Henry Morgenthau Jr., FDR, and How We Won The War
October 15, 2014
How Henry Morgenthau Jr. (1891-1967) "led the Treasury to finance the dismantling of the Nazi juggernaut, and how his final gambit led to his inglorious political downfall." Moreira's (Hemingway on the China Front: His WWII Spy Mission with Martha Gellhorn, 2006, etc.) text, scant on biography and based largely on the voluminous Morgenthau records from the FDR Library, is a case study of wartime governance. His reporting on the bureaucratic business aspect of the mobilization takes the tone of bookkeeping, replete with accounts of budgets, allocations, inventories and production schedules. The war was waged, after all, with superior American economic weaponry, and that superiority was Morgenthau's forte. Not especially articulate or learned, he excelled beyond his perceived abilities as the nation's CFO. He maintained an ardent personal friendship with Franklin Roosevelt, but despite his devotion, he was not always the president's yes man. Morgenthau frequently expanded his secretarial job description, dealing with allies, deliberating with fellow Cabinet members and managing the procurement of the tools of war. He implemented the Lend Lease program, which sent destroyers to Britain, supplied friendly nations with cash and facilitated the transition to pay-as-you-go income taxes. Under his management, vast sums of war bonds were sold at modest interest rates. The most prominent Jew in the administration, he battled bitterly with a State Department that, reluctant to save Jews from Hitler's wrath, was even actively obstructing rescue efforts. Morgenthau was a proud man, and the politicking was tiring and ongoing. Sometimes he cleared up the inevitable complexities; sometimes he added to them. His ill-conceived eponymous plan to completely deindustrialize postwar Germany failed utterly, and in his later years, he became largely forgotten as a public servant. In a book that will appeal to policy wonks and historians of the era, Moreira reminds us of the work of the principal financial planner of World War II.
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November 1, 2014
Journalist Moreira (Hemingway on the China Front) is no stranger to writing about forces working behind the scenes during World War II. His latest subject, the stubborn and determined former secretary of the treasury Henry Morgenthau Jr. (1891-1967) is not as obscure but often overlooked. The book documents Morgenthau's childhood dyslexia, career as a master economist and architect of America's critical bond program, and the rejection of his postwar Morgenthau Plan. The slogan "Buy War Bonds" is indelibly tied to World War I, and Morgenthau is practically solely responsible for the program's existence, which raised the modern equivalent of $4.8 trillion without relying on stocks or large corporations. This program allowed Morgenthau to mobilize the American public as economic soldiers by tapping citizens to participate in the war effort while also framing it as an opportunity into the "soundest investment on the face of the Earth--the United States," and this spirit is well detailed in this work. VERDICT Moreira does an excellent job of incorporating a normally dry subject, economic history, into a story about an obstinate man doggedly determined to defeat the Nazis using plans he knew would work despite sometimes experiencing anti-Semitism in his own country. Recommended for readers of U.S., World War II, Jewish, and economic history; biography lovers; Franklin D. Roosevelt scholars; and general readers.--Benjamin Brudner, Curry Coll. Lib., Milton, MA
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