What are you talking about? Lincoln didn't start the war, the rebels started the war when they seized federal arsenals and fired on Fort Sumter.
Lincoln could just have let the Deep South go. Give them the land, work out a deal for paying for federal assets, and possibly keep the upper south in the Union. That would certainly have had a far lower cost in blood than putting down the South. Eventually the economics of slavery would have collapsed without the lasting hostility derived from the civil war.
Lincoln wasn't a bad president, he was quite good. However he lacks superlative abilities of TR and Washington.
No, the allies would not have won if the US hadn't entered the war, since the US entrance forced the Germans to commit to the Michael Offensive, abandoning their enormously successful defensive strategy in favour of a massive all-out attack to win the war before US troops arrived in strength. Had that attack not taken place, the Germans could have secured the western parts of Russia for grain production with those troops, eased famine back at home, and continued to hold defensive lines in France indefinitely.
Maybe, but the Salonika and Middleastern fronts were being rolled back. The Allies would eventually be able to knock out the Ottomans, push north through the Balkans, and disrupt the eastern territories. That would be a long, slow slog but at the end of the day the Entente still holds the better position by far. Wether or not the war will drag on long enough for a white peace or continue until Austria-Hungary falls and Germany is standing alone on two fronts, I don't know.
Tell that to the Millions of starving Americans who were greatly helped by the welfare system.
Proof? I have never seen any reputable claim of that many Americans starving. Further you do recall that FDR paid farmers to plow their crops under because there was a GLUT of food on the market collapsing prices.
Half of Europe being a dictatorship is better then ALL of Europe being a dictatorship, which would have happened by the way if FDR would not have been President.
Willkie was a bigger hawk than FDR, which is why he lost. He called for an expanded Lend-Lease program, he called for a larger military build-up (there is some merit to the idea that he allowed FDR to bulk up the military), and even went on record in favor of
unlimited aid to the British.
If anything Roosevelt losing in 1940 would have found the US in a more agressive stance with greater neutral lean towards the allies. After Pearl Harbor, Willkie would have hammered the Axis just as hard (though possibly not have tried to appeal quite so much to Stalin's nonexistant noblesse oblige).
225 died in NYC from 1931 to 1934, in Pennsylvania people ate weeds, in Arkansas people were forced to reside in caves and in California many were forced to reside in sewers. Nope the depression didn’t do any thing to harm the American people
Millions of starving Americans not in evidence then. Concession accepted.
Your Point. The US possibly wouldn’t have went to war if it went for the events of December 1941.
Sure it could. The USN and Kriegsmarine were already killing each other. The
Reuben James was already lying at the bottom of the Atlantic due to a German torpedo prior to WWII. Eventually enough US sailors (both USN and merchant marine) would not make it home that the US would eventually issue an ultimatum to Hitler that he could not give in to or weasel out of. That would have delayed US entry significantly, but sans Pear Harbor the US was still in a position to eventually go to war.
You think Social Security was a failure as a social program? Social Security is the lone thing that prevents the necessity of the lower class elderly from working until they day they die like many people had to before it was implemented.
The program designed by FDR does not even do that. He sold it as a ridiciously underfunded program that still isn't fully funded despite thousand percent funding increases.
. FDR knew we would have to join the war eventually and he knew that we'd need Britain as an ally to make it possible, so while he worked up public support and rubbed the Axis powers the wrong way, he also started supplying the British with ships and supplies that they needed to hold out until he could bring the US into the war.
Which of these did Willkie oppose? He called for an expanded Lend-Lease, more support for the British, and USN navy protection of the convoys to Iceland. A republican victory in 1940 would have put a man in the whitehouse who would have maintained the British until Pearl Harbor, and then proceeded to kick Axis ass as happened historicly.
This sounds a lot easier than it is; FDR had to walk a very fine line here because he couldn't outright take sides in the war before Pearl Harbor, but he needed to support the British, so he did it in such a way that wasn't obvious to the layperson (trading ships for bases for example) and kept him from looking like he had already picked a side.
Again which of these policies did Willkie not also advocate? Why would Willkie not have followed through on any of these?
At the time, there wasn't a whole lot of choice. Stalin taking eastern Europe was inevitable, the man made a mad rush to Berlin to try and beat the rest of the Allies. What did you expect FDR to do exactly, go to war with everyone? The Allies needed the Russians and they didn't exactly cozy up to them post-war now did they?
Put American troops on the ground to monitor the elections after WWII. Not sell out the Polish government-in-exile even after Stalin "disappeared" their representatives sent to the USSR. Not turn aside the push into Germany looking for the mythical redoubt. Maybe push the Greek front north into Bulgaria and Yugoslavia.
There are many better options than FDR's stated position: "I think that if I give him everything that I possibly can and ask nothing from him in return, noblesse oblige, he won’t try to annex anything and will work for a world of democracy and peace."
Very funny, Scotty. Now beam down my clothes.
