By Thomas F. Schwartz
Continued from part 1…
As the title suggests, This Is Not Who We Are: America’s Struggle Between Vengeance and Virtue by Zachary Shore examines three episodes of American actions during the WWII period that were motivated by in part by vengeance but eventually turned into more virtuous behavior. The three episodes discussed are the debates over Japanese Internment Camps; the debate over dropping the atomic bomb; and the Morgenthau Plan for postwar Germany. Zachary Shore is a Professor of History at the Naval Postgraduate School, Senior Fellow at UC Berkley’s Institute of European Studies, and a National Security Visiting Fellow at the Hoover Institution.
The Morgenthau Plan proposed to disarm and deindustrialize Germany to prevent Germany from ever having the capability to wage war on its neighbors. Shore correctly argues that government officials as well as American military leaders in Europe found the Morgenthau Plan a compelling solution to keeping a defeated Germany from becoming a future threat to European security. With the costs and casualties of war fresh in everyone’s minds, punishing Germany for its role in the war was an easy choice.
Hoover’s role investigating postwar European food shortages and his recommendations to make Germany self-sufficient in food production provide Shore with a voice of virtue in the Germany crisis. Hoover understood that the Morgenthau Plan was unrealistic as well as contrary to American values. Believing Germany needed to regain its industrial and economic strength to become an equal partner among peaceful nations and not a permanently occupied country, Hoover stated: “After all, our flag flies over these people. That flag means something besides military power.”
Shore details a complex narrative of political infighting within the Roosevelt administration, especially on the matter of the Morgenthau Plan. Henry Stimson, FDR’s Secretary of War, was opposed to the plan but did not have the same personal relationship with the President as did Morgenthau. Roosevelt’s death and the accession of Harry S. Truman provided Stimson with an opportunity to move German policy in a different direction. Having served as Herbert Hoover’s Secretary of State, Stimson saw an ally who could assist in undermining the Morgenthau Plan and replace it with something in the best interests of all. Hoover’s long experience in dealing with mass food relief meant he understood the needs in the short and long term. The Morgenthau Plan simply did not provide a viable economic future for Germany, especially with the Soviet Union as an occupying force in the Eastern portion of the Germany and one of the occupying forces in Berlin.
Shore applauds Hoover’s “kindness, charity, and humane treatment of others, whether friend or foe.” He argues that Hoover saw the need for each of us “to become a better person, collectively becoming a better nation.” Yet Shore is critical of Hoover’s non-interventionist policy before the war claiming, “Had he [Hoover] been president instead of FDR, Hitler and the Nazis might have succeeded, and the world would be a very different place today.” This statement ignores that the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor drew the United States into the war followed days later by Germany’s declaration of war. Once war was declared Hoover supported mobilizing for victory. Shore’s other criticism is Hoover’s failure to endorse the Marshall Plan, “which many historians and scholars now consider among the most successful American government programs of the twentieth century.” As Richard Leiby argues, the Marshall Plan was Truman’s way of embracing many of Hoover’s recommendations but making them his own. Hoover’s objections about the absence of an endgame and the unlimited costs involved seem overly critical in hindsight knowing how the Marshall Plan stabilized a chaotic Europe. Hoover’s larger point, however, remains with us. As payment on the national debt now exceeds that of the defense budget, Hoover’s questions about the limits of American generosity remain.