f reedom of a ction 159nations after the war. Questions arose, however, about what kind of
role the Russians would assume. Th ey might take a narrow view of
Soviet interests and seek domination over bordering states. Roosevelt
hoped instead that if real Soviet security anxieties could be addressed,
Stalin might gradually become a responsible partner in the collective
security arrangements that would follow the war, while Russian par-
ticipation in a liberal economic order might eventually open the
Soviet economy. His positive view of future Soviet behavior set him
apart from many within his own administration, not to mention
Congress and the broader American public. But even the president’s
sanguine expectations for Stalin had its limits: the United States
would not share the secrets of the atomic bomb project with the
Soviet dictator. When Stalin learned of the bomb anyway through his
espionage network, it merely served to confi rm his suspicions about
the Anglo-Americans.
Under Roosevelt’s leadership, the United States fought the Second
World War in pursuit of both military and other long-term politico-
economic national objectives. Defeat of Germany and Japan came fi rst,
to be sure, but that goal did not crowd out all others. As a clear indi-
cation, the United States sent signifi cant military resources to China
under Lend-Lease and recommended to the British that they pursue
major military operations in Burma to reopen the land route to the
Nationalists, the Burma Road. American aid to China continued even
after it became evident that Chiang Kai-shek would not pursue
off ensive operations against the Japanese. Th e British viewed Burma
diff erently, as a stepping-stone in the reconquest of other Japanese-
occupied British possessions to the southeast (Malaya and Singapore).
In a like spirit, the United States refused to back Churchill’s scheme to
attack in the Greek Dodecanese in 1944. “God forbid if I should try to
dictate,” General Marshall told the prime minister bluntly, “but not one
American soldier is going to die on that goddamned island.” As the
Americans saw it, the British pushed the idea not as the best way to
defeat Germany but as a step designed to restore a British presence in
the Balkans and Mediterranean after the war, a design at odds with
Roosevelt’s opposition to spheres of infl uence. Roosevelt, then, fully
appreciated that the war was an appropriate instrument to pursue a
range of national war goals.