FDR - Jean Edward Smith [81]
Back in Washington, FDR turned his attention to the Navy’s preparedness. From an Allied point of view, the war was not going well. The great German offensive in the West had been blunted, but the battle line was forty miles from Paris. The French government had decamped for Bordeaux, virtually all of Belgium was in German hands, and trenches stretched from Ostend on the English Channel to the Swiss border. In the East, General Paul von Hindenburg had turned back the Russian invasion of East Prussia and was moving eastward toward the Vistula. On the Serbian front, the Austrians advanced, retreated, and advanced again, taking Belgrade for the second time. The one glimmer of hope was the war at sea, where the powerful British Navy kept the German High Seas Fleet bottled up in ports along the North Sea, reluctant to risk a direct engagement.
Smarting from his defeat in the New York primary, Roosevelt was eager to resume the struggle to put the Navy on a war footing. In late October, when Daniels left Washington to inspect facilities on the Gulf Coast, FDR took advantage of the secretary’s absence to release a memorandum prepared by the Navy’s brass documenting the fleet’s deficiencies. Thirteen battleships were laid up because the Navy lacked sailors to man them. Eighteen thousand men were needed urgently, but Congress had failed to authorize them. The New York Times printed the memorandum in full, much to the discomfort of the White House.44 “The country needs the truth about the Army and Navy instead of a lot of soft mush about everlasting peace,” Franklin wrote Eleanor. “I am perfectly willing to stand by [the memorandum] even if it gets me into trouble.”45
Trouble may have come more swiftly than FDR anticipated. Daniels was not happy with his deputy’s performance, and when he returned to Washington he took Franklin to the woodshed. The next day Roosevelt issued a disclaimer. “I have not recommended 18,000 more men,” he told the press, “nor would I consider it within my province to make any recommendation on the matter one way or the other.”46
On December 8, 1914, Wilson forcefully restated the administration’s policy. Speaking to Congress on the state of the union,* the president counseled against turning the United States into an armed camp:
We are at peace with the world. We mean to live our own lives as we will; but we also mean to let live. We are, indeed, a true friend to all the nations of the world, because we threaten none, covet the possessions of none, desire the overthrow of none. Therein lies our greatness.
Wilson rejected any increase in the size of the regular Army, dismissed an expansion of the reserves, and said an accelerated naval construction program would require greater study to determine precisely what type of ships should be built. “We shall not alter our attitude because some amongst us are nervous and excited.”47
The following day Daniels assured the House Naval Affairs Committee that ship for ship the U.S. Navy was the equal of any navy in the world. He said the Navy would continue its program of building two battleships a year and requested no increase in the number of enlisted men.48
The committee called FDR to testify on December 16. He had plainly learned his lesson. “It would not be my place to discuss purely matters of policy,” Roosevelt told the congressmen at the outset.49 Pressed repeatedly during the five hours he was at the witness table, he steadfastly declined to discuss administration policy and did not contradict Daniels or the president at any point. In his testimony, FDR hewed closely to the facts. He had the details of every program