In Freedom Betrayed: Herbert Hoover’s Secret History of the Second World War and Its Aftermath, former president offers a revisionist reexamination of World War II, including his frank evaluation of Franklin D. Roosevelt’s foreign policies before and during the war. He also examines the war’s consequences, including the expansion of the Soviet empire and the eruption of the Cold War. Herbert Hoover launched this extraordinary literary project during the war, and it was finally published nearly fifty years after its completion.
On issue after issue, Hoover raises crucial questions that continue to be debated today: Did Franklin Roosevelt deceitfully maneuver the United States into an undeclared and unconstitutional naval war with Germany in 1941? Did he unnecessarily appease Joseph Stalin at the pivotal Tehran Conference in 1943? Did communist agents and sympathizers in the White House, Department of State, and Department of the Treasury play a malign role in some of America’s wartime decisions? Hoover raises numerous arguments that challenge us to think again about our past.
