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1.0 out of 5 stars
A Poor Revision, March 12, 2005
This review is from: Harry S. Truman: Fair Dealer and Cold Warrior (Twayne's Twentieth-Century American Biography Series) (Hardcover)
In his biography of President Harry S Truman, William Pemberton aims primarily to blame Turman and his administration for the Cold War.
This interpretation is highly flawed and dependent on a number of questionable characterizations and assumptions. He objects to any comparison of Hitler and Stalin, ignores and misrepresents various post-war actions by Stalin, and presents Truman's policies as beligerent, ideologically motivated attacks on a cooperative Soviet Union. His criticism of Truman's decision to use the atomic bomb against Japan grossly under-estimates the number of casualties the US would have sustained had Operation Olympic been implemented, and also exagerates the willingness of the Japanese to surrender. Pemberton's conclusion that the primary motive for the use of the atomic bomb was to intimidate the Soviets is aimed solely at supporting his theis that the Cold War was begun by the US and disregards all evidence to the contrary. However, aggresive behavior by the Soviets, such as their demands on Iran, are either not discussed or are misrepresented. The reader is never informed of the nature of Soviet demands on Iran. For Turkey, Soviet demands that their warships be allowed to pass through the Turkish Straits were reasonable, their demands for base rights along the Straits, and for territorial concessions in eastern Turkey, were expantionist. Pemberton, however, does not inform his readers of the expantionist demands. Along similar lines, Stalin's violations of the Yalta Declaration are condoned by Pemberton as a difference of interpretation between Washington and Moscow. Indeed, Pemberton writes, while denouncing Truman's calls for reforms in Soviet-dominated Central Europe, that
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