FDR and the End of Empire
The Origins of American Power in the Middle East
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In 1942, the American journalist and social reformer Oswald Garrison Villard, grandson of noted abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison, warned that World War II could be lost in the colonial empires, where the Allie...
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On Valentine’s Day, 1945, having flown directly from his final meeting with Churchill and Stalin at Yalta, President Roosevelt met with the Saudi king Abdul Aziz al Saud aboard the USS Quincy on Egypt’s Great Bit...
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Only four weeks after Pearl Harbor, an OSS (Office of Strategic Services) operative warned from Cairo: “The Near East is wide open and ripe for plucking.”3 This warning referred mostly to the possible threat of A...
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The British Empire faced one of its gravest crises of World War II when Axis forces made thrusts into Egypt in 1940 and 1941, threatening vital strategic interests such as the Suez Canal. The war tested the Anglo...
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The origins of the “special relationship” between the United States and Saudi Arabia are rooted in the politics of World War II, driven by America’s growing demands for oil. Roosevelt understood that the war offe...
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It would be easy to overlook Syria and Lebanon in light of substantial American involvement elsewhere. Prior to World War II, American officials paid little thought to the Levant. While they gave scant attention ...
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The first challenges Roosevelt faced in the Midle East occurred in Iraq and Egypt, where the British sought to remove governments hostile to their interests. The Americans disagreed over the proper course of acti...
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After the British interventions in Iraq and Egypt, Washington took a stronger stand against British and, to a lesser degree, Soviet, interference in Iran. To Roosevelt, Iran became a demonstration for what the Un...
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With Italian and German forces penetrating the resource-rich and strategically vital Middle East, the Anglo-American Allies wanted to avoid further antagonizing the Arabs over Palestine. After the British interve...
Book Series
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Frank Knox has never previously been the subject of a scholarly biography. This chapter broadly surveys the parameters of the book, exploring its main themes such as the roots of Knox’s internationalism, his r...
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While kee** up his attacks on Roosevelt’s New Deal, Knox also battled with his fellow Republicans over foreign affairs during the years 1937–1940. His frequent visits to European capitals in the 1930s infuse...
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As a pugnacious publisher and former candidate for national office, Knox relished political combat. He led a spirited rhetorical offensive against critics of the administration’s foreign policy such as the cel...
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Despite the widespread media, Congressional, and public obsession with Japan in the weeks following the attacks on U.S. military installations in Hawaii, the Philippines, Guam, and Wake Island, Knox refused to...
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At the beginning of 1944, entering the third year of U.S. participation in the conflict, Knox could foresee an eventual end to what he characterized as an unprecedentedly destructive war. Sobered by the savage...
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Born in 1874, Knox left his Midwestern college in 1898 and joined Theodore Roosevelt’s Rough Riders and fought in Cuba during the Spanish-American War. In 1912 he encouraged Roosevelt to enter the presidential...
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FDR anticipated that Knox would provide the necessary leadership for the administration’s controversial naval expansion program. Knox embarked upon his new job with characteristic zeal. With Congress’s passage...
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This chapter provides insights into the actions of Knox and other senior U.S. officials during the tension-filled months leading to the outbreak of the Pacific War in December 1941. In the year prior to the Ja...