The Peace of Amiens by Nicholas Sumner

Author:Nicholas Sumner
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: Sea Lion Press
Published: 2019-06-09T22:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 22: 9TH JULY 1967

The following is composed of extracts from the text of a series of interviews conducted by Dominic Walton Hartnell with President Harry S. Truman, President of the United States from1945 to 1952. They were originally broadcast on ‘Voice of America Radio’ on the 23rd of October 1967. The interviews touched on many issues concerning President Truman’s time in the Oval Office.

DWH: What was your first concern when you were sworn in to office in January 1945.

HST: To put it simply, the Germans and the Japanese. Wendell Willkie’s Administration confirmed what Roosevelt already realised, which was that Germany and Japan were the principal threats to the United States. He had been reluctant to really force the issue of oil supplies to Japan from the Netherlands East Indies, but I wanted to make a foreign policy statement right off the bat. The Japanese were still digesting their conquests in Far Eastern Russia; Amur, Southern Khabarovsk, Sakhalin and Primorsky. It was important to show them right away that we weren’t going to be trifled with. I simply wasn’t willing to let the oil issue go. Almost weekly there were new stories of atrocities coming out of China, out of Far Eastern Russia. I was determined to take a strong line with both Germany and Japan.

​I was very concerned by the expansion of the Japanese, Italian, Spanish and German Navies, and of course the Argentine-Chilean war that started in ’43. It bought the issues into sharp focus as far as I was concerned. It’s no secret that I saw the German supply of arms to Argentina as a direct violation of the Monroe Doctrine.

​Germany was a nation that seemed to have lost its mind. The way they were treating Jews, of course we didn’t realise then just how completely evil it was, but we did notice the weird Aryan race cult they were starting. They believed the concept of race was something to worship. They were building temples, inventing rituals and they even named some warships after the old Norse gods for heaven sakes! I know the British had a habit of naming some of their warships after Roman gods but this was something much deeper, much more disturbing.

​The Russians too seemed to have got religion in a big way, they had turned back to Orthodoxy and even as they fought to put their country back together their leaders didn’t try to re–impose the atheistic aspects of communism.

DWH: Your Administration was instrumental in negotiating an end to the Argentine-Chilean War which was also one of your first foreign policy concerns.

HST: Well, I’m inclined to say that common-sense broke out, but we did have to crack some heads. It was an absurd squabble over three tiny pieces of rock in the Beagle Channel [109] started by some sealers and whalers and Latin American machismo did the rest.

DWH: Both regimes were quasi-fascist though, and very much a part of the Sterling trading bloc.

HST: Nevertheless, the Monroe Doctrine applied, which is why we needed to crack heads.

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