( men singing in russian )
Stone: In January 1943,
Just days before the final german surrender at stalingrad,
Roosevelt and churchill met
At casablanca in french morocco.
Stalin was not in attendance.
He'd withdrawn his ambassadors from london and washington.
The alliance was in crisis.
The red army was moving west against the germans.
The momentum had shifted.
Appreciation of the soviet sacrifice
Was finally growing in the u.S.
Even fervent anti-communist media-baron henry luce
Made stalin "time" magazine's man of the year in 1942,
Praising his industrialization,
Stating, "stalin's methods were tough, but they paid off."
Another luce magazine, "life,"
Painted the soviet union as a quasi-america,
With its citizens "one hell of a people
Who to a remarkable degree look like americans,
Dress like americans and think like americans."
His ruthless secret police was even described
As a national police similar to the fbi.
Roosevelt felt he had to take action,
Or he risked the breakup of the alliance.
Both he and churchill feared stalin might indeed make a deal with hitler
To save the soviet union further destruction.
After all he'd done it before.
But on many issues roosevelt, unlike churchill,
Saw eye-to-eye with stalin.
Both wanted a weakened,
Pastoralized postwar germany without industry.
It was germany's militarism
That had been the cause of such unrest in europe.
Roosevelt's voice: We either have to castrate the german people
Or we have to treat them in such a manner,
So that they can't just go on reproducing people
Who want to continue the way they have in the past.
Stone: It was at casablanca that the president announced
A policy of "unconditional surrender."
He wanted to send a message to stalin
That the u.S. Would not rest
Until hitler's germany was destroyed.
"unconditional surrender" was a declaration of war
Not merely on the enemy governments,
But on the german and japanese people themselves.
Which in its unintended way,
Would lead to terror bombing of civilian populations,
Harden the resistance of those populations,
And result in the most controversial decision of the war:
The dropping of the atomic bomb on japan.
In hindsight one might argue
That the declaration of "unconditional surrender"
Was one of roosevelt's greatest blunders.
To make matters worse, roosevelt and churchill confirmed at casablanca
The allied decision to land in sicily after north africa,
Again postponing the second front in europe
And relegating their nations to further irrelevance
In determining the outcome of the war.
This would lead to the disastrous
Italian campaign of 1943-'45
That achieved little but a fierce bloodletting
Of allied troops in sicily,
And at slaughterhouses like the beach-head at anzio
And the four battles for monte cassino,
Which did little damage to the nazis.
With the allies bogged down in Italy,
And the soviets increasingly suspicious of british intentions,
Roosevelt and stalin met 10 months after casablanca
For the very first time in tehran in iran
In November 1943.
After trying unsuccessfully to exclude churchill from the meeting,
Roosevelt accepted stalin's offer to stay in the soviet embassy.
But roosevelt found stalin cold and aloof
During the first three days of meetings
And feared he would not succeed.
But on the fourth day, after teasing churchill
In front of stalin about his britishness
And about his cigars,
Churchill, according to roosevelt,
Grew red and scowled.
And the more he did, the more stalin smiled,
Until finally stalin broke out into a deep, hearty guffaw
At the expense of churchill.
And before long, roosevelt was calling him "uncle joe."
The ice had been broken,
And roosevelt felt that he and stalin
Were now talking like men and brothers.
Roosevelt reiterated to the soviet leader
That he would open the long-delayed second front
The following spring. Churchill was forced to commit,
But argued still the landing should be made
To the east through the balkans,
Heading off the advancing soviets.
Roosevelt's voice: The p.M. Is thinking too much
Of a postwar world and where England will be.
He's scared of letting the russians get too strong.
Stone: Roosevelt clearly indicated
He would allow the soviets considerable latitude
In shaping the future of eastern europe
And the baltic states,
Requesting only that stalin implement changes judiciously
And not offend world opinion.
Roosevelt had written stalin a personal note promising...
Roosevelt's voice: The United States will never lend its support
In any way to any provisional government in poland
That would be inimical to your interests.
Stone: Crucially, roosevelt made important headway
When he got stalin to agree to enter the war against japan
When the war against germany was concluded.
Exhausted, roosevelt wrote of the tehran conference,
"we made great progress."
Roosevelt: To use an american
And somewhat ungrammatical colloquialism,
I may say that I "got along fine"
With marshal stalin.
And I believe that we are going to get along very well
With him and the russian people,
Very well indeed.
( gunfire )
The soviet war continued with a bloody campaign in belorussia,
Followed by their entry into poland in January 1944--
Russia's ancient border enemy.
The retaking of poland and particularly warsaw
Is a tragic and bloody story.
Few suffered as much as the poles in this long war.
Six million were killed, three million of them jewish.
But the u.S.S.R. Too
Paid a stiff price to free poland.
600,000 soviets perished.
It was here that the first death camps were actually found
In 1944 by soviet troops,
And revealed unquestionably to the world,
Pictures of the true insanity of hitler's regime.
The soviets quickly set up a friendly government in lublin
That cracked down on the opposition,
Triggering a civil war.
They had excluded the fiercely anti-communist representatives
Of the polish exile government that had been set up in london.
The westerners thought of them as democrats,
But stalin said they were terrorists--
Descendants of the white russians
Who had fought against the revolution
In the russian civil war of 1919-1922.
No stranger himself to terrorist tactics,
Stalin, in order to prevail
Against the hated anti-communist poles in london,
Committed the dual atrocities
Of killing thousands of polish army officers
In the katyn forest in 1940,
And then in 1944,
He ordered the red army to halt outside the capital
While the germans crushed
The native warsaw uprising.
Soviet defenders argued
That the red army had exhausted itself
In a grueling 45-day, 450-mile advance
Against tough german troops,
Over-stretching their supply and communication lines--
That they needed to stand down.
Differences over poland would become
The single greatest source of distrust
Between the u.S., britain,
And the soviet union during and after the war.
But to be fair, many westerners did not understand
That anti-semitism had long been common
Among a significant portion of polish catholics,
Or that to stalin poland was a matter
Of life and death for the soviet union,
Because the polish territories were the corridor
Through which the hated germans had twice passed
Into russia in the 20th century.
For these reasons stalin demanded and enforced
A friendly government on his border.
It was no less an issue to him
Than canada or mexico was
For the United States.
Through 1944 and '45,
The soviets continued to advance,
Taking romania, bulgaria,
Hungary, czechoslovakia,
And with the significant help
Of partisan guerillas, yugoslavia.
Mile by mile,
Across eastern and southeastern europe,
The germans fought to the last man.
Cities became fortresses and were reduced to rubble.
Warsaw, budapest, vienna--
An estimated million soviet troops perished
Liberating these areas.
And as the soviets fought their way to berlin
From several directions,
In the west on June 6th, 1944,
The long-delayed second front
Was finally opened,
One and a half years after roosevelt first promised it to stalin.
The largest armada the world had ever seen,
Involving 11,000 planes
- And some 4,000 ships. - ( gunfire )
Over 100,000 allied troops
And 30,000 vehicles
Landed on the french beach at normandy.
An estimated 3,000 men died in this landing.
Allied forces were now approaching germany
From both east and west.
Victory was inevitable.
A month later in July 1944,
A key event in the future of the world was taking shape--
The democratic party convention opened in chicago.
His health clearly failing,
Roosevelt easily secured the nomination
For an unprecedented fourth term.
Henry wallace, his vice president,
Was probably the second most popular man in america,
The people's choice to be his running mate.
But he had made many enemies over the years.
In may 1942, wallace had given
The acclaimed "common man" speech.
Some have spoken of the american century.
I say that the century on which we are entering,
The century which will come out of this war,
Can be and must be
The century of the common man.
There must be neither military nor economic imperialism.
The March of freedom of the past 150 years
Has been a great revolution of the people.
There were the american revolution...
The french revolution...
The latin american revolutions...
The russian revolution.
Each spoke for the common man.
Some went to excess,
But people broke their way to the light.
Stone: He called for a worldwide peoples' revolution
And an end to colonialism.
His speech was received coldly across the atlantic.
Churchill charged his secret agents
In the u.S. To spy on wallace.
Wallace detested the british empire.
Wallace's voice: I said bluntly that I thought the notion
Of anglo-saxon superiority,
Inherent in churchill's approach,
Would be offensive to many.
Churchill had had quite a bit of whiskey,
Said why be apologetic about anglo-saxon superiority,
That we were superior,
That we had the common heritage
That had been worked out over the centuries in England
And had been perfected by our constitution."
Stone: Wallace's hatred of imperialism
Was universally known and widely acclaimed.
In March 1943, roosevelt sent him
To latin america on a goodwill tour--
Secretly charging him
To recruit nations for the allied cause.
65,000 greeted him in costa rica,
15% of the population.
More than one million cheered
As he moved down the streets of santiago, chile.
( cheering )
( wallace speaking spanish )
Stone: The vice president returned
With a dozen countries declaring war on germany.
It was more than anyone had imagined possible.
Back home, in a gallup poll,
Wallace was the choice of 57%
Of democratic voters to succeed roosevelt.
But opposition to him
From inside the party was enormous.
Jesse jones was allied to a powerful group
Of democratic party bosses, led by party treasurer
And oil millionaire edwin pauley.
United by their hatred of wallace,
Their champion was a man known to many
As the "assistant president."
James byrnes had been raised
In the hot-house politics of sultry south carolina,
An environment where white superiority
And segregation trumped all other issues.
He was a driving force behind blocking
A federal anti-lynching bill in 1938.
After making his name smashing trade unions in the south,
Byrnes became a powerful u.S. Senator.
If you wanted something done on capitol hill,
You saw jimmy byrnes.
By 1943, the mood in washington had shifted.
It was no longer the "new deal,"
And roosevelt removed wallace from the bureau of economic warfare
And put byrnes in charge of the new office of war mobilization.
But wallace still had a powerful supporter--
The american working man.
( people singing )
Stone: Today, few remember that the second world war
Saw more strikes by organized labor
Than at any other time in u.S. History.
In 1944 alone one million workers
Were on strike at one time or another.
The war had rejuvenated american capitalism.
Corporate profits rose from $6.4 billion in 1940
To $10.8 billion in 1944.
Put simply, the war was good business.
But in the face of rising corporate profits,
Workers' wages were frozen.
As a result, a wave of strikes rocked the nation.
( people shouting )
Man: Americans versus americans--
A tragic spectacle in these critical times
When unity is essential to the preservation of democracy.
Stone: Detroit was the key city
In roosevelt's "arsenal of democracy."
Roosevelt: A great arsenal of democracy.
Stone: Many african-american families migrated north
In search of work in the armaments factories.
Racial tensions soon escalated.
One demonstrator jeered...
Man: I'd rather see hitler and hirohito win,
Than work beside a nigger on the assembly line.
Stone: In June, violence exploded,
Exacerbated by the city's
Nearly all-white police force.
Federal troops arrived to restore order...
With live ammunition.
34 were killed in the riots--
25 of them black.
Wallace went to detroit to survey the damage.
He was appalled.
Stone: Years later this remark would be echoed
By civil rights leader martin luther king
In reference to the vietnam war.
By 1944 powerful labor leaders
Sidney hillman and scotsman phil murray,
Expressing complete confidence in wallace,
Had taken a dislike to the new men like byrnes
Taking power in washington.
But the anti-wallace forces told the president
That a wallace re-nomination as vice president
Would split the party.
The president would not answer their ultimatum.
He stalled for time.
Eleanor roosevelt reminded him that wallace had been there
With him since the beginning, a fellow visionary.
But the president's attitude
Towards wallace remained a puzzle.
He sent wallace to evaluate
The war's forgotten front-- in china.
U.S. Ally jiang jieshi had been fighting japan
Since the early 1930s, and with his wife,
The powerful, american-educated madame jiang,
Had strong ties to the u.S. Conservatives.
Wallace, however, saw the growing power
Of mao tse-tung's communist army
And was unsure of jiang's future.
His final report was considered
Too controversial and suppressed.
On his return, wallace was summoned immediately
To meet the president.
The ticket would be the subject of discussion.
It was the moment wallace had been dreading.
Wallace: His affection for me seemed to be completely undimmed,
Because I can remember him pulling me down
So his mouth was next to my ear and saying,
"henry, I hope it will be the same old team."
Stone: When the convention opened,
He was waiting for that support.
But increasingly ill, the president,
Staying in san diego, only sent a note.
Franklin delano roosevelt said, "if I were
A delegate to this convention,
I would vote for henry a. Wallace."
Stone: Despite these words, it was a cruel blow.
The president was not willing
To fight for his vice president.
But wallace remained the favorite.
Labor told the president
That the strike-breaking jimmy byrnes
Was not acceptable. He was out.
Desperate, the party bosses,
Led by edwin pauley,
Robert hannegan, ed flynn, ed kelley and others,
Needed an 11th-hour substitute.
And they settled on missouri senator harry truman,
A man of limited qualifications,
But one with few enemies.
A graduate of high school,
He'd been involved in three failed businesses.
He'd served honorably in world war I.
His most ambitious business venture,
A haberdashery, went belly up in 1922.
And in 1933 he wrote...
Truman's voice: Tomorrow I'll be 49,
But for all the good I have done,
The 40 might as well be left off.
Stone: A year later
Kansas city political boss tom pendergast,
After having been turned down
By his first four choices,
Picked the 50-year-old truman
To run for the senate.
When asked why, pendergast replied...
Pendergast's voice: I wanted to demonstrate that a well-oiled machine
Could send an office boy to the senate.
Stone: Shunned by most senators,
Who dismissed him as the "senator from pendergast,"
And failing to gain roosevelt's endorsement in his re-election bid,
Truman worked hard to achieve respectability
In his second senate term.
But a gallup poll on the opening day
Showed 65% supporting wallace as vice president--
Jimmy byrnes had 3% of the vote,
And truman came in eighth with 2%.
As wallace arrived at the convention,
Labor leaders hillman and murray had delivered.
Wallace supporters were there by the thousands.
Murray, in a thick scottish accent,
Shouted to his men, "wallace! That's it! Just keep pounding!"
The future must bring
Equal wages for equal work
Regardless of sex or race.
- ( cheering ) - stone: Wallace's speech
Was interrupted constantly by applause.
A chant of "we want wallace" filled the hall.
We want wallace! We want wallace! We want wallace!
Stone: Someone hijacked the loudspeakers
And played wallace's campaign song
With its chorus "iowa, iowa, that's where the tall corn grows!"
♪ iowa, iowa, that's where the tall corn... ♪
Stone: Furious, ed pauley threatened
To cut the sound to the amplifiers.
A victorious vote was almost a foregone conclusion--
A wallace victory was certain.
Florida senator claude pepper realized that
If he got wallace's name in nomination this night,
Wallace would sweep the convention.
He fought his way through the crowd to get to the microphone.
But the bosses were now demanding
That session chair samuel jackson adjourn.
This chaos was a fire hazard, they screamed.
Not knowing what to do, jackson called the vote for adjournment.
A few said "aye," but the overwhelming majority
- Boomed "nay." - ( gavel pounds )
And yet, jackson had the gall
To announce that the vote to adjourn had passed.
It was outrageous.
Confusion filled the hall.
Pepper had reached the first step of the stage,
Only five feet-- probably nine seconds-- from the microphone,
Before the bosses forced adjournment
Against the will of the delegates.
If he could have nominated wallace in those moments,
There is no doubt henry wallace would have been
Overwhelmingly returned as vice president.
"what I understood," pepper wrote,
"was that for better or worse,
History was turned topsy-turvy that night in chicago."
Samuel jackson apologized to pepper the next day,
And pepper wrote in his autobiography that jackson said,
"I had strict instructions from hannegan
Not to let the convention nominate
The vice-president last night."
Hillman and murray rallied the same troops
To return the next day and see it through to victory.
- ( cheering ) - but over that night,
Edwin pauley and the anti-wallace forces
United behind harry truman.
Deals were cut. Positions offered--
Ambassadorships, postmaster positions.
Cash payoffs.
Bosses called every state chairman,
Telling them that roosevelt wanted
The missouri senator as his running mate.
Bob hannegan managed to put up 16 "favorite son" nominees
To draw votes away from wallace,
And then channeled those votes to truman.
Even so, the next day when voting began,
Things started to swing wallace's way again.
Iowa, the greatest agricultural state
In the union, gives to this convention
And to the democratic party
Its illustrious, distinguished son
Henry a. Wallace for this nomination
Of the vice presidency of the United States.
( cheering )
( chanting ) we want wallace! We want wallace!
Stone: When the first ballot ended,
It was wallace 429, to truman's 319.
Then a second ballot got underway,
And now the deals the bosses had made kicked into action.
Jackson announced that the second ballot would begin at once--
Therefore, no new convention tickets would be honored.
Mayor kelley's police barred thousands more
Of wallace's supporters from the hall.
But those inside began chanting as before--
Attempting to drown out the proceedings.
Wallace started the second ballot firmly in the lead,
But gradually he lost ground to truman
As the nominees put up by hannegan
Signed over their votes to truman, one by one.
Truman prevailed.
It was over.
I guess this is just another lost cause, mr. Paine.
All you people don't know about lost causes.
Mr. Paine does.
He said once they were the only causes worth fighting for.
And he fought for them once.
And I loved you for it.
And you know that you fight for the lost causes
Harder than for any others. Yes, you even die for them.
You think I'm licked.
You all think I'm licked.
Well, I'm not licked!
And I'm gonna stay right here
And fight for this lost cause!
Even if this room gets filled with lies like these
And the taylors and all their armies
Come marching into this place,
Somebody'll listen to me.
( exhausted sigh )
( woman screams )
Stone: Henry wallace, accepting his defeat,
Pledged his loyalty to the roosevelt-truman ticket
And agreed to remain in the cabinet.
Today, buried by the traditional tale of the second world war,
The events of the 1944 democratic convention
Have been largely forgotten.
They would however change the course of history.
The man who might have been president
Could now only watch from the sidelines
As events unfolded.
There were other deals going on
Behind the scenes in this critical year.
Mistrusting roosevelt's optimism in europe,
Churchill flew to moscow
In October 1944
To meet alone with stalin.
Based on the previous experience
Of u.S. Isolationism after the first world war,
Neither leader seriously believed that american troops
Would remain in europe after the war.
Therefore it was vital to churchill
That he shore up the british position as strongly as possible.
On the back of a scrap of paper
Churchill proposed the share of influence
Each nation would exert in postwar europe.
The u.S.S.R. Would get 90% in romania,
75% in hungary and bulgaria.
Yugoslavia would be split 50/50,
But britain would get 90% in greece.
Greece was vital to the british position in the mediterranean--
Close to egypt and the strategic suez canal,
Through which came the trade which kept the empire alive--
From eastern africa through the middle east,
The near east, and at the heart of this empire--
India, the crown jewel,
And beyond it the far east,
Where singapore was now british again.
Although churchill wanted a non-communist poland,
The truth was that poland was simply off the agenda
And churchill was more concerned
With safeguarding british power.
Stalin took the paper and made a large check
With a blue pencil before handing it back.
Churchill remarked...
Churchill's voice: Might it not be thought rather cynical
If it seemed we had disposed of these issues
So fateful to millions of people
In such an offhand manner?
Let us burn the paper.
Stone: But stalin urged churchill
To hold onto the historic scrap of paper,
Which churchill called a "naughty document."
Newsreel voice: For the first time on record,
Stalin came to the airport
To wish his guests godspeed.
Stone: This was exactly the kind of secret deal
That roosevelt had set out to prevent.
At a press conference in 1944
He'd said of british gambia in west africa,
Which he had visited the previous year...
Roosevelt's voice: It's the most horrible thing I've ever seen in my life.
The natives are 5,000 years back of us.
The british have been there for 200 years.
For every dollar that the british have put into gambia,
They have taken out 10.
It's just plain exploitation."
Stone: Roosevelt spoke repeatedly
About a postwar trusteeship system
That would prepare the colonies for independence.
One of these would be indochina,
Which he insisted not be given back to the french after the war,
As churchill and the french exiled leader charles de gaulle demanded.
Roosevelt told cordell hull,
His secretary of state in 1944,
That "France has had the country--
30 million inhabitants-- for nearly 100 years,
And the people are worse off than they were at the beginning."
Churchill told his number two, anthony eden, in late '44...
Churchill's voice: There must be no question
Of our being hustled or seduced into declarations
Affecting british sovereignty
In any of the dominions or colonies.
"hands off the british empire" is our maxim,
And it must not be weakened or smirched
To please sob-stuff merchants at home
Or foreigners of any hue."
Newsreel voice: British soldiers have
Returned to greece. And historic athens,
Capital of ancient freedom, eagerly awaits liberation.
Stone: Churchill sent british troops into athens
To repress the left-wing and communist partisans
Who had led the underground resistance to the nazis
And were now battling for power
Against reactionary forces who wanted to restore the king.
But the greek people did not want to exchange
The nazis for the old monarch.
Street fighting raged through the greek capital.
Churchill ordered his men
To treat athens as a conquered city.
The british general scobie called in dive bombers.
Stalin, however, refused to back the partisans,
Delivering on his bargain to churchill.
Roosevelt is reported to have said...
Roosevelt's voice: How the british can dare such a thing!
The lengths they will go to hang on to the past."
Stone: With the dawn of victory in europe,
Roosevelt, stalin and churchill met for the second and last time
At yalta on the black sea in early February.
The soviet union was preoccupied with its security.
Britain was preserving its empire.
The u.S. Wanted soviet assistance
In ending the pacific war,
And support for a world economy
Open to u.S. Trade and investment,
And for establishing a united nations
To preserve the new peace.
Roosevelt's doctors had begged him not to go to yalta.
The president was weakening daily,
But his vast spirit kept him going.
Roosevelt's voice: It's been a global war,
And we've already started
Making it a global peace.
Stone: There was little time to waste.
And though they didn't see eye to eye on germany,
The big three agreed to a complete disarmament,
Demilitarization and dismemberment of germany.
They would divide the conquered nation
Into four military zones,
With one controlled by France.
The u.S. Still had one major card to play--
Postwar economic assistance
To help the soviets rebuild their shattered nation.
A reparations commission was established
Based on an estimated figure of $20 billion,
With half going to the soviet union.
This was the carrot.
Poland was the focus
Of seven of yalta's eight sessions.
Ultimately the three leaders compromised
On a polish provisional government of national unity,
Which was admittedly vague,
Intended to include democratic leaders from outside poland.
Naval chief of staff william leahy,
A veteran of the spanish-american
And first world wars, warned roosevelt...
Leahy's voice: This is so elastic
That the russians can stretch it all the way
From yalta to washington
Without technically breaking it.
- Stone: Roosevelt agreed. - Roosevelt's voice: I know, bill.
I know it. But it's the best I can do for poland at this time.
Stone: In truth, the United States and britain had lost their leverage
By failing to open up the second front until very late in the war.
So at the end of the day, f.D.R. Didn't give anything at yalta
That stalin didn't already have.
On the other hand stalin was in no rush
To institute revolutionary change, if at all.
As in greece, he recognized that the communists,
Although they'd often played a leading role
In anti-nazi resistance movements,
Represented a minority element
In most of these liberated nations.
Never having shared trotsky's zeal
For international communism,
He had once remarked that communism fit poland
Like a saddle fit a cow.
It was these conflicts, primarily over poland,
That would eventually tear the alliance apart.
But most importantly to roosevelt,
Stalin definitely committed the u.S.S.R.
To join the war against japan
Three months after the close of the european war.
There were still close to two million japanese soldiers in china.
And without soviet aid, the war could drag on indefinitely.
In return, roosevelt and churchill promised
Territorial and economic inducements
That would essentially restore
What the russians had lost to japan
In their 1904-'05 war.
Additionally, the big three reached some agreements
On the united nations,
Which was set to convene in April of '45,
And a system of trusteeships to deal
With the liberated colonial territories.
Although there were many vagaries left
When it came to the british and french empires
In indochina, africa and asia.
News of yalta ignited a kind of optimism
That hadn't been seen for decades.
Former president herbert hoover
Called the conference a "great hope to the world."
C.B.S. War correspondent william shirer,
Who later authored the renowned bestseller
"the rise and fall of the third reich,"
Declared it a "landmark in human history."
Roosevelt returned in triumph.
Addressing congress for the first time
Without standing on his braces,
He called for acceptance of the results.
...As the beginnings of a permanent structure of peace
Upon which we can begin to build, under god,
That better world in which our children and grandchildren,
Yours and mine,
The children and grandchildren of the whole world,
Must live and can live.
( applause )
Stone: For franklin delano roosevelt,
It was an amazing conclusion to an amazing life.
The yalta agreement would forever be controversial
And roosevelt would be unfairly attacked
For capitulating to stalin.
And in the weeks to follow,
Disagreements with the soviets surfaced
Over poland and other issues.
But roosevelt never lost hope,
And in his last cable to churchill wrote...
Roosevelt's voice: I would minimize the soviet problem as much as possible,
Because these problems in one form or another
Seem to arise every day
And most of them straighten out.
Stone: Roosevelt truly thought
He would live to enforce the peace.
But less than two months later
After 12 years in office,
His great, great heart finally gave out
When he died of a massive stroke.
The longest-serving president in american history,
Franklin roosevelt had seen the country through its hardest times--
The great depression and great war.
Without him, the postwar peace that was achieved at yalta
Between the british and american empires and soviet communism
Could not be maintained.
In-between these giants,
America's new president was a shadow of his predecessor,
And he openly admitted it.
Newsreel voice: As the nation is plunged into mourning,
Harry s. Truman becomes president,
The seventh american...
Stone: On his first day in office
A group of reporters asked how the job was going
And truman replied...
Harry truman's voice: Boys, if you ever pray, pray for me now.
I don't know whether you fellows ever had a load of hay fall on you,
But when they told me yesterday what happened,
I felt like the moon, the stars
And all the planets had fallen on me.
I've got the most terribly responsible job a man ever had.
Stone: When a reporter yelled out,
"good luck, mr. President," truman responded...
Truman's voice: "I wish you didn't have to call me that."
Stone: This was not false humility on truman's part.
He'd only been vice president for 82 days
And only spoken to roosevelt twice.
But neither roosevelt or anyone else
Had ever bothered to inform the lightly-regarded vice president
That the United States was building
The most powerful weapon in history.
On April 15th truman and wallace,
Who had remained in the cabinet as secretary of commerce,
Met the funeral train at washington's union station.
There was another man with them--
Jimmy byrnes,
Truman's old mentor from his senate days
Who had befriended the missourian at a time
When most senators avoided him
As a pendergast political hack.
Impressed with the fact
That byrnes had accompanied roosevelt to yalta,
Although he found out later that he'd left the conference early
And was not in on the important discussions,
Truman came to rely on byrnes above all others for advice.
Byrnes gave truman his first real briefing
About the atomic bomb, which he described
As an explosive great enough to destroy the whole world
That "might well put us in a position
To dictate our own terms at the end of the war."
He did not specify exactly to whom
The u.S. Would be dictating those terms.
( applause )
With great humility,
I call upon all americans
To help me keep our nation united
In defense of those ideals
Which have been so eloquently proclaimed
- By franklin roosevelt. - ( applause )
Stone: This turns out to be a crucial moment
In the history of the world
And much of it has been forgotten,
But it is well worth revisiting.
The first to see truman after roosevelt's death on April 13th
Was secretary of state edward stettinius.
The former u.S. Steel chairman of the board
Had had very little influence with roosevelt.
But for truman, stettinius painted
A picture of soviet deception and perfidy,
Saying that britain's churchill felt even more strongly.
And churchill wasted little time confirming that view both in cables
And in a hurried visit to washington
From his foreign secretary anthony eden.
The british ambassador to the u.S., lord halifax,
Sized truman up, saying the new president was
"an honest and diligent mediocrity.
A bungling, if well-meaning amateur"
Surrounded by "missouri county courthouse caliber" friends.
That afternoon truman met with jimmy byrnes.
Admitting his abject ignorance,
He implored byrnes to tell him about everything
"from tehran to yalta" and "everything else under the sun."
Byrnes gladly accommodated.
In a series of meetings,
Byrnes reinforced stettinius's message
That the soviets were breaking their yalta agreements
And implored truman to be, above all,
Uncompromising with them.
Truman made clear his intention to make byrnes secretary of state
As soon as stettinius had gotten
The united nations off the ground.
In this atmosphere, ambassador to the soviet union
Averell harriman,
Having rushed back from moscow,
Warned that the u.S. Was facing
A "barbarian invasion of europe"
And urged truman to stand firm
And tell foreign minister molotov in washington
That "we would not stand for any pushing around
On the polish question."
As soon as the russians had control over a country,
Harriman said, the secret police moved in and wiped out free speech.
But he clarified that the soviets would not risk a break with the u.S.
Because they desperately sought the postwar reconstruction aid
That roosevelt had promised them.
Truman masked his limited understanding
Of the issues with bluster and bravado,
Telling harriman that he didn't expect
To get 100% of what he wanted from the russians,
But he did expect to get 85%.
It is important to note
That many of the most vociferous critics of the soviet union
Shared a similar class background
And a deep hatred for anything that smacked of socialism.
Harriman was the son of a railroad tycoon
Who had founded brown brothers harriman.
James forrestal had made a fortune on wall street.
Stettinius had been chairman of the board
Of the nation's largest corporation.
They were joined by enormously wealthy international bankers,
Wall street and washington lawyers,
And corporate executives who had mostly inherited
Or made their fortunes during the interwar years.
These men would come to shape postwar u.S. Policy
And included dean acheson, robert lovett,
John mccloy, john foster and allen dulles,
Nelson rockefeller, paul nitze,
And general motors president charles wilson,
Who as head of the war production board
Had said that the United States needed
A "permanent war economy."
Although they had served roosevelt,
They had in fact little influence on him.
Opposed to this antagonistic point of view
Towards the soviets were the veterans--
Secretary of war henry stimson,
Army chief of staff general george marshall,
And former vice president henry wallace.
Admiral william leahy again noted the elasticity
Of the yalta agreement and the difficulty
Of alleging bad faith on that basis.
In fact he said, after yalta, he would have been surprised
Had the soviets behaved differently than they had.
Marshall, who "time" magazine
Had named "man of the year" for 1943,
Contended that a break with the soviets
Would be disastrous, given u.S. Dependence on them
To help defeat the japanese.
The conservative secretary of war, henry stimson,
Who had fought the ute indians in the 19th century
And still liked to be called "the colonel,"
Was long practiced in the ways of the world.
When confronted by the issues of acquisition by force,
He explained that the u.S.S.R. Had been a trustworthy ally,
Often delivering even more than had been promised,
Especially in military matters.
He reminded the president of poland's importance to russia and said...
Stimson's voice: The russians are probably being more realistic
About their own security than we are.
Stone: He had previously noted that russia...
Stimson's voice: Prior to 1914 had owned the whole of poland,
Including warsaw, as far as germany
And that she was not asking for restitution of that.
Stone: He added that, outside the u.S. And britain,
Very few countries shared the western understanding of free elections.
Nonetheless, in his first meeting
With soviet foreign minister molotov on April the 23rd,
11 days after roosevelt's death,
Truman wasted little time accusing the soviets
Of having broken their yalta agreement, particularly in poland.
When molotov tried to explain
The yalta-polish agreement through stalin's eyes,
Truman dismissed his clarifications.
When molotov raised other issues, truman snapped...
Truman's voice: That will be all, mr. Molotov.
I would appreciate it if you would transmit
My views to marshal stalin.
Molotov's voice: I've never been talked to like that in my life.
Truman's voice: Carry out your agreements
And you won't get talked to like that.
Stone: Molotov stormed out of the room.
After the meeting, truman boasted...
Truman's voice: I gave it to him straight. I let him have it.
It was a straight one-two to the jaw.
Stone: His bullying of the soviet foreign minister
Probably conjured up images
Of 5'4" john "peanuts" truman,
The 5'8" president's father,
Who, back in missouri, would pick fights with men
A foot taller to show how tough he was.
He wanted that same toughness in his sons
And found it in harry's younger brother vivian.
Harry, however, was diagnosed with flat eyeballs
And forced to wear coke-bottle-thick glasses.
He could not play sports
And he was bullied by the other boys,
Who called him "four-eyes" and "sissy"
And chased him home after school.
When he arrived home trembling,
His mother would comfort him by telling him not to worry
Because he was meant to be a girl anyway.
Gender issues plagued him for years.
He would often refer to his feminine features and attributes.
Economic hardship added to his woes.
No sissy anymore, he now proved he could stand up to leaders
Of the second most powerful nation in the world.
His father, whose approval he struggled unsuccessfully to win
When he was alive, would have been proud of him now.
Stalin, feeling betrayed,
Wasted no time cabling truman the following day,
Insisting that roosevelt had agreed
That the pro-soviet polish government
Would form the kernel of the new government.
He added he didn't know if the governments
Of belgium or greece were really democratic,
But he wouldn't make a stink
Because they were vital to british interests.
These were strong words.
And where the opening of the united nations
In san francisco two days later on April the 25th
Should have been an occasion to celebrate a new era in international peace,
It was instead ruined by tension between the allies.
The russian request to have the pro-soviet government seated
To represent poland was rejected.
After that
Relations continued to deteriorate rapidly.
Realizing that his get-tough tactics
Had not produced the desired results,
Truman met twice with joseph davies,
The former ambassador to the soviet union.
A conservative corporate attorney,
He'd surprised liberal critics
By sympathizing with the soviet experiment.
Davies counseled truman that the soviets had always been
"sticklers for reciprocity between allies."
So they accepted british-imposed governments
In africa, Italy and greece
Even though they did not represent
The anti-fascist forces in those countries,
Because they understood these were
"vital interests" to america and britain.
And they expected similar consideration
For their vital security interests in poland.
Davies noted how fundamentally
The relationship had changed in the last six weeks
With the british acting as instigators,
And warned that if the russians decide
The u.S. And britain are "ganging up on them,"
They'll respond by out-toughing the west
As they did in concluding the 1939 pact with hitler
When it became clear that the west would not help them stop the nazis.
But he assured truman that
"when approached with generosity and friendliness,
The soviets respond with even greater generosity."
Davies agreed to set up a meeting between truman and stalin.
In that same crucial month,
A few days after roosevelt's death,
The soviets had amassed three armies of 2 1/2 million men
To take berlin and end forever hitler's 1,000-year reich.
But incredibly the germans were still able,
With all their losses, to muster an enormous defense
Of one million men with fortified bunkers, air, artillery.
Their most fanatical recruits
In this terrible gotterdammerung:
Child soldiers.
It was the third reich's last stand.
The battle was bloody.
80,000 russian troops were killed,
At least 300,000 casualties,
Fighting street to street.
Berlin fell in four days.
Hitler and his long-term mistress eva braun
Married and the next day committed suicide.
Seeking revenge for the german rape of the u.S.S.R.,
And further fueled by what they had witnessed liberating
The concentration camps of majdanek,
Sobibor, treblinka and auschwitz
En route to berlin,
The soviet soldiers behaved brutally
Towards the vanquished germans.
( gunfire )
Stalin did nothing to stop it.
But when reports began to fill the world's airwaves
Of vast hordes of soviet soldiers raping their way through germany,
Orders came from above to stop,
And the rapes stopped.
The stories continued--
Up to two million women, some claimed, were raped.
In just a few weeks over 100,000 did seek
Medical care for rape.
As part of the intended roosevelt-stalin plan
For the pastoralization of germany,
Soviet officials in the first few months
Shipped 100,000 rail cars of construction materials
And personal goods back to russia--
Some to help rebuild
The shattered economy and some--
Like furs, paintings, gold and jewels--
For purely monetary purposes.
But as a result, the worldwide perception
Of the soviet union endured that it was a barbaric
And brutal semi-asian nation
Invading what had once been civilized europe.
The dictionary definition of "empathy" is...
But truman did not seem capable of comprehending
The pain and suffering of the soviet people or their motives.
Roosevelt, a man who had suffered from polio in his life,
Had understood that the war had been won by soviet sacrifice
And that peace now depended on mutual respect.
Even churchill had admitted the soviet army tore
The guts out of the german military machine.
Stalin was a tyrant, absolutely--
A ruthless, paranoid dictator who disdained
The u.S. Concept of democracy,
But he was also in the tradition of the cruelest tsars.
He had clearly gotten along with roosevelt,
And had, according to several high-level witnesses,
Kept his word to roosevelt.
He desperately wanted friendly relations
With the u.S. To continue.
But as the cold war descended,
The laurels of the u.S.S.R.'s victory over nazi germany
Were stolen-- or rather, forgotten.
It would take another 20 years
For another u.S. President and veteran--
John fitzgerald kennedy, who had lived his entire life
In some degree of pain and with the prospect of death--
To pay homage to the soviet contribution in world war ii.
No nation in the history of battle
Ever suffered more than the soviet union
In the second world war.
At least 20 million lost their lives.
Countless millions of homes and families
Were burned or sacked.
A third of the nation's territory,
Including two-thirds of its industrial base,
Was turned into a wasteland--
A loss equivalent to the destruction
Of this country east of chicago."
Stone: Germany officially surrendered may 7th.
Newsreel voice: The war in europe has ended.
Unconditionally and finally our german enemy
Has surrendered to russia, to britain
And her commonwealth, to america,
To the millions who fought with their hearts and souls,
To the people of all free nations.
( cheering )
Stone: As v-e day was celebrated around the world,
It also meant that the soviets, as agreed at yalta,
Would enter the pacific war around August 8th--
Almost three months before the November 1 start date
For the planned allied invasion of mainland japan.
When truman and byrnes,
Now appointed secretary of state,
Met with stalin and churchill in the most important conference
Of world war ii at potsdam in a suburb of berlin,
They were waiting for news of the secret atomic tests
In the desert of alamogordo.
Truman had pushed the start of the summit
Back two weeks to mid-July
And hoped the bomb would be tested
Before negotiations with stalin began.
In the desert, robert oppenheimer said,
"we were under incredible pressure
To get it done before the potsdam meeting."
It turned out, from truman's perspective, to be worth the wait.
On July 16th, while truman was touring bombed-out berlin
And preparing for the next day's meeting with stalin,
Scientists exploded the first atomic bomb.
It exceeded all expectations.
Some scientists even feared
They had indeed set the atmosphere on fire.
Groves cabled the preliminary results to stimson,
Who rushed to brief truman and byrnes.
They were elated. They knew that they had a date with destiny.
( dramatic music playing )