Committee to Defend America by Aiding the Allies
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The Committee To Defend America By Aiding The Allies (CDAAA), also known as the William Allen White Committee after its nominal chairman, was a front group for British Security Coordination(BSC) in the US in the early years of the Second World War.[1]
In 1940, the British Ministry of Information sought a direct telephone link with the Committee, but was dissuaded by the ambassador, Lord Lothian who said:
- It would be most disastrous to the William Allen White Committee were it ever to be established that it was communicating and collaborating with any branch of His Majesty's Government.[2]
The Committee's offices were at 8 West 40th Street, New York City, which housed a number of other pro-British organisations including the League of Nations Association, Sandy Griffith's Market Analysts Inc. and the Nonpartisan Committee to Defeat Hamilton Fish.[3]
After America's entry into the war, the committee was renamed Citizens for Victory.[4]
Contents
Goals
The Committee's key aims were to ensure the repeal of neutrality laws which impeded the flow of goods to Britain and France, and to ensure that both Republicans and Democrats nominated presidential candidates friendly to the allies.[5]
Activities
The Committee's William Allen White News Service, headed by John Balderston, was based at the Rockefeller Center in New York, along with British Security Coordination and a number of other fronts.[6]
The Committee acted as a BSC cutout in sponsoring propaganda broadcasts on radio station WRUL.[7] It was also one of a number of British fronts which sponsored opinion polls by the BSC-controlled Market Analysts Inc.[8]
In 1941, David Dubinsky hired Jay Lovestone to run the Committee's labour division.[9]
Postwar legacy
Twelve members of the CDAAA went on to become members of the 1950 Committee on the Present Danger.[10]
People
Officers
- William Allen White - Chairman
- Frederick Chadwick McKee- Treasurer
Members
Henry P. Van Dusen | Lewis W. Douglas | Clark Eichelberger | David Dubinsky
Affiliations
Subsidiaries
External Resources
- Committee to Defend America By Aiding the Allies Records, 1940-1942: Finding Aid, Princeton University Library, Mudd Manuscript Library
Notes
- ↑ Thomas E. Mahl, Desperate Deception, Brassey's, 1999, p.24
- ↑ Thomas E. Mahl, Desperate Deception, Brassey's, 1999, p.42
- ↑ Thomas E. Mahl, Desperate Deception, Brassey's, 1999, p.109
- ↑ Ted Morgan, A Covert Life, Random House, 1999, p.37.
- ↑ Thomas E. Mahl, Desperate Deception, Brassey's, 1999, p.42
- ↑ Thomas E. Mahl, Desperate Deception, Brassey's, 1999, p.41
- ↑ Thomas E. Mahl, Desperate Deception, Brassey's, 1999, p.44
- ↑ Thomas E. Mahl, Desperate Deception, Brassey's, 1999, p.78
- ↑ Ted Morgan, A Covert Life, Random House, 1999, p.37.
- ↑ Jerry Wayne Sanders, Peddlers of Crisis, South End Press, 1983, p60.
