The Accidental President

by A. J. Baime

  “Okinawa: It is officially stated”: Captain Vardaman to the president, June 19, 1945, SMOF: Naval Aide to the President Files, box 16, Truman Papers.

  “The strength of will-power”: Winston S. Churchill to Truman, June 21, 1945, SMOF:MRF, box 8, Truman Papers.

  Chapter 29

  “I didn’t know you could get up”: “President Flies Non-Stop to West,” New York Times, June 20, 1945.

  “Harry Truman has now been”: Drew Pearson, “Washington Merry-Go-Round,” Washington Post, June 19, 1945.

  “It sure is swell for you”: Ibid.

  “a human lane up the main”: “President Ends Air Trip to Northwest,” Los Angeles Times, June 20, 1945.

  “The whole countryside seemed”: The Diaries of Edward R. Stettinius, Jr., 1943–1946, eds. Thomas B. Campbell and George C. Herring (New York: New Viewpoints, 1975), p. 402.

  “The whole city was all keyed”: Oral history interview, Henry Reiff, p. 83, Truman Library.

  “world organization with police”: Ian Buruma, Year Zero: A History of 1945 (New York: Penguin, 2013), p. 309.

  “It’s what we stand for”: “Truman Acclaimed on Arrival by Air to Close Parley,” New York Times, June 26, 1945.

  “Well, you certainly have done”: Conversation from Campbell and Herring, Diaries of Edward R. Stettinius, pp. 403–4.

  “The Charter of the United Nations”: Address in San Francisco at the Closing Session of the United Nations Conference, June 26, 1945, Truman Library, https://www.trumanlibrary.org/publicpapers/viewpapers.php?pid=73.

  “to find a way to end war!”: Statement by Harry S. Truman at the San Francisco conference, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TCOvCemH8AQ.

  FINDER! DO NOT OPEN: Stephen C. Schlesinger, Act of Creation: The Founding of the United Nations (New York: Perseus, 2003), p. 257.

  “By jove, look who’s here”: “Truman Tells Home Folks His Job Is Winning Peace,” New York Times, June 28, 1945.

  WELCOME HOME, HARRY!: “Truman Realizes Ambition of Filling Home-Town Hall,” Washington Post, June 28, 1945.

  “Hello Harry!”: “Home Folks,” Christian Science Monitor, June 28, 1945.

  “the things that had happened”: “Truman Realizes Ambition.”

  “That gives you a rent free”: Harry S. Truman to Martha Ellen Truman and Mary Jane Truman, June 16, 1945, FBPAP:FCF, box 19, Truman Papers.

  “Gentlemen, and ladies”: Transcript of press conference, June 27, 1945, PSF, box 51, Truman Papers.

  “Is it Mr. Byrnes, Mr. President?”: Ibid.

  “This is the most wonderful”: “Truman Realizes Ambition.”

  “Time and again, I have tried”: Ibid.

  “I arrived at the White House”: Ibid.

  “The first one is to win”: “Our World Role,” New York Times, July 1, 1945.

  Missouri did not practice: See “The State of Missouri,” Fortune, July 1945.

  “It looks to us”: “Truman’s Hometown Is ‘Smalltown, USA,’” New York Times, July 1, 1945.

  “Hello there, Eddie”: “Praise Makes Him Swell Up, Truman Says,” Washington Post, June 29, 1945.

  “I want some shirts”: Ibid.

  “If it had been left to your”: Margaret Truman, Bess W. Truman (New York: Macmillan, 1986), p. 298.

  “Mother had flatly refused”: Ibid., p. 266.

  “Take a few more of us”: Ibid.

  “The choice before the Senate”: Address Before the Senate Urging Ratification of the Charter of the United Nations, July 2, 1945, Truman papers, https://www.trumanlibrary.org/publicpapers/viewpapers.php?pid=76.

  “I don’t think you know Jimmy”: Oral history interview, Samuel I. Rosenman, p. 25, Truman Library.

  “It just shows how cruel”: Diary excerpted in Arthur Vandenberg, Jr., ed., The Private Papers of Senator Vandenberg (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1952), p. 225.

  “My, but he has a keen mind”: Longhand note, July 7, 1945, PSF:LNF, box 283, Truman Papers.

  Chapter 30

  “I sure dread this trip worse”: Harry S. Truman to Bess W. Truman, July 12, 1945, FBPAP:FCF, box 14, Truman Papers.

  “All attempts to secure”: Supreme Headquarters, Allied Expeditionary Force to War Department, cable, June 20, 1945, William D. Leahy Papers, Records of the United States Joint Chiefs of Staff, box 10, record group 218, National Archives, College Park, MD.

  “No explanation can be given”: General Floyd Parks to War Department, cable, ibid., box 6.

  “in order that full continuity”: Winston S. Churchill to Truman, June 14, 1945, SMOF: Naval Aide to the President Files, box 8, Truman Papers.

  “There isn’t any doubt”: “Why Jimmy Byrnes Is Now So Close to the President,” Daily Boston Globe, July 30, 1945.

  “just taking a little something”: Transcript of press conference, July 5, 1945, PSF, box 51, Truman Papers.

  “a good letter opener”: Ibid.

  “I have a successor in mind”: Ibid.

  “now actually going on”: Memorandum for the president, “Proposed Program for Japan,” July 2, 1945, Henry L. Stimson Papers, box 23, National Archives, College Park, MD.

  “There is reason to believe”: Ibid.

  “Japan has no allies”: Ibid.

  “On grounds of secrecy the bomb”: Henry L. Stimson, “The Decision to Use the Atomic Bomb,” Harper’s, February 1947.

  “overwhelming character of the force”: “Proposed Program for Japan” memorandum.

  “the inevitability and completeness”: Ibid.

  “substantially add to the chances”: Ibid.

  “that we were busy”: Diary of Henry L. Stimson, July 3, 1945, Stimson Papers.

  “with the purpose of having”: Ibid.

  “Yes,” Truman answered: Diary of Henry L. Stimson, July 2, 1945, Stimson Papers.

  “There was a long discussion”: Department of State, memorandum of conversation, re: China, June 9, 1945, WHCF:OF, box 1928, Truman Papers.

  “settle the controversy”: William D. Leahy, I Was There: The Personal Story of the Chief of Staff to Presidents Roosevelt and Truman Based on His Notes and Diaries Made at the Time (New York: Whittlesey House, 1950), p. 381.

  “A lot has happened since”: Diary of Bruce Forsyth, July 3, 1945, Bruce Forsyth Papers, box 1, Truman Library.

  “high hat, top hat”: Harry S. Truman to Martha Ellen Truman and Mary Jane Truman, July 3, 1945, FBPAP:FCF, box 19, Truman Papers.

  “It’ll be a circus sure enough”: H. S. Truman to B. W. Truman, July 3, 1945, FBPAP:FCF, box 14.

  “‘babes in the wood’ affair”: Diary of Eben A. Ayers, Robert Ferrell, ed., Truman in the White House: The Diary of Eben Ayers (Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 1991), p. 5.

  “fair-minded . . . a hard worker”: “Truman Wins Plaudits of Big Majority,” Public Opinion News Service, July 1–2, 1945.

  “The present conference projects”: “President Truman Gains Popularity and Prestige Overseas,” Washington Post, July 22, 1945.

  “The American people expect”: Samuel I. Rosenman, John W. Snyder, and George E. Allen, memorandum to the president, July 6, 1945, Foreign Relations of the United States: Diplomatic Papers, the Conference of Berlin (the Potsdam Conference), 1945, vol. 1, doc. 192, Office of the Historian, Department of State, https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1945Berlinv01/d192.

  “I’m sorry if I’ve done something”: H. S. Truman to B. W. Truman, July 6, 1945, FBPAP:FCF, box 14.

  “How I hate this trip!”: Longhand note, July 7, 1945, PSF:LNF, box 283, Truman Papers.

  Chapter 31

  he was #51: USS Augusta Corrected Telephone Directory, PSF, box 141, Truman Papers.

  “Old Harry sat around batting”: “Cousin Harry,” New Yorker, November 24, 1945.

  “Truman, a newcomer”: Charles E. Bohlen, Witness to History: 1929–1969 (New York: W. W. Norton, 1973), p. 226.

  “600 B-29 Superfortresses”: USS Augusta: “Morning Press,” July 7, 1945, PSF, box 141, Truman P
apers.

  “first baptism of incendiaries”: Ibid.

  “Conversations relating to peace”: Press release, Statement by Acting Secretary of State Joseph C. Grew, July 10, 1945, PSF, box 197, Truman Papers.

  “I don’t suppose anyone gives”: “Maj. Gen. Harry Vaughan, Aide to President Truman, Dies at 87,” Washington Post, May 22, 1981.

  “The Conservative government”: Oral history interview, Robert G. Nixon, p. 265, Truman Library.

  “This is the biggest fool thing”: Memoirs by Harry S. Truman: 1945; Year of Decisions (New York: Konecky & Konecky, 1955), p. 11.

  “Three cheers for Mr. Truman”: Log of the President’s Trip to Berlin Conference, July 7, 1945, Truman Library. Note: Much of the detail from Truman’s movements during the Potsdam trip comes from this official log.

  83 suitcases, 1 trunk: Harry H. Vaughan, James K. Vardaman, and George C. Drescher to James J. Rowley (Secret Service), July 12, 1945, SMOF: Naval Aide to the President Files, box 5, Truman Papers.

  “Everyone was relieved when”: Diary of Joseph E. Davies, July 15, 1945, Joseph Edward Davies Papers, box 18, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress, Washington, DC.

  “It is comfortable enough”: Ibid.

  “wholly inadequate”: Log of the President’s Trip, July 15, 1945.

  Truman was Kilting: Top Secret Code Name for Places and Passengers, June 27, 1945, William D. Leahy Papers, Records of the United States Joint Chiefs of Staff, box 10, record group 218, National Archives, College Park, MD.

  “Safeguard Your Health”: Conference Bulletin Number 1, Davies Papers, box 18.

  “Safely landed in Berlin”: White House Map Room to Matthew J. Connelly, July 15, 1945, SMOF: Naval Aide to the President Files, box 5, Truman Papers.

  “The difficulties with Churchill”: Harry S. Truman to Eleanor Roosevelt, May 10, 1945, Steve Neal, ed., Eleanor and Harry: The Correspondence of Eleanor Roosevelt and Harry S. Truman (New York: Citadel, 2002), p. 27.

  “I had an instant liking”: Truman, Memoirs, p. 340.

  “No,” the Briton said: Ibid.

  “obvious power of decision”: Robert J. Donovan, Conflict and Crisis: The Presidency of Harry S. Truman, 1945–1948 (Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 1977), p. 73.

  “I felt that here was a man”: Winston S. Churchill, The Second World War, vol. 6, Triumph and Tragedy (New York: Bantam, 1962), p. 541.

  “P.M. delighted with Pres.”: Charles L. Mee Jr., Meeting at Potsdam (New York: Franklin Square, 1975), p. 59.

  “This is the most powerful”: William D. Leahy, I Was There: The Personal Story of the Chief of Staff to Presidents Roosevelt and Truman Based on His Notes and Diaries Made at the Time (New York: Whittlesey House, 1950), p. 395.

  “You could smell the effluvia”: Oral history interview, Robert G. Nixon, p. 297, Truman Library.

  “the long, never-ending procession”: Truman, Memoirs, p. 341.

  “That’s what happens”: Ibid.

  “I hope for some sort of peace”: Longhand note, July 16, 1945, Truman Papers, https://www.trumanlibrary.org/whistlestop/study_collections/bomb/large/documents/index.php?documentdate=1945-07-16&documentid=1&pagenumber=1. Also: http://nsarchive.gwu.edu/NSAEBB/NSAEBB162/38.pdf.

  Chapter 32

  “If we postpone”: Kai Bird and Martin J. Sherwin, American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer (New York: Vintage, 2005), p. 307.

  “obviously confused and badly”: Ibid.

  “There was an air of excitement”: Leslie M. Groves, Now It Can Be Told: The Story of the Manhattan Project (New York: Da Capo, 1962), p. 291.

  “The strain had been great”: Ibid., p. 293.

  “There could be a catastrophe”: Bird and Sherwin, American Prometheus, p. 306.

  “It was raining cats and dogs”: Richard Rhodes, The Making of the Atomic Bomb (New York: Touchstone, 1986), p. 666.

  “We were determined to look”: Ibid., p. 668.

  “With the darkness and the waiting”: Ibid.

  “It is now zero minus twenty”: Peter Goodchild, Edward Teller: The Real Dr. Strangelove (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2004), p. 105.

  “My hand was on the switch”: Rhodes, Making of the Atomic Bomb, p. 670.

  “My first impression was one of tremendous”: Groves, Now It Can Be Told, p. 296.

  “All of a sudden, the night”: Lawrence Badash, J. O. Hirschfelder, and H. P. Broida, Reminiscences of Los Alamos 1943–1945 (Boston: D. Reidel, 1980), p. 76.

  “The lighting effects beggared”: Memorandum for the secretary of war, July 18, 1945, General Leslie R. Groves, Truman Papers, https://www.trumanlibrary.org/whistlestop/study_collections/bomb/large/documents/index.php?documentid=2&pagenumber=1.

  “The war is over”: Groves, Now It Can Be Told, p. 298.

  “We knew the world would not”: Interview with J. Robert Oppenheimer, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QBYyUi-Nkts.

  “Operated on this morning”: Acting chairman of the Interim Committee (Harrison) to secretary of war (Stimson), July 16, 1945, Foreign Relations of the United States: Diplomatic Papers, https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1945Berlinv02/d1303.

  “no loss of life”: The press release appears in Vincent C. Jones, United States Army in World War II: Special Studies: Manhattan (Washington, DC: Center of Military History, 2007), p. 517.

  “The Conduct of the War with Japan”: Memorandum for the president, “The Conduct of the War with Japan,” July 16, 1945, Henry L. Stimson Papers, Yale University Library.

  “It seems to me that we are”: Ibid.

  “The Russians, I am also informed”: Memorandum for the President, “Trusteeship for Korea,” July 16, 1945, Henry L. Stimson to Truman, https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1945Berlinv02/f732.

  “is the Polish question transplanted”: Ibid.

  “Is everything all right?”: Diary of Joseph E. Davies, July 16, 1945, Joseph Edward Davies Papers, box 18, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress, Washington, DC.

  “I got to my feet and advanced”: Longhand note, July 17, 1945, Truman Papers, https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1945Berlinv02/d1303.

  “What I noticed especially”: Memoirs by Harry S. Truman: 1945; Year of Decisions (New York: Konecky & Konecky, 1955), p. 342.

  “An unforewarned visitor would”: George F. Kennan, Memoirs: 1925–1950 (Boston: Atlantic Monthly Press, 1967), pp. 279–80.

  “straight from the shoulder”: Truman, Memoirs, p. 341.

  “I am here to—be yr friend”: Bohlen notes, Truman-Stalin meeting, July 17, 1945, Foreign Relations: Diplomatic Papers, https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1945Berlinv02/d710a-5.

  “don’t understand horse trading”: Ibid.

  “the most urgent, to my mind”: Truman, Memoirs, p. 411.

  “Most of the big points”: Longhand note, July 17, 1945.

  “You could if you wanted to”: Truman, Memoirs, p. 341.

  “All I could do was increase”: William M. Rigdon, White House Sailor (New York: Doubleday, 1962), p. 197.

  “I think he’s loose somewhere”: Sound recording of Truman interview, MP2002-309, Screen Gems Collection, Truman Library.

  “I can deal with Stalin”: Longhand note, July 17, 1945.

  “strikingly informs all that”: Richard Beckman, unpublished memoir, Richard Beckman Papers, box 1, Truman Library.

  “As we entered, we were almost blinded”: “Potsdam and the Conference Facilities,” diary of Joseph E. Davies, July 19, 1945, Davies Papers.

  “only a few miles from the war-shattered”: Harry S. Truman, “Cold War Starts at Potsdam,” Life, October 17, 1945.

  Chapter 33

  “Who is to be the chairman”: Meeting minutes, Potsdam First Plenary Session, George Modelski and Sylvia Modelski, eds., Documenting Global Leadership (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 1988), p. 393.

  “One of the most acute problems”: Ibid.

  “That is,” he sai
d, “the permanent”: Ibid.

  “I don’t want just to discuss”: Ben Cohen, meeting minutes, Potsdam First Plenary Meeting, July 17, 1945, Foreign Relations of the United States: Diplomatic Papers, Conference of Berlin, https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1945Berlinv02/d710a-10.

  “I am well aware that”: Modelski and Modelski, Documenting Global Leadership, p. 393.

  “There is only one other question”: Ibid., p. 401.

  “The table was set with everything”: Memoirs by Harry S. Truman: 1945; Year of Decisions (New York: Konecky & Konecky, 1955), p. 350.

  “I’ll bet that lieutenant”: Ibid., p. 351.

  “Doctor has just returned”: Charles L. Mee Jr., Meeting at Potsdam (New York: Franklin Square, 1975), pp. 82–83.

  “Two hundred million people”: George F. Kennan, Memoirs: 1925–1950 (Boston: Atlantic Monthly Press, 1967), p. 226.

  “They gave him the choice”: Harry S. Truman to Bess W. Truman, July 18, 1945, FBPAP:FCF, box 14, Truman Papers.

  “If you had gone down like France”: Winston S. Churchill, The Second World War, vol. 6, Triumph and Tragedy (New York: Bantam, 1962), pp. 539–40.

  “The experiment in the New Mexican”: Ibid., p. 544.

  “world shaking news”: Ibid.

  “Now all this nightmare picture”: Ibid., p. 545.

  “By using this new agency”: Ibid., p. 546.

  “I think,” Truman told Churchill: Ibid., p. 547.

  “Believe Japs will fold”: Longhand note, July 18, 1945, Truman Papers, https://www.trumanlibrary.org/whistlestop/study_collections/bomb/large/documents/index.php?documentid=63&pagenumber=2.

  “Stalin said that the Soviet Union”: “HST Let Stalin Stall Tokyo,” Boston Globe, August 23, 1960.

  “crisp and to the point”: Charles E. Bohlen, Witness to History: 1929–1969 (New York: W. W. Norton, 1973), p. 228.

  “Joe, how am I doing?”: Diary of Joseph E. Davies, July 18, 1945, Joseph Edward Davies Papers, box 18, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress, Washington, DC .

  “What is the meaning of reference”: Ben Cohen, meeting minutes, Potsdam Second Plenary Meeting, July 18, 1945, Foreign Relations: Diplomatic Papers, Conference of Berlin, https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1945Berlinv02/d710a-19.