In 1938 , Cadogan replaced Robert Vansittart as Permanent Under-Secretary at the Foreign Office . He considered his predecessor 's style to be emotional and disordered compared to Cadogan 's terse and efficient manner . There were , however , no significant divergences in policy although Vansittart 's detestation of the dictators was more publicly known . Cadogan served in this capacity from 1938 to 1946 and represented Britain at the Dumbarton Oaks Conference in 1944 , where he became well acquainted with Edward Stettinius and Andrei Gromyko . His work there was greatly respected . Winston Churchill told Parliament , " His Majesty 's Government could have had no abler representative that Sir Alexander Cadogan and there is no doubt that a most valuable task has been discharged . " In preparation for the Yalta Conference , Cadogan expended a great deal of effort attempting to bring the " London Poles " under Stanislaw Mikolajczyk around to the idea of losing their eastern territories to the Soviet Union . After 22,000 Polish officers and intellectuals were shot by the Soviets in Katyn , Cadogan wrote in his diary on 18 June 1943 that " years before Katyn the Soviet Government made a habit of butchering their own citizens by the 10,000 s , and if we could fling ourselves into their arms in 1941 , I do n't know that Katyn makes our position more delicate . The blood of Russians cries as loud to heaven as that of Poles . But it 's very nasty . How can Poles ever live amicably alongside Russians , and how can we discuss with Russians execution of German ' war criminals ' , when we have condoned this ? " He was also involved in discussions about the composition of provisional governments in Yugoslavia and Greece . Cadogan then accompanied the British delegation to the Yalta Conference in 1945 . David Dilks , the editor of his published diaries , notes , " He looked on Yalta much as he had looked at Munich . Both agreements entailed serious injury to the rights of states which could not defend themselves against large and predatory neighbours ; both reflected the military and geographical facts ; neither was a matter for pride or for fierce self-reproach , since it hardly lay in British power at the material time to do other ; both looked better on signature than in the hard after-light . " Cadogan wrote in his diary in January 1944 : " They the Soviet diplomats are the most stinking creepy set of Jews I 've ever come across . " At the end of the war Cadogan had hoped for the Washington embassy but it went to another capable career diplomat , Sir Archibald Clark Kerr . Instead , it is probably his experience with the League of Nations and his prominent role at Dumbarton Oaks that made Clement Attlee appoint Cadogan the first Permanent Representative of the United Kingdom to the United Nations . He served in this capacity from 1946 to 1950 . During his time at the UN , as David Dilks points out , " British diplomacy had to be conducted from a precarious position of over-commitment and economic instability . " Cadogan expressed great frustration with the inflexibility of his Soviet counterparts , who were forbidden from mixing with other delegations or informal exchanges of views . At one point , he asked himself , " How can ten men discuss with a ventriloquist 's doll ? " He saw many parallels between Soviet actions at the beginning of the Cold War and those of the Germans on the eve of the Second World War . He remarked to Winston Churchill , " What forces itself on one 's attention is the degree to which everything favours the evildoer , if he is blatant enough . Any honest Government fights ( in peacetime ) with two hands tied behind its back . The brilliant blatancy of the Russians is something that we can admire but can not emulate . It gives them a great advantage . " Although he was never celebrated as a public figure , Cadogan enjoyed great prestige within diplomatic circles . He was widely respected for his ability , character and experience . He and his wife cultivated a large and varied number of friends by entertaining at their Long Island home , Hillandale
Yalta Conference
Yalta Conference
Alexander Cadogan