American Presidents: Totalus Rankium - 32.3 Franklin D Roosevelt

Episode Date: March 20, 2021

As WWII breaks out, FDR enters an unprecedented third term - He has political battles ahead of him, as well as actual battles he desperately wants to avoid. Can he keep the US out of the war? Find out! (I mean, find out how he doesn't. We all know he doesn't.)

Welcome to Totalus Rankium. This week, Franklin D. Roosevelt Part 3. Ah, hello there. Welcome to American Presidents Totalus Rankium on St. Patrick's Day. I am Jamie. It's not offensive at all. No, it's not. No stereotypes here. Yes, sorry, you've thrown me off my intro, it must be said. I forgot you were Irish one day, yeah. Hello, welcome. That's not how I start. How do I start? I'm Rob. I'm Rob, and this is American Presidents. Ranking all the presidents. Talus ranking, ranking all

the presidents from Washington to Biden and this is episode 32.3 Franklin Roosevelt. I kind of stumbled my way into the intro there. No one's going to notice. It's good. Whilst I'm stumbling though, let's talk about a stumble I did last week, or last episode. Cue sad music. Go on. Off it goes. Yeah.

This one's just a stupid one. I've made two really silly mistakes, one in the Roman and one in the American series, in the last two recording sessions. Because usually when I make a mistake, I go, oh, yeah, I didn't spot that. These ones are things that I already knew, but I just for some reason said wrong. Is Frank N'Diouzou not a president?

No, not at all. Apparently he was an Egyptian pharaoh. It's all very confusing. No, it wasn't that. I mentioned J.P. Morgan last episode. Oh, this is a Twitter message. Yeah, and then just sort of off the cuff, it wasn't in my notes, and just went, yeah, he's still around.

Of course he's not still around. Seriously, he was many things with J.P. Morgan, but he wasn't the undead. So, yes, that was his son. That was a reference to. Yeah, I was tired. That's all I'm going to say. So I'm sorry to everyone. This is a follow-up on, you know, excuses.

I say after excusing myself. Yeah, it just happens sometimes. Sometimes you get the wrong J.P. Morgan. Yeah. I did it last week. I said, J.P.! Oh, no, it's Mum. Yeah, so there you go.

So that's that correction. So now we can stop the sad music. There we go, that's done. And now we can jump into this episode, Jamie. Wow, this one was a hard one to write. Yeah, I can imagine. Yeah, yeah. Because I don't write it, that's all I can do.

But I'm excited to do it because it was a very interesting one to write. Okay. For reasons I'll explain later. But let's just say, as a British person, it was very interesting writing essentially a brief timeline of World War II from a US perspective. Pearl Harbour. Yes we talk about that but anyway come on let's do it let's go intro. Hitler's dead body no um oh I know I'm inspired by a certain advert but I won't tell you which one imagine a black horse running across a beach okay this in no way fits uh with what i had you can go dead hitler if

you want that would equally be hard i was kind of hoping you were just going to say room uh i can pick okay a horse running inside a room no no knocking knocking about the tables shells off the wall people screaming how the wall, people screaming. I do a horse on the beach. How the hell did the horse get up here? It's the 58th floor. I do a horse on the beach. Right, open.

On a horse on a beach. A black horse. Black horse on the beach. Running in slow motion. Close up of the hooves of sand being kicked up. Arcs through the mist. It's a misty beach. Then cut back to the long shot it's running towards you

slightly slightly to the right but generally towards you and then as it gets closer and closer keep cutting to the hooves and then cutting to the long shot closer and closer hooves long shot and eventually the horse kind of wheels around and stops directly in front of the camera sort of sideways because it's wheeled round. You can just see the side of its head. So you don't get a nose in the camera? No, no, no. Side-on view. But then the horse turns to you and says, do you want to hear a story?

At that point the camera sort of moves up and down because the camera's nodding. One day, President Roosevelt entered a room. It was a misty room, much like this day, says the horse. Sort of gesturing a hoof to the misty beach. For the reason the room was misty is that a bath had just been particked.

Partucking. You wonder whilst the horse is talking, but second language, you forgive it. Right, fair enough. President Roosevelt peers through the mist, and then comes a booming voice. An English voice. Come in, come in! Quite a good impression from the horse, you're quite impressed.

Yeah. FDR enters the mist, and as the mist clears, there is stood the awesome figure, I will say, of a naked Winston Churchill. Oh, oh, there's an image. The horse gives you a knowing look right down the camera. Horse just looks down,

then looks back up again and nods. Yeah. FDR started to back out, says the horse. But Winston Churchill, Prime Minister of Great Britain, don't you know and you think of course i know horse but yeah you let him off come in come in the prime minister of great britain has nothing to hide from the president of the united states and embarrassed roosevelt talks to winston churchill briefly and then exits the room.

Looking directly out the ceiling. Yes. The horse then just says, of course, do we know if this story is true? There's another pause. Nay. And then he trots off into the distance. He's like running away from the camera.

And after a solid five minutes of this horse getting slowly smaller and smaller, it just explodes. D-Day Beach. And then everyone stops at the beach, yes. Yeah, so there we go. I should get the horse in well, didn't I? You did, yeah. Good.

I'm glad. Right, okay. Oh, no, hang on. The explosion happens, but then after about 30 seconds Bits of the horse start landing And some bits of horse hit the camera And it spouts out Franklin D. Roosevelt

Part 3 That is amazing That's like a one in a million Who'd have thought it So there we go, that's our introduction Nice Are you ready for this episode? I think so.

On that note. So, we left on the eve of war, if you remember. Britain and France have declared war on Germany after Hitler ordered the invasion of Poland. War. In fact, you could argue it's not the eve of war, it's literally war, isn't it? Yeah. Great Britain. Roosevelt immediately met with the press.

Can we stay out of this? The press asked him. And I quote, I not only sincerely hope so, but I believe we can and every effort will be made by this administration to do so. So, Roosevelt did not want

the United States fighting Old War battles. Fair enough. Fair enough. But to do that, he needed to make sure that Germany did not win. As mentioned at the end of last episode, Roosevelt was very aware of the threat that the rise of Nazi fascism represented. If Europe was lost, they really would be in trouble.

This isn't a far-off concern here. It needs to be defeated. However, he also doesn't want to go to war. So that's where his mindset is right now. We need to do whatever we can to make sure that Germany loses short of fighting ourselves. Now, it was around this time he received a letter, a fairly simple and small letter.

It was from a scientist called Szilard. He worked in this fairly new field of science, nuclear physics. Ah. Ah. Yeah. Efficient. The letter was co-signed by none other than Albert Einstein, don't you know? Oh, yeah, very, very exciting.

I'll quote the letter. In the course of the last four months, it has been made probable that it may become possible to set up a nuclear chain reaction in a large mass of uranium, may become possible to set up a nuclear chain reaction in a large mass of uranium, by which vast amounts of power and large quantities of new radium-like elements would be generated. Now it appears almost certain that this could be achieved in the immediate future. This new phenomenon would also lead to the construction of bombs, and it is conceivable, though much less certain, that extremely powerful bombs of a new type may thus be constructed. A single bomb of this type carried by boat and exploded

in a port might very well destroy the whole port altogether, and also with some surrounding territory. However, such bombs may well prove to be too heavy for transportation by air. FDR saw that this seems important. Yeah, tell you what, we'll send it on to the boffins in the military and that'll do. Someone keep an eye on that. Might be important in the future, he thought. So just know that's ticking along in the background, albeit slowly at the moment. Yeah. Now, during FDR's fireside chat soon after this, he announced that the United States was going to remain neutral in the war. But, and I quote, Even neutral has a right to take account of facts

and cannot be asked to close his mind or his conscience. So, in other words, yeah, we're neutral, but we're not actually neutral, guys. But we're neutral. We know what's going on. So, first thing, on the agenda, make sure Britain gets as many arms as they possibly can to take care of this war without the US having to join. Just remember, guys, rub out the USA bit on the bombs.

Yes, definitely. Because due to a law on the books at this moment, since World War I, it was illegal to sell arms to a country in a war that you were neutral in. So the United States were not allowed to, by their own laws, sell Britain any arms. I guess a key word of that is sell.

Ah, you're onto something. That comes in a bit later if you're referring to the idea of just giving them away. Well, loaning. Yes, lend-lease. We come into it. We definitely do. Oh, really? Yeah. But actually, even that wouldn't have been allowed

because that would have been seen as too much. They need to get this law off the books. The President realises this. So he puts out some feelers. Can we get rid of this law to stop assailing to the British? There was some backlash to this idea. Not everyone liked the idea of remaining neutral, or perhaps more fairly liked the idea of pretending to be neutral

but actually being on Britain's side. But if you remember Charlesles limburg from college's episode yeah you remember national hero flew solo to paris over the atlantic celebrations massive racist yeah he was loved in germany he was i bet he was oh he certainly was um yeah he publicly opposed the position taken by the president, claiming that the president was not being neutral at all, which is a fair enough point. But then Lindbergh also argued that this was not, and I quote, a question of banding together to protect the white race against foreign invasion,

but an age-old struggle within our own family of nations. So we should not get involved with this. It's a family squabbleble not a good old race war was his opinion according to Polingdon at the time this was actually a very popular opinion in America and the America First Committee sprung up this was an anti-war pressure group

which at its peak had 800,000 members within it huge wide range coalition of people in the America First Coalition, from out-and-out fascists who were supporting Germany, to out-and-out communists who didn't want a war to break out at that time, to people who just said no to war, because war is obviously not a good thing. Yeah, the America First Committee drew in a lot of people from all walks of life. It was very popular at the time. However, FDR stuck to his guns.

He even addressed Congress, which was out of session at the time, which is extremely rare. Essentially, what he said was, look, we either give the enemies of Germany and Italy some weapons now, or in a couple of years, we're going to have to use them ourselves. What would you prefer to do? We can't stay out of this. It's gonna drag us in. That went down fairly well in Congress, and what went even better was another fireside chat. As we have seen before, Roosevelt was very good at getting on the airwaves, explaining what was seen as a complex situation in a way that seemed very relatable and easy to follow. People listened to his argument and would swayed very easily.

Public opinion shifted rapidly, became very positive to helping Britain. So yeah, okay, selling arms, weakening our own military sounds bad, but lots of British soldiers dying instead of our own, yeah, I can get behind that, thought many. Now, the problem with this argument is that it opened up the line of attack on Roosevelt, which was, what do you mean we either fight now or we'll be forced to fight later? Are you saying that you're willing to do some fighting? You're not saying you're going to stay out regardless. Roosevelt had to push back against this and said, and I quote,

no person in any responsible place has suggested sending the boys of America to the battlefields of Europe making it very clear, we're not going to go and fight this is a European war, we don't want to get involved. Will not happen yeah, so anyway Congress swayed, public opinion swayed, the law

was repealed, shipments started up, arms rapidly start flying out of the country and towards Britain. So, Roosevelt had won what felt like his first political victory in quite a while, after a very rocky second term, if you remember. Generally

it was a first term very successful, second term, oh dear, this is going badly. But this is coming to the end of his second term and he's finally got a victory. Which is interesting, because this is the end of his second term. Because at this point it wasn't law, was it? It was just a gentleman's thing. Washington said, I'm not doing a second term because I'm knackered.

Oh, and also it's bad for democracy, but I'm so tired. I'm so tired. No more. And everyone had followed his example. It makes sense if you've got a president who keeps being president. A bit dodgy when people start talking about going on for

longer than they should do. Are we talking dictator here? But like you say, it certainly wasn't a law at this time. Roosevelt told his friends how much he was looking forward to retiring because he was really tired. He even signed a contract with a magazine to be

its editor after his term had ended. So he was making actual plans. It wasn't just saying to his friends oh I'm retiring. No, he'd got plans in place. On top of this he was also worried about his health. One evening he collapsed at dinner. Just collapsed onto the table.

Doctors concluded he'd suffered of a mild heart attack. So, yeah, that's not good. Stress of being present, it ages you. It does. So, maybe it's time to retire. I just can't do it, in fact, he said, when a friend mentioned the possibility of a third term. I definitely know what I want to do. I do not want to run. Pause. Unless, between now and the convention,

things get very, very much worse in Europe. Meanwhile, things were getting very, very much worse in Europe. What became known as the Phony War, so this, if you're not into your World War II history, this was a period near the start of world war ii where all sides spent a while kind of watching each other wondering who was going to do what uh cold war style yeah so much so that many people started to suspect that actually this this was going to be a damp squib it wasn't going to happen it'll all be over by christmas yeah it's nothing it's not gonna be like the great war again thank god then that came to an abrupt end in april 1940 when germany

invaded denmark and norway both fell within two weeks well denmark fell within hours uh if they just folded like a flat in the cupboard i went to a really interesting norwegian museum about the nazi occupation it's really interesting. Because they had their own, a bit like in France, had their own resistance fighters and stuff. Yeah, yeah. That's something you don't hear much of in this country, do you? You hear about the French resistance

quite a bit, but not the resistance of other occupied countries. No, because they all would have, I imagine. Oh yeah, yeah, certainly would have. But yeah, interesting. There's so much history, Jamie. So much. I know. We'll never get through it all. Damn it. That was the plan.

One person at a time. Yes. Look forward to Baker's totalitarian reign. Anyway, the Prime Minister in Britain. Who was the Prime Minister in Britain during World War II? Everyone knows. Well, at the start of it, it was Woodrow Wilson. No, what, what? No, no!

Neville Chamberlain! That's Dagan. Oh, no! There's Neville Chamberlain. Peace in our time. Of course. Peace in our time. Neville Chamberlain. Yeah, he'd been heavily criticised for being a little bit too weak on Hitler, shall we say.

For saying things like, peace in our time. And that Hitler chap, no way he's going to be invading anyone soon. Certainly not Poland. He said stuff like that, and he was losing confidence in the government. Quite literally. If you're not from Britain, maybe you don't know, but it's an official thing. If you lose confidence in the parliament, you're voted out. It can happen to any prime minister at any time and yeah he was voted out and in his place was the hard drinking

bullish cacophony of a man winston churchill uh the relationship between roosevelt and churchill is a hugely important one and we're not going to have time to go into all the meetings between the two in this episode although we'll go through some. But to begin with, Roosevelt was very unsure about this Churchillian fella. In fact, I quote, I suppose Churchill was the best man England had, even if he was drunk half the time. This is what Roosevelt told his cabinet shortly afterwards, apparently, which I think is slightly unfair to Churchill

because I'd say he was drunk far more than just half the time. Oh, yeah, yeah. Oh, yes. Meanwhile, German forces had pushed into the Netherlands and Belgium. Roosevelt received his first message from the Prime Minister Churchill. After some, let's just

face it, some poetic waffling that Churchill loved to do, he stated simply, But I trust you realise, Mr President, that the voice and the force of the United States may count for nothing if they are withheld for too long. So in other words, come and join us.

Come on. Come on. Come on. You know you want to. Come on. Please. Please. Seriously, please. He phoned up and essentially went, seriously, America you either join now or you're up for all something. You won't like it if you're up for it.

Meanwhile, the 1940s election was getting underway. Oh, I'm going to warn you now. I'm going to say the word meanwhile quite a lot. There's a lot of jumping around in this episode. But just go with it. It's a bit like a roller coaster. Here we go. The election's going on.

Roosevelt obviously doesn't want to run again. No, he doesn't want to do three terms. Definitely not. In fact, he made no statement either way on whether he'd run again Obviously, that just led to huge speculation But it was becoming clearer to Roosevelt That actually, as much as he didn't want to He was going to run again As Germany pushed into France

And pushed out the British forces in Dunkirk It was obvious that things indeed were Very, very much worse in Europe. Despite a hugely impressive propaganda push by the British government, which has actually led to a large number of the population in Britain to this day thinking that Dunkirk was an amazing victory, it was actually a catastrophic loss. Yeah, well, the victory was just getting a few soldiers back home. Yeah mean it's you know getting people back yeah it was it was run away the best we can um and fantastic film as well

well yeah look to this day make make hero films out of it rather than brush it under the carpet oh dear we lost there now due to this loss uh churchill sent word to fdr once more our paraphrase help roosevelt rejigged some laws and declared that a large portion of arms in the military were actually surplus from World War I. Now, have they looked at it? Yeah.

They look very shiny, sir. No, no, definitely surplus from World War I. In fact, I'm pretty sure the same technology wasn't around during World War I. Shut up, shut up, Brandon. Yeah, and because of that, they were sent over at cost. There we go.

Making no profit. Here, have them, just buy they were sent over at cost. There we go. Making no profit. Here, have them, just buy them at cost. Britain was hugely restocked, basically regaining most of what they'd lost in France very quickly, within a couple of months. Churchill, hugely grateful for this, and praised, and I quote, the supreme act of faith that Roosevelt had shown Britain

that they would be able to make good use of the weapons that had been stripped out of the US military. Italy declares war on France. Why not? Is this Mussolini? Yeah, we're Mussolini there. The democratic convention's approaching at the same time, and Roosevelt announced that Italy has stabbed France in the back. His rhetoric was becoming more and more partisan, as you may have noticed. Now, at this time, only 30% of the US population believed that the Allies could win this war. It was looking very bad at this point. But their president made it very clear to them.

We're on the Allied side. I mean, we're neutral, but we're on the Allied. Allied guys, yeah? Is what he said. In a masterpiece of a political move, Roosevelt then appointed two Republicans into his cabinet. Oh, yeah. Oh, yes. In particular, it was in the War Department.

He was making it very clear that whatever was about to happen, it's going to be a united America that would face it. And also, it helped that this completely threw the GOP convention that was about to start. But, there are guys.

You can't... Tony! Come back, Tony! They'll cross the aisle. The GOP started to push into an American-first isolationist platform because that was the opposite of Roosevelt. It was a very obvious way to go. But they'd missed the boat. Public opinion had shifted enough that a clear majority had started to worry

that indeed they did need to do something about Nazi Germany here. In fact, things were moving very quickly, and in the end, the GOP nominated a compromise candidate, an ex-Democrat, in fact, called Wilkie. By ex-Democrat, as in within a year ago he was a Democrat. Yeah. Also, he pretty much supported everything roosevelt stood for new deal brilliant fantastic definitely in fact what we should do said wilkie is everything

fdr is doing but we should not go to war so that was the stance that gop decided to go for paint roosevelt was a warmonger and uh yeah we'll go anti-war. I wonder how long it was after Pearl Harbor. They said, yeah, okay. Do you want that in milliseconds? We'll get to that quite soon, don't we? Next up was the Democratic Convention. Now, there was obviously an isolationist movement within that party as well. And they sought to pledge that the party would not participate in any foreign wars outside the Americas. We must promise that to the electorate. Roosevelt was able to use his political clout to insert the line, except in the case of attack, which becomes quite important later on.

Quite handy, yeah. Then it came time to nominate the candidates. Now, the party was split. Roosevelt was very popular and he could win, but he'd also shown himself to be a little bit power-hungry. And third term, really? Is this good? Sort of tyrant-y that, isn't it?

Sounds a bit tyrant-y to me. Twelve years. That's the sign of a tyrant. The southern Conservatives were still also very unhappy about all this progressive New Deal stuff that was going on. So, that was a huge faction who hated him within the Democrats. So what was

Roosevelt going to do? This is the main concern of the convention. Was he even running? He's not said anything. A couple of other prominent members of the party are running. Should we vote for them instead? Then Roosevelt sent a message to the convention that was read out aloud. And I quote, The President has never had and has not today any desire or purpose to continue in the office I quote, That's quite nice. Now, just as when the Roman Emperor Anastasius in the early 6th century stood up in the Hippodrome and announced that he would definitely abdicate as soon as the people found

a better emperor, this galvanised support immediately for FDR. Apparently there was a pause in the convention, and then suddenly someone who, let's face it, was probably waiting for his moment and was nudged in the ribs, started chanting, we want Roosevelt, we want Roosevelt.

And then the whole room shouted, we want Roosevelt. And everyone just really wanted Roosevelt after that. So there you go. He was nominated first round. Job done. Beautiful. Yeah. As the election was now between Wilkie and Roosevelt and both supported providing arms to Britain,

that just continued. Brilliant, fantastic, off that goes. Just as well, because the Battle of Britain was now underway. Again, if you're not sure about World War II, the Battle of Britain was the fight for the air supremacy over the island nation. It was an air war over Britain. God bless the Spitfire. Exactly.

Roosevelt still faced long and protracted opposition from many in both parties who did not like to see so many american arms planes and ships being thrown into a war that let's be honest was probably going to be lost things were not looking good for the allies at this point however political support came from an unexpected place when all of a sudden the gopP nominee, Wilkie, pointed out that Britain losing essentially meant that it would be the United States at war next. So when you've got the president and the person running against him

both with the same message, public support was swung round. See, you'd never get that now. Yeah, exceptional times. That's what they were. Well, I mean, you could argue we're in exceptional times now, but then you've got half the people saying, wear a mask, and the other half saying, don't wear a mask. It's not as exceptional, though, is it? Well, I guess not.

Yeah, but I know what you mean. You get the feeling it would take a lot for the United States to unify politically at the moment. Yes. I'm not sure what would do it. It would have to be a full-on Pearl Harborbour 9-11 style event, I'm guessing. Yeah. Yeah.

That's cheery, isn't it? Anyway, back to the history. Yeah, the draft started. That's nice, isn't it? No, we're not going to war. Why say we're going to war? Just because we've started a draft, a peacetime draft, the first ever peacetime draft in our history.

No, we're not going to war. But just in case, you know, don't want to get caught out, do we? So, peacetime draft, that starts up. Then, shortly after this, the world learnt that Japan had been talking to Germany and Italy. What, said many people. The three had decided that if any of the others were invaded by a country currently at peace, the other two nations would step in. And after signing the treaty, Germany, Japan and Italy then all turned and gave a very meaningful stare at the United States. Yes, we're talking about you.

Who, me? Now, by this point, the GOP had turned more and more anti-war in an attempt to take votes off Roosevelt, who was doing marginally better than Wilkie. So they start going more and more anti-war as an attempt to take votes off Roosevelt, who was doing marginally better than Wilkie. So they start going more and more anti-war as they go on. The announcement of the Tripartite Act between Germany, Japan and Italy did the GOP no favours. This sounded like war was inevitable. Roosevelt was therefore favourite to win.

And indeed he did. It wasn't even close. Not quite the same landslide as the last one, but still 27 million to 23 million votes. Wow. 449 electoral college votes to 82. Pretty good wipeout. Oh, it certainly is. So, whether the United States were going to be dragged into the war or not,

Roosevelt was going to be the one to lead them. Well, at the moment, with their trifecta group, whatever you called it, there's only one word to describe America. Surrounded. Um, yeah. Japan on one side. Yeah, yeah, whatever you called it. There's only one word to describe America. Surrounded. Yeah. Japan on one side. Yeah, it's not good. What's also not good, the Blitz.

That starts... Hey, Coventry, woo! Yeah. Well, for various reasons, including the loss of the Battle of Britain and then the British bombing Berlin, Hitler switched strategies and started targeting industrial sites in Britain,

which also happened to be civilian hubs because why not damage the morale at the same time? So, yeah, night after night for weeks, London's bombed, various other cities, including the city that you're in now and the city I'm not far from. So the Blitz is going on. Churchill let Roosevelt know the stark truth.

We've run out of money, he said. In a couple of months, we can no longer pay you for any arms. So Roosevelt used his post-election high to push for, the thing you predicted earlier, the Lend-Lease Scheme. Britain would be lent arms, and as long as they promised to give them back after the war, no charge It might be a bit trap-lised but we'll

definitely send it back. Fine, just wipe a bit of the blood off good as new be fine. Details could be ironed out later, it's fine Another fireside chat got the public on board with this. Nearly 70% approved the Lend-Lease scheme which is impressive. I mean, 70%

approval rate in anything is good. This was mostly because they saw it as a way of staying out the war, which 80% of the country still believed was the most important thing. So, whatever you say, Roosevelt, as long as we stay out the war, we'll support you. Then the Nazis invade Russia. Oh dear. Yeah.

Hitler never played risk. Thought it would be a good idea to invade Russia. Yep. Never heard of this Napoleon chap either, apparently. When should we go, sir? Midwinter. Well, invading Russia proved a bit of a problem for Roosevelt. His immediate response was, well, now we need to aid Russia because Russia is now fighting Germany. Churchill had announced pretty much that. He said something along the lines of, I'm no fan of communists, but they're fighting Germany, so we will support them. The problem in the United States, however,

is that communist Russia had been the bogeyman since World War I in that country. More so than in Britain. Fears of a revolution still lived on, and many saw communism as a far greater threat than the genocidal racism of Nazi Germany. Let dog eat dog was essentially the attitude. In fact, I'm quoting

a senator there. Let them kill each other. Yeah. Again, however, Roosevelt was able to use his fireside chat to help sway public opinion. Staying out the war was the most important thing. I know you all think that, but if you want that, we must help the Russians. If the Russians fall, Europe falls, we get dragged into the war. Are you with me? And it turned out

they were. The law went through. Russia became eligible for lend-lease as well. So they were getting a huge amount of arms from America. Japan's up next. Whistle stop tour today. Yeah, there's a huge debate in Japan at this point, which the United States were on top of because they had broken the Japanese diplomatic code, which is nice, so they could listen in and figure out what was going on. Now, hugely simplifying here, there was a pro-peace faction within the Japanese government, but they'd been defeated. And now, the only argument in Japan was whether they should push north, join Germany in invading Russia, or go south and claim the natural

resources of Southeast Asia by taking them off the United States and European powers. Yeah. Which, uh, obviously I know how big Russia is and how much land it spans, and obviously I know you've got Japan on one end and you've got Europe on the other end, but still, it's still when you hear of World War II and how much land it spans. And obviously, I know you've got Japan on one end and you've got Europe on the other end.

But still, it's still, when you hear of World War II and how Japan were thinking of joining in Germany's invasion of Russia, it's like, Russia's a big place. It's massive. It really is. Anyway, they decide to go south. They go, short version of that. Because believe me, there's more of it.

They decide not to go into Russia. Well, sort of. They did go into Russia for a bit and had their asses kicked essentially so he decided to go south and uh news reaches america that japan have taken by force french indo-china which uh essentially is roughly where modern vietnam is so in that region roosevelt was pressured to stop selling japan oil now roosevelt didn't want to do this he really resisted doing this because he realized if he stopped selling japan oil japan would only have five percent of their oil they got 95 of their oil from america if you take 95 of a country's oil off them, they don't sit down and go, sorry, they go and find oil from somewhere. It will escalate. This will lead to war, was Roosevelt's

argument. So he didn't want to do this, but Roosevelt, for a change, saw public opinion move away from him. Many saw sanning to Japan as appeasement. It's like they're threatening our land in the Philippines and you want to keep sanning them oil to do it. A majority of the country or to be fair only just a majority but it was a majority preferred war to allowing Japan to get more powerful.

The long history of racism on the west coast against the Japanese certainly helped the idea that Japan would be a quick easy victory and not like getting into war with a European power no absolutely no yeah be over by Christmas that one would be yeah definitely yeah meanwhile Roosevelt decided to meet up with Churchill it's time we meet in person he said oh yes so the two met in secret Churchill braving the crossing of the Atlantic that was full of German submarines at this time

Essentially the plan was well, the boat we're on is quite quick so the submarines probably won't be able to catch us I love that Yeah It wasn't just Churchill either It was several high up people in the army and the navy If that ship went down there would have been real trouble

but yeah, they did it Anyway, one of the most fortuitous chances for the Allies in the entire war, it turns out that Roosevelt and Churchill got on really well, personally. The war would have had a very different path had the two leaders

not gone on, I imagine. They were on first-name terms within one meeting and they were laughing and joking by the end of their time together. Now, the two were nothing like each other roosevelt was very easygoing chatty early to rise early to go to bed yeah martini in the evening friendly uncle but without the sinister overtones churchill on the other hand was well he was churchill he was bombastic uh he got up near midday he drank his way through the day, occasionally having naps,

then really getting to work in the evening until about three or four in the morning. But despite the differences, the two respected each other and got on personally. From this point on in the war, the ties between Britain and the United States were closer due to the ties of the leaders. Special relationship.

Well, yes, you can argue this is the closest the two countries have ever been. So it was decided in this meeting that a Hitler first policy was going to be taken by Britain and the United States. Take Hitler down first and then Italy and Japan would follow. He's the real powerhouse here. Take the head off the snake.

Now to do that, what we need to do is control the Atlantic. We can control the Atlantic. We can control all the shipping to Germany. We can just cut them off. Now, the United States were not at war. We're definitely not at war everyone. Stop saying we're at war. We're not at war.

I didn't declare anything. Did you? This isn't a declaration of war. This is a charter. That's what this is. It's an Atlantic charter. It just makes note that the United States were going to be doing a bit of patrolling in the Atlantic. You know, they might be near some British ships. Maybe.

Maybe. You never know. And if anyone attacks, then obviously we'll defend ourselves. Maybe. You never know. And if anyone attacks, then obviously we'll defend ourselves. We're not at war. Why would you say that? We are fishing boats. Germany took note, and soon afterwards

German submarines started targeting US ships protecting the British supply vessels. Roosevelt then declared a shoot-on-sight policy. Not war. Not war? Not war, no. No. It's just if we see a German or Italian ship in American waters, and by American waters

what I mean is the Atlantic, then we will shoot it on sight. Yeah, it's not war, though. No, no. Stop saying we're at war. The events in the Atlantic were taking up a lot of Roosevelt's time, as you can imagine.

Reciding over and not war takes up a lot of time. But his cabinet also kept mentioning Japan. Every now and again, they'd pop their heads around the corner. About Japan, sir, they'd say. Oh, fine side, Roosevelt. Yeah, I should probably pay attention to this. Now, while he was meeting with Churchill, which I just mentioned, a sub-cabinet committee led by the future Secretary of State named Axon,

if I'm pronouncing his name correctly, well, he had discovered something. As the chair for the cabinet committee, he realised a bit of small print, he had the legal power to stop all oil exports to Japan. Now, I'm simplifying this story slightly, but essentially, someone on a small committee realised, hang on, if I just don't sign this document, we will stop selling oil to Japan. And he happened to be a bit of a war hawk, and he did not want to sell oil to Japan, so he stopped all of America sell oil to Japan, so he stopped all of America selling oil to Japan. Ah. Yeah.

Public opinion was with this, because, like I said, many saw selling oil as appeasement, so Roosevelt decided, I can't fight this, I can't go back on it, it's done. What's done is done. Okay, Japan, no more oil. Japan found themselves with only 5% of the oil they were relying on. It was hoped that this would cripple the country's economy. So fingers crossed there, that's the last we hear from Japan. Brilliant.

Great. Huzzah. And, to be fair, there was some attempts to call things between the two countries, from both nations, but the diplomatic channels were not particularly strong. The hawk factions in both countries had pretty much managed to take dominance by this point. Roosevelt himself wanted to return to a pre-embargo stance, so can we pretend that didn't happen, everyone? But no, wasn't going to happen. Roosevelt suggested that Japan would be sold oil once more, but Japan would promise not to invade any more southern islands than the Pacific.

And we just won't say anything about China, which might annoy some of our allies, especially China. But we're just going to stay quiet about that one. How about that, Japan, said Roosevelt. But it was too late, too little. The diplomatic channels were shutting down. Although many in the US military supported Roosevelt's suggestion on this

because it gave them more time to prepare for any fighting, especially in Europe. Again, most people in the United States and also most of United States allies, including Britain, thought that this was far too soft on Japan. We need to go in harder. Then an internal clock in Japan ran out. Those advocating for peace in Japan had essentially been given a deadline to achieve it.

Fine, you want peace, you've got until this date. After that, the gloves are off. The date came, the date went. Those advocating for peace in Japan failed. The hawk faction took over once more. Now, due to the code breaking, Roosevelt was aware of this and said and I quote, we are likely to be attacked

perhaps as soon as next Monday. So they knew an attack was coming. But no one was expecting what was actually going to happen. Most thought that Japan was going to attack a US ally in the region yeah there's a lot of islands being held by european powers in that region then again we have annoyed them personally

so there was a chance that they might actually directly attack the united states by attacking the philippines less likely but we need to be prepared they might attack us directly in the Philippines. One of our colonies very far away. Yeah. The thought of Pearl Harbor in Hawaii simply didn't occur to anyone, or at least it didn't occur to anyone who could have done anything about it. I'm sure afterwards many people said, oh no, I knew it was going to happen,

but the reality is that the people who should have known didn't know. Now, the first plane to take flight from a ship, you'll be interested to know, I'm sure, took place in what year? Like an aircraft carrier? Yeah, yeah. I imagine it's not... I don't know. I can't guess.

In my head, they're quite modern, so this sort of time? Well, that was my thought process whilst doing my notes, so I looked it up. 1912, apparently, was the first ever plane launched from a ship, which is interesting. When you say launch, did it fly? It was a tall ship and it was blowy. But no, no, no, it took off and everything and perhaps even landed.

Well, definitely landed, but maybe landed correctly. Who knows? So this isn't brand new technology, but to this scale, it's brand new technology. This is a new type of warfare. On December 7th, 1941, Japanese bombers that had crossed a huge, vast ocean attacked a completely unprepared naval base. Nearly 2,500 people died. 175 aircraft were destroyed. About the same again crippled. 18

warships lost. Pearl Harbor. That's what it's known as. Or the attack on Pearl Harbor. Big deal in American history. A shocked Roosevelt was informed of the damage. He met with his war council and arranged various troop redeployments, like you do, in a kind

of horses already bolted kind of way. churchill was on the blower uh is this true said churchill we're getting reports he said which was translated for interpreter to mean have you been attacked yes it was true roosevelt confirmed churchill probably trying to hide his smile simply stated well that certainly simplifies things oh yes to be fair roosevelt had just said we're in the same boat now so um but yeah this was although obviously tragic for america britain saw this as ultimately good news because finally they're going to get some support which they desperately needed yeah yeah church Churchill later stated that the United States was like a giant

boiler. Once the fire is lighted under it, there is no limit to the power it can generate. He said. And the fire was certainly lit. Oh, yes, it was. So far, Roosevelt had been battling, and to be fair, winning public support with the whole, we're not going to go to war, so we need to support our allies argument. The policy was very clear. We provide aid so we don't have to fight. It was a continuous political battle to keep this approach afloat and it was not an easy one.

But now, practically the entirety of the political spectrum swung into line. The America First faction just collapses instantly. But it would. Well, yeah. It was with an overwhelming support that Roosevelt asked Congress to declare war on Japan. Which they do. Days later, staying true to the Tripartite Pact,

Germany and Italy declare war on the United States. Roosevelt thought back to that letter about nuclear physics and bombs and made sure someone was still on that. Someone's still doing that thing with the scientists and the bombs? Yeah, Tony! Tony! You used to work on the bombs.

Guy really frazzled, slightly charred face. The bomb that can blow up like three or four ships at a time. Is someone still on that? Yeah, someone was still on it. And they made sure that more people still on it and they made sure that more people were on it and then they poured some money into it and

named an operation. This is called the Manhattan Project. Yes. It suddenly had a project name that sounded cool and everything. So that's now working. Within weeks of the declaration of war, German submarines attack the east coast of the United States.

Wow. Yes, this is something, incidentally, if you're American, you don't hear about in Britain. No? No, no. This was full-on German submarines in the harbour of New York. Wow. Yeah. The United States Navy were not prepared in the slightest.

navy were not prepared in the slightest in early 1942 nearly 250 merchant ships were sank before a single german submarine was destroyed oh my goodness yeah and it was through these waters full of the german submarines that churchill came along again ah hello it's fine we're on a fast ship they won't catch us value I'm sure whiskey this time he came right into America rather than meeting Roosevelt up in Canada he came to stay in the White House

of all places yes they were going to discuss the next moves Churchill was shown to the room that he was going to stay in and said something

along the lines of well this won't do and then he stormed around the White House trying the beds all the beds until he found one he liked and then declared that's where he'd be staying. He then let it be known he expected sherry before breakfast, scotch before lunch, and champagne and brandy in the

evening. Make sure it's always there, please. A shocked White House staff were even more amazed when they discovered that Churchill actually seemed to remain sober throughout the day. Churchill was a serious drinker. One of those serious drinkers become fairly immune to being obviously drunk. Don't get me wrong, he was certainly drunk all the time, but he wasn't obviously drunk. In fact, Churchill wrote home to the current Deputy Prime Minister, Labour's Clement Attlee. Oh, yes. I quote, We live here as a big, happy family. He said, writing with one hand

whilst toweling himself off with another hand. And this is when Roosevelt walked into the room. Splendid. Yes. The horse, by the way, at the start, saying are we sure this really happened? Nay. Well, there's a reason why that. Churchill later denies this story. He said it didn't happen. But someone close to Roosevelt later claimed that they had talked to Roosevelt after it had happened. well there's a reason why that uh churchill later denies this story he said it didn't happen but

someone close to roosevelt later claimed that they had talked to roosevelt after it had happened and roosevelt was talking about how shocked he was so uh one word against another i don't know you get the impression if it had happened churchill would have just said yes it happened though but i don't know maybe maybe churchill didn't like the idea of people talking about him flapping in the breeze. Yeah, because it doesn't make him look great. But he doesn't seem to care, does he? He's known to be a bit eccentric with his Japanese-style dressing gown and slippers. Churchill was many things.

That's what I'm going to say. A complex character, shall we say that? Many layers. Yes, that's what he had. Anyway, Churchill had a great time in the United States. After all, he was half American, his mother was American.

His huge, huge history buff, as many people know. Loved the Civil War, as in the American Civil War. Quite often would correct people on dates if they were talking about the Civil War. Including Roosevelt one day, who was talking about something that happened in the Civil War, as in the American Civil War. Quite often would correct people on dates if they were talking about the Civil War. Including Roosevelt one day, who was talking about something that happened in the Civil War.

Apparently Churchill didn't even look up from the paper he was reading and just corrected the date. It was actually a Tuesday. Yes. But yeah, he had a good time. He was invited to speak to a joint session of Congress, the first foreigner allowed to do so since Lafayette

in 1824. So hero of the Revolutionary War. Now you can accuse Churchill of many things. You certainly can. Many, many things you can accuse him of. But one thing he undoubtedly did incredibly well was give a speech. And wow did Congress love his speech. He pointed out that if his dad had been American rather than his mother, he probably would have ended up in Congress himself. And everyone cheered. Anyway, his trip ended with the British and the United States agreeing that the next step was to invade North Africa.

That's the next step. Considering at this present time the United States really wanted to invade Europe and Britain wanted to invade North Africa, Churchill could chalk that one up as a win. Around this time Roosevelt signed into existence Executive Number 9066. Ah, yes.

Yeah. Famous 9066. Yeah. Now how we were talking about light-hearted stories about Churchill being in the nude. Yeah. This one's not light-hearted. Executive Order 9066 is fairly wordy. I was trying to find a nice quote that could just sum it up, but it just doesn't work.

If you read the whole thing, there isn't one quote that works. So I'm going to paraphrase instead. War means that we need to protect ourselves against sabotage. So round up anyone who looks like they might sabotage our war plans. Of course, there was further subtext. Yeah. By anyone who looks like they might sabotage war plans, what they meant, of course,

was anyone who looks Japanese. Yes. Yeah, because this is George Takei, the actor that plays Sulu. He grew up in an internment camp. Did he? I did not know that. Interesting. Well, there you go.

Yeah. Sorry, spoiler, internment camps. Yeah, the order didn't state countries or states, but it was indeed overwhelmingly the Japanese who were rounded up and put in internment camps. So let's face it, there were concentration camps. Yeah. It's a nasty sounding word, but let's not beat around the Or let's face it, they were concentration camps. Yeah. It's a nasty sounding word, but let's not beat around the bush here.

That's what they were. Italians and Germans, in theory, were rounded up as well. Ah, but they're white. Well, some of them were. In fact, roughly 10% of people who were rounded up were Italian or German. So as you can see, yes, they did get caught slightly, but 90% of people were Japanese. A huge percentage of that Japanese population who were rounded up

were American citizens as well, which is a distinction, but not a hugely important one. You're rounding people up, you're rounding people up. But it is interesting to note that these were actual American citizens being rounded up here. So why did over 100,000 people end up in concentration camps all over America? Because they looked foreign. Yes. Well, yes. But let's go into it a bit more detail. It was mainly the age-old refusal to believe that your country could lose in a fair fight. You remember how many times in our Romans series when the Romans

lost a battle, the emperor would always explain how they lost because someone had sabotaged. Yeah. Yeah. We didn't lose. Someone betrayed us from our own ranks because either... They cheated. Yeah, we're either so good that we always win or

we're so good that some of our ranks are so good at sabotaging that cause us to lose. There's no way the enemy defeated us. I'm just making that really clear. But that was generally the mindset after Pearl Harbor. There was no way we could have been so incompetent or unaware

in Pearl Harbor. There's no way. So there must have been Japanese forces working within the United States. It is the only explanation. And it was true because a commission looked into what happened in Pearl Harbor and reported that, yes, indeed, there were American citizens with Japanese ancestry who had secretly worked with the Japanese government. Now, I mean, they provided no evidence, of course.

No. No. But that didn't matter because the commission said that it was true. Oh. Yeah. It wasn't true. No evidence has ever surfaced whatsoever that there was ever any sabotage from an American citizen in regards to Pearl Harbor. It just, as far as historians can tell, it's just completely not true.

As per usual, in times like this, the Constitution proved to be utterly useless. I will quote the Assistant Secretary in the War Department. If it is a question of safety of the country or the Constitution, why, the Constitution is just a scrap of paper to me. Yeah. Anyway, the War Department asked Roosevelt whether they should indeed round up the Japanese population in America,

because, you know, they look different, don't they? And they look a bit like the enemy. Roosevelt essentially said, this is a military matter, it's your call. For national security, lock them up. Well, the War Department decided, yes, it was necessary. So FDR said, fine, if you think so, and he signed the executive order. So there you go. Just like that, tens of thousands of American citizens overnight found their land confiscated

off them. It wasn't just come over, we're going to put you in a camp. It was you need to sell all your belongings first. Wow. You've got a business, it's gone. If you've got a fridge, sell it. So you at least got something because you can't bring your fridge with you, so you might as well sell it. Of course, if everyone's selling their fridges, what happens to the price of fridges? They go down. Yeah, so literally you've got people touring the Japanese neighbourhoods, buying furniture off Japanese families for a pittance. Anyway, the Japanese families were then taken to barns,

or just general livestock areas, because why not? Because you need somewhere to keep them whilst the concentration camps are being built. Once the camps were built, the families were then forced on trains and trucks and placed within the camps under armed guard. They were then paid to work. Look at that, they were paid to work.

Not barbarians. Oh, there we go then. Yeah, it Look at that, they were paid to work. Not barbarians. It was next to nothing, as you can imagine. Medical care was provided, as long as someone who had been rounded up and put in the camp happened to be a doctor, because we're not actually going to give you a doctor. By provided, I mean, look after yourselves.

So there you go. That happened. We've seen worse in the podcast We have It's up there There's almost like a parallel line going with some of the stuff Yeah, yeah And some of the stuff going on in Europe as well

Yeah, yeah I mean, not as killy, but No, but I mean, it's a step along the line, isn't it? A disturbingly close step. It's a footstep towards it. Yeah. Roosevelt later said he regretted, and I quote,

the military necessity imposed upon these people. That's still a justification. Oh, yeah, yeah. That is a, I'm sorry, but it had to happen. Yeah, his attitude was always, the military said it had to be done, so it had to be done. That's his losing a few words of disgrace. We'll come back to this in statesmanship. Yeah, his attitude was always the military said it had to be done, so it had to be done. That's his losing a few years of disgrace. We'll come back to this in

statesmanship. Anyway, the Supreme Court, you'll be pleased to know, obviously there is a third branch of government. The Supreme Court is there to balance things. See sense and see if things are backed by the Constitution. Obviously rounding people up who are American citizens

is against the Constitution. That is very people up who are American citizens is against the Constitution. That is very clear, surely. Yeah, apparently not. Yeah. Despite the fact throughout the war, like I say, no proven case of espionage against any American citizen of Japanese heritage was ever proven. Yeah, the Supreme Court backed it, saying it's simply part of war.

Yeah, but that then goes into... That can then be used in future court cases, can't it? Well... Time of war now, so take what you want. It is interesting to note the speed with which America backtracked from this. We have seen some atrocities in the past, and we've seen apologies, but usually like a century or more after the fact we're talking like clinton or bush or someone making the apology 1976 president ford apologizes we now know what we

should have known then not only was that the evacuation was wrong but japanese americans were and are loyal americans So just over 30 years. Yeah, yeah. Within the lifetime, definitely. That said, it does highlight the fact it was wrong. Yeah, people realised that this was wrong. But people back things in wars that they wouldn't dream of backing in peacetime.

It's very easy to get things done as a government during wartime. Yeah. Anyway, back to the war. Things aren't going well in the Atlantic or the Pacific. Roosevelt wanted a morale boost. Things aren't going well. Any chance, lads, he said to the armed forces, could we bomb Tokyo?

Is that a thing that we can do? I know it's really far away, but they got to Pearl Harbor. Can we get to Tokyo? Might need a big bomb. Well, he was told, yes, we can. Just, we think, maybe. It's risky. So risky, we're not actually going to test it first.

We're just going to go for it because... Any volunteers? Well, they had plenty of volunteers. They didn't all get back. No. Yeah. They bombed Tokyo. It wasn't hugely successful in terms of a military win

it did very little to japan's war infrastructure but it certainly did give america a morale boost it did what roosevelt wanted to do which was make the united states look like they were doing something so again it's though i didn't know i didn't know that they essentially blitzed japan yeah yeah i mean it certainly is not to the extent that the way European countries are bombing each other at this time. But yes, there was bombing over Tokyo at this time. Far more important, however, in the war between Japan and America was the Battle of Midway.

I've heard the name. Yeah. Now, again, being born in Britain, everyone knows that World War II was between Britain and Germany only, and America turned up near the end. That's how you're taught in Britain. So I'm guessing if you're taught in America, the Battle of Midway is definitely more important. The whole Pacific theatre just is not mentioned. Sorry should be clearer, is not mentioned as much obviously it is mentioned but it really isn't mentioned

as much in Britain because obviously Britain weren't involved in that part but yeah no this was a hugely important battle in the entire war because it was in the middle of the Pacific it was a new form of battle, this was aircraft carrier versus aircraft carrier

this was not ships firing upon each other. This was ships being miles away from each other and sending planes at each other to try and bomb the other ships. Oh, wow. Yeah, brand new warfare. Unlike Pearl Harbor, the United States learnt of the planned attack before it happened, so they were essentially able to ambush the Japanese, which is impressive on sea, because usually we've seen loads of ambushes in our Roman series, and that's usually because the Roman army hide behind a bush or something.

But no bushes in the sea, so I don't know, big wave, maybe. Well, you get seaweed. Yeah, maybe that. But yeah, they ambush the Japanese, and the Japanese lose heavily. They never recover. Really? Their navy certainly doesn't. And the powerhouse of the United States industry, which is in full swing by this point, was able to rebuild any losses on their side in a very short amount of time. The Japanese couldn't replace what they had. The war in the Pacific was far from over, but from this

point on, the United States are advancing at every point. Meanwhile, Stalin. back to Russia. Yes, Stalin got in contact with Roosevelt. Thanks for the Lend-Lease, he said. Brilliant, really useful, we're loving that. I appreciate your capitalist ideologies, thank you. Yes. Incredibly helpful.

But is there any chance of opening up a second front in Europe anytime soon? This was the same expression he used, same intonation. He was famous for it. We could really do with drawing off some of the German forces. We're really suffering some casualties over here. Don't know if you've noticed. So second front in Europe? Don't know.

Maybe. Anytime soon, guys. Anytime. Ah, go on. Any time. In fact, he said, and I quote quote if you postpone your decision you will eventually have to bear the brunt of war and if hitler becomes master of this continent next year it will be unquestionably tougher than this year not stalin sorry his ambassador said that

the voice of stalin big metal helmet yeah big oversized mouth yeah that was the laugh yeah so pretty much the same kind of thing that Churchill's been saying for the last couple of years. Roosevelt was sympathetic and replied, yes, of course, you're right. We need to open up a second front in Europe. We will do it this year. And he looked over at the calendar.

1942 was written on it. And lots of dramatic irony happened to people watching from the future. Churchill then heard of this and said something along the lines of what? And then choked into his brandy he did. What do you mean

you've told Stalin we're going to invade Europe this year? Have you not noticed the year is 1942 and anyone from the future can tell you that's not when we do it? We don't have the landing craft your troops aren't ready and our troops are spread too thin we can't invade europe right now if we're going to invade europe and i'm not saying that we should in any particular way yet but if we do it needs to be a big push not a rushed half measure hitler's fortified europe

it's like we just need to attack one beach at some point somewhere. Yeah, just one point with everything we've got. That's what we need to do. Wait a year or two, build up the forces, attack. Meanwhile... That's surprisingly hesitant for Churchill, but I guess he's... Meanwhile, let's take North Africa like we agreed. Softer target, and also has the huge advantage

that it means we'll be fighting in all these places that people learn about whilst doing classics. Far more exciting fighting in all the places that the Greeks and the Romans did than, what, in Normandy? Who's ever fought in Normandy? No one's ever going to remember Normandy, are they? Yes. It's a dreary, wet seaside town.

I went there a few years ago. I want to go and take Sicily. That's what I want to do. Like the first Sicily. That's what I want to do. Like the first public war. That's what I want to do. Yeah. Yeah. So, perhaps being a bit flippant here,

there were obviously military reasons to take North Africa as well, but it should be pointed out that Britain saw it as far more important than Russia and America, who really thought that, you know, Europe, where Hitler is, maybe we should be attacking there. Well, it's the Hitler First policy as well, you could say. Well, yeah. There's Hitler.

Look. There is that argument. There's Hitler's face. There's the arrow. Roosevelt was convinced by Churchill, you make a good point, he said. Not all his staff were. There were still many high up in America going, no, Europe, Europe, Europe. But Roosevelt was convinced. and like I say,

this relationship between Churchill and Roosevelt, hugely important. However, the problem with not invading Europe, after I told Stalin that we would, someone now needs to go to Moscow and tell Stalin we're not invading Europe. Volunteers. Anyone? Right, Churchill, you're the one who said we're not going to do it, so you go and tell Stalin.

Churchill goes off to Russia to smooth the ruffled feathers. Stalin, to his credit, saw the wisdom of delaying. Okay, fair enough. I won't kick up a big fuss. He essentially said, I'm not happy about this, but I understand your reasoning. Okay. So, no falling out of the alliance.

That's good. Yes. In November 1942, the Allies invade North Africa. Morocco and Algeria were soon taken. Roosevelt sent word to Franco in Spain. We stayed out of your civil war, Franco, so why don't you stay out of this? Paraphrasing.

Fair enough, came the reply. Direct quote. Maybe. uh and then things start moving even quicker if things weren't moving quickly enough hitler finds out about this not happy so he decides to take the rest of france oh see yeah he said she left southern france uh rule themselves yeah yeah so that there's nothing out there but sunflowers you guys carry on it's it's essentially spain down there anyway so yeah bits of italy yeah who cares but no rest of france is his now if you're going to invade north africa i'm taking france meanwhile the allied forces were moving across north africa doing fairly well short version of that the russians won a huge victory

in stalingrad short version of that and in the Pacific, the long-drawn-out island hopping started when the United States took Guadalcanal. As shown in the HBO miniseries The Pacific. I've just searched that on Amazon. I'm gonna buy it. Have you not seen that? Still not, no. Wow. But you love Band of Brothers.

I know. I just never bothered to watch it. It's not quite as good, but it is still very good. And I will say the best way to watch Band of Brothers and the Pacific, by far, is chronologically. Work out when each episode takes place in both series, and then watch both series. Hopping between the two. I assume you have a system for that that you will share with me later on. I typed into Google, Band of Brothers specific chronological order watching,

and obviously there are other geeky people in the world, even geekier than I, who have typed it out and everything. Yeah, there were a couple of debates because some episodes span a bit of time. But yeah, no, it's the better way to do it. Because the Pacific has a bit of a lull in it. It drags for a couple of episodes, but that gets broken up if you watch it chronologically. So yeah, it's good stuff.

So I used to think about Band of Brothers, with the episode, you know, where they're in the frosty, cold forest. Oh, best episode. But that's, yeah, I know, it's amazing. Love that episode. Anyway, right, right. Well, all that's...

Actually, that's not happening yet. That happens later. But the start of the Pacific's happening now. Anyway, what I'm trying to say is that there's fighting all over the world. There's a reason they call it World War. North Africa all but won, so Britain wants to take Sicily at this point. Ensure the Mediterranean is entirely theirs.

As we have found in our other podcast, if you've got Sicily, you've got the channels in the Mediterranean. Meanwhile, Russia and the United States went back to talking about crossing the channel into France. Can we talk about that now, please? However, Eisenhower, the man in charge of the United Forces in North Africa at this time, informed the President, well, as much as you're talking about going into France, either way, we won't be ready to invade across the Channel until 1944 at the earliest, because we need to consolidate all our forces and strike at one point. So, with a bit of a sigh, it was decided fine, let's take Sicily, let's stay in the Mediterranean.

Anyway, back to the Atlantic. Still naval warfare going on in the Atlantic, remember. The submarine war is raging on. The Germans have over 200 submarines operational at this point. They're doing a huge amount of damage. Britain cracked the Enigma code. Yes, they did.

Alan Turing. Yeah, Benedict Cumberbatch cracked the code. He was there as well. Great, brilliant news. Fantastic news. Less good than perhaps modern films and knowledge has made out because yeah, it's great we've cracked the code

but the Germans had already cracked ours and it just meant that everyone could read each other's messages by this point, so it kind of cancelled everything out. I mean, yes, it's good, but it's not as good as it could have been. Still, not bad. Not bad. Not going brilliantly, though, so in an attempt to shift the tide, Roosevelt ordered six aircraft carriers from the Pacific to the Atlantic. We've got some aircraft carriers, and the German submarines were very vulnerable

to air attack because they could not stay underwater indefinitely, so they had to surface. And when they did, those planes could rip them apart. I imagine as well they probably can't go as deep as they'd like. So these aircraft carriers, even if we only bring six

over, we could do some significant damage, thinks Roosevelt and those advising him. Reaction from the military was very mixed, depending on which theatre of war they were currently engaged in. Yeah, I can imagine. A range between what you mean you're taking six aircraft carriers to, brilliant, six aircraft carriers. Either way, the move certainly helped the Atlantic War. The amount of German submarines sank in a month increased fourfold from eight to over 40. Wow. Yeah.

The German admiral in charge of the submarines realised, oh dear, if this goes on much longer, we'll have no submarines left. Damn it, but we're going to have to withdraw the submarines, otherwise they're just going to get wiped out. So there you go. Within just a few months, theantic had been pretty much won the sea lanes were open between the united states and britain excellent we can get food again yes meanwhile back home industry had hit its stride tanks and aircraft and arms were flying off the shelves the united states quickly

decided on a policy when it came to their arms building. It was build cheap, build fast and build as many as you can. It was widely acknowledged that the German arms and tanks were definitely superior to anything the Americans could build. But I'll quote one general at the time, but we did all right because we built so many of them. we built so many of them. Yeah. It's like when you read the injury statistics or the death statistics in wars, in the First World War and Second World War, like Russia has by far the most soldier deaths.

So many casualties. But they've got so many of them. Yeah. You know, you push through anyway. Yeah, yeah. They achieved victories because they poured troops in. And yeah, it was... Same with the crappy tanks it

was uh like that one german general at one point mentioned something along the lines it's not my notes it's me half remembering something but it was something along the lines of every single tank that came at us we destroyed within moments but we ran out of arms before they ran out of tanks yeah yeah so yeah there you go. Just keep building. Now, to make sure that things carried on being built smoothly, Roosevelt's administration introduced a mandatory

contract renegotiation. Now, to simplify this, the government put in an order of arms. So, I don't know, what would you want to buy during a war? Metal. Yes, maybe you need metal to build guns or something, make a hat. So you put in an order for metal. This was important.

And then the company would come back and say, yes, that will be $10,000. This is an outrage, says the government. Now, usually the company would then shrug and say, take it or leave it. And someone would sit back and make a huge profit. But no, not anymore, because a law was put through. If the company was seen to overcharge, the government would step in and take the money back. That's borderline socialism. Oh, yes.

I mean, this is governmental control to a level that America have certainly never seen in terms of business before. Now, due to this, the hyper-capitalist society that meant a ridiculous amount of things could be built in a very short amount of time also did not run into the usual problem that people were making huge amounts of profits, which meant the government would run out of money and everything would collapse. In fact, the Roosevelt administration managed to get the best of both worlds. Incredibly quick and effective production, but also not having to pay too much for it.

So still the people making it will still get rich. Well, not really. They weren't too happy. Not as rich, though. But again, Ward does interesting things to people's politics and philosophy. And the usual Robert robber barons sat back and thought okay we're taking a financial hit but we don't want to lose the war because that

will be a bigger financial hit so yeah we're not happy but we'll have to deal with it until the war's over anyway back to the war uh sicily was taken you'll be pleased to know syracuse uh foul they've still got their lasers uh yeah and their big forks that pick things up. Yes, lift up the U-boats. A reference to our Roman Republic, Syrus, that many people won't get. Anyway, once Sicily was taken, Italy was internally shaken, shall we say. There was a bit of a mini-coup. Mussolini was deposed.

Italy surrendered and declared war on Germany. Hurrah! Hitler responded by taking Italy by force and putting Mussolini back in power and saying, oh, no, you don't. So, it didn't really work. Britain and the US then attempt to take Italy by force back, but the so-called soft underbelly of Europe

turned out to be a hard armadillo shell they were hit by tough resistance and didn't really get too far fighting continues here for the rest of the war um now in fact call back here do you remember our fourth ever episode we recorded as totalus rancium it was caligula's episode yes and in that episode i mentioned caligula's episode. Yes. And in that episode, I mentioned Caligula had some cruise ships. And I mentioned they were discovered in the early 1900s. And they were bombed. Yeah, they were destroyed in this time. So this is when they're destroyed.

You finally got there to the destruction. Yes, there you go. Caligula's cruise ships were destroyed. Still, a bit of a tangent there. Roosevelt and Churchill meet not to discuss cruise ships No, they meet In the Mediterranean On a boat? No, on an island

Although Roosevelt flies Roosevelt flies and it's the first time a president An acting president Is in an airplane At least certainly long distance Because I was going to say Neville Chamberlain flew over to Germany to play Hitler. Yeah, he wasn't, as far as I remember,

the President of the United States, though, so that doesn't change my fact. No, but that still means we win. The discussions were around what to do with Germany after they'd won, which I can't help but feel was slightly premature at this point. I mean, yeah. Things are looking good, though.

I think the circle's closing. Oh, yeah. Things are certainly looking better, far better than they were a year or two ago, but still, we're still pre-D-Day here. Yeah. I mean... Yeah.

Anyway, they talked about what to do with Germany after they won. They also talked about this nuclear physics-y bomb thing that was under development that people were talking about. Churchill apparently wasn't too much of a fan because apparently he was happy with explosives how they are but he shouldn't stand in the way of improvement essentially was his message. Yeah. Roosevelt promised to share any information on the bomb they had with Britain. Britain were obviously trying to

develop a bomb at the same time as America. One country who were not, however, was Germany. They were not to know but Germany had given up on trying to develop a bomb at the same time as America. One country who were not, however, was Germany. They were not to know, but Germany had given up on trying to develop an atomic bomb. Really? Yeah, they decided it was too hard and it would take too many resources away from the greater achievement, which was wiping out all the Jews. Yeah. So it was decided Roosevelt and Churchill should meet Stalin in person.

If we're going to hammer some ideas about post-war Germany, we really need to talk to Stalin. So should we talk to them all together? Skipping a bit of time here, but yes, the meeting was set up. And in November 1943, the three meet in Tehran. Hey! This was the first time Roosevelt had met Stalin, and he was determined to make it work. His ambassador in Russia obviously already knew Stalin, and later on described Stalin in this way.

He was better informed than Roosevelt and more realistic than Churchill. In some ways, he was the most effective of all the wartime leaders. And at the same time, he was, of course, a murderous tyrant. So, murderous tyrant, but an effective one. Yeah. Mainstream to his bow. So talk was once again, what should we do with Germany? Shall we wipe it off the map?

Was one suggestion. I mean, Germany as Germany was a fairly new country. Can we just pretend that didn't happen? So just get rid of that. Another idea, Holy Roman Empire. Should we go back to that? We don't just get rid of that another idea holy roman empire should we go back to that we don't have to call it that but you remember when it was all hundreds of small little states and no one had a clue what was going on it was incredibly daunting to anyone who was thinking of maybe potentially doing a podcast on it in the future do you remember that we could go back to

that maybe or what about split germany into four or five larger states maybe that would be more manageable maybe we could do that these were the ideas floating around they hadn't learned how they since the first time well as we see they had learned something as we will see later on right don't cripple them economically yeah yeah don't punish them well start stalin did kind of want to uh churchill and roosevelt were saying this is how we ended up in this mess. We can't cripple them completely. But at one point, Stalin made a bit of a joke. He said the best way to make sure we had peace after the war

was to execute all 50,000 German officers at the end of the war. I imagine that was a little bit of a pause. Roosevelt then joked back. He said 50,000 was far too high perhaps they should execute 49,000 instead Stalin, yes, I can go down to that Churchill apparently was not

amused at all and he was very blustered and announced that he would rather be shot himself than order such a thing the honour of a British man blah blah blah blah yes it'd be awful if we caused the death of hundreds of thousands of people The honour of a British man. Blah, blah, blah, blah. Yes. It'd be awful if we caused the death of hundreds of thousands of people.

Britain would never do that. Of course not. Pass me a brandy. There have been debate amongst historians about exactly what the play was in this exchange. Certainly the biography, the couple of biographies that i read covering this suggested that stalin was joking roosevelt saw it as a joke and joked back and churchill didn't understand the joke that's very british yeah roosevelt then used this as a way to mock churchill in a friendly way for his britishness which really softened Stalin up, apparently, who found that amusing. And after that, communication worked better.

Much to Churchill's... It's breaking the ice. Yeah, yeah. However, I can't help but wonder whether that was one of those kind of jokes where you're kind of testing the waters. It wouldn't be funny, guys. It wouldn't be really funny if we executed 50,000 Germans. Wouldn't it be funny unless

we actually do it should we do it no it's funny i was joking what maybe was what stalin was doing there nice who knows so the meeting continues now the main issue apart from germany was opening up the second front in europe because yes we can talk all we want about what to do with germany after war but we need to win it so what what about this second front, said Stalin? Kind of useful if we have that second front. The United States wanted it to happen via France. Yes,

this is the plan. We're going to go in, we're going to cross the Channel, go through France. Churchill still, however, was advocating going through the Mediterranean. It'll be easier that way. Yeah. Look what I did in World War I, he he said how successful it was going through the mediterranean so i see i see his view though because i guess you're thinking well

you know because from churchill's views like at the time the british army was very good and they were demolished because the german the nazis just came through the French trees, the forests, and pushed them back so much and killed almost their entire army. So it's like, well, I don't want that to happen again. Oh, yeah, yeah. It makes sense from Churchill's point of view. Dunkirk was not good. No, it wasn't.

It really was not. And do we want to go back there? Because we could not hold on to it before. No. Let's try a different avenue they've literally built a fortification let's let's go around it let's walk around it there is an argument to be had however there was also an argument to be had to build up as many forces as you can and punch a very small hole through the defense the the

battering round because if it works then you have really destroyed that defence so there were arguments either way and this was essentially what was going on in the end it was decided that they would invade France in May of 1944 and it would be led by the American General Dwight Eisenhower short version

of that but obviously we'll get more detail on that in a future episode really? Why? I don't know. There's reasons. In the end, obviously, as we all know, those of us who do know, it wasn't May, it was June.

June the 6th that became D-Day. Over 150,000 troops invaded a heavily fortified coast of France over the sea and through the air. And it works. Watch Band of Brothers for more information. Or Saving Private Ryan. I don't know. Pick up a book.

What? The Allies managed to open up a second front, and Hitler was forced to fight on those two fronts. And this is where the war enters its most popular period in terms of what is popular in the imagination today. This is the push of the allies through europe which certainly gets most of the attention yeah certainly to casual people interested in history which i'll happily include myself amongst before you're really getting into

the nitty-gritty of the war but it is obviously only a very small portion of the war however back home roosevelt's health was starting to him. Despite the lack of the use of his legs, he had always been in good health, but that had kind of stopped of late. Remember, he had a mild heart attack at the end of his second term, but he's only going downhill. Yeah, he was always tired, he struggled to

concentrate. He saw a doctor and a heart murmur was discovered. Despite this, Roosevelt pushes on. There was a war on, after all. There's also an election. Now, there'd been a lot of speculation over whether he would run a third time or not. Not so much for the fourth election.

Things were clearer. In fact, I quote, Reluctantly, but as a good soldier, I will accept and serve in this office if I am ordered to do so by the commander-in-chief of all of us, the people of the United States. If his belief was that only he could steer the United States through the war was perhaps unfounded in the last election, what was he basing that on? Well, actually, he's got a much stronger case this time. It was he who had a close working

relationship with Winston Churchill. He even got on with Stalin. It's like, actually, you've got a very strong argument to say changing leaders now is a bad idea. We've nearly won the war. And also, they'd nearly won the war. It was Roosevelt who had taken on a war that almost everyone saw as unwanted and unwinnable. And he turned it into something close to a victory. Due to this, it was not uncertain once more. The GOP ran an even less

effective campaign than the last one. The biggest weakness... Yeah, vote for him. I'm voting for him. Why wouldn't you vote for him? Yeah, the biggest weakness was Roosevelt's health. Can we go after him for his health? What was the problem here?

Roosevelt had managed to get through his entire political life with go after him for his health? What was the problem here? Roosevelt had managed to get through his entire political life with people attacking him for his health. He knew how to win that battle. Now he was actually genuinely struggling with his health, but like before, he was able to hide it quite well because he knew how to.

He knew how to fight back against those kind of attacks. So it just didn't stick. Then in July 1944, he headed to Pearl Harbor. It was decided that the Philippines had to be taken back next as a matter of principle. They were, after all, American. So we'll do that. The plan was formulated to force Japan to a surrender

without invading Japan itself. It was seen that invading Japan would be incredibly difficult. A lot of lives would be lost. So maybe there's a way of forcing Japan into a surrender. It was around this time that his son, who was serving in the South Pacific, wrote to Roosevelt. His son mentioned that the invasion of Japan

was a reason why he could not come home. Roosevelt wanted his son to come home for a bit. His son had said, no, the invasion of Japan is important, and Roosevelt wrote back, and I quote, We will have something that will end our war with Japan before any invasion takes place. It is something that we can use and we will use if we have to. Something we will certainly use before you or any of our sons die

in an invasion of Japan. Oh dear. Yes. And then the onimous bell rang. Gong. The onimous gong. Anyway, the election came, the election went. No one was in any doubt.

Roosevelt won 26 million to 22, so yet another landslide victory. 432 electoral college votes to 99. I mean, you could argue the gap is narrowing but he wasn't a well man i mean he was losing weight rapidly by this point he was visibly starting to look like he was struggling uh people were surprised when they met him people had known him all their life uh hadn't seen him for a couple of months, met him and went, oh wow, what's going on? He was also starting to have attacks of angina whilst he was delivering speeches, worries that it was full-on heart attacks on its way. Yeah. Despite this, he didn't slow down. After his fourth inauguration, so there you go, four terms,

down. After his fourth inauguration, so there you go, four terms, he headed back to the Mediterranean and met with Churchill on Malta. From there, they both headed across the Black Sea to a Soviet resort town of Yalta. He's very active for a very sick guy. Oh, yes, it's taking it out of him, but he's active. Again, meeting of the big three. In fact, eight meetings over eight days take place this time. By this time Russia has taken Warsaw and the United States and Britain and the Allies working with them have managed to get past the Battle of the Bulge and into Belgium.

So the best episode of Band of Brothers has gone by this point. Yeah, it really was now a matter of time before Germany fell. You can now comfortably start talking about what should we do with Germany after the war. So that's what they talked about. It was decided that Germany would be occupied, not dismantled. France also would get to be a part of the occupation.

Roosevelt wasn't best pleased with de Gaulle becoming the leader of France because he wasn't elected. It seemed a little bit despot-y to Roosevelt. Anyway, de Gaulle is now in charge of France. Roosevelt kind of finally gives up and says, fine, yeah, we'll recognise you since everyone else has. But just, no, a bit of tension between France and America there. No more statues from you. Yeah.

No more giant copper women. So France would get part of Germany, obviously Britain and America would, and also Russia, they said. And what should we do? Just kind of like split it up neatly? Yeah, that makes sense. We'll split it up neatly. What about the capital, they said? I don't

know. Let's make it its own isolated little pocket that you can only fly into and fly out of. I can't see any problems with that whatsoever. What should we do with one city, they said don't know build a wall through it that's insane said someone shut up said someone you're ruining our fun why would somebody do that i i think could only be uh what happened in that meeting i mean yeah anyway yeah so, so Germany split up and occupied. It was decided also that Russia could have Poland. I mean, no one said it like that because that's not good, is it?

Obviously, Britain went into war, literally went into war because of Poland and defending Poland. And we're not going to give Poland up. No one's going to know. No, that'd be ridiculous. You could have Poland in all the other countries in Eastern Europe. It was all dressed up in diplomatic speech. It was fine. It was fine. Yeah, yeah.

We will take care of Poland. Yes, yes. That'd be fine. But yes, essentially it was, yes, Russia, you can have everything east of Germany, we'll have everything west, was pretty much the deal. So that was all agreed on. Also, it was agreed that Russia would join the fight with Japan within a couple of months of Germany's fall, so that was good.

They also discussed what to do with the Jewish population in Europe. Everything to do with the idea of Israel starts to be brought up. We do not have time to go through all that now, unfortunately, as fascinating as it is. But just know that things are being discussed around this time. At the end of the Yalta Conference, Roosevelt wrote that the results were not good, obviously. I mean, there were some things that weren't great about this, but it was the best they could have hoped for. Then in March 1945, Roosevelt spoke to a joint session of Congress. For the first time ever, he appeared in his wheelchair.

He did not have the energy to stand up. Wow. Yeah, he announced that it should be celebrated that they had not waited to the end of the war to set in motion the machines of peace. This was essentially a victory speech, and it was warmly applauded. Later on that month, an exhausted president went to Warm Springs to rest. He wasn't eating, his weight was still falling off him, his hands were shaking at all times, he struggled to remember names and events. He's really going to pieces. And then on the 12th of April, after noting that they still had 15 more minutes to work until lunch,

he suddenly said, and I quote, Oh. Yeah, his health was really failing. Yes. Yeah. So there you go. That is the incredibly busy life of Roosevelt Yeah

I'm almost sad that the war story hasn't finished Almost, it's almost there And it's not a World War II podcast It's a present podcast So we now get to rate Franklin D. Roosevelt Okay Here we go

Try not to drag this out too much. But there's a lot to discuss here. Good. There's no way he's not scoring highly in statesmanship, in my mind. I'm just going to say that right at the start. The man had a successful political career in which he was widely regarded as a force for good. This is remarkable for a politician. Most politicians at some point fall from grace.

He does not. That's true. He was an able point fall from grace. He does not. That's true. He was an able assistant secretary from Navy during World War I, if you remember, way back to his first episode. He was a state senator and did reasonably well there. He was the governor of New York and arguably did an even better job. He was elected president four times, each time in a landslide victory. I mean, that's very statesmanly, isn't it?

I'd say it's very statesmanly. He navigated the United States through not one, but two of its biggest ever crises. The Great Depression and World War II. Just one of those alone would have been hugely impressive, but both of them is phenomenal. The New Deal was a radical break from the Gilded Age that had been needed for decades. The slow crawling away from the Gilded Age has not really helped that much. The New Deal certainly is helping a lot more. Countless families that were really struggling, starving to death in utter poverty, were pulled out of that

poverty thanks to the New Deal. People were starving. They no longer were. I mean, that's good. You can't argue against that. They'll get your votes. Yeah. You also get a lot of points for being instrumental in defeating one of the most fanatically genocidal governments in history. in defeating one of the most fanatically genocidal governments in history. If you're defeating Nazis, you get points. Yeah. That said... Can I add one more thing in?

Yeah. His fireside chats, he was able to get... Because that's part of statesmanship, surely? Oh, yes, that is a very, very good point. His political skill using the fireside chats, very impressive. He used the technology available to him to get his message out.

He'd have been amazing on Twitter. I don't know. I don't know whether it would have suited his... Not in this time. It would have been... Because it was more chatty. It was like your friendly uncle having a chat to you

and explaining everything. That's what it was like. Yeah. But yeah, no, that's also a good point. But, despite all these good points there is certainly room to criticize and in fact i've actually spent far more of my word count here in criticizing him than not just because i want to be fully fair but then we can judge him so bad one major argument against him especially in recent times is that the new deal was actually

not helpful for the country at all. That it was actually the war that brought the country out of the Depression and got the economy back on track. The New Deal was actually harming the country. Now, I find this argument very hard to agree with personally. I think it's very obvious the economy was clearly improving until Roosevelt pulled back from the New Deal too soon, and then it crashed again. And then, yes, the war certainly pulled it out completely. I'm not saying the war didn't help the economy in the United States. Of course it did. But it was also getting back to pre-Depression levels.

It was almost there. So I struggle to agree with this argument. Well, what's the data say? You've got to go by data, surely. The trouble with data and economies is that the data can be so complex that you can get the data to say whatever the hell you want I'm not an economist I don't know much about the economy

I think it's fairly clear if we wrote the podcast we do but what I will say is that most economists agree that the New Deal helped Economists that don't that I've come across tend to be fairly modern economists that are pushing a agenda that they want to say about modern economies however fair enough i certainly know

that some people disagree with that and fair enough the economy's complex i'm not saying i'm right here i'm just saying i think the evidence proves that the New Deal was doing a good thing. Fair enough. Yeah. But it is a criticism against him, so I thought I should include it for being fair's sake. Another criticism that I can get on board with about the New Deal is that, as ever, things being great for most people in the country means that it was not great for all people in the country. And usually, as we've discovered in the podcast, this means it was good for white people in the country means that it was not great for all people in the country. And usually, as we've discovered in the podcast, this means it was good for white people and not for non-white people. In order to get a lot of the New Deal stuff through,

Roosevelt had to cut a lot of deals with the faction in his party that really were not for helping the minorities. The Southern Democratic faction in the party really didn't want things like black farmers to be able to form a union, for example. So Roosevelt essentially said, fair enough. To get his New Deal through, he allowed several things to pass that were not helpful for black people.

Or, more to point, the biggest one is that Roosevelt did not push for a law, which was the anti-lynching law. Now, we've talked about this a few times now. It's still not on the books, the anti-lynching law. It still can't get through politically. You could argue Roosevelt is the most powerful president we have ever seen. And he could have surely, at the height of his powers, got that anti-lynching law through, but he doesn't because he doesn't want to upset

the Southern Democrats in his party. So in 1944, you could legally lynch Black people? No, because lynching is murder, so you couldn't. However, the anti-lynching laws, if you remember, put in extra levels of punishment for, not the people doing the physical lynching, but for the infrastructure around them for allowing it to happen. So prosecutors who didn't prosecute would be prosecuted. Things like that. It made lynching much less appealing to those in authority.

Much more likely for them to crack down on it. That's what it was for. It's still scary that people did that. Yeah. What the hell? The fact that we're in World War II and this law is still not through. Like, our grandparents were alive when...

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's insane. Yeah, so, I mean, this is definitely a criticism you can level against Roosevelt. He was very powerful. Surely he could have done more in this area. And he just kind of doesn't. He also gets criticism for not doing enough to help the Jews in Europe.

And yes, he certainly could have fought harder to change the immigration laws of the country. But again, very much like anti-lynching laws, he decides not to because he knew he'd lose political power in doing so. That also highlights the anti-Semitism. Oh yes, there was certainly anti-Semitism a lot in America at this time. People who did not want to see Jews or any immigrants coming to America. It doesn't matter what the stories are. The stories were probably made up anyway. Stories of mass execution camps, that's a scare story.

We heard those in World War I. Never came true, did it? Yeah, that was the attitude of many people. That obviously, tricky one, this one, because you could argue every leader could have done more to help the Jewish population in Europe because, my God, did they need some help and they did not get it.

But at the same time, how much did people know and how much did people know? And how much could be done? Everything happened rapidly. It's a very hard one to judge, but it certainly is something to talk about whilst coming up with criticisms. So there you go. That's in here as well.

This one, however, is straight up obvious. Big criticism. Concentration camps in America to detain American citizens. Yeah, you can't really justify this in any meaningful way. You can't. You can't. It's not good. It's bad. You cannot justify it. The fact that he delegated the decision to the military is no defence whatsoever.

He was the president. He was in charge. He delegated and then he signed off on that delegation. It was his fault. That's all I can say on that. There's no defence. No, there isn't. Another valid criticism of him is him running for a third term. Slightly less horrific than concentration camps and talks of not aiding people facing genocide and everything.

However... I feel like you should have done this in severity. I didn't do it in any order, to be honest. No, he doesn't. But there is certainly something to be said that this is a worrying trend roosevelt attacked the supreme court he attacked congress he spent his political life trying to strip powers away from the other two branches of government and then he made himself king if he hadn't have died for his fourth term who says he wouldn't have gone on for a fifth term

and a sixth term and then declared himself president for life. It is a slippery slope. It is worrying, even as a joke. If someone's talking about having a third term, you've got to sit up and pay attention, even if they're doing it with a smile on their face. In a democracy where the whole idea is that you share power and you vote people in, clinging on to the power is worrying. Now, of course, you can argue that extenuating circumstances here are world war. Also, he was, you can argue that extenuating circumstances here are world war. Also, he was using his forces for good when he was attacking the Supreme Court, you could argue, because he was trying to bring down an inherently racist system that was set up against the working classes, and he achieved some good things. But that is a ends justify the means

argument. You can't reasonably argue that it is not a little bit worrying to set a precedence that a president can just keep being president for life no the only the only way you can justify is by saying he was voted in each time yeah but after five elections and he's not voted in what happens then i mean it's it's setting a precedent there was a reason why that's hypothetical it It is, it is. And this is all hypothetical. There was a reason why they brought in the two term limits pretty much immediately afterwards.

However, despite all this, like I said, there's quite a few criticisms there. When you look at the start of his administration and then you look at the end, the country is in an unquestionably better place. Roosevelt inherited a country on its knees, quite likely close to the government falling. I mean, it's not a million miles away. It's not crazy thinking to think a revolution could have taken place. It was happening in

other countries. America was in a bad place. And then at the end of Roosevelt's administration, America was a global superpower with the strongest economy and a military in the world. And other countries acknowledge that as well. Britain, it might have been sucking up slightly, but Britain certainly said, you are strong. Yeah, Britain for the first time went, actually

yeah, you're more powerful than us. We're forced to admit it. And so did a lot of countries in the world. Not only had the country become a superpower, it was actually more fairly structured. The society of America was better. Now, it was far from perfect. It is full of problems still,

but it is better than it was. It has improved. For a vast majority of Americans, life was better than it was. Not necessarily great, but improvements had been made. So yes, there were very, very valid reasons to criticise Roosevelt. And I definitely would not be saying he is a perfect president.

And it is fair that he is criticised for things. But I think it would be disingenuous to claim that he was anything but ultimately a positive force in the history of the country, despite the obvious stains yes do you want to put an arbitrary number on all that? it's going to be high but because of the

neglect of certain things that he potentially had power to solve, not solve but edge towards a better ending he could have been for example the concentration camps yeah yeah jewish people the whole um lynching thing um i'm giving him an eight so i'm taking off two for that which seems almost i don't think it's harsh i think you could argue i could have

taken off more i i i think the the benefits outweigh the negatives because if nazi germany had taken over more it would have been a lot worse i i'm with you i was thinking eight as well uh this is one of the hardest ones to to judge i would say because there are some obvious bads but there are also so many goods um yeah i going to say 8, and I also completely understand why people might disagree with us. But I'm going to say 8 for now. 16. Also, if you're a listener, please tell us what you give as well, because that would be very fascinating, and the reasons why.

Next. So, as a youth, he was pompous. He was a member of the elite, and he had, if I remember correctly, literally every spoon that was made of silver in his mouth. That's a big mouth. Yeah, yeah. And he didn't seem to realise it either, did he? He was a hard man to like in his youth, looking back at him in history.

He shared, or at least did not fight against, his class's casual racism against black people, Asians, Catholics, Jews, which, yeah. It's a big long list. Yeah, anyone who's not white and not Catholic, anyone who's not him and his class, basically. So there's that. That's not good.

But then he catches polio. And he seems to change. Now, you can debate, was it the illness, or maybe just passage of time and age? People change over time. But he turned into a person who actually seemed to care about the people he represented. You cannot say this about all presidents.

No. He genuinely seemed to want to make changes to the laws that would help people, not help his party stay in power. And there was a huge difference between those two things. Most presidents we've seen, I would argue, will do the latter over the former. I would argue this for impartiality.

The UK does a similar thing. So I think it says something about his character later in life that he was willing to go against the grain of his party at times fight factions of his party at times although obviously he also did just give up at times and make compromises that were questionable but generally he tried to make things better for the people he represented. Now, you can argue the same with Teddy Roosevelt. The reason why he was able to do this was because he was so incredibly posh and rich.

It is a privilege given to people so posh and rich that they can actually care about other people because they're not busy worrying about themselves. It's security. Yeah, but I think it's a bit harsh to take points away from him just because he happened to be incredibly rich and privileged because he could have just sat there and done nothing. I'll be honest, all of what you said I think is irrelevant. He grew up probably a bit stuck up, but it'll change.

So that shows a willingness to change. It's positive. So the only other thing I could think of in this round were his moral failings. The only thing I could think of here is he had an affair. But... Forgot that, yeah. Unlike other presidents we've covered,

this affair seems to be a simple, he fell out of love with Eleanor, he fell in love with Lucy, Eleanor found out, they decided to stay together professionally, because they never were a couple again. They just think separately for the rest of their lives. But they got on well enough. They just weren't close. This is not Cleveland attempting to institutionalise a young woman

after he got her pregnant. This is not the same thing. I don't think this is something to give out points for. This was a marriage that fell apart, but it was in a time where divorce was tricky and the two decided to stay together for a mutual benefit so fair enough so unless you can remember anything it's really tricky because you kind of think you're linking back to statesmanship there are certain policies that went through or didn't happen. Does that have a grounding in his own moral character? I didn't get the sense, looking into him, that it did. I think they were political compromises he made. Now, you can argue making those as political compromises is dodgy. You could certainly say the compromise itself was bad, but this was Roosevelt doing things he didn't want to do because he saw it as the only way he could

get other things done which in my mind falls under statesmanship whether he should be criticized for it or not is the different round I don't think that falls into this round I'm thinking minus one there were definitely some little cases of uh oh really Roosevelt um so I'm not going to say zero he's no hates no but there's nothing big i mean i'm sorry if you're going to be casually racist throughout your life you're not getting zero uh but there's no there's no big big stories or scandals or anything minus two next interesting to see what you think here right very briefly because it is the wrong episode. Posh upbringing. He went to a posh school.

He did more posh things. He then went to the Senate. He became the Assistant Secretary for the Navy. He campaigned for Vice President. Then he catches polio. There's the whole recovering from polio, trying to walk again, going to his job and then collapsing in the foyer.

All of that, all of a sudden, you've got some drama. Everything up to this point, less so, but maybe is a good leading into the polio story. Then you've got the political comeback. I mean, you've got the way we ended episode one, where everyone's cheering for him because he's managed to get to the podium. I mean, that's cinematic.

That just is. Then he was the governor. He did a fairly good job. He was the president. First term, New Deal does well. Second term, failed power grabs doesn't do well. that just is then he was the governor he did a fairly good job he was the president first term new deal does well second term failed power grabs doesn't do well third term war and then he dies now what i would argue is that his life is politics at its arguably best it's not flashy or interesting but it gets things done it effective. Whether you agree with his politics or not

is debatable but he got stuff done in a non-flashy way. That's what you want from your politics. But that's not this round. That's statesmanship. This is silver screen. How interesting was his life? His life was fascinating.

I would love to see a four, five, six part series on his life. Yeah? Yeah, it'd be fascinating because I think everything that happened was interesting. Yeah. You've got obviously the war series, which should be the final series.

You've got the New Deal, just like the conversations that we had, the debates. Yeah. And even the failed paragraphs was an interesting side to Roosevelt that I've never really come across before. I've heard lots about the positives of Roosevelt and not much about the negatives of Roosevelt.

The fact that he was a little bit power grabby, the fact that he was a potential, oh, is this leading into tyranny kind of in the United States? Not much, but the worry was there. You could see why people would be worried at the time. I can see the fear, but I think it would come to a point where if he kept doing it, people would just be like, no, I'm not voting for you anymore.

Yeah, yeah, you'd hope. It's not the best, but it's pretty good. I think he fastens it. I mean, conversations with Churchill and Stalin I mean, that alone is getting you points So the fact that he's got to come back from the polio Actually, I'm saying it's not the best He is up there, isn't there?

What did we give his cousin, Teddy In this round? Surely it was four marks Surely Teddy Roosevelt got four marks in his round Can you find it faster than I do? Yeah, I can find it faster than you can Excellent, I'll put my phone back Yeah, yeah

Okay, Teddy got four marks in this round because of course he did. But he became a cowboy. He went to Deadwood. Yeah, but that's never... We can never get anyone 10 again after that, which I don't think is fair because it's a different time and you can

get different interests. You've persuaded me. I was going to go 8. My heart was in 8, but you've persuaded me for your argument that actually it is a bit better than that. I was going to go 8. My heart was in 8, but you've persuaded me for your argument that actually it is a bit better than that. I'm going to go up to 9. I'm going to go for 9. That's a damn good score. That is a damn good score. That puts him on par with

Washington in this round, and only Teddy Roosevelt and Jackson beat him for just a story of someone's crazy life. Yeah, okay, 19. This is going to be a good score. This is interesting, because I had in my head

what I thought the official portrait was for Roosevelt, but I've just gone onto the website that I usually use, and I've pulled it up. Turns out the one I thought isn't actually the official one. Okay. Maybe I'm just thinking of a famous photo. This was not the one i thought isn't actually the official one okay maybe i'm just thinking of a famous photo this was not the one i thought um he looks actually a little bit younger here uh than did you see the wikipedia one possibly maybe it's just the one on wikipedia i'm thinking about you've got roosevelt sitting looking it's got a bit of a square chin going on and looking uh

off to the right there's tassels left tassels in the background jamie you've got a bit of a square chin going on. Looking off to the right, there's tassels. I look like Cleft. Tassels in the background, Jamie. Gotta love a tassel. Looks like some American flags. He's got a book on the table in front of him. It's all right, but it's nothing. I'm really disappointed with this.

I'm strongly disappointed. This is going to be a weak round for him. I mean, it's not awful. I don't look at it and go, oh dear. It's very middle of the road. I don't hate it. I don't love it. I feel nothing, Jamie.

I'm dead inside whilst I watch this. He looks very modern. He's got a tie on and a shirt. He's got this white little thing in his pocket. It's like a tissue thing. Five. Really? Yeah.

I'm going for four. I'm less impressed than you. Okay, so that is a 2.25 maybe this is his round because the bonus let's see how he does shall we terms three he completes three turns so he gets three whole points assassination one someone tried to kill him remember in the last episode yeah yeah he survived so he gets a point election despite being four elections they were all landslide victories in fact his average of his electoral college votes even though that it has taken over four elections, is third behind over Washington and Monroe. Washington's doesn't count because he was just shoehorned in, so he got 100%, and Monroe was during the afternoon of good feelings, so he did quite well. But yeah,

so incredibly good. So that is two points for election. He gets six points for bonus. If he wasn't already doing well, that meant he would be doing well. I'll be honest, I will not be surprised if he's won this. Really? Our current first place is none other than Lincoln himself on 40. Our second place is Teddy Roosevelt on 38.5. And in third place is George Washington on 37. So where does Franklin Roosevelt come?

I don't know. I'm going to tell you right now, Jamie. He scores 41.25. Oh, he beat him. Yay. New leader. New leader. Oh, brilliant.

Got through the Great Depression. Got through World War II. Well, kind of. close close um it's the bonus points that swung it for him though without those bonus points without that extra point for the election if he hadn't been nearly killed and then gone into his third term yeah he wouldn't actually have won so it really was the case that someone tried to kill him and that he did a term more than anyone else. Well, congratulations to the assassinator. Well done

to you, sir. It's what he would have wanted. Yes. However, before we go on to the next point, Future Us needs to talk to us. It's amazing how we can predict this. I know, it's amazing how we can predict this i know it's amazing thanks pest us i always go with those guys they're really good they're they're good guys

aren't they a bit behind the times they are a little bit they don't even know that joe biden tripped on the on the steps of air force one do? No, they don't know that yet. Nor do I. Did that happen today? Yeah. I've not seen the news. I came home and started editing. Which brings us to the point. Right, whilst editing it occurred to me that we missed an important part of the episode,

albeit perhaps an obvious one. We forgot to discuss whether Roosevelt is is American or American. I mean, it's obviously yes. I mean, it's obviously yes. Everyone knew it was going to be yes. I mean, it's a yes. But we've just popped it in here. It's now official. Well done, FDR. Not only are you our highest scorer, but you also are an American. That's how you pronounce it. Yeah, in British.

Yeah. Anyway, back to past us. Yeah, okay. Good luck, guys. Just word of warning, guys. You waffle a bit towards the end, so it's probably going to be cut down quite a bit. So just watch out for that.

Thanks. Thanks, Futurus. Wise words. Let's keep it succinct at the end here. Thanks. Thanks, Futurists. Wise words. Let's keep it succinct at the end here. But what I will say, I really wanted to, at the end of this episode, to be able to announce what we're doing with the American President series come the future.

But unfortunately, we're still not quite there. There are still a couple of things we're trying to sort out. And I don't want to say something and then have to come and say, actually, we're doing it differently now. So what I am going to say is that there are some small changes coming, but they are exciting changes.

But there will not be an episode out in the next President slot, because I need time to do the research. So no episode in two weeks, but two weeks after that, we will start with President Truman. Oh, Truman.

Yes. Yeah, I've seen the Truman Show. Yeah, yeah, it's all about President Truman. I'm going to watch it to do my research. That's what I was going to say. Yes, exactly. So I hope you will join us for that. And yeah, get in contact with us.

Are you outraged FDR is now in the lead? Yeah. Or do you think we made a good assessment? Who knows? Yeah. Right. Thank you very much for listening. Yeah.

And please follow us on Facebook and Twitter. Okay, then. All that needs to be said is... Goodbye. Goodbye. Hello, Winston. Yes, yes, no, good to hear from you too. Yes, yes, no, we were shocked. We never expected the attack, but fear not.

We will rally and we will fight back, Churchill. Yes, Cuban cigar. More brandy. Yes, no, of course. This does mean we're in the same boat now. Oh, poor people in India. Yes, of course, of course, yes. We'll be offering our shipments to you as soon as possible,

and you're right, the Atlantic is an important front. Fear not, we will not focus solely on the Pacific. Scotch! Yes, you're right, of course, the plan is that eventually we will remove some of our fleet into the Atlantic, but you must understand, Churchill, that we must focus now on Japan, at least in the short term. must understand, Churchill, that we must focus now on Japan, at least in the short term. Well, Clare Lately, he's a fool, he's a socialist. Yes, of course. We will send you as many arms as we can. Again, I must freely state, we are in this together now, Churchill.

Come to you, what, what, what, don't you tell it. Meanwhile, in England. Well, I want to thank you, Roosevelt, for your conversation. I think we've got a good route to defeating Hitler. Well done. Goddamn hickory! Beastball! Yee-haw! My voice exactly on such a sensitive nature with the royal family.