1. We all know what happened during WWII, and how FDR hid and ignored the heinous crimes of Soviet Russia in order to align the United States with that evil empire.
He persuaded the American public that the USSR was just like any other nation. The result was the entrenching and extending Communist domination in the world.
2. A view into the mind of Franklin Roosevelt can be glimpsed through the words of George Kennan, " American adviser, diplomat, political scientist, and historian, best known as "the father of containment" and as a key figure in the emergence of the Cold War. He later wrote standard histories of the relations between Soviet Union and the Western powers. He was also a core member of the group of foreign policy elders known as "The Wise Men".
George F. Kennan - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
" After commenting bitterly on the inexcusable body of ignorance about the Russian Communist movement, about the history of its diplomacy, about what had happened in
the purges, and about what had been going on in Poland and the Baltic States, Kennan turns more directly to FDR alone:
I also have in mind FDRs evident conviction that Stalin, while perhaps a somewhat difficult customer, was only, after all, a person like any other person; that the reason we hadnt been able to get along with him in the past was that we had never really had anyone with the proper personality and the proper qualities of sympathy and imagination to deal with him, that he had been snubbed all along by the arrogant conservatives of the Western capitals; and that if only he could be exposed to the persuasive charms of someone like FDR himself, ideological preconceptions would melt and Russias cooperation with the West could be easily arranged.
For these assumptions there were no grounds whatsover; and they were of a puerility that was unworthy of a statesman of FDRs stature?
http://www.mmisi.org/ma/30_02/nisbet.pdf
Again....Kennan said "...no grounds whatsover..." and "...a puerility that was unworthy of a statesman...."
Now....those who wait for historians to pass judgment.....there you have one of the best.
3. Nor was Kennan the only one warning FDR:
a. In a letter to FDR, dated January 29, 1943, William Bullitt (Franklin D. Roosevelt appointed Bullitt the first US ambassador to the Soviet Union, a post that he filled from 1933 to 1936.) warned Roosevelt about what would happen if he continued pursuing the policies of appeasement toward Stalin that formed the foundation of the American war strategy.
He pleaded with FDR not to 'permit our war to prevent Nazi domination of Europe to be turned into a war to establish Soviet domination of Europe.' He predicted the Soviet annexation of half of Europe; George Kennan identified that letter as the earliest warning of what would be the result of FDR's policies.
"For the President Personal & Secret: Correspondence Between Franklin D. Roosevelt and William C. Bullitt," Orville H. Bullitt, p. 575-590
Instead, FDR was listening to the advice of the Soviet spy living in the White House, Harry Hopkins.
b. "Not only did FDR overlook the external evidence, FDR ignored the counsel of key experts at the State Department, which, at the time, was home...to an educated and experienced cadre of anti-Communists....who would be neutralized and purged....n 1937...the Russian research library at the State Department was broken up, the files on Communists, foreign and domestic, ordered destroyed. The second, in 1943.
Both purges took place under Soviet pressure and even direction as when in March 1943 Foreign Minister Litvinov, incredibly, handed over a list of American diplomats the Soviets wanted fired....a "guilt offering to Stalin from Roosevelt"...
West, "American Betrayal," p.193.
4. What could, should have happened?
When the (anticipated) event that Hitler would attack Stalin's Russia, as they did June 21st, 1941, America should have done nothing...no more than relaxing restrictions on exports to the Russians...but at the same time securing a quid pro quo for further assistance! Lend-Lease should not have been the automatic and unlimited buffet that it turned into!
"Finally, should the Soviet regime fall,...we should refuse to recognize a Communist government-in-exile, leaving the path clear for establishment for a non-Communist government in Russia after the war."
These were the words of Loy Henderson, Soviet and Eastern European affairs expert and Foreign Service officer, as quoted by Martin Weil in "A pretty good club: The founding fathers of the U.S. Foreign Service," p. 106.
Imagine the lives saved had the United States elected a President with the wisdom of a George Kennan, or Loy Henderson, instead of Franklin Roosevelt.
Millions.
tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wished.
Hamlet
He persuaded the American public that the USSR was just like any other nation. The result was the entrenching and extending Communist domination in the world.
2. A view into the mind of Franklin Roosevelt can be glimpsed through the words of George Kennan, " American adviser, diplomat, political scientist, and historian, best known as "the father of containment" and as a key figure in the emergence of the Cold War. He later wrote standard histories of the relations between Soviet Union and the Western powers. He was also a core member of the group of foreign policy elders known as "The Wise Men".
George F. Kennan - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
" After commenting bitterly on the inexcusable body of ignorance about the Russian Communist movement, about the history of its diplomacy, about what had happened in
the purges, and about what had been going on in Poland and the Baltic States, Kennan turns more directly to FDR alone:
I also have in mind FDRs evident conviction that Stalin, while perhaps a somewhat difficult customer, was only, after all, a person like any other person; that the reason we hadnt been able to get along with him in the past was that we had never really had anyone with the proper personality and the proper qualities of sympathy and imagination to deal with him, that he had been snubbed all along by the arrogant conservatives of the Western capitals; and that if only he could be exposed to the persuasive charms of someone like FDR himself, ideological preconceptions would melt and Russias cooperation with the West could be easily arranged.
For these assumptions there were no grounds whatsover; and they were of a puerility that was unworthy of a statesman of FDRs stature?
http://www.mmisi.org/ma/30_02/nisbet.pdf
Again....Kennan said "...no grounds whatsover..." and "...a puerility that was unworthy of a statesman...."
Now....those who wait for historians to pass judgment.....there you have one of the best.
3. Nor was Kennan the only one warning FDR:
a. In a letter to FDR, dated January 29, 1943, William Bullitt (Franklin D. Roosevelt appointed Bullitt the first US ambassador to the Soviet Union, a post that he filled from 1933 to 1936.) warned Roosevelt about what would happen if he continued pursuing the policies of appeasement toward Stalin that formed the foundation of the American war strategy.
He pleaded with FDR not to 'permit our war to prevent Nazi domination of Europe to be turned into a war to establish Soviet domination of Europe.' He predicted the Soviet annexation of half of Europe; George Kennan identified that letter as the earliest warning of what would be the result of FDR's policies.
"For the President Personal & Secret: Correspondence Between Franklin D. Roosevelt and William C. Bullitt," Orville H. Bullitt, p. 575-590
Instead, FDR was listening to the advice of the Soviet spy living in the White House, Harry Hopkins.
b. "Not only did FDR overlook the external evidence, FDR ignored the counsel of key experts at the State Department, which, at the time, was home...to an educated and experienced cadre of anti-Communists....who would be neutralized and purged....n 1937...the Russian research library at the State Department was broken up, the files on Communists, foreign and domestic, ordered destroyed. The second, in 1943.
Both purges took place under Soviet pressure and even direction as when in March 1943 Foreign Minister Litvinov, incredibly, handed over a list of American diplomats the Soviets wanted fired....a "guilt offering to Stalin from Roosevelt"...
West, "American Betrayal," p.193.
4. What could, should have happened?
When the (anticipated) event that Hitler would attack Stalin's Russia, as they did June 21st, 1941, America should have done nothing...no more than relaxing restrictions on exports to the Russians...but at the same time securing a quid pro quo for further assistance! Lend-Lease should not have been the automatic and unlimited buffet that it turned into!
"Finally, should the Soviet regime fall,...we should refuse to recognize a Communist government-in-exile, leaving the path clear for establishment for a non-Communist government in Russia after the war."
These were the words of Loy Henderson, Soviet and Eastern European affairs expert and Foreign Service officer, as quoted by Martin Weil in "A pretty good club: The founding fathers of the U.S. Foreign Service," p. 106.
Imagine the lives saved had the United States elected a President with the wisdom of a George Kennan, or Loy Henderson, instead of Franklin Roosevelt.
Millions.
tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wished.
Hamlet
