the Great Patriotic War can be found in the electronic archive.