海角大神

Jeffrey Frank鈥檚 new book 鈥淭he Trials of Harry Truman鈥� takes a different tack than David McCullough鈥檚 Pulitzer Prize-winning doorstop 鈥淭ruman鈥� that became a bestseller 30 years ago. Frank doesn鈥檛 spend any time on Truman鈥檚 service in World War I or his stint as an enterprising haberdasher in Kansas City. This book isn鈥檛 concerned with the making of a man 鈥� it鈥檚 concerned with the making of a president.

Truman had very little training for that job. He鈥檇 been Franklin Roosevelt鈥檚 vice president for less than three months when Roosevelt died in April of 1945. Suddenly, Truman was thrust into the Oval Office and found himself in charge of a vast, hyper-industrialized country fighting the greatest war in human history.聽

To his credit, Frank seeks to look at the whole of Truman鈥檚 time in office. He spends some time, for instance, on Truman鈥檚 involvement with the race-related issues of his America. But even Frank, always ready to defend Truman, is forced to admit this involvement was limited. 鈥淭ruman was never in a hurry when it came to the changes that real racial equality would bring,鈥� he writes, adding optimistically: 鈥渂ut injustice, and unfairness, grated on him, the cruelties inflicted on blacks angered him, and he wanted no part of any of that.鈥澛�

It鈥檚 hardly a picture of visionary leadership, but Frank is often commendably even-handed in that assessment. He refers to Truman as 鈥渁 determined man, a man of limited imagination and experience, who happened to be a good man, and who managed to hold tight for nearly eight years as he was hurled through the mid-twentieth century, and wouldn鈥檛, or couldn鈥檛, let go.鈥� It echoes the assessment of former 海角大神 Science Monitor columnist Roscoe Drummond, who allowed, 鈥淲hile he does not count himself a heavy thinker, Mr. Truman knows what is going on in Washington.鈥澛�

But perhaps inevitably any weighing of the trials of Harry Truman tends to come back to the most historic, most momentous decision he or any other world leader has ever made: the decision to use nuclear weapons in warfare.聽

Truman hadn鈥檛 known about the Manhattan Project before he became president, and Frank asserts that the plan to use atom bombs against Japan was already so set in stone that nothing could change it. 鈥淚n theory, Truman could have decided not to use the bomb,鈥� he writes, 鈥渂ut that would have meant reversing a decision that, as a practical matter, had been made for him.鈥� That鈥檚 not exactly 鈥淭he Buck Stops Here.鈥澛�

The justification Truman himself used for the rest of his life 鈥� that using the bomb accelerated Japan鈥檚 surrender, thereby sparing the lives of half a million U.S. soldiers who would otherwise have needed to slog from island to island in an invasion of Japan 鈥� is dismissed by Frank as 鈥渟omething of a fiction.鈥� But that doesn鈥檛 seem to matter to him, nor, he argues, did it to the president.聽鈥淣o matter the number, Truman understood that it was a president鈥檚 duty to protect American soldiers; momentum overcame doubt and hesitation.鈥澛�

This is no justification, as plenty of people understood at the time. Frank quotes an American hostess talking to a friend: 鈥淓very time I look at a picture of President Truman, I think what an honest, decent face he has but how incongruous it was to hear from that flat, unimpressive voice those bloodcurdling words about the power of the atomic bomb.鈥� 鈥淏loodcurdling鈥� is the key word, and Frank鈥檚 own research only grotesquely confirms it: 鈥淣ot least of the reasons to go forward was a natural, if chilly, curiosity to see if, and how, the 鈥榞adget鈥� 鈥� worked in an actual war.鈥澛�

鈥淭he Trials of Harry Truman鈥� looks with refreshing directness at both Truman鈥檚 strengths and weaknesses 鈥� readers seeking an even-handed account of the major issues in his administration need look no further than this solid volume. They just need to proceed with caution, as Frank himself admits: 鈥淎nyone retelling that story must contend not only with the alarms of the present age but, in the character of Harry S. Truman, with the immeasurable power of sentimental imagination.鈥澛�