S8 Ep270: THE EROSION OF NEUTRALITY AFTER POLAND AND FRANCE Colleague H.W. Brands. H.W. Brands outlines the erosion of neutrality following the fall of Poland and France. Roosevelt maneuvers to adjust neutrality laws and aids Britain via the destroyers-for-bases de

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John Batchelor

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🗓️ 2 January 2026

⏱️ 11 minutes

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THE EROSION OF NEUTRALITY AFTER POLAND AND FRANCE Colleague H.W. Brands. H.W. Brandsoutlines the erosion of neutrality following the fall of Poland and France. Roosevelt maneuvers to adjust neutrality laws and aids Britain via the destroyers-for-bases deal, despite isolationist skepticism. Lindbergh and his allies fear these steps are a trap leading to inevitable war. Meanwhile, Churchill's correspondence with FDR becomes increasingly manipulative, desperate to secure American support against Germany, while Lindbergh warns that the British are seeking a US bailout. NUMBER 3
1930 WITH HOOOVER AND PERSHING AT THE WHITE HOUSE

Transcript

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0:00.0	I'm John Batchel with visiting with Professor H.W. Brands. His new book is America First, Roosevelt versus Lindbergh in the shadow of war.
0:10.1	Poland's cut up. The people of the bloodlands are massacred. Some of this is known. It's generally understood that the Hitlerites are hostile, but then, again, so are the Stalinists.
0:22.5	This is a part of the war where Germany and Russia seem to be cooperating.
0:28.3	However, watching this from America, FDR, knows that he needs to adjust the Neutrality Act.
0:36.8	And he's in correspondence with the man who's
0:40.3	become the first Lord of the Admiralty again, whom we all know is the hero of the Second War,
0:46.2	Winston Churchill. However, the relationship between FDR and Winston Churchill is transactional.
0:54.0	They both want something from each other. And they carry on
0:57.5	a correspondence beginning 1940, early in 1940, while Roosevelt is trying to convince Congress to let him
1:06.5	adjust the Neutrality Act. I'm interested in how Lindbergh was viewing all this.
1:13.3	He's visiting with senior members of Congress, some very famous senators, Burton Wheeler,
1:20.8	Gerald Nye, Robert Bore himself, for heaven's sakes, you know, the man who connects us to TR. What are the senators
1:29.4	telling him? What do they want from him, Professor? Well, the first thing that they're telling
1:35.0	him is don't trust Roosevelt. They didn't trust Roosevelt. They believe that Roosevelt was saying
1:41.2	one thing while aiming to do something else. So upon the outbreak of war,
1:46.0	Roosevelt requests that Congress modified the neutrality legislation. I should add here that Congress
1:52.2	had passed a series of laws starting in 1935 to prevent exactly those steps that had led
1:58.7	gradually the United States into war the first time around. So, for example,
2:04.1	selling weapons to belligerents, making loans to the belligerents, American nationals sailing
2:09.3	on the ships of belligerents. And each one of those contributed to America's entry into the
2:14.4	First World War. So Congress wrote a series of laws saying, you can't do that.
2:19.4	And so you can't sell weapons to the belligerents because the first go-round during World War I,
	...

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