Truman's Bluff

The M4 Shermans were the old tanks with the 75 & 76mm guns. The Pershing tanks were the new, diesel powered 90mm armed ones.

What do you call Puerto Rico? And we certainly kept the Philippines for quite awhile. Heck, didn't we pick up most of our Pacific Island Territories from the Germans at the end of WW I?

Fiction, fantasy and, sometimes, a whole lot of fun are. But, not history. History, as the great Marc Bloch beautifully defined it, is the study of man in time. Time being a continuum and continual change. Whilst I'm not a big FDR fan, for many reasons, I'll dispute your thesis that he wouldn't have used the Atomic Bombs on Japan, as President Truman did. He, after all, had given the go-ahead for and hastened the progress of the Manhattan Project. There's nothing that has ever come to light that would indicate FDR not using the weapons to end the Pacific War.

I'd take some issue with your timeline on Iran, the existence of more nuclear bombs and Truman's 'read my lips' warning delivered confidentially to Stalin. Those events were in 1946, following the Churchill Iron Curtain speech in Missouri and the realization settling in that Stalin had no intention of partnering or even being friendly with the West. George Kennan sent an 8,000 word analysis from the Moscow Embassy and Stalin had stated that war was inevitable with Capitalism in a recent speech. We were planning some very impressive A-Bomb tests(and had already invited various powers to observe same) in the Central Pacific by the time that Stalin was given HST's warning to exit Iran's northern areas.

Excellect article! Where Truman differed from his great predecessor was his realism about Stalin which he brought with him into office. He was the ideal President for the post-war era and for opposing Soviet expansionism. FDR as great as he was in leading us to victory over the Nazis and Japanese (we must credit him with developing the bomb which ended World War II) was much too fond and trusting of Stalin to be an effective post-war President.

If the old line corrupt big-city party bosses hadnt forced Roosevelt to dump Henry Wallace and replace him on the ticket with Truman we'd be living in a socialist state today...hey, wait a minute! We ARE living in a socialist state today. Khruschev was right, my parents grandchildren are living under Obamunism!