The Mantle of Command: FDR at War, 1941–1942

Franklin D. Roosevelt's role as commander in chief of the military during World War II has not been covered as much as other aspects of his presidency. Hamilton (senior fellow, McCormack Graduate Sch., Univ. of Massachusetts-Boston; JFK: Reckess Youth) is well qualified to remedy that, showing how FDR worked with individuals and nations. He blasts Winston Churchill's colonialist values, poor selection of military leaders, and constant meddling in their tactical plans, as well as Douglas MacArthur's vanity and failure to prepare for a Japanese attack, but shows that FDR appreciated both men as fighters. Hamilton presents FDR as a serious student of world affairs who learned from his six years as assistant secretary of the navy. Unlike most books on Henry Stimson, FDR's secretary of war, and George C. Marshall, his chief of staff of the army, Hamilton's work critiques them for their opposition to Operation Torch in French North Africa in 1942, opposition that was near mutiny against the president. Marshall's disagreement, Hamilton charges, cost him command of the Normandy invasion: FDR brought Adm. William Leahy out of retirement to be chairman of the combined chiefs of staff, putting the Pentagon in its place just as he did the Axis powers.