Cord Meyer Jr. Quotes
It is at least inconsistent to declare that there can be no doubt as to the defensive nature of American preparations, while seizing upon every similar step by the Soviet Union as incontrovertible evidence of its insatiable imperialism.
Cord Meyer Jr., President, United World Federalists, Peace or Anarchy, Little Brown, 1947
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The Scientific Project that developed the Atomic Bomb. He was a strong advocate for disarmament and that was being debated at the United Nations. He was critical of Bernard Baruch’s tactics but it soon was clear to almost all that the Russians were not interested in a serious UN supervised disarmament. Oppenheimer was profoundly disappointed when it was clear that disarmament was being blocked by the Russians and their veto. After that he didn’t trust the Russians, and concentrated on trying have US policies that would not goad the Russians into an arms race. This quotation is particularly important because in an effort to discredit his views on nuclear policy some politicians accused him of being a security risk with the innuendo that he was a communist and even a Russian agent.
Chamberlain’s military assessment of Russia’s military ability was yet another example of his faulty judgment. He was not alone however in that many British military experts and American as well, thought that Stalin and Russia could not hold out against Hitler and any military aid given to Russia would just fall into German hands. It was FDR assistant Harry Hopkins who went to Russia, toured the front, met with Stalin and other Russian leaders and observed the Russian people and then recommended to FDR that we send arms to Russia. It was a critical judgment. In the end, the Germans suffered more casualties on their Russian front than any other part of the war and it was the Russians who took Berlin though they suffered large casualties themselves.
Russia then had designs on Afghani Territory. About a century later, Russia Invaded Afghanistan and tried to impose a communist government. It failed and the Afghans drove out the Russians.
Kennedy was then a Senator with an eye on the White House. No such missile gap existed, and when Kennedy was elected President, he had the problem of public expectation for a problem which did njot exist, but he had been instrumental in creating.
At the end of WWII there was much tension between Russia and the Anglo-American alliance. This plan was developed but never implemented. See {613195} for Prime Minister Winston Churchill’s description of the invasion idea.
Truman had to deal with Stalin for many years. In earlier days he had a much more favorable view of the Russians. See {626410} for his view 22 years earlier.
This was an amazing prediction for the time. Most Europeans were not sure that the United States would even survive, and Russia was looked upon as the most backward nation in Europe. By the middle of the 20th century—over 100 years after Tocqueville wrote this—The United States and Russia were the two superpowers of the world.
Most American felt that way at the time of the Russian occupation and the Mujahedeen resistance.
1st Earl Baldwin of Bewdley. Baldwin has been castigated since WWII for being part of the “appeasement group” in England. As Prime Minister in 1935 he would not face the threat of Fascism, Germany and the Nazis and did not initiate a major arms buildup. Churchill, among others, never forgave him. See {626930} for Churchill’s view of Baldwin.
Ironically, at the time she wrote this column, Mrs. Roosevelt was being accused of being a communist by some Southerners who associated her strong views against racism and segregation. Some in the North thought she was a communist because of her active role in the New Deal, Yet here she was, willing to use military force to prevent Soviet expansion.
Cord Meyer Jr. was a US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) official. After serving in World War II as a Marine officer in the Pacific War where he was both injured and decorated, he led the United World Federalists in the years after the war. In about 1949, he began work with the CIA where he became a high-level operative, retiring in 1977. He married Mary Pinchot in 1945; the couple divorced in 1958, and she was subsequently romantically linked to President John F. Kennedy. Her 1964 murder remains both unsolved and controversial.
