FDR's Catastrophic, Horrendous, and Treasonous Handling of WW II in Europe

[rightwinger]

FDR would have risked nothing by telling the German resistance that if they could kill Hitler, overthrow the Nazis, seize the government, and agree to give up conquered territory, the U.S. would halt the war and recognize their government. If the resistance had managed to kill Hitler but was unable to take over the government, this still would have constituted major progress and likely would have led to an early end to the fighting. If the resistance was unable to deliver at all, no harm would have been done to our war effort.

Lot of “ifs” there

Better to just take over the country and force them to conform to the norms of civilized nations

If they gave up captured territories would they get to keep their Death Camps?

 

[gipper]

FDR would have risked nothing by telling the German resistance that if they could kill Hitler, overthrow the Nazis, seize the government, and agree to give up conquered territory, the U.S. would halt the war and recognize their government. If the resistance had managed to kill Hitler but was unable to take over the government, this still would have constituted major progress and likely would have led to an early end to the fighting. If the resistance was unable to deliver at all, no harm would have been done to our war effort.

Lot of “ifs” there

Better to just take over the country and force them to conform to the norms of civilized nations

If they gave up captured territories would they get to keep their Death Camps?

Why are you such a right wing imperialist?

 

[Ame®icano]

FDR had a WORLD war to deal with
Carter couldn't even handle a problem with Iran

What would you have done differently than Carter?

....first, he doesn't want to do a military option...then when he does, he picks a very high risk/idiotic option
....that was an act of war..I would've lined up the B52s and said either release them or else---you see what happened recently? the Iranians don't want the big boys coming to town

In that case the hostages would have been used as shields

Carter negotiated behind the scenes and got all hostages out alive

"Carter got hostages out alive"

LOL

No no no.... LOOOOOOOLLLLLL

In the end
No American hostages were killed. The only thing that got Americans killed was a military action

They were taken hostages under Carter, and kept hostages for 444 days.

Military action was another peanut farmer's brilliant move, was it?

 

[Ame®icano]

In his 600-plus-page book The New Dealers' War: Franklin D. Roosevelt and the War Within World War II, award-winning historian Thomas Fleming documents in sickening detail how FDR needlessly prolonged WW II in Europe by several months and cost hundreds of thousands of American and European lives. FDR did this by insisting on “unconditional surrender” and by refusing to even consider the substantive peace offers made by the German resistance leaders, even though those leaders included high-ranking German officers such as Admiral Canaris, the head of the Abwehr, Germany’s military intelligence agency.

Fleming provided an extensive summary of the evidence of FDR’s catastrophic handling of the war in Europe in a long 2009 article titled “FDR Writes a Policy in Blood” in MHQ: The Quarterly Journal of Military History. The article is now available on historynet.com. Below are extracts from the article:

FDR’s blind insistence on unconditional surrender prolonged World War II and cost hundreds of thousands of lives. . . .​

Inwardly, Churchill was dumbfounded by Roosevelt’s announcement [of the policy of unconditional surrender]—and dismayed by its probable impact on the conduct and outcome of the war.​

The prime minister’s British colleagues were even more alarmed. The chief of British intelligence, Maj. Gen. Sir Stewart Graham Menzies, considered unconditional surrender disastrous, not only to certain secret operations he already had in progress, but also because it would make the Germans fight “with the despairing ferocity of cornered rats”. . . .​

That consternation was shared by not a few Americans in the ranks of VIPs standing behind the two leaders. Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower thought unconditional surrender was idiotic—it could do nothing but cost American lives. Later, he said: “If you were given two choices, one to mount a scaffold, the other to charge twenty bayonets, you might as well charge twenty bayonets.”​

Lt. Gen. Albert Wedemeyer, who was the architect of the strategy for D-Day, was even more appalled. He decried the idea from the moment he heard it. Just before the war, he had spent two years in Germany attending the Berlin War College and he knew firsthand the deep divisions between Hitler and the German General Staff. An unconditional surrender policy would, he accurately predicted, “weld all the Germans together”. . . .​

Since the war began, British intelligence chief Menzies and the Abwehr’s Admiral Canaris, two seeming opponents in the art and science of black warfare, had been in shadowy touch with each other through emissaries who shuttled from Berlin and London to the borders of the Nazi empire. In 1940 the Abwehr leaked Hitler’s planned assault on Holland, Belgium, and France. The British and French dismissed it as a ruse and discovered, too late, that its details were excruciatingly authentic. While the admiral went briskly about the business of intelligence, running spy networks throughout Europe, evidence accumulated suggesting the astonishing possibility that the head of the Abwehr was a secret enemy of the Nazi regime.​

Around Canaris was grouped a loose confederation of Hitler opponents in the German Foreign Office, the army, and the political world. They included Ulrich von Hassel, a career diplomat whose diaries are a main source of information about the resistance; Gen. Ludwig Beck, former chief of the general staff, who resigned in protest when Hitler threatened to invade Czechoslovakia in 1939 in violation of the Munich agreement; and Count Helmuth von Moltke, great-grandnephew of the general who had defeated France in 1871 and made Germany a world power. Another important figure was Karl-Friedrich Goerdeler, the former mayor of Leipzig, whom the Nazis dismissed from his post when he refused to remove a monument to the great German-Jewish composer, Felix Mendelssohn.​

Beck, the key figure, was still deeply admired by many generals on active duty. Through him, the conspirators hoped to persuade the army to stage a coup d’état to remove and, if necessary, kill Hitler. . . .​

Before Casablanca [where FDR announced the policy of unconditional surrender], Field Marshal Erwin von Witzleben, Germany’s supreme commander of the West, had told Canaris that he loathed Hitler and was ready to do everything in his power to overthrow him. After Casablanca, Witzleben said: “Now, no honorable man can lead the German people into such a situation.” Gen. Hans Guderian, the inventor of panzer warfare, declined to participate in the plot for the same reason, when Col. Hans Oster, second in command to Canaris, approached him. Col. Gen. Alfred Jodl, chief of the German armed forces operations staff, said at the Nuremberg War Crimes trials that unconditional surrender had been a crucial element in his refusal to join the conspiracy. Nevertheless, Canaris redoubled his efforts to reach out to the United States. . . .​

In June 1943, Helmuth von Moltke journeyed to Istanbul to talk to the U.S. naval attaché, George Earle, a Balkans expert who wanted to rescue Eastern Europe from Soviet domination. Earle persuaded William Donovan, head of the U.S. Office of Strategic Services, to come to Istanbul. There, the Germans offered to fly a member of the German general staff to London to arrange for a peaceful surrender of the western front—if unconditional surrender were modified. Donovan rushed to the White House, only to discover FDR had no desire to negotiate with “these East German Junkers.”​

Around the same time, Canaris developed a seemingly more fruitful contact in Berne, where Allen Dulles had become the Office of Strategic Services station chief. Here the messenger was Hans Bernd Gisevius, also an Abwehr agent, disguised as the German vice consul in Zurich. To bolster his bona fides, Canaris leaked reams of secret information about the German war effort to Dulles, who forwarded it to Washington with strong recommendations to cooperate with the resistance movement, which he code-named “Breakers.” From the White House came only silence. Nothing came of a similar initiative in Stockholm, also launched by the German Foreign Office in 1943. . . .​

With mounting desperation, Canaris himself took to the field in Spain. With the help of the Spanish Foreign Office, in August 1943 he arranged a meeting between himself, Menzies, and Donovan at Santander. It was surely one of the strangest and most fateful encounters of the war. Menzies was disobeying the orders of his putative commanders, the Foreign Office bureaucrats, and Donovan was acutely aware by now that Roosevelt was equally hostile to his presence. But Canaris charmed and convinced both men of the logic of his proposal to work out an arrangement whereby the Anglo-Americans would support a coup d’état and peace on the basis of the German borders of 1939—surrendering all Hitler’s conquests. One of Canaris’s deputies, who was present at the meeting, said it was the most exciting experience in his secret service career.​

When the two Allied intelligence chiefs reported to their superiors, however, the reception was, if possible, even more venomously negative. For Canaris, the disappointment was crushing— and it soon became doubly depressing when his enemies in the Nazi hierarchy, who had long suspected the Abwehr of treason, began to strike at some of his most trusted subordinates.​

First, Oster and one of his cohorts were caught aiding escaping Jews. Next Moltke attended a garden party at which a number of indiscreet things were said about the regime. After one more futile trip to Ankara in the last weeks of 1943 to try to contact the American ambassador to Cairo, who was an old friend, Count von Moltke, too, was arrested. Investigators from several branches of the Nazi apparatus threatened Canaris and his grip on the Abwehr.​

While the German resistance struggled to win recognition from Roosevelt, his antipathy toward them and the German people was hardening. In May 1943 Churchill came to Washington for a conference, code-named “Trident.” Probably reacting to the attempts by Canaris to reach him through Donovan, Roosevelt told the prime minister he wanted to issue a declaration that he would refuse to negotiate with the Nazi regime, the German army high command, or any other group or individual in Germany. Churchill, once more demonstrating his dislike for taking such an intransigent public stand, managed to talk him out of it. . . .​

Shortly after Sicily fell, Italy’s King Victor Emmanuel III dismissed Benito Mussolini and appointed Field Marshal Pietro Badoglio premier. Badoglio immediately opened secret negotiations with American emissaries to get Italy out of the war. Everything seemed to be moving toward a stunning capitulation, which would have opened a huge gap in Hitler’s Festung Europa. But Roosevelt insisted that he would accept only unconditional surrender—and the removal of the king and the field marshal. Badoglio angrily withdrew from the negotiations and for over six weeks the talks were stalled while Eisenhower, Churchill, and others desperately tried to persuade the president to let them cut a deal that would have saved thousands of British and American lives.​

By the time Roosevelt relented and permitted the king and the marshal to remain in power, the Germans had poured 24 divisions into Italy, and the Italians had no country to surrender.​

Unbeknownst to the German conspirators, they were acquiring allies on the other side. As British and American planners contemplated the harsh realities of at- tacking the 1.5 million–man German army in France, doubts about the policy of unconditional surrender escalated. It soon became evident that virtually no one in either Allied government supported the policy except Roosevelt and those in his White House circle.​

On March 25, 1944, Gen. George Marshall and the Joint Chiefs of Staff submitted a memorandum to the president, urging “that a reassessment of the formula of unconditional surrender should be made…at a very early date.” The chiefs proposed a proclamation that would assure the Germans the Allies had no desire to “extinguish the German people or Germany as a nation.”​

On April 1, 1944, Roosevelt replied with an outburst that revealed as never before the extent of his disdain for Germany.​

Eisenhower was drawing on his experience in Italy, reasoning that if the Allies had proposed installing an Italian field marshal as premier, what was wrong with the same approach for Germany? In his cable to Hull, Stettinius, obviously quoting Eisenhower, said they should try to encourage the emergence of a German Badoglio. The cable also added the suggestion that after the beachhead was established in France, Eisenhower should call on the German commander in the West to surrender.​

From the White House, in response to this extraordinary message, came another bout of silence. . . .​

While this charade played out in Washington, some 500 leaders of the German resistance were being tortured by the Gestapo and tried before a so-called People’s Court, packed with Nazi party members who jeered and hooted at them. Field marshals and generals, colonels and former officials of the Foreign Office and the Abwehr were forced to wear clothes that were either ridiculously large or small, to make them look as much like buffoons as possible. Yet they managed to defend themselves with calm dignity, boldly testifying that they had tried to overthrow Hitler because Nazism filled them with moral and spiritual revulsion.​

Neither Churchill nor Roosevelt, nor any of their spokesmen, uttered a public word of sympathy or regret for these men. Instead, the Anglo-Americans showered Germany with mocking leaflets, sneering that the conspiracy was a sure sign of imminent collapse.​

It’s clear, FDR was a murderous psychopath. Then, Truman takes over and he is worse.

However, Americans like to cling to their fairy tale version of WWII, as the good war won by the greatest generation. Statist propaganda works.

Indeed. we were for sure brainwashed in out corrupt school system into believing all that what a great president FDR was blah blah blah. so many facts on that murderous traiter were omiited from the history books. another suppressed fact is what a traiter and mass murderer Eisenhower was as well.

Here is the REAL traiiter and mass murderer and pal of FDR exposed-:remember both parties are corrupt and they are one in the same. as you well know" did you know about this event between murderer Ike and uncle Joe as he called him?

By stopping General Patton's advance and handing Eastern Germany to Stalin, "Ike" enabled the mass rapes and murders.

As 2 million German women were being gang raped on Stalin's orders, Eisenhower partied with 'Uncle Joe' - atop Lenin's tomb!

These are the REAL mass murderers below,these three sick disgusting monsters are all burning in hell alongside with Eisenhower.

“Uncle Joe” and the Soviets did most of the fighting and dying in that war.
While FDR was delaying a US invasion until he had built up his forces and would minimize US casualties, the Soviets were fighting in Moscow, Leningrad, Stalingrad, Kursk and hundreds of other killing fields.

By the time we finally executed D Day, the Soviets had already smashed German forces and were marching westward

The Soviets did 90 percent of the fighting and dying in the European theater. We reaped the benefits

yes--after all of that--the Russians are not going for conditional surrender

Can’t believe some morons believe the Soviets would be willing to shake hands and go home

What do you mean "you can't believe". That's exactly what they did after fall of Berlin wall. It took them 45 years, but eventually they did it. If traitors didn't give them nuke tech and jet blueprints, it would happen much sooner.

 

[LA RAM FAN]

It’s clear, FDR was a murderous psychopath. Then, Truman takes over and he is worse.

However, Americans like to cling to their fairy tale version of WWII, as the good war won by the greatest generation. Statist propaganda works.

Amen to that

 

[CrusaderFrank]

They would have surrendered to the west to try to prevent being overrun by the Soviets, for starters.

Patton would have been in Berlin months ahead of the USSR. FDR stalled our drive so that Stalin could swing south and add Bulgaria to his collection!

FDR worst President in history

 

[Regent23]

It’s clear, FDR was a murderous psychopath. Then, Truman takes over and he is worse.

However, Americans like to cling to their fairy tale version of WWII, as the good war won by the greatest generation. Statist propaganda works.

Amen to that

It only seems fair that the generation that fights the war be allowed to create the surrender terms. The murderous psychopath mentioned is also rated by the voters of his time, and
American historians, as America's greatest president.

 

[my2¢]

I guess it is what to be expected when you have a president who thinks he's smarter than the generals.

 

[whitehall]

Chief of Staff George Marshall was promoted to his position ahead of a dozen more qualified Army Generals. It turns out that he was FDR's gofer and not much else. Ike was afraid he would be relieved of duty after the debacle of the Bulge but the media turned the situation around and pronounced the most notorious intelligence failure in history to be a victory. Ike was ordered by Marshall to halt his Troops on the outskirts of Berlin and let the rag tag Russian mob take the city. The Iron Curtain was part of FDR's foreign policy.

 

[Quasar44]

FDR needed war to distract from the fact that his seven years of economic idiocy was total failure.

We should have let the Russians and Germans exterminate each other

 

[Quasar44]

FDR was a cartel boss
He had zero honor
A man of extreme corruption and evilness
He was an avaricious serpent

 

[LA RAM FAN]

FDR was a cartel boss
He had zero honor
A man of extreme corruption and evilness
He was an avaricious serpent

You. Nailed it.

 

[justinacolmena]

“unconditional surrender” and by refusing to even consider the substantive peace offers made by the German resistance leaders

If they were resistance leaders, they would have already been fighting on our side against the National Socialist Workers Party of Germany which obviously had the support of U.S. Democrats, including FDR.

The U.S. declared war on Germany, and then invited top Nazi scientists to work for the U.S. government via Operation Paperclip. Obviously the U.S. Democrats who supported the war did so with the intention of coopting it into a war against the resistance in full solidarity with the Nazi Party.

Many Jews, especially anti-communists, or Sephardic vs Ashkenazi, were on the Nazi side as well. Adolf Hitler himself was part Jewish.

And it's somewhat confusing, because for all the notorious concentration camps of Germany and Poland, the Russian pogroms led by Stalin on our side of the war were incarcerating just as many Jews and working them to death in the gulags or labor camps of the former USSR.

 

[basquebromance]

FDR was president for 4,222 days during every one of which his party controlled Congress, yet he still vetoed 635 bills

 

[rightwinger]

FDR was our greatest modern President

Turned the US into a modern Democracy and Super Power both economically and militarily

 

[gipper]

FDR was our greatest modern President

Turned the US into a modern Democracy and Super Power both economically and militarily

He sucked.

 

[rightwinger]

FDR was our greatest modern President

Turned the US into a modern Democracy and Super Power both economically and militarily

He sucked.

Saved the US and saved the world

FDR greatest President

 

[HenryBHough]

If America had nukes but FDR left it to Truman to use them he should have been tried and executed as the traitor he would have been. Had Hitler come to glow in the dark maybe the Japs would have thought twice before failing to see the light.....errrrrr..........glow!

 

[gipper]

FDR was our greatest modern President

Turned the US into a modern Democracy and Super Power both economically and militarily

He sucked.

Saved the US and saved the world

FDR greatest President

He screwed up the world and fucked the nation.

 

[Regent23]

FDR was our greatest modern President

Turned the US into a modern Democracy and Super Power both economically and militarily

He sucked.

Saved the US and saved the world

FDR greatest President

He screwed up the world and fucked the nation.

Even Reagan voted for FDR four times, and again, as did America's best historians, and most importantly the American people. Maybe it is one of those periods in history that one must live through to appreciate the magnitude of the Great Depression and World War 2. Would the American people vote for Trump four times or even two?