Harry Truman had some good points but also glaring deficiencies. We should get over the idea of the high school-educated bantam rooster “good old Harry.” He turned out to be better than expected but as an unknown when he succeeded Roosevelt, we expected nothing. We just missed inheriting Henry Wallace the crypto-pro-Left visionary which would have been disastrous. Here are Truman’s good points and bad-and you decide.

Good: horrific as it is to consider, he dropped the atomic bomb and won World War II which saved us at least 5 more years of war and many thousands of young American lives by island-hopping….still a tough decision that would keep you and me awake for the rest of our lives. But it didn’t faze Harry who slept a good 8 hours the night after he gave the order. (Good but that gives you pause, doesn’t it?)

Good: He finally learned he should stop listening to State Department appeasers and reject the Obama-like idea that pleaded with the USSR: “can’t we all get along?” He pushed the Marshall Plan that stabilized western Europe and largely saved it from Communism and proclaimed the Truman Doctrine supporting those who resisted Soviet imperialism, supported the Berlin airlift. Good: He recognized the new nation of Israel.

Bad: He seized the country’s steel mills to head off an impending strike during the Korean war which was found unconstitutional by the Supreme Court. Bad: He was notoriously soft on corruption which especially hit the IRS: the assistant treasury secretary in charge of tax policy had to resign for doing favors to big-wigs. Bad: After World War II, he became convinced that by possessing the A-Bomb we could cut back on military preparedness so he slashed the Marine Corps to the bone. He fired four defense secretaries between 1947 and 1951. That led to the “Revolt of the Admirals” which spared the armed services so that they would be ready for the Korean War (which was caused by Truman).

Bad: He caused Free China to fall to the Communists by insisting that Chiang kai Shek accept them in a coalition government (which Mao was committed to reject). Chiang refused with the result that the U.S. ended all military support for him against the Reds and Mao took over in 1949. Bad: his secretary of state said publicly that Korea was outside the perimeter of our defense which triggered the North to invade the South on the pretext that we didn’t care. Truman then reversed the policy and ordered us into an extra-constitutional “police action” which never had congressional sanction. Bad: Having done that, Truman gave World War II hero 5-star general Douglas MacArthur too free a rein leading MacArthur to assume he had the sole right to invade China to punish its entry into the war.

Bad: Having foolishly seeming to give MacArthur too much authority, when things got hot, Truman fired him instead of allowing Mac, a true hero, to resign-and bad again-fired him via news reports (MacArthur hearing from a radio broadcast that he was removed). This incompetence led to frenetic division in the United States which tore the country apart and encouraged North Korea and Mao-led China.

Bad: He was notoriously soft on corruption which had permeated the IRS where agents on the take were winking at tax evaders. After a congressional probe he called in a special prosecutor who reported to the Attorney General. But when the special prosecutor got close to corruption by the AG, the AG fired the prosecutor…after which Truman fired the AG. Government became a musical chair comedy.

Bad: He shut his eyes when it was disclosed by Joe McCarthy and others that the government was riddled with Communist sympathizers…and famously charged that McCarthy was dragging a “red herring.” But pressured by congressional hearings, he set up his own probe which resulted in 2,500 employees being dismissed-but he resisted demanding that all federal employees take a loyalty oath. Bad again: He was warned repeatedly that undersecretary of the Treasury Harry Dexter White was pro-communist and should be fired. Truman resisted and instead named White to a high post in the International Monetary Fund. When it got too hot, White skipped out to Moscow as a bonafide Communist, taking with him God knows how many secrets to give to the Kremlin.

While liberal university historians rated him 9th among the presidents and 4th among the six “near great” presidents, he should be near the bottom-probably in the lowest third. But the legend of Harry Truman the Great lives on-thanks to hagiographers as David McCollum. The unjustified glory phase still continues with Republican presidents and candidates who say they will strive to be “another Harry Truman.” They know not what they mean.

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Tom Roeser is the Chairman of the Editorial Board of the Chicago Daily Observer

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