Figure 1.--. |
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Some authors are extremely critical of these actions and strategy taken by the Roosevelt Administration in the struggle with the isolations and the dictators. Roosevelt was a contoversial president and while loved and admired by the vast majority of Americans, inspired intense critiscism from consevative stalwarts. One writer claims, "Most historians now recognize that Roosevelt knowingly and deliberately lied to the American people. At the very time he was assuring them of his intentions to stay out of the European conflict, he was making secret commitments to England to help
maintain the British Empire in the Far East. He was doing his best to goad Germans submarines into attacking American vessels. And he ultimately found the "back door" to war by goading the Japanese in the Pacific. [Hornberger and Richman] Franklin D. Roosevelt lied his way to reelection. And the result was another American intervention into a European war." [Hornberger] We are not at all sure that President Roosevelt "lied his way to reelection", but he did certainly skirt the truth and did conduct secret diplomacy. If reelection had been his main goal than he would have not persued the policies he did to aid the Allies. Clearly he put American national interest in front of his reelection. A more balanced view is that the President effectively and appropriately used presidential leadership to help guide public opinion so that Americans came to understand the mortal dangers from totalitarian dictators and did everything he could to increase military preparation for a war he knew would eventually reach America. A key to the survival of Western democracy was to keep Britain in the fight. Here critics are probably right that he was in essence goading Hitler into war, but this is a biased way of looking at it. Hitler more than any other leader in modern history used war and the threat of war as a tool of foreign policy. He needed little goading. He was all to ready to wage war when he felt the curcumstances favorable. Roosevelt's policies actually caused him to declare war against America when it was not advantageous for Germany and at a time that viable allies still existed for America. After all, America was not bombing German cities or invading Germany, but rather supporting convoys to sustain Britain who Hitler had forced into the War and was attempting to bomb into submission through a strategy of terror bombing. No reputable historian doubts that if Britain and the Soviets had fallen America would have been next and without these allies the cost and even prospects for success would have been dire indeed. Concerning Japan, the Administration policy can be seen as goading Japan into war, but that was not the only option given Japan. The other option was to stop making war. That the intrinsic nature of the Japanese militarists saw this as an unacceptable option should indicate why the war had to be fought.
Some authors are extremely critical of these actions and strategy taken by the Roosevelt Administration in the struggle with the isolations and the dictators. Roosevelt was a contoversial president and while loved and admired by the vast majority of Americans, inspired intense critiscism from consevative stalwarts.
One writer claims, "Most historians now recognize that Roosevelt knowingly and deliberately lied to the American people. At the very time he was assuring them of his intentions to stay out of the European conflict, he was making secret commitments to England to help
maintain the British Empire in the Far East. He was doing his best to goad Germans submarines into attacking American vessels. And he ultimately found the "back door" to war by goading the Japanese in the Pacific. [Hornberger and Richman] Franklin D. Roosevelt lied his way to reelection. And the result was another American intervention into a European war." [Hornberger] We are not at all sure that President Roosevelt "lied his way to reelection", but he did certainly skirt the truth and did conduct secret diplomacy. If reelection had been his main goal than he would have not persued the policies he did to aid the Allies. Clearly he put American national interest in front of his reelection.
A more balanced view is that the President effectively and appropriately used presidential leadership to help guide public opinion so that Americans came to understand the mortal dangers from totalitarian dictators and did everything he could to increase military preparation for a war he knew would eventually reach America.
A key to the survival of Western democracy was to keep Britain in the fight. Here critics are probably right that he was in essence goading Hitler into war, but this is a biased way of looking at it.
Hitler more than any other leader in modern history used war and the threat of war as a tool of foreign policy. He needed little goading. He was all to ready to wage war when he felt the curcumstances favorable. Roosevelt's policies actually caused him to declare war against America when it was not advantageous for Germany and at a time that viable allies still existed for America. After all, America was not bombing German cities or invading Germany, but rather supporting convoys to sustain Britain who Hitler had forced into the War and was attempting to bomb into submission through a strategy of terror bombing.
No reputable historian doubts that if Britain and the Soviets had fallen America would have been next and without these allies the cost and even prospects for success would have been dire indeed.
Concerning Japan, the Administration policy can be seen as goading Japan into war, but that was not the only option given Japan. The other option was to stop making war. That the intrinsic nature of the Japanese militarists saw this as an unacceptable option should indicate why the war had to be fought.
Today we tend to thing that President Roosevelt's victory over the isolationists was preordained as the threat from the NAZIs and Japanese militarists. This was emphatically not the case. Many Americans were convinced that the great evil was war itself and the danger of involvement in another European war and not the threat from abroad. This abhorence of war certainly can be understood and it speaks well of the American character that the desire to avoid war was so pervasive. But it is clear today that the avoidance of war in fact put the nation in jeporady. The depth of the American feeling on the mater was such that what is surprising that the President was able to prevail in his confrontation. Why did the President succeed? There are a range of reasons. Certainly many had come to trust President during the Great Depression. Presidebt Roosevelt rcognized the danger of Hitler and the NAZIs from the very beginning. The difficulty was convincing Americans of the danger. The President's was consumed with the Depression and domestic issues through most of the 1930s. He did take one very important step early in his administration. He recognized the Soviet Union. We have no real statement as to why he proceeded so agressively with this action as there are no Roosevelt menmoirs. We know, however, that it was a priority. He even took it out of the hands of the State Department and persued this from the White House. Certainly a key consideration must have been geo-politics. The Soviet Union would be critical in any effort to contain the rise of NAZIsm. Little more could be done untill the late 30s. President Roosevelt's strategy was five fold. One was to let the barbarism of the NAZI and Japanese tyranies speak for themselves. Two was to push for reamament so that America would be able to confront the dictators when the time came. Three was to support the Allies (Britain and France) democracies in the hope that they could successfully deal with Hitler. Four was to carefull form public opinion, taking care not to get to far in front of public opinion. Five was to persued the campaign as a bibartisan effort.
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