University of North Texas Digital Library
Posted on 08/14/2011 7:17:23 AM PDT by Homer_J_Simpson
Clemet Atlee has this announcement to make on the recent meeting between President Franklin Roosevelt and Prime Minister Winston Churchill.
BBC – Clemet Atlee Speech to British Nation
Meanwhile, from sea, Winston Churchill also broadcasts the text of the agreement between himself and President Roosevelt.
BBC – Winston Churchill – The Atlantic Charter
University of North Texas Digital Library
(Left to right: Franklin Roosevelt Jr, Winston Churchil, Franklin Roosevelt, and Eliot Roosevelt on board the Augusta off of Newfoundland.)
(The HMS Prince of Wales dwarves the USS McDougal as they are moored side by side during the Atlantic Charter Conference in Placentia Bay, Newfoundland)
(Roosevelt and Churchill sit in the foreground while in the back ground from left to right are Harry Hopkins, William Averell Harriman, Admiral Ernest King, General George C. Marshall, General Sir John G. Dill, Admiral Harold Stark, and Admiral Sir Dudley Pound)
Click the following pictures for raw footage of the Atlantic Conference.
Breaking news ping.
Ain’t they dead by now? /S
Thank you again.
Very interesting to read history in real time as told by current doyennes of literay in their day.
Agreed. Many thanks to Homer and company. These are always wonderful to me.
The title threw me a bit. I thought the rookie Hussein dusted off someone else’s financial plan and would implement something that actually worked in the past. My bad.
The “Atlantic Charter” proclamation refers specifically to looking toward a world after the destruction of “Nazi tyranny” — it’s great that FDR was bringing to US to such a position in an official diplomatic document, but it was certainly outside the norms of neutrality.
It is a fascinating (and harrowing) period between Sept. 1, 1939 and Dec. 7, 1941 as FDR and other US leaders increasingly recognize the need to align the USA in support of the UK (and then even of the odious USSR) in order to defeat the Axis powers, even while the USA is not officially in the war.
Without the Pearl Harbor and related attacks by Japan, who knows how long the USA might have continued in the murky terrain between peace and war, trying to provide (”lend-lease” etc.) enough supplies and weapons to allow the UK and then USSR to resist, while not declaring war upon Hitler and Naziism.
Indeed, if Hitler had not been so foolish as to declare war on the USA on Dec. 11, 1941, would FDR and Congress have opted to go to war with Nazi Germany, at least right away? Or would we have been solely engaged in fighting a Pacific Ocean war against Japan while continuing to supply the UK and USSR?
To your last point, I would say that it would have been very difficult for FDR to get Congress to declare war on Germany as well. I think it still would have been an eventuality, but it may have taken months or perhaps even more to convince them to fight on both fronts. I’m pretty certain that if any significant amount of time passed between the declaration of war on Japan and the request to declare it on Germany, there would have been a large contingent protesting the prospect of fighting a two front war and a “Not until Japan is defeated” crowd would have taken hold not only among the populous, but in Congress as well.
Yes, that’s how I would assess the matter. Historical counterfactuals can be a guessing game, but I find them fascinating if the issues discussed are plausible.
Without Hitler’s declaration of war I think the public anger and focus would have remained overwhelmingly upon defeating Japan, and it would have been a tricky issue over some period of time to get enough Americans to realize that direct US involvement in Europe and North Africa was essential as well. It probably would have come, but there would have been some period of time in which our main focus was on the Pacific..... whereas with Germany at war with the USA the official policy within the Pentagon was “Europe first” I believe.... although certainly huge major resources did go to the Pacific as well.
Official policy was a “Europe First” position. This was first set forth in Admiral Stark’s Dog Plan memo of November 1940. This position was affirmed in the ABC-1 Conferences which this Atlantic Conference meeting can be considered a portion of.
The reality was somewhat different though. By the end of 1942, despite the fact that we had invasion forces in North Africa, there were more troops committed to the fight against Japan then there were against Italy and Germany (460,000 against Japan vs 380,000 for Italy and Germany).
A good book on the subject of these agreements and how they worked in practice is “Allies and Adversaries: The Joints Chiefs of Staff, the Grand Alliance, and U.S. Strategy in World War II” by Mark A. Stoler.
thanks, I’ve gotta read that book!
I’ve always wondered what “Europe first” really meant in practice, since obviously in 1942 and even much deeper into the USA’s war a huge portion of US forces went to the Pacific.
In 1942 we were so seriously limited in what we could do against Hitler beyond the anti-submarine war, the invasion of N. Africa etc. Stalin would have loved us to throw any kind of invasion force onto the continent of Europe, since even a fiasco for the US/UK might at least distract German forces a bit. But we had excellent reasons to wait and develop an invasion that could really succeed, no matter how long it took to get to D-Day.
I think we would have ultimately provoked Nazi Germany into war by continuing to ship to Britain, and the first time a US ship was fired on, would have provided us with the Casus Belli to declare war on Germany.
I think you will really like this book then. It is an serious academic writing so in places it can be a bit dry, but it is loaded with information and very well researched. I’ll throw another one out there that you might enjoy which is called “Partners in Command” by Mark Perry. This looks at much of the same strategy, but it looks at from the perspective of Marshall’s and Eisenhower’s relationship. It gives a different angle to the war time strategy.
excellent, thank you, I’m going to read both of those books!
Thanks, I always appreciate recommendations of good books on subjects of interest to me.....
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