Two Important Works on War Revisionism
A transcript of the Lew Rockwell Show episode 244 with John Denson
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ROCKWELL: Good morning. This is the LEW ROCKWELL SHOW. And how great it is to have as our guest this morning Judge John Denson. John is a long-time practicing lawyer in Opelika, Alabama, and he was a judge. But, always, his whole life, he's been a great student of history, especially war history, especially revisionist war history. And we love having him come onto the show and tell us about the important new books that we should be aware of, about the actual conduct of U.S. wars, the reasons for them, and all the things that the standard historians don't tell us.
So John is going to start off today by talking about two extremely important new books, one on World War I, one on World War II.
So, John, tell us.
DENSON: All right, well, Lew, of course, you know and we've talked about my interest in the wars. It's mainly about, why did a war start. And when America is involved, why did America get into the war. And then, of course, I'm interested in how it ended and whether it ended with a just peace or not.
So the two books I'm talking about today, published this year. One is how we got into World War I, and mainly just limited to Wilson's decision to take us into that war. And the second one is about World War II. It's about a sensational new book written by Herbert Hoover and just released this year. He finished writing the book in 1963 and died at the age of 90, in 1964, and it's just released this year.
So those are the two books, and I'll probably start off with World War I.
ROCKWELL: Great. Well, tell us the title first.
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DENSON: The title of the book is Nothing Less Than War, by Justus Doenecke. And the title comes from Wilson's address to Congress to get them to declare war. He wanted them to merely recognize that nothing less than war already existed. Rather than asking them to declare it, he just wanted them to declare it already existed.
(LAUGHTER)
So that's the reason for the title.
Professor Doenecke states – in the book, he says that much of his research over the years has been focused upon opponents of American foreign policy during the initial years of World War II and the Cold War. And he says this work continues somewhat in that vein. So he tries to present a balanced approach. In other words, he gives you the pro and con of the people that were influencing Wilson to get into the war and those telling him to stay out.
But he presents mainly an examination of Wilson's leadership and how he interacted with the people that were around him. And one of the conclusions that Doenecke comes to is that Wilson failed in his selection of people to advise him because Doenecke says they all let him down. They were all encouraging him to get into war, except William Jennings Bryan, his secretary of state. So otherwise, he tries not to – Doenecke tries not to take sides. He just presents both sides. But that was one of the conclusions that the people around Wilson let him down.
ROCKWELL: An actual honest historian, in other words.
DENSON: Yes. He tries to be balanced, whereas, the Hoover book, Hoover is attacking. He doesn't try to present an historian's balanced view. It's his opinion about what he thinks. So Doenecke is a professional historian with many good books. And this is one of the best because I think that the point is so important.
I want to quote about the importance of decision (sic) from one of Murray Rothbard's books. It's Wall Street, Banks and American Foreign Policy. And Murray says, "American entry into World War I in April, 1917, prevented a negotiated peace between the warring powers and drove the allies forward into a peace of unconditional surrender and dismemberment, chaos and disruption throughout Central and Eastern Europe at war's end, and the consequent rise of Bolshevism, Fascism and Nazism to power in Europe. In this way, Woodrow Wilson's decision to enter the war may have been the single most fateful action of the 20th century, causing untold and unending misery and destruction. But Morgan profits were expanded and assured."
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So I agree with Murray's assessment that this decision was maybe the most fateful decision an American president has ever made because I think it led directly, as Murray says, to World War II, to Nazism, to Bolshevism, and so forth. So this book is strictly about what influenced Wilson's decision. And he was not pressured by public opinion. There were no polls saying you've got to go to war. There was no one single event like Pearl Harbor. There were series of events but nothing that just drove America to war. So it was really a decision made by Wilson to present it to Congress. And it was highly debated in Congress. And that's where the real debate took place.
But some of the interesting parts to me is that Doenecke goes into some of Wilson's ideas before he was president and shows his proclivity towards war and wanting to get into a war.
And here's some of the views Doenecke presents. He says that, "The United States was founded to serve humanity, bringing liberty to mankind." And in 1904, Doenecke says, "The future president spoke of sharing America's global calling with the British Empire. Wilson said, quote, 'The Anglo-Saxon people have undertaken to reconstruct affairs of the world and it would be a shame upon them to withdraw their hand'."
And Wilson had strong English ties. I didn't know this. His mother was born in the British Isles. And his paternal grandparents were both British. He says, Doenecke says, "Wilson admired the English culture and institutions, esteeming the practices of Parliament." And then he says, "Wilson believed in overseas expansion." Wilson is quoted as saying, quote, "Our interest must march forward, altruists though we are, other nations must see to it that they stand off and do not seek to stay us." Those were all his views before he was president.
ROCKWELL: Wow.
DENSON: So it so sets the tone.
Two of the people who were trying to get him into the war were Teddy Roosevelt, who kept calling him a coward, and Henry Cabot Lodge, who was a Senator that was constantly lobbying for America to get into the war.
William Jennings Bryan was the one that tried to prevent it. And, of course, he couldn't, so he resigned as secretary of state.
ROCKWELL: One of Rothbard's laws was always, "Nobody ever resigns."
(LAUGHTER)
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But, of course, in this case, he actually did resign. Maybe we can forgive him for some of his economic ideas because of his conduct in this.
DENSON: That's right. He was the only one for peace.
The vote was finally 82 to six in the Senate, and 373 to 50* in the House.
One of the interesting things that Doenecke brings out is Congressman Charles Lindbergh, the father of the aviator, he points out that Wilson was praised for creating the Federal Reserve System in 1913. But the Congressman, he says, quote, "Congressman Charles A. Lindbergh, Republican from Minnesota, father of the famous aviator, blamed the, quote, 'greedy speculators of the money trust,' end quote, as revealed in supposed Federal Reserve documents that were overseas, and that caused that – for bringing the nation to the verge of hostilities." In other words, Lindbergh was saying it was the Federal Reserve that helped us get into the war.
(LAUGHTER)
But to me, the most sensational quotation about Wilson and the war is the conversation he had in March before the declaration in April. And he's talking with Frank Cobb, the crusading editor of New York World. He says, Doenecke says, "After confessing that he had done everything possible to avoid the war, Wilson expressed deep anxiety. Once the United States entered the conflict. Quote, 'The spirit of ruthless brutality will enter into the very fiber of our national life infecting Congress, the courts, the policeman on the beat, the man in the street'." And Doenecke says, "The Constitution, not to mention freedom of speech and assembly, could not survive the ordeal." In short, quote, "It required illiberalism at home to reinforce the men at the front. In addition, Germany would be badly beaten or defeated and that the peace would be a dictated one. There would be no neutral bystanders left to foster a just settlement."
ROCKWELL: Wow.
DENSON: Now, that's Wilson's idea before he asked for the declaration of war. And it's obvious he saw what it was going to do.
ROCKWELL: And he was elected as president on a peace ticket, wasn't he?
DENSON: Elected. Yes, kept us out of war, was his slogan –
(LAUGHTER)
– when he was elected in 1916.
But to think that he could see all that in advance, and then to get into it. It's a war that America should not have entered.
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The main thing, of course, was American policy towards the submarine warfare of the Germans. Several attempts were made in Congress. One was the McLemore Resolution in the House and the Gore Resolution in the Senate that tried to either force the president to warn people to stay off the ships or to do something to not provoke this submarine warfare. So Wilson took the position that, no, people have a right to travel and we don't want to interfere with their right to travel. So some nut could get on a British ship and it be sunk and be a cause for war.
The disappointing part of the book was that he used a book about the Lusitania, written by sort of a court historian named Thomas Bailey, who apologized for Roosevelt and Pearl Harbor and so forth, and doesn't really hit the nail on the head about the Lusitania.
The book that I hoped that he would have talked about is entitled, The Lusitania, by Colin Simpson. I've cited and talked about that book a lot. And it really tells the true story, I believe, of the sinking of the Lusitania. And it involves Churchill, who was in charge of Cunard line; nationalized the line when the war started. And the British had designed a ship so they could carry munitions and they – this was while Secretary of State Bryan was still in office. And the Germans informed Bryan that the Lusitania, which was going to sail from New York to England, contained contraband, illegal weapons and ammunition that was being shipped, and that they intended to sink it, and that he should tell the president and the president should warn Americans to stay off the ship. And Wilson refused to do it. The Germans ran ads in the New York papers, telling people, stay off this ship; it's going to be sunk. And, of course, it was the fastest, greatest ship in the world.
Churchill changed the captains. And then he gave orders as the ship approached England for the escort to leave it, for it to slow down and stop evasive action. And Churchill knew that there was a German sub there. And it sank the Lusitania and I think 123 Americans. So it sort of became the emotional part, almost the Pearl Harbor. But it happened, I think, in 1915, so, long before the declaration of war. But it was the sort of thing that indicted Wilson and Churchill too in my mind. And I thought Doenecke would say something more about that in his book but he didn't.
But nevertheless, I think it's just a great book. I highly recommend it. It's an important decision. It shows that it was almost discretionary to Wilson about getting us in and, yet, he had full knowledge of what it was going to cause and the dreadful consequences to America and to peace in the world. And he knew that it would be an unjust peace as a result.
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ROCKWELL: Which is what he wanted.
DENSON: I guess. Yes.
ROCKWELL: Yes. I notice from the title of the book, it sort of reminds me of the fact that, of course, at that point, he wanted to be like what subsequent presidents have become, guys who can declare war on their own say so, which is a dictator.
DENSON: Yes.
ROCKWELL: Because he wanted to say it was already war so Congress was merely ratifying, not actually declaring.
DENSON: Well, he brings up also about Philip Dru: Administrator, the book that was written by House.
ROCKWELL: Yes.
DENSON: Who was a close adviser. And it was published anonymously first. And Doenecke says that there's no evidence that Wilson actually read it but he did take it with him on a vacation. And in that book, it talks about House creates this dictator that changes the whole world. And it's pretty much the plan, you know, of going into a war and having a dictator that dictates how things will be put together.
ROCKWELL: And a fascist social and economic system domestically.
DENSON: Right.
ROCKWELL: And, of course, it sort of has come true, Phillip Dru: Administrator.
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DENSON: Right.
ROCKWELL: Now we've got an Obama Dru: Administrator, a George Dru, whatever, but –
(LAUGHTER)
The system seems to abide.
DENSON: The second book is one that I saw advertised in the Hoover Press this time last year. It was going to be published in May of 2011. And I kept waiting for it and they never did send it. I kept calling and finally it came out just in November of this year. The title of it is Freedom Betrayed: Herbert Hoover's Secret History of the Second World War and Its Aftermath. And he called it, at various times, his magnum opus, or his war book.
And most of us, who defend the free market, Libertarians, have had to talk about Herbert Hoover in a different way, in that most of the time we are trying to set the record straight that the Depression was not caused by Hoover's failure of laissez faire policies. Because Hoover was part of the Progressive movement. And he served as secretary of commerce and then as president and he believed in some government regulation of the economy. We have not seen him as a champion of freedom at all.
But in this book, he emerges as part of the Old Right. And he becomes the most anti-war American of his day and very supportive of the America First movement. And he actually ran for president, tried to get the nomination, Republican nomination, in 1940, as an anti-war candidate. He could see all of Roosevelt's moves towards trying to get us into war. And he thought that if he could get the Republican nomination that he could prevent America from getting into World War II. And, of course, Wendell Willkie won.
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And Hoover was suspicious that people had sabotaged his campaign and his speech. And he says that, "There's going to be books written to justify all my conclusions." And so there is a book now out called Desperate Deceptions: British Covert Operations in the United States, 1939 to 1944, by Thomas Mahl. And it talks about how they sabotaged the Hoover campaign to make sure that Wendell Willkie was the Republican nominee so that there would be no challenge to Roosevelt's foreign policies.
ROCKWELL: I also like how Mahl describes what they did with the pollsters, the big national polling companies, in cooperation with the Roosevelt administration – of course, with the British too – phony'd up the polls so that, even though there was no increase in American sentiment for intervention, Gallup and all the rest of the polls showed increasing war fever on the part of the American people. And it was all just a trick, all just a lie, just the propaganda, things like that. I always think – when I think about polls today, or at any other time, I always remember the Mahl book because they were happy to turn them into lying machines for the government, like the rest of them.
DENSON: Right. Well, there's so much written about a guy named William Stephenson, who went by the code name "Intrepid," that was – had a secret organization of the British located at Rockefeller Center, working directly with Churchill to get America into the war. That was their whole purpose. And they were here in 1939. And they provided a false map to Roosevelt; provided a false document to Hitler, trying to stir up things. And so they were working behind the scenes much more than Hoover realized.
It's a 900-page book. And I don't want anybody to be scared away, because it's what you call a page-turner. Because this is, to me, one of the best, most revealing revisionist histories of World War II that is around.
Let me read a couple of paragraphs right at the end that sort of summarizes what the book is about.
Hoover states, "From the ample lessons of World War I and its aftermath, I opposed every step towards World War II and the foreign policies that flowed from it. I make no apologies, for every day since has confirmed my judgment. A host of other public men and women and, indeed, the majority of the American people were opposed to the intervention in the war. The reasons for our opposition should be made clearly a part of the public record. And this record should include the great difficulties under which we, of the opposition, labored. We were viciously attacked by the Roosevelt and Truman administrations and their collaborators. Moreover, the character of the propaganda used by these administrations should also be part of the record."
This next sentence is close to my heart because it's the reason for doing the book, The Costs of War.
Next, Hoover says, "A far more important purpose of these volumes is to remind our people of the consequences of war. The victors in modern war are in reality the vanquished. If at times this narrative appears to be blunt in its conclusions, I hope the reader will keep in mind the results of 20 years of Roosevelt, Truman domination of America. These policies made nearly half the world Communist, armed and bent on the destruction of all free men; made another one-third of the world Socialists, both seeking to infect American life. The cost to the American people has been 400,000 dead sons; nearly 800,000 more wounded; and imposed on us the need to support two million widows, orphans and disabled veterans; saddled us with more than $300* billion in federal obligations; brought taxation through the front door as to every cottage and every – inflation through the back door, as to make a post-war income of $5,000 a year no greater than the purchasing value than a pre-war income of $2000; undermined our savings for insurance and old age; and in the end, brought us 10 years of Cold War and no peace at the end yet."
ROCKWELL: Wow.
DENSON: So, sort of lays it out exactly why he wrote the book.
ROCKWELL: I once was in a discussion with the former head of the Hoover Institution in California. He was chastising me for Murray Rothbard's great book, America's Great Depression, where he talks about Hoover as predecessor of the New Deal and his agricultural and other interventionist economic policies. Of course, that was true. I mean, Murray wrote a great book and shows that side of Hoover. But I said to him, why doesn't the Hoover Institution ever discuss peace. I said, it's in your title, "War, Revolution and Peace," but you never discuss Hoover's actual views on foreign policy. Of course, I had no idea about this book. But I did know, as president, he was not a warmonger.
DENSON: Well, yes, and, of course, there wasn't a war going on and when he was president in '28 to '32, and so he had no reason to express his views on war. But he had seen the results of World War I and became one of the most respected men in the world, I mean, after World War I, when he saved millions and millions of lives while – organization of a food program. And it's his celebrity status in that regard that opened so many doors to him that he could talk with people all over the world and get documents. He had people furnishing him documents that nobody else could get. And those are supposedly located at the Hoover Institute. So it's there's great source of material for revisionist historians at the Hoover Institute on War, Revolution and Peace. So –
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(LAUGHTER)
ROCKWELL: You know, you mentioned that he was Progressive. But maybe, unlike today's Progressives, he was actually – there were a number of Progressives who were anti-war. He wasn't the only one. So even though the movement – it's very unfortunate from an economic standpoint. And, of course, it had its Teddy Roosevelts and Woodrow Wilsons, but they weren't all bad. I mean, there were some good guys, like Hoover.
DENSON: One interview that was interesting is that he was travelling at in Europe – and he traveled all the time. He lived in the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in New York but he traveled all over the world. And he just happened to be in Europe and our ambassador to Germany couldn't get an audience with Hitler. But Hitler gets in touch with Hoover and asks him to come see him and talk to him. So he has an interview with Hitler. And then Goering asked him to come and see him and he went to Goering's house. But it's things like that where he had access to people that nobody else could see and talk to. And so it lends a lot of credibility to this book because he talked to these people.
He talked to Joe Kennedy at length about the guarantee of Britain to Poland. And Kennedy was supposed to write a book about this. But, anyway, there's about three pages dedicated to his talk with Joe Kennedy. And Kennedy confirmed to him that the British government was aware that the Versailles Treaty needed to be revised. And they had no real objection to it being revised, even by Hitler if he did it peacefully. And so when the invasion of Czechoslovakia took place and then Britain took a hard line and gave Poland a guarantee that they would back them up, and for them not to negotiate on Poland, then the war started.
And Kennedy said that it was very much against the British policy for them to make that guarantee but that Roosevelt intervened, through his Ambassador Bullitt, and told the Polish people not to negotiate with Hitler. And if they got into war, if a war erupted, that if they wanted America backing, then they had to make that guarantee to Poland. And so Kennedy and Hoover both felt that if that guarantee had not been made, there would have been only one war and that would have been Stalin and Hitler. And that's what Hoover says. The only inevitable war was between Stalin and Hitler. And we should have let them battle each other to a frazzle.
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And there's an excellent book about that called the War of the Century: When Hitler Fought Stalin, by Laurence Rees. And it talks about how terrible that war was. And that's what Hoover talks about a lot, is that war should have put the two dictators at each other's throats and reduced them down to nothing. We should not have intervened on either side of that war. The only other place I've seen that is in Forrestal Diaries, where somebody played golf with Kennedy and heard that. But here, Kennedy talks with Hoover at length about it.
Of course, another thing is Pearl Harbor. Hoover sees every move that Roosevelt is doing to try to, first, provoke the war with Germany and get them to fire the first shot, and he can't get them, you know. So then he turns to Japan. And he sees that as one of the great deceits – Roosevelt provoked Pearl Harbor. Now we have the book Day of Deceit: The Truth About FDR and Pearl Harbor, by Robert Stinnett, that gives us the McCollum paper that shows the eight steps that McCollum told Roosevelt to follow to provoke the war. And Hoover follows all those steps. Of course, he didn't know there was –
(LAUGHTER)
– a McCollum memorandum. But, anyway, he sees Roosevelt as provoking Pearl Harbor.
He goes through about 19 failed statesmanship ideas. One that I had never heard of that occurs before the war was that while Hoover was president in 1932, he set up a world economic conference to be held in 1933. And part of reason for setting up the conference was to try to restore the gold standard worldwide. And he said as soon as Roosevelt came into office and the preliminary work had been done, and Roosevelt called in 10 prime ministers to Washington with whom he agreed to restore the gold standard in international transactions and, suddenly, the conference was repudiated and Roosevelt canceled it. And then Hoover says, "His own Secretary of State Hull explicitly denounced this action by Roosevelt as the roots of World War II." And never, never run across that.
Secondly, he goes through another problem – was the recognition of Communist Russia in 1933 by Roosevelt. Most countries had treated the Russians, the Bolshevik regime, as outlaws and criminals. And Roosevelt recognized them as a legitimate government. And Hoover says, "Four presidents and five secretaries of states (sic), Democrats as well as Republicans, had, with knowledge of the whole purpose and methods of international Communism, refused such action."
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He goes into Munich, too. And, to me, that's one of the most complicated subjects to talk about, Munich and appeasement. That's become just sort of a dirty word. But Hoover explains how the Versailles Treaty needed to be revised. And as I've said, the British took the position with Hitler and let him know, we have no problem with you revising the treaty as long as you do it peacefully. So the idea of going to Munich was to try to undo some of the things that had been done by the treaty.
Poland had ceased to exist as a country before World War I. It had been taken over and split up by Germany, Russia and the Austrian Empire. So part of the purpose of the Versailles conference was to recreate the country of Poland. So they took various things away from Germany and they split Germany in half. And East Prussia was split off by a corridor that went to the sea. And a city, the German city of Danzig was there and it was a German city. And so the British had taken a position, yes, you need to revise that; we agree with that. And then, suddenly, Roosevelt steps in and tells them, tells the British, you know, tell Poland not to negotiate with Hitler on that anymore and go to war.
And in Munich, the Sudeten Germans were incorporated into Czechoslovakia. And the British had no problem with the Sudeten Germans coming back into Germany. And they thought that Danzig should probably come back to Germany as a city, that there should be a railroad or a road built across Germany to East Prussia to rejoin Germany.
So Hitler was doing all this knowing that the British were not opposing it. And then, suddenly, Roosevelt steps in and tells them, you know, the British not to negotiate anymore and tells Poland don't negotiate anymore, and tells the British, give a guarantee to the Poles that you'll back them up and we'll back you up. So it goes into a lot of the problems with Munich and appeasement. There's a whole lot about the guarantee of Poland.
Also, the undeclared war that he had with Germany by the Lend-Lease program. In other words, that was almost an act of war, well, by furnishing materials to the British.
He was very critical of Roosevelt for his alliance with Stalin. He thought that the Roosevelt administration was full of Communists and –
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ROCKWELL: It was.
DENSON: And so now we have the book The Venona Secrets: Exposing Soviet Espionage and America's Traitors, by Herbert Romerstein and Eric Breindel. And it goes into great detail. Even Harry Hopkins, who is Agent number 19 – lived in the White House; second most powerful man in America; right there with Roosevelt – was a direct Communist agent, according to the Venona cables. These were intercepts by the FBI that were following all of the Communist infiltration of Roosevelt's administration. And Hoover was – knew about a lot of that. Very critical of Roosevelt and his allowance of the Communists inside of his government.
Hoover praises this little book here, Great Mistakes of the War, by Hanson Baldwin, that I've used a lot in talks. Hanson Baldwin was a writer for The New York Times and covered World War II. And he condemns the unconditional surrender policy as the most dreadful decision that Roosevelt made. And Hoover agrees with that. That was one of the worst things that could have been done. It lengthened the war. It probably caused twice as many people to be killed. It led eventually to another thing that Hoover objected to and that was not accepting the peace proposal of Japan. He says that it was known as early as February and as late as May, 1945, that the Japanese were willing to surrender if they could keep their emperor.
ROCKWELL: They were trying to surrender.
DENSON: They were trying to surrender and they were sending messages. And he condemns Truman because he says Truman should not have continued the unconditional surrender policy. He should have accepted the peace proposal of Japan and not dropped the atomic bombs.
He's also critical of Roosevelt before the war for not accepting Japanese peace proposals by Prince Konoe. He goes into great detail about that. That the Japanese were doing everything within their power to try to reach a peace agreement but Roosevelt refused to meet with him. So –
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ROCKWELL: He wanted war.
DENSON: And he wanted a war. And I've written at other places, I think the reason he wanted it is he wanted to create the United Nations and he had to have a war to do that. And America had to be in it to do that.
He sort of liked Truman as a person and –
(LAUGHTER)
– he condemns his policies. But he wrote to Truman and said he was thinking about writing an article. Of course, he was writing this book. He said, I may be a little critical of you. And Truman wrote back and said, I hold you in such high esteem there's nothing you could say that would bother me. And so he condemns Truman for his Cold War policy, containment policy, the Potsdam Conference; condemns Roosevelt for Tehran and Yalta. He condemns Roosevelt and Truman for the loss of China, forcing Chiang Kai-shek to take in the Communists. And so he says that it's a combination of the Roosevelt, Truman administrations that set us up for the Cold War, the War in Korea.
So this is from sort of a man on the inside. He wrote 33 books. And this is the only one of his books that I've read but it is a blockbuster. It is the best World War II revisionist history I've read.
ROCKWELL: Wow.
DENSON: By a real statesman. So we can condemn Hoover for his economic policies in the '29 Depression, but I think he's a real ally for us that I believe that we need the revisionism for World War II.
ROCKWELL: And, of course, Murray always held that the key issue is always foreign policy in war and peace. And revisionism, of course, telling the actual facts of the situation –
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DENSON: Right.
ROCKWELL: – versus government propaganda, is just essential. So this is a very high accolade for Herbert Hoover –
DENSON: Yes.
ROCKWELL: – that he wrote this book. It's too bad it took so long to publish, but obviously better late than never.
(LAUGHTER)
DENSON: That's right. Well, it's edited very well by George Nash, who has a Ph.D. from Harvard in history, and wrote a book, The Conservative Intellectual Movement in America Since 1945,* I think it was. But he was hired to help publish this book because it had to be edited and put together. It was sort of in pieces and parts. And he has an excellent long introduction that sort of sets the stage for it. So it's hard for me to emphasize too much how important I think this book is and how helpful it will be to people who are involved in trying to revise history so that we can avoid wars.
ROCKWELL: I notice that it's getting very little attention. You've written about it. Pat Buchanan has written about it. But so far as I know, that's about it. So it's important to tell people about this book to let them know it exists. A great resource for college students or even high school students –
DENSON: Yes.
ROCKWELL: – going into this sort of thing. And you don't have to read it from beginning to end. You can just look at the specific parts if you want. But as you say, Hoover turns out to be a wonderful writer.
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DENSON: I had been looking for this book for a long time. When it came out and I began to look at it, I thought of Pat Buchanan and his book about The Unnecessary War. So I wrote him a letter and I said, Pat, you have got to get this book. I said, this backs up everything you've said. And so he wrote back and said he ordered it; hadn't heard about it. And then I saw that he did a piece for you on LewRockwell.com on Pearl Harbor, which is – came right out of – he recommended the book, so. And in his article on LewRockwell.com, he says take a week off and read this book. It's important.
(LAUGHTER)
It an easy read though if you're interested in this subject. So I would highly recommend it.
ROCKWELL: Well, John Denson, thanks so much for all your work, editing The Costs of War, a very important book in the history of the war revisionism, for writing A Century of War, and also editing a book on the presidency, the presidents as tyrants. Keep it up is all I can say.
DENSON: Thank you very much.
ROCKWELL: Well, thanks so much for listening to the LEW ROCKWELL SHOW today. Take a look at all the podcasts. There have been hundreds of them. There's a link on the upper right-hand corner of the LRC front page. Thank you.
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* - This information was corrected and will differ from the audio.
December 28, 2011
February 22, 2012
John V. Denson [send him mail] is a practicing attorney in Alabama and an adjunct scholar at the Mises Institute. He is the author of A Century of War, and editor of The Costs of War and Reassessing the Presidency.
Copyright © 2012 by LewRockwell.com. Permission to reprint in whole or in part is gladly granted, provided full credit is given.
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