the only way conceivable in which he could have achieved a federated palestine or even a different kind of partition in 1947 was to have agreed to send american troops to palestine to enforce an agreement. there was just in other way. american troops would have had to replace the british, they would have had to stand between the jews and the arabs, they might have had to stand there for a decade, maybe they'd still be with there, for all we know. truman was absolutely not willing to do that. in 1945 he wasn't willing to do that was america was demobilizing from the war. 1948, berlin airlift middle of cold war, worried to death, completely beoccupied by -- preoccupied by europe, not by pal student at that point. -- palestine at that point. and completely unwilling to contemplate sending troops to the middle east when the possibility loomed of a major war in europe with the soviet union. so without that it's hard to imagine. the state department had this fantasy that they could get the british to stay there, and they kept sending people over to convince the british to stay. and the britis

he gives up on the idea practically speaking of the federated palestine but he still tries to apply theme principles. the united nations when the proposal for partition comes up in 19478 partitioning palestine into a jewish and arab state he tries to make the proportions fair to the arabs than they were. not 56-40 but something closer to 50/50. after this date is recognized the same thing on the refugees and borders. he will make attempts to try to resolve conflict and then withdraw. so it's not, it's not a kind of picture you would get if you look at the truman of the cold war the decisive luck stops here are truman. the other side of it is the side that is really peculiar and we are talking about the psychological side here. throughout this whole period truman remains wedded to the idea of a federated palestine the grady morrison planned. he keeps telling people to come visit him and i'm going to read you a few things just to convince you that i'm not making this all up. he recognizes the state of israel on may 14, 1948, okay? may 15 he writes a newspaper man who had been pressuring h

federation of american zionists and the american jewish committee, and they vote. the back room boys demanded a house cleaning at state, an appointment of somebody who's really trustworthy on palestine matters. people at state are really bitching things up, niles wrote lowenthal. president truman agreed saying to critics like marshall and forestal, i'm sorry, gentleman, but i have to answer to the hundreds of thousands who are anxious for the success of zionism. he took the palestine portfolio away from henderson's near eastern desk and gave it to clark gifford, niles and lowenthal. it would henceforth be managed for its domestic political dividends, strategy be damned. lloyd henderson was then sent off to be ambassador to india. marshall rebelled, telling the president that he was weakening the u.s. globally by his uncritical support for the zionists. marshall and henderson were for an arab state in the palestine with guarantees for a jewish minority. truman and the back room boys wanted partition with the very best areas, 55% of the total land mass, to the jews which would, of course, imperil any cold war coalition against the soviets. u.s. policy, marshall scolded the president,