In 1944 , Morgenthau proposed the Morgenthau Plan for postwar Germany , calling for Germany to lose its heavy industry , and the Ruhr " should not only be stripped of all presently existing industries , but so weakened and controlled that it can not in the foreseeable future become an industrial area " . Germany would keep its rich farmlands in the east . However Stalin insisted on the Oder-Neisse border , which moved those farming areas out of Germany . Therefore , the original Morgenthau plan had to be dropped , Weinberg argues , because it was " too soft on the Germans , not too hard as some still imagine . " At the Second Quebec Conference on September 16 , 1944 , Roosevelt and Morgenthau persuaded the initially very reluctant British Prime Minister Winston Churchill to agree to the Morgenthau Plan , likely using a $ 6 billion Lend-Lease agreement to do so . Churchill chose however to narrow the scope of Morgenthau 's proposal by drafting a new version of the memorandum , which ended up being the version signed by the two statesmen . The gist of the signed memorandum was " This programme for eliminating the war-making industries in the Ruhr and the Saar is looking forward to converting Germany into a country primarily agricultural and pastoral in its character . " The plan faced opposition in Roosevelt 's cabinet , primarily from Henry L. Stimson , and when the plan was leaked to the press , there was public criticism of Roosevelt . The President 's response to inquiries was to deny the press reports . As a consequence of the leak , Morgenthau was in bad favor with Roosevelt for a time
Second Quebec Conference
Second Quebec Conference
Henry Morgenthau Jr.