# How much did Churchill and Stalin know about FDR's illness? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [April 25, 2009, 1:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-did-churchill-and-stalin-know-about-fdrs-illness/494286 "2009-04-25T01:17:32Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2009, 1:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-did-churchill-and-stalin-know-about-fdrs-illness/494286/1 "2009-04-25T01:17:32Z")
Considering that FDR was near the end of his life when he was at Yalta, just how informed were Churchill and Stalin about FDR’s condition-his childhood polio and such? Considering that his disability had been very carefully hidden from the public, how could they manage when meeting with world leaders? (Of course at that time, he was an old man, so they could use an excuse for a wheel chair) ---
**Author:** ![Polycarp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/82dd89/32.png) [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2009, 1:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-did-churchill-and-stalin-know-about-fdrs-illness/494286/2 "2009-04-25T01:49:03Z")
The congestive heart failure, only his physicians knew, and possibly one or two others in the “official” White House staff – even Roosevelt himself was not told. The polio was an open secret, and Churchill at least was fully aware of Roosevelt’s limitations and capabilities – several places in his History of the Second World War he alludes to FDR’s handicap. Mackenzie King too was quite aware of it. It’s not clear how much Stalin knew when, but between Soviet intelligence and completely aboveboard contacts, it’s clear it was no surprise to him when they first met in person. On the opposing side, Goebbels’s propaganda machine tried to pay up the polio as having affected FDR’s mental processes. ---
**Author:** ![Paul\_in\_Qatar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ccd318/32.png) [@Paul\_in\_Qatar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Paul_in_Qatar)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2009, 2:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-did-churchill-and-stalin-know-about-fdrs-illness/494286/3 "2009-04-25T02:25:19Z")
It seems that the polio was known by anyone who wanted to know about it. Darn near anyone who ever met him (in decades of public life) plus all the people they told plus all the most radical of the Republicans (and other political enemies). That adds up to a lot of people. Nobody denied he was crippled; they simply did not mention it. ---
**Author:** ![telebox](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7ea924/32.png) [@telebox](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/telebox)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2009, 2:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-did-churchill-and-stalin-know-about-fdrs-illness/494286/4 "2009-04-25T02:47:02Z")
Odd that the OP refers to FDR as an old man, since he was the youngest of the ‘Big Three.’ As regards outside knowledge, is it not possible that the Russians, if not the British, were aware of intimate details of his health, or that of most other significant members of the conference ? The pernicious nature of soviet penetration allowed them access to almost anything that was supposedly secret - Los Alamos being a key example at that time. All it would take would be a wireless telegrapher somewhere in the ‘food chain’ to leak details of that day’s message, being sent from his medical team at Teheran, Yalta or Potsdam back to Washington. There are numerous examples in history books of the extent to which soviet intelligence used overseas assets to glean a nugget of information, even for seemingly trivial reasons … I think that Anthony Beevor in his book ‘Stalingrad’ referenced an anecdote about Italian troops disembarking from trains at Stalingrad, and being addressed by name from the Russian side, with news from home. Likewise a US aviator Mike Bosilievic, later shot down in Vietnam, was first notified of the birth of his daughter, on Radio Hanoi. That was mentioned in a BBC documentary, and book called ‘We Can Keep You Forever.’ Since it addressed the issue of the MIAs. If they would go to those lengths, to target unremarkable ( at least in a strategic sense) soldiers, and airmen, surely that indicates that they would put huge resources behind learning everything they could about someone like FDR ? ---
**Author:** ![postcards](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/8e8cbc/32.png) [@postcards](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/postcards)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2009, 4:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-did-churchill-and-stalin-know-about-fdrs-illness/494286/5 "2009-04-25T04:28:14Z")
> [@Guinastasia](#): > > …his childhood polio… Nitpick here; FDR was 39 when he contracted polio. ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2009, 4:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-did-churchill-and-stalin-know-about-fdrs-illness/494286/6 "2009-04-25T04:35:28Z")
> [@postcards](#): > > Nitpick here; FDR was 39 when he contracted polio. :smack: Would you believe that my degree is in history? I guess what I’m really asking is-how much did FDR SHOW in front of them? Did he actually use a wheelchair? (And yes, he was the youngest, but that doesn’t mean he wasn’t well, elderly.) ---
**Author:** ![BrassyPhrase](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ea666f/32.png) [@BrassyPhrase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrassyPhrase)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2009, 4:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-did-churchill-and-stalin-know-about-fdrs-illness/494286/7 "2009-04-25T04:42:46Z")
I know Wikipedia isn’t a considered a good source but as polio is a disease contracted in childhood– I was reading this from the poliomyelitis entry: > [@](#): > > The disease was very well publicized during the polio epidemics of the 1950s, with extensive media coverage of any scientific advancements that might lead to a cure. Thus, the scientists working on polio became some of the most famous of the century. Fifteen scientists and two laymen who made important contributions to the knowledge and treatment of poliomyelitis are honored by the Polio Hall of Fame at the Roosevelt Warm Springs Institute for Rehabilitation in Warm Springs, Georgia, USA. (Although it was long thought that polio had caused President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s paralysis, which led to the creation of the Institute and hence the Hall of Fame, in 2003, a peer-reviewed study found it was actually more likely that he suffered from Guillain-Barré syndrome.[85]) ---
**Author:** ![telebox](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7ea924/32.png) [@telebox](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/telebox)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2009, 4:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-did-churchill-and-stalin-know-about-fdrs-illness/494286/8 "2009-04-25T04:49:42Z")
> [@Guinastasia](#): > > :smack: > > Would you believe that my degree is in history? > I guess what I’m really asking is-how much did FDR SHOW in front of them? Did he actually use a wheelchair? > > (And yes, he was the youngest, but that doesn’t mean he wasn’t well, elderly.) Did you come across this ? FDR’s most famous public display of his disability came in, when, after an exhaustive Big Three meeting at Yalta with Churchill and Stalin, he appeared in his wheelchair. “I hope you will pardon me for this unusual posture of sitting down during the presentation of what I want to say,” he told a packed House, “but I know you will realize that it makes it a lot easier for me not to have to carry about ten pounds of steel on the bottom of my legs.” [http://www.prospect.org/cs/articles?article=what\_fdr\_and\_elizabeth\_edwards\_have\_in\_common](http://www.prospect.org/cs/articles?article=what_fdr_and_elizabeth_edwards_have_in_common) ---
**Author:** ![Notassmartasithought](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/c0e974/32.png) [@Notassmartasithought](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Notassmartasithought)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2009, 5:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-did-churchill-and-stalin-know-about-fdrs-illness/494286/9 "2009-04-25T05:16:53Z")
[http://media.hoover.org/images/digest20033\_milani1.jpg](http://media.hoover.org/images/digest20033_milani1.jpg) is a photo from the Tehran conference at the beginning of December, 1943. [http://www.chosunjournal.com/yalta.jpg](http://www.chosunjournal.com/yalta.jpg) is from Yalta, in February, '45, or about 14 months later. I’ve always been struck by how gaunt FDR looked in the Yalta photos, so I can’t believe that Churchill and Stalin weren’t at least aware of the toll that the 12 years in the White House had taken on him. Remember that Churchill was older than FDR, was defeated for PM in '45, and then _won_ again in what, '54? Looking at the Yalta photo of FDR, one can’t imagine him in the presedency in the '50’s. ---
**Author:** ![Broomstick](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/broomstick/32/246_2.png) [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2009, 11:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-did-churchill-and-stalin-know-about-fdrs-illness/494286/10 "2009-04-25T11:56:59Z")
I can’t remember the exact quote(s), but supposedly at Yalta, when Churchill and Stalin first saw FDR after his arrival, one commented to the other that FDR was not long for this world and the other agreed. Yes, both Churchill and Stalin were aware of FDR’s disability, and even if not up on the details, they were also quite aware of the man’s decline by Yalta. It was obvious just by looking at him. ---
**Author:** ![Happy\_Poster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/c89c15/32.png) [@Happy\_Poster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Happy_Poster)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2009, 12:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-did-churchill-and-stalin-know-about-fdrs-illness/494286/11 "2009-04-25T12:02:36Z")
Sure, but when Churchill took on his second PMship he was gaga 😃