Bruce writes:

> GWB's latest reason for invading Iraq is going to be revealed in a 
> documentary to be aired in Britain on Oct 10, 17, and 24. Apparently he was 
> only following orders:
>  
> 
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2005/10/07/
> MNGNVF3SFM1.DTL
>  
> Jerusalem -- President Bush told two high-ranking Palestinian officials 
that 
> 
>  he had been told by God to invade Afghanistan and Iraq and then create a 
>  Palestinian state to bring peace to the Middle East, they recall during a 
>  documentary on Middle East peace that airs next week in Britain.
>  "President Bush said to all of us: 'I'm driven with a mission from God,' " 

Surprisingly, or perhaps not, Harry Truman said much the same thing regarding 
his administration's original recognition of the State of Israel by the 
United States in 1948. Truman shared the same middle-American conservative 
Christian worldview as Bush and came to many of the same conclusions.

George C. Marshall, the five-star general who was the author of the Marshall 
Plan for the recovery of Europe and who was Truman's Secretary of State, 
thought that the creation of the state of Israel would be so destabilizing to the 
area that he told Truman that he would not vote for him in the next election if 
he went ahead with his plans for recognition.

I've included below a bit of text that describes those events, albeit it 
seems a bit sanitized to me. The recognition of Israel was among the most divisive 
issues of the Truman presidency. And although the name of the website is 
"palestinianfacts.org", I believe the site to be authored by Jews, either American 
or Israeli, not by Palestinians themselves. Nevertheless, taking all of that 
into account, the text below is an accurate history:

========================================

Why did the United States immediately recognize the State of Israel?
 
Margaret Truman said it was the most difficult decision Harry Truman ever 
faced as president. Should he support the creation of a Jewish homeland in 
Palestine, or shouldn't he?

Presidential advisers and the government were split. Clark Clifford, Truman's 
legal counsel, strongly favored recognition. The Jews deserved a sanctuary 
after the horror of the Holocaust, Clifford argued. Besides, the new state would 
likely come to pass whether Truman urged it or not.

But the Department of State, including the highly respected Secretary of 
State, George Marshall, advised against it, as did much of his cabinet. Truman 
greatly admired Marshall and had said, "there wasn't a decoration big enough" to 
honor Marshall's leadership during World War II. At a White House meeting on 
May 12, 1948, Marshall objected to quick US recognition of a Jewish homeland. 
It would look as if Truman was angling for Jewish votes, he said, and might 
endanger access to Arab oil. He went so far as to say that if Truman went ahead 
and recognized the new state, then Marshall would vote against him in the 
coming election.

Truman made his own decision. Two days later, May 14, 1948 Israel was born at 
the stroke of midnight, Jerusalem time. The United States announced its 
recognition of the new nation only 11 minutes later.

Danial Pipes, in reviewing Michael T. Benson's book Harry S. Truman and the 
Founding of Israel makes these observations about Truman's decision:

"Everyone knows that Harry Truman provided help to the Zionists because he 
could count votes, and there were few Arab votes in 1948. That, anyway, is the 
thesis developed by John Snetsinger in 1974 and since repeated ad nauseum. 
Well, it turns out not to be true. In a masterful and exciting presentation, 
Benson proves that Truman's policies resulted not from nose-counting but from 
deeply-held beliefs. His pro-Israel outlook "was based primarily on humanitarian, 
moral, and sentimental grounds, many of which were an outgrowth of the 
president's religious upbringing and his familiarity with the Bible." Extensive 
research into Truman's biography and earlier career shows his impressive 
consistency. Benson, of the University of Utah, establishes Truman as a studious child 
and deeply religious young man who, when he unexpectedly found himself in the 
Oval Office, lived faithfully by his precepts. In the case at hand, he expressed 
sympathy for Zionism as early as 1939 and reiterated his views many times 
subsequently.

"Truman's determination had great importance; of the many momentous issues in 
his presidency, he personally involved himself most directly with what he 
called the "puzzle of Palestine." In Benson's words, these personal interventions 
against the entirety of the American foreign policy establishment "constantly 
rescued" the Jews from defeat. The author concludes that the standard account 
of Truman risking U.S. security interests for cheap political advantage is 
deeply unfair to this most moral and honorable of American presidents."

   --http://www.palestinefacts.org/pf_independence_recognition_us.php

========================================

Wirt Atmar

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