Roosevelt's Secret War

Archival Summary & Scope

Joseph Persico's *Roosevelt's Secret War* unearths a previously overlooked dimension of FDR's wartime leadership: his deep, personal involvement in intelligence and espionage. Portraying Roosevelt as a master of covert operations, the book reveals how he ran spy rings from the Oval Office, established America's first central intelligence agency, and skillfully manipulated information. Revelations include FDR's desire to bomb Tokyo before Pearl Harbor, his advance knowledge of Hitler's plans for Russia and the Holocaust, and the concealment of a British disaster to protect the Ultra codebreaking secret. Persico also definitively addresses the question of FDR's foreknowledge of the Pearl Harbor attack. This account details how Roosevelt, uniquely suited for secret warfare, was both a formidable spymaster and a target, facing Soviet and British intelligence threats that compromised the White House and the Manhattan Project.