FDR dies Dec. 7, 1941

President Roosevelt was always in poor health, and it was amazing he managed to live as long as he did. So let's say he wasn't so lucky. Upon learning of the attack on Pearl Harbor, the stress gives him a brain aneurism and Roosevelt falls out of his chair instantly dead. Henry Wallace is now the PotUS. What changes?
 
I think Germany and Italy wait much longer on deciding for or against their DOWs on the US.

They will most likely try to use the political change in the US after the new President gets in office to try to get Congress to choke off Lend Lease at least when it comes to the Soviet Union as they will quickly find the President won't do it and they will assume him to be weak getting into office.
 
I think Germany and Italy wait much longer on deciding for or against their DOWs on the US.

They will most likely try to use the political change in the US after the new President gets in office to try to get Congress to choke off Lend Lease at least when it comes to the Soviet Union as they will quickly find the President won't do it and they will assume him to be weak getting into office.

Given who would become president, their going to be very disappointed indeed. Wallace may not have been quite as Soviet-sympathetic as For All Time makes him out to be, but he was more sympathetic then even Roosevelt was (whose sympathy towards the USSR was of the more pragmatic sort).
 
Given who would become president, their going to be very disappointed indeed. Wallace may not have been quite as Soviet-sympathetic as For All Time makes him out to be, but he was more sympathetic then even Roosevelt was (whose sympathy towards the USSR was of the more pragmatic sort).

Nah, FDR's sympathy for Uncle Joe was more then the pragmatic sort, Tuman's arguably was, but you are correct about Wallace at the same time Congress in no small measure had a say in such affairs. The new President finds himself in too many fights with Congress it won't go well and he doesn't have FDR's gravitas.

Hitler knew FDR after Pear Harbor could and would get America into the war in Europe in a time and place of his choosing. At times I think Hitler overestimated FDR's power, but the new guy well that is a different matter entirely.
 
Nah, FDR's sympathy for Uncle Joe was more then the pragmatic sort,

No. It was heavily pragmatic. FDR recognized that the Soviet Union, in bearing the burden of breaking the Heer, was the prime means with which Germany had been defeated. This gave Stalin enormous political clout, prestige, and even a strange sort of moral authority (and isn't that a bizarre thing to say about Stalin) relative to Roosevelt. His deference to Stalin was a recognition of that fact (when it wasn't a function of his declining health, as happened frequently at Yalta).

at the same time Congress in no small measure had a say in such affairs.
Congress had already agreed to authorizing lend-lease well before Pearl Harbor happened, so that hurdle has already been well cleared for Wallace.

Hitler knew FDR after Pear Harbor could and would get America into the war in Europe in a time and place of his choosing. At times I think Hitler overestimated FDR's power, but the new guy well that is a different matter entirely.
It might delay Hitler's declaration for about a month, but once he see's the American flagged convoys moving material en-masse to Britain and the USSR, he'll realize he still doesn't have much of a choice.
 
Stalin breaking all his promises for a free Eastern Europe was what FDR expected? FDR's last few weeks on this Earth tell otherwise and I have to suspect if he believe he would have he would have gone with a more Truman like policy.

Truman's view was to heavily support Stalin while he is losing and then start cutting the support when he was winning as he believed Stalin's promises to be not worth so much.
 
Stalin breaking all his promises for a free Eastern Europe was what FDR expected?

I didn't say anything about what Roosevelt expected, I'm talking about what Roosevelt thought he could get out of Stalin given the overwhelming importance of the Soviet contribution in the European War and the popularity that importance had bought the Russians in the US.

FDR's last few weeks on this Earth tell otherwise
The biggest highlight of FDR's last few weeks on this Earth is a tirade about how Stalin was breaking all the promises he had made at Yalta. So yeah, he was pretty well aware of what was going on. He was also well aware of what his limits were and he dealt with Stalin within those limits.

and I have to suspect if he believe he would have he would have gone with a more Truman like policy.
Had Truman been in charge 1942-45, his policy probably would have been no different then Roosevelt's for largely the same reasons: the US had to back Stalin because the Soviets were the ones breaking the Heer and, in doing so, saving tons of American lives. This immediate, military reality blatantly overrode any longer-term post-war political concerns. Tellingly, Truman in the '42-'45 period was wholly supportive of FDR's policy toward the Soviets (as Truman's attitudes tended to reflect the attitudes of the American public and the American public was wholly supportive of FDR's policy toward the Soviets). And even when he took office he by-and-large stuck to the US's ends of the wartime agreements and was relatively lax in dealing with the Soviets compared to how he would treat them in the post-World War 2 environment.
 
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