146 e lusive v ictories
Yet much as the president wished to hold open all possibilities, each
step, even some designed to avoid defi nitive choices, drew the United
States closer to war. Roosevelt’s election to a third term in November
1940 relieved him of immediate electoral considerations. He soon
announced to the American people that the United States would
function as the “arsenal of democracy.” In March 1941, responding to
Churchill’s plea, the administration secured congressional approval of
the Lend Lease Act to increase the volume of war supplies. Billed as a
way to avoid direct American involvement in the war, Lend-Lease also
increased the American investment in British survival. For example,
unless the additional armaments and goods reached England, the
program would be useless, and the Royal Navy could not adequately
protect shipping from America while also meeting its other vital obliga-
tions. Th e U.S. Navy therefore took on greater responsibility for the
transit of ships from American ports across the Atlantic, including
so-called neutrality patrols to warn merchant vessels of nearby U-boats.
Meanwhile, the president, skirting the neutrality legislation by crea-
tively redefi ning “Western Hemisphere,” extended the U.S. security
zone as far as Greenland.
Events in the Atlantic in 1941 demonstrated again that an American
president exercises initiative over foreign and military policy that can
dramatically increase the likelihood of war without congressional
approval. Roosevelt, still worried over public reaction, denied that U.S.
Navy ships were serving as escorts for convoys to and from Great
Britain. Instead he called operations within the expanded American
security zone “reconnaissance.” As his critics pointed out, this was a
distinction without a diff erence. Neutrality patrols invited confronta-
tions with German U-boats that would surely result in both American
and German losses. Nor was Roosevelt done. Convinced by September
that the time had come to provoke Germany into submarine attacks
that would justify going to war, the president ordered the U.S. Navy to
shoot on sight at any U-boats. Th e action seemed designed to goad
Hitler into war, but the führer side-stepped confrontation by directing
his submarines to avoid engagements with U.S. Navy vessels. He was
not quite ready to add another enemy.
Meanwhile, the mounting prospect of war in early 1941 prompted
high-level military consultations between Great Britain and the United