World War Two 1945 the Wheelchair President b05vlzsn default

I just did something that franklin delano roosevelt was never able to do on any day of his 12-year presidency in

1945

, when the global war reached its devastating climax. franklin roosevelt was the alliance's supreme wartime figure, but also a man living on borrowed time images of churchill roosevelt and stalin's meeting at yalta are well known, what may be less familiar given his appearance is the fact that the american

president

was by some years the youngest of the big three, roosevelt's health was collapsing from chronic heart disease and for two decades as a secret paraplegic, a wartime american general nicknamed him rubblex, but Few Americans knew that their

president

could not walk without assistance or that he had been diagnosed with near heart failure and that in Roosevelt's complicated personal life there were other skeletons hiding in the closet.

His formidable but fragile wife, Eleanor, had supported him during his long battle with disability, but their marriage was now under increasing strain because Roosevelt lived with a dark secret about an affair exposed and ended 25 years earlier, but now resurrected. in times of war by an isolated president. In the solitude of power despite all these very human flaws, however to the public, Roosevelt stands as one of the most notable presidents of the United States, he crafted a new agreement to lift the United States out of the depression of the Roosevelt would not survive the war, but his attempt desperate to create lasting peace and its tangled legacy in the postwar

world

are one of the great stories of the 20th century, to understand the end of World War II and the dawn of the Cold War, we must also understand the mind and the heart of the most enigmatic of leaders, how his complex personality influenced

world

affairs at a critical moment in history. history in

1945

franklin roosevelt was a man inspired by visions of a better world but also gripped by deep personal anxieties the

wheelchair

-bound president of the united states was rushing to shape the future before his past caught up with him in early november 1944 American forces were dealing deadly blows to the enemy The American military dominated the war in Western Europe In the Pacific The American navy had penetrated deep into Japanese coastal waters to hunt the ship at home The arsenal of democracy was producing more aircraft combat that britain and russia combined experts were already talking about superpowers with united states in a league of its own franklin roosevelt had been elected president for an unprecedented fourth term he was the most powerful man in the world but, ironically, one powerless over great part of his own body on election night November 7, 1944 Roosevelt Sitting here on the front porch of Springwood, the family mansion in Hyde Park, about 75 miles north of New York, savoring the taste of victory from porch, FDR could look down the length of the avenue to Albany Post Road, it was a view he knew so well in the In the early 1920s, he had contemplated it day by day with a mixture of hope and despair.

Just a quarter of a mile. This was a trip he longed to make, but for years his legs couldn't make it and now his heart was too weak too. Delano Roosevelt's character was forged in a unique crucible of privilege and then adversity. He was the only son of a wealthy New York gentry, one of the riverside families whose large estates stretched along the shores of the cottages after a pampered childhood dominated by his widowed mother. sarah delano roosevelt went to groton modeled after victorian english public schools, to harvard and then to a manhattan law firm a good springboard into politics roosevelt also married well eleanor was his fifth cousin once removed and niece of the president Theodore Roosevelt She brought a wealth of useful connections to a young man with political ambitions.

Over the next 11 years she gave birth to a daughter, Anna, and five sons, one of whom died before his first birthday. Eleanor was an intelligent, intense but shy young woman. Her marriage gave him new confidence and poise. but she was still prone to paralyzing nerves and what she called griselda moments when she sank deeply. The young FDR, by contrast, was inspired by Uncle Ted with his bold, whirlwind style, even though his own branch of the family were Democrats and not Republicans. The beginnings of his political career were dazzling. FDR rose through the ranks of New York State politics to become Undersecretary of the Navy during World War I while he was still in his thirties.

The Navy became a lifelong passion, but even more lasting was the influence of his wartime boss. President Woodrow Wilson. Wilson tried. to sell Americans his vision of a lasting peace built around the League of Nations, but the Senate rejected his plans. The United States fell back into isolationism and Wilson himself was felled by a massive stroke that paralyzed him and the rest of his presidency for the rest of his life fdr would be inspired by wilson's political ideals and also tormented by the wilson's personal tragedy in 1920, age 38, fdr ran as vice presidential candidate of the democratic party although the democrats lost he was clearly a rising star, but he already had secrets this was a man who flew high but lived dangerously fdr reveled in the attention that came with politics in 1918 a journalist wrote this almost sensual portrait his face is long and firmly shaped and marked with marks of confidence intensely blue eyes rest in light shadow a firm, thin mouth breaks quickly to laugh open and freely, roosevelt knew that he was attractive to women and he enjoyed it although he was married and had a family, he was an incorrigible flirt but his affection for lucy mercer, helena's secretary, was not a mere flirtation i can't get a number the world is asleep come on to misbehave Lucy was tall and elegant with a rich voice, deep eyes and a dazzling smile.

It's unclear how far things went between them during World War I, but FDR appears to have talked about marriage for a while. His letters were certainly passionate, as Eleanor discovered when she found them. by chance in 1918. 1918 shocked by panic for a time she felt completely betrayed there was talk of divorce franklin's mother sarah intervened harshly warning her son that if he gave up his wife shaming the family name she would disinherit him and he would not get another smell that fdr had to listen to but the prize that eleanor got for staying together was franklin's promise that he would never see lucy again the affair would have ended many marriages but franklin still admired and respected eleanor her fierce intelligence her passionate sense of good.

And for her part, Eleanor still believed in Franklin, perhaps even loved him, although the relationship was almost certainly no longer sexual and the tension was relieved in 1920 when she learned that Lucy had married a rich man. New York businessman, but then, in August 1921, came a different and even more relationship. A devastating setback for the Roosevelts. FDR suffered from polio. The disease was generally known as infantile paralysis because it particularly affected children, causing them to scream in agony and lose control of their bodily functions. Little by little, painfully, Roosevelt began to recover, but his thighs and legs remained unusable. and he was confined to a

wheelchair

and hated the hospital variety.

He put wheels on ordinary wooden chairs that were less cumbersome. They made him a special car that he could drive without using pedals. Spring wooden ramps were installed and moved him from one floor to another. floor via a pulley elevator in the servants quarters originally used for suitcases and trunks, let me be frank about what polio had done to this handsome and virile ambitious politician. He was now a man who could not dress or undress himself and had to be pushed to bed or placed on a toilet in the parlance of the time when he was now 39 years old.

How would he face a life like that? Franklin's mother was once again certain of what the future should be. Her beloved son should retire to the Hudson and withdraw from public view but fdr refused to heed his mother's wishes with the intention of making a political comeback he called his polio a childhood illness something a strong adult should simply overcome against all odds. the ants this mother's boy whom she dressed for much of his childhood in girl's clothes and The costumes of little Mr. Fontelroy went deeper, found an iron determination and a radiant hope. FDR had a simple and direct faith in God as his father.

He was an ornament in the local Episcopal church and was sustained by an underlying belief that Providence was watching over him in his worst moments of sleeplessness. During the nights of his illness, he told himself that this was a litmus test that tested his moral fiber for the challenges ahead, that faith and resilience would become an essential part of his charisma as a political leader, As he would say later in his life, once he had spent two years trying to move a toe, everything is in proportion. Roosevelt's battle with himself accentuated the secrecy ingrained in him as an only child, a mysterious being holding his cards close to his chest. would become central to FDR's political identity, allowing him to be all things to all men.

In 1939 the Washington press caricatured him as the sinks; even those closest to Roosevelt only understood a fraction of his mind and very little of his heart. He often said that he never let his left hand know what his right hand was doing. Which hand am I, Mr. President? Treasury Secretary Henry Morgenthau asked eagerly. Morgenthau was once an old friend and Hudson Valley neighbor. Roosevelt smiled sweetly. "You are my right hand man," and then added, "But I keep my left under the table. Divide and conquer. That would be the Roosevelt's motto both in politics and in private.

In a life in which no one stereotyped as a man in a wheelchair could hope to be politically successful at the time, somehow Roosevelt had to walk again or at least look like it. He wore a heavy steel corset and braces that ran from his hips to his heel. The weight was exhausting. and the metal cut into his body, but the braces when locked allowed him to stand, he then worked to strengthen his torso so he could maneuver his pelvis and locked legs forward, finally he tried to walk every morning imprisoned in what seemed taken out From a Medieval Torture Chamber Roosevelt would stand near the house and swear that he must go down the driveway today, then he would head towards the doors using crutches to propel each side of his body forward, after a few steps, he would He stopped to rest, sometimes covered in sweat. he would crash to the ground and they would have to put him back fuming in his wheelchair.

FDR never gave up hope of reaching Albany Post Road, but after a couple of years of heavy failure it became clear that he could not. walk freely he would have to con the public if he could his chance came in the 1924 election campaign roosevelt was hired to give the nomination speech at the democratic party convention in new york on behalf of candidate smith this would be his first public appearance since that polio appeared in 1921. He practiced for hours with his teenage son James to be ready to take those few vital steps behind the scenes. They helped Roosevelt to his feet and put braces on his legs, then James gave him his crutches. fdr slowly propelled himself across the stage with his eyes lowered and his face fixed in concentration the audience watched in silence in the gallery eleanor wove like a maniac when she reached the podium roosevelt gave her back her crutches she clung to the podium for dear life smiling widely as the crowd cheered Roosevelt spoke for a full half hour with energy and animation that seemed almost to glow under the spotlight.

In the end he praised Al Smith as the happy warrior of the political battlefield. A reference to Wordsworth's poem in honor of Admiral Lord Nelson, but it was clear from the press reaction. That the happy warrior who stood out on that hot June day in New York was not Al Smith, Franklin Wrestling Smith failed to win the presidency in 1924, but he tried again in 1928, when Roosevelt once again gave the nomination speech, this time in Houston, Texas. FDR was an accomplished public speaker, and more importantly, he had become a public walker wearing steel braces and clutching the arm of his son Elliot.

This time FDR walked to the podium wearingjust a cane. The speech was a complete success. The Americans concluded that Roosevelt had clearly recovered; he was no longer crippled; illuminated by grief thousands of Americans are here to cheer you up the birth of a new era in national affairs an era of the new deal that is supposed to lift the country out of its chaos four years later, in 1932, with the United States hit by the worst depression In its history, Roosevelt himself ran for the presidency, obtaining a landslide victory and becoming the first Democrat to occupy the White House since his political mentor Woodrow Wilson.

There has never been such a joyous and jubilant shout applauding the inauguration of the Roosevelt Club. the idol of the nation here today, first of all, let me state my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear This fear in itself is astonishing, even after he took office, most Americans never discovered the press Roosevelt's secret photo and the photographers maintained a discreet silence about his disability. The only surviving photographs of FDR in a wheelchair come from family photos or home movies, but the appearance did not alter reality. The wheelchair-bound president was trying to lead his country through one of the most difficult decades in its history, but ironically, I think Roosevelt's illness was his greatest source of power as he told Americans traumatized by depression that the only thing we have to fear is fear.

Roosevelt himself, more than almost all of his compatriots, knew what he was talking about in his first two terms. Roosevelt was concerned about his new deal for the United States to lift the country out of the depression through massive spending on infrastructure and social programs, but Roosevelt became increasingly concerned. He was involved in foreign policy as Nazism took hold in Europe. Having spent several summers in the Rhineland during his youth, he had long been convinced that the German elite were expansionist militarists and noticed that Hitler described him as a wild man and a crazy when he read the abridged English edition of Mein Kampf in 1933, FDR wrote. caustically on the flyleaf, this translation is so rushed that it gives a completely false view of what Hitler really is or says that the German original would constitute a different story during the 1930s.

Roosevelt could do little to change isolationist attitudes in the United States. , but then came the surprising thing. The German conquest of Western Europe in 1940 created a global crisis. Roosevelt brought the United States closer to beleaguered Britain. Then, the United States was dragged into the global war by the Japanese assault on Pearl Harbor in December 1941. Powerful and resourceful gangsters have banded together to wage war on all mankind. race your challenge has now been launched to the united states of america we are now in this war we are all in it to the end every man, woman and child is a partner in the most tremendous enterprise in our american history in 1942 and 1943 america, ally With Britain, he participated in a brutal fight against Japan in the Pacific and also through his troops against the Germans in North Africa and then Italy tested what Churchill called the underbelly of the Axis before attempting to attack the hard blow. of hitler in france the sources of International brutality, wherever it exists, must be broken absolutely and definitively, we must begin the great task before us by abandoning once and for all the illusion that we will ever again be able to isolate ourselves from the rest of humanity, but the war posed new challenges for a humanity that already Weary President Roosevelt did not simply want victory, he wanted to shape a lasting world piece and prevent a repetition of Woodrow Wilson's tragedy.

I think for him that meant drawing communist Russia into peacetime cooperation, going beyond the era of European imperialism and, above all, persuading. Americans to assume the burden of international leadership in an improved version of Wilson's League of Nations. It was in pursuit of these goals that Roosevelt traveled halfway around the world in November 1943 for summit meetings in Tehran and Cairo, here the man they nicknamed the Sphinx was able to take the measure of foreign leaders and test his political skills if his enigmatic and secretive nature seems to be all things to all men working in the world spent by roosevelt the highlight of the trip was his first meeting with the other ally of united states joseph stalin, russia's revolutionary tsar had now gained the upper hand in his titanic struggle with hitler the red army was driving the germans out of ukraine roosevelt hoped to establish a close personal relationship with the soft-spoken and soft-spoken soviet leader stalin concise and dry humor, he seemed like a man with whom he could do business but roosevelt had to persuade winston churchill british prime minister churchill also felt he could work with stalin personally but as a confirmed anti-communist he harbored dark fears about what might happen if the soviet ideology Roosevelt's mind was on fire throughout Europe, on the contrary, it was more open to him, Stalinism seemed very different to Leninism, the Soviets had abandoned the official ideology of the world revolution and had allied themselves with the West.

Roosevelt genuinely believed, I believe, that it was possible to bring the Reds out of the cold into the family of nations and that he was the man to do it in Tehran. Roosevelt was willing to manipulate his former ally Winston to achieve his goal, eager to show the Soviets that the United States and Britain were not operating as a bloc. Roosevelt did everything he could to side with Stalin against Churchill. together they goaded the British leader about the number of Germans who should be shot after the war. Roosevelt envisioned Russia and Britain as one of the policemen who would ensure peace and order in the postwar world as bulwarks of the new United Nations organization.

Stalin's goodwill in Tehran was tied to his greater goal for the postwar world. The end of imperial imperialism was one of Roosevelt's obsessions, but he essentially saw it as a vice of the Europeans with their extensive colonial empires. They seem to not recognize Russia's expansion across Asia as imperialist and certainly not the United States' expansion from the Atlantic to the Pacific when they met alone in Tehran. Roosevelt treated Stalin almost as a fellow anti-imperialist when he discussed how to handle this. problem with the European reactionaries, he told Stalin that after a hundred years of French rule in Indochina the inhabitants were worse than before, as for the British raj in India, Roosevelt advocated what he called a reform from below, something in the Soviet line to which Stalin responded curtly from below would mean a revolution Roosevelt was delighted with the results of his trip for him the meeting with Stalin had been a great step towards achieving his goal of a new world order that would no longer center on the great historic powers of Europe, but the 12,000-mile round trip had taken an enormous toll on the president's health, enormous and, indeed, fateful.

In Washington in December 1943, Roosevelt fell ill with the flu and seemed unable to regain his strength. By Christmas, he said he felt like he was boiled. Owl, he fell asleep in meetings and complained of persistent headaches. Several long breaks over the new year at his beloved Hyde Park didn't make much difference. What is surprising today, I think, is the almost casual unprofessionalism of the medical care provided to the most powerful man. was in the world for months the president's personal physician, admiral ross mcintyre, insisted that fdr's problem was simply persistent bronchitis and the after-effects of the flu, but then mcintyre was a rather strange type of presidential physician's daily work de mcintyre was surgeon general of the united states navy the highest ranking medical post in the navy responsible for 52 hospitals and 175,000 doctors and nurses who cared for the president.

He was finished because he got that job through contacts in the right places and because Roosevelt had a chronic sinus condition and was an ear, nose and throat specialist. During his career, his presidential duties would call the White House around 8:30 in the morning and go up to the president's room for what he called a look-in. This consisted of sitting while Roosevelt, still in bed, ate breakfast and chatted about what the morning newspaper said Mcintyre told me everything I wanted to know without a thermometer or stethoscope without taking a pulse simply by listening to his teacher's voice this was not a model of advanced medical science it was not until March 1944 when the president ran a temperature of 104 degrees that McIntyre reluctantly arranged for him to have a check-up at the Bethesda Naval Hospital, outside Washington, secretly lodging him.

They boarded the presidential train in Hyde Park and took him for what was probably the first serious medical examination of his life. The entire Bethesda presidency was the Navy's main hospital and the president was being cared for by one of his young and promising cardiologists, Dr. howard bruin fdr was jocular and talkative, he kept that all the time like a covert guest for the internal anxiety of the the checkup itself was deeply alarming these are dr bruins notes from the original exam the president's lungs were congested his heart huge and readings of dangerously high blood pressure 170 over 110 well above normal wrote that he was shocked by what he had found the diagnosis here is crude hypertension hypertension heart disease heart failure fdr's visit to bethesda could not be kept secret, but at a conference press admiral mcintyre unabashedly insisted that the president's health was satisfactory, aside from the lingering effects of the flu and bronchitis, what fdr needed, his doctor claimed, was just a little more exercise and sun behind the scenes, however, McIntyre struggled with a desperate look, a bruising action, a devastating diagnosis, the young cardiologist insisting that Roosevelt needed injections of the drug digitalis to strengthen his heart, a regular daily pattern of bed rest, and a strict diet to wean him off. of delicious food, his infamous late night cocktails and 20 or 30 cigarettes a day McIntyre was absolutely furious, you can't do that, he shouted, this is the president of the United States, but Bruin was sure that would be the case if they didn't act quickly. and he quietly held his ground until three high-ranking boards of Washington physicians finally gave permission to go ahead.

Brewing achieved significant results after a week of digitalization. The president's lungs were clear and his heart was smaller. He slept much better and had reduced his cigarette smoking. half a dozen a day, but his blood pressure was still very high and with it the risk of suffering a stroke; However, in those days there were no medications available for high blood pressure and the standard remedies for the most powerful man were difficult to achieve, rest and be stress-free. in the world, but bruin did what he could, he convinced FDR to take a break at the estate of an old friend, Bernard Baruch, in South Carolina, early in the evening, and a lot of fishing was a real tonic.

Roosevelt liked it so much that he stayed four weeks, but none. Part of this addressed the basic problem of how the ailing president could survive all the pressures he had been under outside the White House for nine of the first 20 weeks of 1944. Now he was back, but this time he was trying to operate in a four-hour day. It was not at all satisfactory for the president of the United States, especially for a president who planned to run for a fourth term, Washington rumor mills speculated feverishly about how FDR's health would handle another four years as president, the election of his new running mate formula for the vice presidency would be Be critical, Roosevelt wavering over the alternatives only at the end of the day, pumping for the obscure and inexperienced Senator Harry Truman of Missouri and becoming very stressed about the whole thing, was another alarming sign of FDR's illness.

Dr. Howard Brewing was never consulted, but looking back, he had. There is no doubt that a fourth term was a medical impossibility and deep down FDR surely knew it too. I think it's telling that at the end of his checkup at Bethesda the president thanked Dr. Bruin and his staff, but then left without asking a single question and continued to avoid. Any discussion of his true condition with Bruin or any other qualified doctor, I think Roosevelt didn't want to know, maybe he couldn't afford to know that this was a man with a vision that, like most statesmen, he had come to See yourself as irreplaceable with a vision. arrivesArrogance, the cardinal sin of all political veterans, in the summer of 1944, as the war reached its climax, the wheelchair-bound president was sure he had to stay to shape the political future, but given the desperate state of his health, this was a reckless decision. bet on June 6, 1944 d day of the long-awaited Anglo-American landings in France the news of Operation Overlord was received with relief and joy throughout the United States that night the president spoke by radio to the American people not in a tone of exaltation but in the In the form of a simple prayer, our children, the pride of our nation, on this day have undertaken a great effort, a struggle to preserve our republic, our religion and our civilization, and to liberate a suffering humanity, help us, almighty god, to rededicate ourselves with renewed faith in you in This hour of great sacrifice, but for the moment the gis did not reach far beyond the hedges of Normandy pinned down by fierce German resistance, meanwhile another D-Day dawned on the Eastern Front , little known even today in the west, this marked destiny. both Europe and the operation in general on June 21 the red army unleashed its summer offensive in interpial russia the impact was devastating in five weeks while eisenhower and montgomery were deadlocked in normandy the red army destroyed 20 German divisions and advanced 450 miles even at the gates of Warsaw, but when the Polish army rose up against the Nazis, the Soviets provided little help.

It is true that the Red Army was now exhausted and in no position to assault a well-defended city, but Stalin rightly saw the Warsaw Uprising as a deliberate attempt. by the Poles to liberate their country before it fell under Soviet control Churchill, angered by the Soviet attitude, pressured Stalin to offer help, Machiavellian as always in his approach to ends and means, Roosevelt stayed out of this discussion , for him the real goal remained to forge a long-term partnership with the Soviet leader in Tehran, he had even pretended to sleep when Stalin and Churchill haggled over the details of Eastern Europe by joking, I don't give a damn about Poland, wake me up when we talk about Germany, but Warsaw is on the rise. had a significant effect on roosevelt's ambassador to russia, april harriman, the soviet response to the rise of the left in warsaw, harriman's sentiment, fdr was overconfident that the soviet regime was gradually adopting western democratic forms, the issue became became even more pressing when, in September 1944, the Red Army swept into Romania and Bulgaria, the Soviets were clearly going to have a presence in Eastern Europe after the war ended, how should the West deal with them again?

Roosevelt and Churchill were not in agreement in October 1944, Churchill flew to Moscow to reach an agreement on the spheres. of influence in the Balkans by recognizing the consummated destiny of Soviet rule in countries such as Romania and Bulgaria he hoped to preserve Britain's interests in Greece and Yugoslavia this was the now notorious percentage agreement that Roosevelt accepted for the moment, but for him and for American public opinion this type of spheres of influence, the conclusion of agreements was another sign of the old world imperialism that had caused two world wars. While he bided his time, the president pressured Stalin to hold another summit at which they could confirm the shape of the new world order he had envisioned at the summit.

At the same time, the Roosevelt administration mounted a massive public relations campaign to sell the new United Nations to the American people, presenting it as the country's second chance to realize Woodrow Wilson's goal: a new hit film about the Great War, the President hit theaters that fall and portrays Wilson as a tragic hero driven by a vision ahead of his time who destroyed himself trying to achieve it. FDR saw a private screening at the White House when the film hit Wilson's point. stroke roosevelt was visibly moved dr. Bruin heard him mutter, "God, that's not going to happen to me." Afterwards, the president's blood pressure was 240 over 130, almost double the healthy norm.

Roosevelt wanted to achieve the new world order that Wilson had failed to create and was determined to stay. to lead it, but he feared it would be a long time before victory was achieved because this was truly a world war, not just a fight in Europe, American troops were encountering fierce Japanese resistance throughout the Pacific. Roosevelt had approved the development of a potentially devastating new weapon, but despite the investment of two billion dollars no one knew if the atomic bomb would work, so the US military had to prepare for a massive invasion of the Japanese islands in 1945, 1946 or even later, judging by the cost of recapturing Saipan. lay and other pacific islands in 1944 this would be a brutal fight with heavy american losses the horrors of the war affected roosevelt personally, prompting him to be more open about his own disability when he toured hawaii in july 1944, Roosevelt was usually seen in public in one of two positions, either sitting in an open car or standing with his leg braces locked to keep him upright, but when visiting the seriously injured youth of Saipan at his best When they had lost limbs and would be disabled for the rest of their lives, Roosevelt deliberately stayed in his wheelchair and told a secret soldier to push him slowly through the rooms, rubber feet and all while conversing solicitously with the people. patients, the message was clear: you didn't need legs to get to the top, FDR rarely showed his illness in public, but now he was wielding the power of vulnerability.

I've told that story many times, but I still find it deeply moving. Here was a man who had to endure the countless petty indignities of being a paraplegic every day and yet could radiate confidence in public. and the good humor they inspired millions, but the courage and self-discipline he displayed relentlessly for more than 20 years had taken their toll and now his medical regimen was sucking the rest of the fun out of his life food drink good company the happy country warrior world political battle leader wielded as much power as anyone could wish for, but as a human being he was deeply unhappy in 1944.

I think Franklin Roosevelt was almost empty with loneliness. If you think of the other war leaders, their private lives were relatively simple. Churchill suffered a long time. wife who kept him going at the cost of her own emotional exhaustion since for the dictators abstinence hitler had a devoted mistress while stalin mourned his first wife he drove the second to suicide and then he seems to have enjoyed killing roosevelt the love life was more complex and typically devious, but I think the tangled story defies any simple moral judgment. Roosevelt's women were essential to his survival as a politician, and in 1945 love and politics became intertwined like never before.

To understand this, we must delve into his emotional past despite FDR's affair with Lucy Mercer in 1918. Eleanor continued to care for him deeply, caring for him during the peak of his illness in 1921 and even learning how to place catheters and operate urinals, but the mission crossed from Eleanor made her more motivated and found it harder to relax with Franklin continued to enjoy. Cheerful female company, especially attractive young women who thought they were wonderful women like Marguerite Lehand, known as Missy, his main secretary for 20 years, who idolized the man she called F.D and who made him laugh, and Daisy Stickley, the spinster cousin of FDR's Hyde Park, 10 years. younger whom she treated as a special confidant and a quiet companion in her own way these women gave her the love that was missing in her own marriage eleanor also found love in other ways through the feminist movement in manhattan she flirted with lesbian relationships and founded one doing business with two of his special friends, nancy cook and marion dickerman, in valquil, a property a few miles from springwood, fdr privately called nancy and marion, the transsexuals, but liked them while saying that uncle franklin was absolutely charming and encouraged the company.

Here at Valkyr, which finally gave Eleanor a place of her own and FDR always considered himself an architect, she even designed the cabin for them. FDR also needed his own hideaway and designed this simple house on the highest hill of the Roosevelt estate, whose porch faced west. Across the Hudson River, in the upper cabin, FDR could keep some distance from Eleanor. Clearly, the Roosevelts were now far from a traditional couple. Each had an independent life that involved close friendships with other people that suited Franklin, who never wanted to depend on any person except her. The marriage had also put down deep roots hardened by the Lucy Mercer affair and also by her battle with polio. and they shared a commitment to progressive politics to make America a better place.

Everything Eleanor Roosevelt says and does becomes news true to her prediction. Her personal life is. It is no longer his, but is becoming an American institution as Franklin moves into the White House. Eleanor became the wheelchair-bound president's eyes and ears, traveling the country learning about human misery and informing him and the nation, as well as being his first wife. From a president who once held her own weekly press conference, she writes a daily column in a syndicated newspaper called My Day My Day, which she began writing in 1935 and quickly became one of the most popular columns in the press.

US. She saw her role in part as that of initiating the trial. Balloons for her husband that she could then disown if critics shot them down. I was the agitator. Eleanor said he was the politician. Theirs was a remarkable political partnership, completely new in American history, but when the New Deal president became wartime president, things began to take a turn for the worse. change Eleanor hated the wall and was deeply depressed by the deaths, the mutilations and the morning as the fight dragged on over the two began to separate they no longer agreed on the cause that mattered as eleanor hardened, franklin increasingly trusted More about vivacious younger ladies to keep you company Mrs.

Roosevelt and Crown Princess Martha of Norway are among the celebrities appearing at New York's Madison Square Garden He was greatly enthralled with the exiled Princess Martha wife of Prince Olaf of Norway who She moved her three children to America to escape the war. Eleanor was reserved but shrugged telling a friend that there is always a Martha to relax and for the endless pleasure of having an admiring audience for every breath she was Roosevelt's daughter Anna. an energetic and determined woman in her late Thirties who came to fill the void between her parents, moved into the White House in 1944 and did everything she was asked, big or small, to make FDR's existence more comfortable when Roosevelt fell ill. after Tehran's efforts.

Elena seemed oblivious to his physical condition and it was Anna who urged him to undergo a proper medical check-up. This was a battle to help keep the president alive so he could achieve his vision of the world after the war, but the result was a strange and rather thorny menage. Eleanor, a tea drinker, hated FDR's cocktail hours. Before dinner, when there was an unspoken agreement that no official business would be discussed, Anna indulged them on a modest level as one of her few pleasures. At the end of the cocktail hour, Eleanor entered armed with a sheaf of papers, now Franklin said in his usual forceful way, I need to talk to you about these FDR just got lost, threw Shefa's papers across the room and said to a mortified Anna, you deal with those in the morning, Eleanor stayed. silently with pursed lips and then said: I'm sorry and walked. far away, but fortunately for Eleanor, she didn't know the lengths Anna would go to keep her father happy.

On April 28, 1944, in the deepest secrecy, she arranged for Mrs. Winthrop Rutherford to have lunch with the president while he recuperated in the South. Carolina Anna preparing lunch at her father's behest was the prelude to more than a dozen intimate dinners that would follow over the next year, usually at the White House when Eleanor was away. Her absence was an essential condition because this Tetartet was not with another Martha. Franklin was seeing his former lover again, Lucy was now a free woman who had just been widowed at the age of 52. Anna acted as her go-between. Her father asked her to arrange schedules and special access to the White House, this put Anna in what she later admitted.It was a terrible position as a child, Anna had taken her mother's side in the matter, but now, as a remarried divorcee, she realized that her father needed understanding and grateful company instead of the latter. list of things that Eleanor had to do and that she could also See that Lucy is still special by allowing her to enjoy what Anna called a few hours of much-needed relaxation, it was still a really strange situation.

These women mattered in different ways to Roosevelt. At the beginning of 1945 the war was reaching its climax, but when and how it would end remained a question. As the new year began the Allies were recovering from numerous casualties after a desperate German counterattack in the battle. from the bulge and the us navy where japanese kamikazes attack off the coast of thailand roosevelt was briefed on the status of the manhattan project the us race to build the atomic bomb a test was likely in a matter of months, but not yet It was unclear whether it would work.

However, Roosevelt did not inform his new vice president, Harry Truman, about the progress of the Senate bomb plot to be FDR's running mate. From Roosevelt's gray, haggard face, Truman could sense that the president's heart was failing. Truman, in his own words, was worried and troubled, but Roosevelt simply kept his new vice president out of the bomb and politics in general, given his state of health. It was almost criminal, but Roosevelt was like a man who denied his own mortality, perhaps only in those fleeting moments when Lucy conjured and knew the vitality and love of her lost past, did Roosevelt express his dark fears about the future on the 22nd.

January 1945. Roosevelt prepared for a second meeting with Stalin. The Soviet leader was afraid of flying and did not want to go beyond his safety net, so Roosevelt and Churchill had to go to him. Stalin's chosen location was the former Tsarist summer palace in Yalta, Crimea. and back by ship and plane, a 14,000 mile round trip was another long and arduous journey for an ailing president and when Roosevelt finally got there, this was no vacation spot, Crimea had just been recaptured from the Germans. and modern conveniences were in short supply. Although bedbugs were plentiful, high-ranking generals had to queue to use the few bathrooms, the week-long conference would draw on all of FDR's reserves of strength, the stakes were high for Roosevelt at Yalta, he wanted to reach a agreement on the new united nations and on a strategy to defeat Japan and on both issues, Soviet cooperation was vital, but like Tehran, he and Churchill did not always agree on how to deal with Stalin and the Soviet leader continued to unsettle them with his tactics tactics playing hard. to go to dinner the first night, he put them on the defensive by pretending to be offended by their nickname, Uncle Joe.

Despite this, Roosevelt was convinced that he could secure Soviet participation in the United Nations to anchor them in the community. international to achieve a Soviet agreement on the grand architecture of a new world order. FDR deliberately stayed above what he considered small details, especially in Eastern Europe, while Churchill and Stalin haggled once again over Poland, Roosevelt pressured the Soviets to sign the declaration on liberated Europe. General commitment on the independence of all countries free from Nazi rule. FDR hoped that signing this would commit the Soviets to following Wilsonian values ​​or at least holding them accountable if they did not.

He told skeptics that it is the best I can do for Poland. At that time, aware that the Red Army already controlled Poland, Roosevelt did not press as hard as Churchill; In his opinion, you couldn't make omelettes without breaking eggs and it was simply bad luck that so many eggshells were polished. His top priority as always was not to jeopardize relations with Stalin and in Asia Roosevelt's soft approach seemed to pay off. fruits. accepted Stalin's demands for territory in Japan and China in exchange Stalin confirmed that the Soviets would enter the Asian War within three months of victory in Europe with the still untested atomic bomb General George Marshall Chief of Staff of the US Army he was relieved to share the brutal end of the Japanese war with the red army he was asked as he left yalta if he expected to enjoy civilized comforts again marshall said gravely what we have gained here i would gladly have stayed a whole month when he returned to Washington.

Roosevelt was exhausted. He delivered his summit report to the seated Congress, making a rare reference to his disability. I hope you will plan me for an unusual sitting posture. down, but I know you'll find that I find it a lot easier not having to carry around 10 pounds of steel on my lower legs and also the fact that I just completed a 14,000 mile trip. The speech was full of optimism about Stalin as a man of good faith and about a new era in international politics, and I am confident that Congress and the American people will accept the results of this conference at the beginning of our permanent peace framework on which we can begin to build, under the direction of God, that better world in which our children and grandchildren must live and live.

Roosevelt needed to sell Yalta to his own people before the founding conference of the new United Nations that would be held in San Francisco in April. He did not want a repeat of the tragedy of Wilson and the League. He not only needed to bring the Russians in from the cold but all Americans During March 1945, Stalin tightened his control over Poland. Churchill sent messages of anguish to the White House demanding a joint protest to the Kremlin over what he already called an Iron Curtain falling over Eastern Europe, but FDR, more coldly realistic, felt that the poles were a lost place. cause and did not want friction over Eastern Europe to jeopardize the UN project, but by early April Stalin was dragging his feet in threatening to send only one junior diplomat to San Francisco, which would leave the Americans wondering if the Soviets had really turned the page. despite the strange moments, fdr stuck to his policy of bringing the russians into the family of nations to the end, he wrote to churchill to downplay the aggro with moscow, he would minimize the overall soviet problem as much as possible because these Problems in one form or another seem to arise every day and most of them are clarified, however we must be firm and our courts so far are right.

Was Roosevelt right that the West needed to calm Russian insecurities? If he continued with his strategy of bringing the Soviets out of the cold, he would have avoided or at least alleviated the cold war or was Churchill right that the only message they understood was the firmness that has to remain a fascinating what if of history because Roosevelt He died before the Cold War really began, but Roosevelt Churchill's debate on conciliation versus toughness still perplexes statesmen today. When it came to Vladimir Putin's Russia in early April, Roosevelt went to Warm Springs, Georgia, for another break, Dr.

Bruin was present, as were Daisy and Lucy, in his manner, also part of his medical team, Eleanor remained in Washington, but bombarded him with messages. on war issues they once argued on the phone about aid to yugoslavia for a full 45 minutes after roosevelt hung the veins in his forehead were swollen and his blood pressure had risen 50 points eleanor was still pressing him hard, mind and heart, Just as he had done since the dark days of polio in Warm Springs, the president worked on his Jefferson Day radio address aimed at selling the new united nations to the United States as an essential part of lasting peace.

The draft recalled the words From his inaugural address in the depths of depression that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself Roosevelt planned to close with these resounding words the only limit to our realization of tomorrow will be our doubts of today let us move forward with strong and active faith even though The president seemed tired in a good mood, there was nothing to suggest what would happen the next day, Thursday morning, April 12, the president complained of a stiff neck and a slight headache, but he sat patiently before a portrait painter who was fiddling with his papers, suddenly, just before lunch, I looked up, I have a terrible pain in the back of my head, he muttered and then collapsed forward and lost consciousness as the assistants lifted him onto his bed and Dr.

Bruin worked desperately. A shocked Lucy was led to a car and left for a couple of hours. The president fought for life, his tortured, harsh breathing reminding us of the dying Abraham Lincoln 80 years earlier at the end of another great war, but at 3:35 p.m. Roosevelt's heart finally stopped in Washington that afternoon the vice president was in the capitol while eleanor was attending a benefit concert called by phone to the white house she listened to the news trying to stay calm when truman arrived at the white house it was eleanor who broke the news harry the president is dead of surprise she asked him if there was anything What could I do for her?

I looked at him softly. Is there anything we can do for you? Because you're the one in trouble. Now Elena maintained her composure throughout that afternoon. She kept it when she arrived at Warm Springs that night, even when she learned the guilty secret that Lucy had kept. been there for the last three days that she had visited franklin on many occasions over the previous months and that anna had fixed everything it was only later when she confronted anna that eleanor lost her cool consumed by a burning anger betrayed long ago but she had expected once and for all now she found herself betrayed again this time with her own daughter as a compass it was a bitter and anguished encounter that left the two women separated for many months the next day repressing her emotions she accompanied her body on the special train that was made its way 800 miles north to the nation's capital, still bruised and angry Eleanor watched with growing amazement as the thousands lined the route openly weeping for their lost president after a service at the white house the casket was carried to Hyde Park to be buried next to Springwood, the house where she had been born, Eleanor was deeply moved and began to realize how much her imperfect husband had meant to her people;

She had known him too well, but in other fundamental aspects she had not been able to appreciate him while the United States cried, so did the free world and even Stalin when Ambassador Harriman visited the Soviet leader the day after Roosevelt's death Stalin's reaction seemed to vindicate fdr's policy of building trust harriman wrote i could tell he was obviously deeply distressed by the news he greeted me silently and stood holding my hand for about 30 seconds before asking me to sit down stalin asked many questions to harriman on roosevelt's health and on the circumstances of his death for a paranoid dictator obsessed with murderers and poisoners it was difficult to believe that the president of the united states had died simply of natural causes after failed medical care with real emotion stalin declared that president roosevelt is dead but his cause must live on we will support president truman with all our strength and all our will seizing his opportunity harriman suggested that the best way to help truman and reassure the american people about soviet-american relations would be for Foreign Minister Molotov went to see the new president and then attended the opening session of the UN in San Francisco after a brief discussion with Molotov.

Stalin agreed in death that it seemed that Roosevelt had secured what was slipping away. through his fingers in the final weeks of his life and so the Soviet Union joined the United Nations and became a permanent member of the Security Council as Roosevelt had envisioned, but his hopes for Russia's eventual alignment with the Social democratic values ​​were utopian or at least not something that had been achieved until now. Despite the formal end of the cold war, the spirit of yalta evaporated in part because stalin was determined to control his conquests in eastern europe and considered any kind of overt politics as a security threat, but, ironically, it was another of Roosevelt's legacies that poisoned the peace even if the big three had managed to resolve their differences in germany and eastern europe and that is a big problem if the the way the second world war ended in asia made the cold war almost inevitable the race to build an atomic bomb nazi germany capitulated to the first american atomic test truman fearful asroosevelt of the bloody battles to end the war in asia dropped two atomic bombs on japan as soon as he heard the news stalin made a soviet bomb the regime top priority the cold war arms race was born, the endless competition for superiority in increasingly complex murder weapons and thus, ironically, one of Roosevelt's projects, however necessary it might now seem to end the war, helped undermine his vision of peace, the united nations was poisoned by the suspicion. among the police who he hoped would maintain peace and security, but the Cold War never led to World War III, the bomb may have acted as a deterrent, but I believe the lack of foundation in those vital weeks of transition between the war and peace also played a role. created the structure, however fragile, of an international community in that basic sense Roosevelt's hopes were realized and Eleanor remained faithful to FDR's global vision to overcome her pain and bitterness in 1918, she took solace in the verses that a friend sent him that they are not dead and that they live lives that they leave behind in those they have blessed live a life again in a strangely moving way it was as if America's outpouring of grief after Franklin's death made her belatedly aware of the greatness that lay behind his pettiness, secrecy and deception daisy suckly in some ways, FDR's closest companion, but never his lover or his wife, perfectly captured Franklin Eleanor's relationship on the night of his death, she wrote in her diary, poor thing, I think she loved him more deeply than she herself imagined and his feeling for her was deep. and the fact that they couldn't relax or play together is the tragedy of their lives together because I think, from everything I've seen of them, that they had everything else in common, it was probably a personality thing of a certain lack of humor of their part I can't blame either of them, they are both extraordinary people, well above average for seven years after their death, Eleanor was a member of the American delegation to the UN, the only woman, it is my decision as president of the Commission. that the point raised by the Soviet member comes from every Machiavellian combination of charm and persistence reminiscent of FDR himself helping to push through the United Nations declaration of human rights in 1948.

He also maintained his My Day column until a few weeks before his death in 1962. Championing liberal causes such as civil rights, equal pay for women, and a national health service during the McCarthy era, even after FDR's death and despite his double betrayal, Eleanor's association with Franklin remained somewhat Inseparably today, Franklin and Elena lie here in Hyde's Rose Garden. park beneath his simple tombstone their complex, often contradictory marriage, marked by FDR's betrayals, masked a deeper unity of purpose and values ​​between two notable, if flawed, personalities who shared a vision of a better future and from the grave You can look down the avenue towards Albany. post road the sight that haunted roosevelt for the last quarter century of his life the wheelchair-bound president never made it to the main road, but the journey he completed with his successes and failures helped define our world in the XXI century.