FDR's Military Acumen Saved Soldiers?

[PoliticalChic]

The premise is whacked. FDR did not claim any great military accume. He'd been Sec of the Navy, and loved the ships. Beyond that, he pretty much followed events in the White House Map Room, and flitted with tangental efforts like the OSS and support of Russia. In fact, that was one thing the Germans initally misuderstood. Unlike Hitler, he generally bowed to King and Marshall, and their subordinates, like Ike. US strategy was based upon a general consensus within the War Dept as to what was best, and what was possible given the challanges and resources. FDR could be swayed, but as with the Italy and Greece situations, he generally came around to his Admirals and Generals views.

Churchill took a more direct role. Firstly, he replaced Chamberlin, whose overall strategy led to disaster. Secondly, after the BEF was nearly lost in France, and had to be rescued from Dunkirk, leaving the army essentially unarmed because of material losses, and an industry not capable of rapid rearmament, the professional officer corp lost political capital. And even then, the Brit's inability to meet Rommel's tactics led to a purge of one general after another, sort of like Lincoln and the Army of the Potomoc. Further, Britian was simply too small to do anything more than nibble at the edges of Hitler's Riech, and their Army just wasn't too good at that. Conversely, the Royal Navy and Air Force were more successful in winning strategic victories, albiet narrowly and at horrible human cost.

But, early on, the Brits had more troops and planes in the field, so they were able to have more sway over strategy. Later on, Ike repeatedly frustrated his own American commanders by deferring to Montgomery and others as much as he did. But, one benefit of that was Churchill was genuinely grateful for that, and it did help support British civilian moral at a time when they were scraping the barrel of their national treasure and male population. And, at the same time, FDR just became more and more ill.

The real question about post-war Europe was what might have happened if FDR was the same man he was in 1941 in 1944, or what might have happened if Truman was given the same access to policy and intelligence than BushI and Biden had/have.

I'm not going near cheney ... unless I have a hot shot and stout stick.

"FDR did not claim any great military accume."

Silly doggie....it's the title, but far from the premise.

It is the very opposite.

FDR's bending over backwards to advance the wishes of his BFF, Uncle Joe, cost the lives of American military men.



You should clean off those specs and re-read the OP: it was very clear that I made no such claim about FDR.

Here's part:

The bulk of our international problems stem directly from the intentions, strategy, actions, of President Franklin Roosevelt.
Had he not supported and inflated the USSR, there would not have been a Red China.
Nor a Korean War.
But the issue has revolved around whether the Left's icon was misguided, or intended the deleterious political philosophy.
If the collapse of Germany have come sooner....think that would have saved American lives?
And the Korean War....36,940 Americans killed, 91,134 wounded, and 8,176 still missing.


I expect you to pay better attention in the future....or, no doggie chew-toy for you.

 

[PoliticalChic]

Mark Clark is not on the hit parade of soldiers that served in Italy. Read up on Clark and the .

Clark's enemies reach the way you do....

Then reality rears it's head:


"Clark became the youngest American to be promoted to general in 1945.
General Dwight D. Eisenhower considered him a brilliant staff officer and trainer."
Mark W. Clark - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Somebody thought he was pretty good:
"During the Korean War, he took over as commander of the United Nations Command on May 12, 1952,..."
Ibid.

The generals might have loved Clark but did the soldiers in his command? A good staff officer and good trainer may not make Clark a good combat commander. The question regarding Clark was did he misuse his troops to enhance his own reputation?

"...did he misuse his troops to enhance his own reputation?"

You've succinctly captured the essence of the OP with respect to Franklin Roosevelt.

 

[Unkotare]

I'm not going near cheney ... unless I have a hot shot and stout stick.

Are you threatening the former Vice President of the United States?

 

[bendog]

"...the credence it deserved."

On whose say-so?

Your source was produced by Columbia University grad .

I have a bit of experience with that university....and you should not be surprised to note a political perspective therein.


My statement comes from General Mark Clark who was, at the time, in command of Allied Armies in Italy.
I believe I'll give Clark the nod.

Mark Clark is not on the hit parade of soldiers that served in Italy. Read up on Clark and the .

Clark's enemies reach the way you do....

Then reality rears it's head:


"Clark became the youngest American to be promoted to general in 1945.
General Dwight D. Eisenhower considered him a brilliant staff officer and trainer."
Mark W. Clark - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Somebody thought he was pretty good:
"During the Korean War, he took over as commander of the United Nations Command on May 12, 1952,..."
Ibid.

I gave it no credence because that's what it is worth, PC. The link I put up showed the strategy that dismissed churchill's soft underbelly idea was developed before Clark became a player. Clark was pushed as a star by Ike in North Africa, but that was after the American players set the overall strategy.

You've simply fallen for another revionsit history based upon proving an ideology.

 

[bendog]

I'm not going near cheney ... unless I have a hot shot and stout stick.

Are you threatening the former Vice President of the United States?

grow the ef up.

 

[Unkotare]

I'm not going near cheney ... unless I have a hot shot and stout stick.

Are you threatening the former Vice President of the United States?

grow the ef up.

Is that a yes or a no? Why are you afraid to answer?

 

[bendog]

I watched part of Hyde Park on the Hudson very early this morning. I'd forgotten Bill Murruy made this film. It didn't get many "stars," so I looked up reviews. The criticisms basically were it was a "small" movie, and reviewers thought it was a intended as a grand bioptic. I thought that was wrong. Rather, it was a pretty droll comedy of manners, set when a young King George VI (bertie) and a young Queen Mother visited FDR at the Hudson estate in 1939, with the King coming hat in hand as it were, desperate for military aid. Unusual film. I tivoed it, and hopefully Mrs. Dog won't be too worn out to enjoy it early in the evening.

 

[Unkotare]

You enjoy movies about historical villains? Is that your preferred genre?

 

[Mushroom]

Had he not supported and inflated the USSR, there would not have been a Red China.
Nor a Korean War.
But the issue has revolved around whether the Left's icon was misguided, or intended the deleterious political philosophy.
If the collapse of Germany have come sooner....think that would have saved American lives?
And the Korean War....36,940 Americans killed, 91,134 wounded, and 8,176 still missing.


I expect you to pay better attention in the future....or, no doggie chew-toy for you.

Wow, what a mess.

Yes, there would have been a Red China. The Communist Party of China was formed in 1921, and even 25 years of battle against both Nationalist and Imperial Japanese forces had destroyed it. I seriously doubt the fall of the USSR would have caused it to fail either.

Unless the USSR had totally collapsed there would have been a Korean War. The former Prefecture of Chosin was partitioned by the UN, because they did not want to see it go to a Colonialist European nation like the UK or France. Because neither the US nor USSR was interested in creating a "Korean Colony", they were the choices for controlling the peninsula.

Who cares if the collapse of Germany came sooner? It would not have saved lives because the Allies would have been facing a lot more Germans on the Western Front.

Something like 2/3 of all German forces were on the Eastern Front, trying to hold back the Soviet hordes. Move them from a pacified region of the former USSR and place them in Western Europe, and you would have had an Allied bloodbath.

I can't even believe I have to say such a simple fact.

No, the war would have gone on much longer. Greater resources sent to Europe would also have drug out the Pacific theatre as well. If the USSR had folded, I think the death tolls would be at a minimum 50% higher, and the war would have lasted at least 2 years longer.

And you bounce back to Korea again for some reason. Countries have attacked other countries long before the USSR came into existence, while the USSR was in existence, and long after they have been placed on the ash heap of history. Do we blame Iran-Iraq and Iraq-Kuwait on them as well? Maybe if the USSR did not exist, Pakistan would not have attacked India (or India attack Pakistan - I really don't care who started any of their little tiffs).

All you are doing is giving a rant that you are trying to base on military beliefs, but in reality has very little connection to military science or theory at all.

Better luck next time though.

 

[Moonglow]

Had he not supported and inflated the USSR

with his bicycle tire pump.

there would not have been a Red China

Why yes the National Army was highly revered by Chinese. Those ranks of Red Chinese were actually not Chinese at all but US soldiers sent there by FDR when he was 6 feet under.

 

[Peterf]

From Kathleen Burk's 'Old World, New World'. At the Tehran conference november 1943 " .... Roseveldt decided he had to prove to Stalin he was now the important partner an there was no Anglo-American front, and he did this by ostentatiously slighting Churchill. In Tehran he stayed at the Soviet rather than the British embassy; furthermore he met privately with Stalin but not with Churchill. Most crassly he decided to humiliate Churchill publicly".

FDR's intention was that after the war the world would be run by the USA and the Soviet Union. He much admired Stalin, who he saw as a kindred spirit. It is fortunate that he died and was succeeded by a better and wiser man, Truman.

 

[gipper]

From Kathleen Burk's 'Old World, New World'. At the Tehran conference november 1943 " .... Roseveldt decided he had to prove to Stalin he was now the important partner an there was no Anglo-American front, and he did this by ostentatiously slighting Churchill. In Tehran he stayed at the Soviet rather than the British embassy; furthermore he met privately with Stalin but not with Churchill. Most crassly he decided to humiliate Churchill publicly".

FDR's intention was that after the war the world would be run by the USA and the Soviet Union. He much admired Stalin, who he saw as a kindred spirit. It is fortunate that he died and was succeeded by a better and wiser man, Truman.

Agreed...except the statement about Truman. I do not consider him any better or wiser than FDR. Give 'Em Hell Harry did nothing to eliminate Stalin's spies from access to the White House. Even after being repeatedly warned. He did what he could to protect Alger Hiss. He ruthlessly incinerated women and children with the dropping of a-bombs on a defeated nation. He murdered those defenseless people over the objections of numerous American military and political leaders. To say nothing of the fiasco that was the Korean War.

Truman was forced to recognize Stalin and the USSR for what they were, by their actions of enslaving eastern Europe.

 

[Trajan]

Southern Democrats fraught to keep segregation alive. Northern Democrats did not. In fact their support of blacks cost them the South. Both Republicans and Democrats have strongly supported the EPA until recent years.

"In fact their support of blacks cost them [Democrats] the South."

Utter nonsense.

No doubt you learned same at the feet of a Liberal school marm.



1. Liberal neurotic obsession with this apocryphal notion- it’s been cited hundreds of times in the NYTimes- is supposed to explain why Democrats can’t get nice churchgoing, patriotic southerners to vote for the party of antiwar protesters, abortion, the ACLU and gay marriage.

a. They tell themselves it’s because they won’t stoop to pander to a bunch of racists. This slander should probably be the first clue as to why southerners don’t like them.

b. The central premise of this folklore is that anyone who votes Republican is a racist. Pretty sophisticated thinking.





2. Second, the South kept voting for Democrats for decades after that 1964 act. And, btw, Democrats continued to win a plurality of votes in southern congressional elections for the next 30 years…right up to 1994.
"GOP Poised to Reap Redistricting Rewards" by Michael Barone on Creators.com - A Syndicate Of Talent

a. Between ’48 and ’88, Republicans never won a majority of the Dixiecrat states, outside of two 49-state landslides. Any loses in the South are directly attributable to their championing abortion, gays in the military, Christian-bashing, springing criminals, attacks on guns, dovish foreign policy, ‘save the whales/kill the humans environmentalism….certainly not race!

b. Rather than the Republicans winning the Dixiecrat vote, the Dixiecrats simply died out. By contrast, Democrats kept winning the alleged “segregationist” states into the ‘90’s. If states were voting for Goldwater out of racism, what of Carter’s 1976 sweep of all the Goldwater states?

Covered fully in "Mugged," Coulter.



Hint:
Know why they were called 'Dixiecrats,' not 'Republicrats' or 'Dixiecans'?


Did you know that Senate Democrats blocked every anti-lynching bill the Republicans offered?
True story.



Too late for you to learn?

I'm not trying to point out that Republicans were any more racist than Democrats. However, beginning in 1960's the GOP got a big boost when southerns began voting Republican, first in national elections and then state and local elections.

The shift from Democrat to Republican in the South began in the mid 1960’s with the civil rights act, first presidential elections, then gubernatorial elections and finally the legislatures. However it all began with the passage of the civil rights bill.

In presidential elections:
After reconstruction and prior to the introduction of the civil rights act, the southern states voted for Democrat presidential candidates in 95% of the elections. In fact several states, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, and South Carolina had never voted Republican after reconstruction until the Civil Rights Act was passed.

After the introduction of the civil rights bill, almost every southern state voted Republican in presidential elections with the exception of the Carter and Clinton election. Alabama and Mississippi have never voted for a Democrat presidential candidate since the civil rights bill was passed.

List of United States presidential election results by state - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

In gubernatorial elections, the South started turning to Republicans in 1966 with Republican wins in Arkansas and Florida, followed by Kentucky in 1967, and North Carolina in 1973. Beginning in 1980, the remainder of the Southern states began electing a steady stream of Republican governors.

Solid South - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

you're 2 for 11...we had this out and you wound up leaving the thread last time..........how many times must tis be put to bed, for god sakes