Herbert Hoover

[LarryHW.]

Has anybody read Freedom Betrayed: Herbert Hoover's Secret History of the Second World War and its Aftermath?

http://www.hooverpress.org/productdetails.cfm?PC=1470

If so, what did you think of it?

[pasoleati]

I have. It is s splendid book that alone delivers a deadly blow on FDR's actions before and during WW2. Among most interesting documents is a memo on a meeting between Hoover and Joseph Kennedy in 1945. Kennedy revealed to Hoover that when FDR pressured Chamberlain to sign the security quarantees to Poland, Kennedy had been present with Chamberlain at that moment and Chamberlain had stated something along the lines (I don't have the book handy right now, so I am quoting from memory):"Well, now you Americans and Jews have the war you wanted. I fear that I have just signed the death warrant of civilization."

Hoover has also excellent evidence how FDR allowed Soviet moles to infiltrate the US government from the beginning of his presidency.

He also notes how Britain prevented humanitarian aid from delivery to occupied Western Europe by Hoover's relief organization.

Regarding FDR and Stalin, not too long ago I listened to a archival radio interview of Churchill's interpreter during all of his Big 3 conferences. He noted how he overheard FDR and Stalin planning a post-war India: Britain kicked out and replaced by a bolshevik regime.

[LarryHW.]

Hoover book

I have. It is s splendid book that alone delivers a deadly blow on FDR's actions before and during WW2. Among most interesting documents is a memo on a meeting between Hoover and Joseph Kennedy in 1945. Kennedy revealed to Hoover that when FDR pressured Chamberlain to sign the security quarantees to Poland, Kennedy had been present with Chamberlain at that moment and Chamberlain had stated something along the lines (I don't have the book handy right now, so I am quoting from memory):"Well, now you Americans and Jews have the war you wanted. I fear that I have just signed the death warrant of civilization."

Hoover has also excellent evidence how FDR allowed Soviet moles to infiltrate the US government from the beginning of his presidency.

He also notes how Britain prevented humanitarian aid from delivery to occupied Western Europe by Hoover's relief organization.

Regarding FDR and Stalin, not too long ago I listened to a archival radio interview of Churchill's interpreter during all of his Big 3 conferences. He noted how he overheard FDR and Stalin planning a post-war India: Britain kicked out and replaced by a bolshevik regime.

I haven't read the book yet, but I do know a good deal about Hoover. He was a bitter man in the 1930's and 40's. To most Americans at that time, the name Hoover was associated with personal and national economic disaster. I'm sure you have head of the term "Hooverville." It was a souce of deep frustration for the man who had been known as the great international humanitarian and relief worker in World War I and after to have presided over one of the greatest periods of misery an suffering in his own countries' history and have been very ineffective in combating it. On the very day he left office, the American financial system was on the edge of collapse. Be aware that these is at least an element of sour grapes behind Hoover's attitudes in that period. Ditto Joe Kennedy.

[pasoleati]

Well, the possibility or even probability of sour grapes exist in every personal account. However, Hoover's book is very well referenced, so there are fewer grapes here.

There are some blind spots in it. E.g. Hoover's hatred of "militarism" is ridiculous given the fact that brutalization of warfare is the handiwork of war-hating non-militarists (would diehard pork eaters rejoice if pigs were killed to extinction...).

Another blind spot is Hoover's selective humanitarism. E.g. Indians did not fit his bill as he rejoices how Ametican revolution could vent itself "...into near vacant hinterland.".