W. Averell Harriman Quotes

The biggest trade that Germany and Britain had was with each other, in the prewar period; I think I'm right in that. Two highly industrialized nations had the most trade with each other, and it wasn't tariff policies alone that made trade relations better for both of them.

Actually I'd had a certain amount of experience in Europe in the inter-war period, as a banker, and I was also a member of the Board of Directors of the International Chamber of Commerce.

We became convinced that, regardless of Stalin's awful brutality and his reign of terror, he was a great war leader. Without Stalin, they never would have held.

As far as the Russians were concerned, I felt the reverse; they had adequate gold, if they wanted to buy, and they weren't dependent upon international trade. I felt they were more self-sufficient.

Roosevelt was determined to stop Stalin from taking over Eastern Europe. He thought they finally had an agreement on Poland. Before Roosevelt died, he realized that Stalin had broken his agreement.

The war changed everybody's attitude. We became international almost overnight.

We both agreed that Stalin was determined to hold out against the Germans. He told us he'd never let them get to Moscow. But if he was wrong, they'd go back to the Urals and fight. They'd never surrender.

Roosevelt was the one who had the vision to change our policy from isolationism to world leadership. That was a terrific revolution. Our country's never been the same since.

It never occurred to me that we would have as grandiose a program as the Marshall Plan, but I felt that we had to do something to save Europe from economic disaster which would encourage the Communist takeover.

Conferences at the top level are always courteous. Name-calling is left to the foreign ministers.

The Russians obtained a number of plants under Lend-Lease, which had been authorized by Washington, that I thought were not justified for their war effort. They wanted them for postwar use.

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You have a feeling when you're recording, like, 'This is gonna translate really well,' and when you see it live, and it kind of proves that, that's an amazing feeling.

Promise me you'll always remember: You're braver than you believe, and stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think.

I always have to have my lipstick. Sometimes I have more than one shade: start with one color for the morning, one for night. Sometimes I have a couple shades just in case I need something more powerful for the day.

Our military might is the guarantor of Russia's security and independence.

I see that not everyone in the West has understood that the Soviet Union has disappeared from the political map of the world and that a new country has emerged with new humanist and ideological principles at the foundation of its existence.

W. Averell Harriman Quotes

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