Freedom Betrayed: Herbert Hoover's Secret History of the Second World War and Its Aftermath [Hardcover]

George H. Nash (Editor)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 7, 2011

Herbert Hoover’s “magnum opus”—at last published nearly fifty years after its completion—offers a revisionist reexamination of World War II and its cold war aftermath and a sweeping indictment of the “lost statesmanship” of Franklin Roosevelt. Hoover offers his frank evaluation of Roosevelt’s foreign policies before Pearl Harbor and policies during the war, as well as an examination of the war’s consequences, including the expansion of the Soviet empire at war’s end and the eruption of the cold war against the Communists.

Editorial Reviews

Review

“What an amazing historical find! Historian George H. Nash, the dean of Herbert Hoover studies, has brought forth a very rare manuscript in Freedom Betrayed. Here is Hoover unplugged, delineating on everything from the ‘lost statesmanship’ of FDR to the Korean War. A truly invaluable work of presidential history. Highly recommended.”
    —DOUGLAS BRINKLEY is professor of history at Rice University and editor of The Reagan Diaries.

“Finally, after waiting for close to half a century, we now have Hoover’s massive and impassioned account of American foreign policy from 1933 to the early 1950s. Thanks to the efforts of George H. Nash, there exists an unparalleled picture of Hoover’s world view, one long shared by many conservatives. Nash’s thorough and perceptive introduction shows why he remains America’s leading Hoover scholar.”
    —JUSTUS D. DOENECKE, author of Storm on the Horizon: The Challenge to American Intervention, 1939–1941

“A forcefully argued and well documented alternative to, and critique of, the conventional liberal historical narrative of America’s road to war and its war aims.  Even readers comfortable with the established account will find themselves thinking that on some points the accepted history should be reconsidered and perhaps revised.”
    —JOHN EARL HAYNES, author of Spies: The Rise and Fall of the KGB in America

“Freedom Betrayed offers vivid proof of William Faulkner’s famous dictum that “The past is never dead. It’s not even past.” For those who might think that history has settled the mantle of consensus around the events of the World War II era, Hoover’s iconoclastic narrative will come as an unsettling reminder that much controversy remains. By turns quirky and astute, in prose that is often acerbic and unfailingly provocative, Hoover opens some old wounds and inflicts a few new ones of his own, while assembling a passionate case for the tragic errors of Franklin Roosevelt’s diplomacy. Not all readers will be convinced, but Freedom Betrayed is must-read for anyone interested in the most consequential upheaval of the twentieth century.”
    —DAVID M. KENNEDY is professor of history emeritus at Stanford University and the author of Freedom From Fear: The American People in Depression and War, 1929–1945.

“Herbert Hoover’s Freedom Betrayed is a bracing work of historical revisionism that takes aim at U.S. foreign policy under President Franklin Delano Roosevelt.  Part memoir and part diplomatic history, Hoover's magnum opus seeks to expose the “lost statesmanship” that, in Hoover’s eyes, needlessly drew the United States into the Second World War and, in the aftermath, facilitated the rise to global power of its ideological rival, the Soviet Union.  Freedom Betrayed, as George Nash asserts in his astute and authoritative introduction, resembles a prosecutor’s brief against Roosevelt—and against Winston Churchill as well— at the bar of history.  Thanks to Nash’s impressive feat of reconstruction, Hoover’s “thunderbolt” now strikes—nearly a half-century after it was readied.  The former president’s interpretation of the conduct and consequences of the Second World War will not entirely persuade most readers.  Yet, as Nash testifies, like the best kind of revisionist history, Freedom Betrayed “challenges us to think afresh about our past.”
    —BERTRAND M. PATENAUDE, author of A Wealth of Ideas: Revelations from the Hoover Institution Archives

 “Nearly fifty years after his death, Herbert Hoover returns as the ultimate revisionist historian, prosecuting his heavily documented indictment of US foreign policy before, during, and after the Second World War. Brilliantly edited by George Nash, Freedom Betrayed is as passionate as it is provocative. Many no doubt will dispute Hoover’s strategic vision. But few can dispute the historical significance of this unique volume, published even as Americans of the twenty-first century debate their moral and military obligations.”
    —RICHARD NORTON SMITH is a presidential historian and author, former director of several presidential libraries, and current scholar-in-residence at George Mason University.

Book Description

The culmination of an extraordinary literary project that Herbert Hoover launched during World War II, his “magnum opus”—at last published nearly fifty years after its completion—offers a revisionist reexamination of the war and its cold war aftermath and a sweeping indictment of the “lost statesmanship” of Franklin Roosevelt. Freedom Betrayed: Herbert Hoover's Secret History of the Second World War and Its Aftermath originated as a volume of Hoover’s memoirs, a book initially focused on his battle against President Roosevelt’s foreign policies before Pearl Harbor. As time went on, however, Hoover widened his scope to include Roosevelt’s foreign policies during the war, as well as the war’s consequences: the expansion of the Soviet empire at war’s end and the eruption of the cold war against the Communists.

On issue after issue, Hoover raises crucial questions that continue to be debated to this day. Did Franklin Roosevelt deceitfully maneuver the United States into an undeclared and unconstitutional naval war with Germany in 1941? Did he unnecessarily appease Joseph Stalin at the pivotal Tehran conference in 1943? Did communist agents and sympathizers in the White House, Department of State, and Department of the Treasury play a malign role in some of America’s wartime decisions? Hoover raises numerous arguments that challenge us to think again about our past. Whether or not one ultimately accepts his arguments, the exercise of confronting them will be worthwhile to all.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 920 pages
• Publisher: Hoover Institution Press; 1st edition (November 7, 2011)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0817912347
• ISBN-13: 978-0817912345
• Product Dimensions: 6 x 2.4 x 9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 3.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (32 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #243,062 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

234 of 241 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Willing to Look at World War II in a Different Light? November 24, 2011

By Albert Alioto

Format:Hardcover

Reading this book is a searing experience. On almost every page Hoover calls on the reader to think differently about things the conventional wisdom supposedly settled decades ago.
Everything is meticulously documented, and no one else in human history collected documents the way Hoover did.

Will Hoover's version of events now be the definitive account of World War II? Of course not. But the definitive account of the war can no longer be written without taking Hoover's
work into consideration. And it ought not be enough for those who would dispute him to dismiss him as a sore loser who never got over losing the 1932 election. They should
accept the challenge of showing specifically where he is mistaken.

83 of 87 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars What would have been different if Hoover won in 1940? January 21, 2012

By LD TOP 500 REVIEWERVINE™ VOICE

Format:Hardcover

FDR refused to help the country get out of the Depression by not cooperating with Hoover before the inauguration 4 months later. FDR took credit for what Hoover had done (the public works projects like the dams) and feared allowing any credit to go to Hoover. Hoover was actively seeking the nomination in 1940. Hoover was the greater organizer and intellectual of the two (FDR had to use notes on index cards while Hoover could speak extemporaneously for an hour).

In 1940 Hoover wanted to provide humanitarian aid to Western Europe like his program after WWI. Churchill and FDR refused. But he did succeed in Finland. He thought that Hitler and Stalin would eventually fight and weaken each other so he was not in favor of fighting Hitler. He saw that Hitler wanted to go east and even if he defeated Russia, Hitler would find it unmanageable. Hoover believed that Churchill made errors in WWI and in WWII. While wishing to help Britain, he opposed Lend-lease because it gave FDR the power to order arms production for other countries and supply them without Congressional approval. He noted FDR's penchant for dictatorial powers and opposed it.

He believed that FDR was provoking Japan when it was unnecessary. In the end he thought using the atomic bomb was a mistake. At first he opposed Chiang Kai-Shek but thought the idea of forcing him into a coalition with Mao was a disaster.

Some people like to think about the "what-if" scenario. The book lays out an alternative to many decisions currently taken for granted. But Hoover was in a position to see and know behind the scenes info and would have made other choices. It makes you wonder about alternative time lines.

56 of 64 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Growing admiration for Hoover February 8, 2012

By John H Moffat

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase

I must confess to knowing very little about Herbert Hoover before opening this book, that is, apart from his undeserved reputation as the man who failed to hold back the flood of the Great Depression . As I learn more about him my admiration for him as a great humanitarian and dynamo of energy grows proportionately. Although less than a third of the way through this book, it is already shaping up as a classic of revisionist history of WW2 and its aftermath to rank alongside the work of David Irving and Pat Buchanan (... The unnecessary war) and other leaders in this genre. The major difference of course being that Hoover did it much earlier and was directly and personally involved in that history. It is very well written, parts of it beautifully so.