when fdr was at yalta, could you talk a little bit about his frailty, his health at yalta that maybeyou didn't include in the book? >> i did. >> okay. [laughter] >> the trip to yalta was really rigorous and difficult. it involved a long sail across the ocean. that wasn't so difficult. that, he enjoyed being on a ship. it then involved a seven-hour flight from the island of malta to the black sea on a rumbling -- the newest airplane in our fleet, but still a rumbling propeller-driven plane that traveled at about one-third the speed of an air force one today. and that was followed immediate ly by a five-hour trip are over roads that had been ravaged during the war when the nazis occupied the crimea up into the mountains. he hadn't been in good shape when he set out, he was quite exhausted when he got to yalta, and great efforts were made by his two doctors who accompanied him, the white house physician who was the surgeon general of the navy, an admiral, and dr. bruin, the cardiologist whom i mentioned. and his eldest child, his daughter, anna, to keep him out of unnecessary discussion

if you are talking about yalta in particular and there wasn't -- there was a great incentive for fdr to get the soviet union, the agreement for the fight against japan and the bomb is an issue at potsdam but not yet at yalta. >> we're going to stay to left in the far back. could you please stand, ma'am. >> why, exactly did fdr choose harry truman to run with him in his last presidential campaign? >> long answer. i don't know enough details on in a to answer that. >> we're going to -- >> where is rob statino, we're going to extend that session by 45 minutes to we could have a full explanation. >> i would go to somebody else in the audience. i know there was a certain amount of political -- truman was a good guy from the part of the country that roosevelt wanted. he was a respected senator. but again, he wasn't part of the inner circle. he was brought in for the -- as vice presidents often are for certain political advantages. and he had a lot of friction with a lot of fdr staff because he was not part of the inner circle. but i -- again, i'm not as overly expert on the machinations of

tehran,nto, -- and yalta, and potsdam gives vision to this.our political and bilateral politicalfor and ideological reasons he felt , he needed to acquire space and he needed to maintain absolute control and no country, especially not germany, would ever be able to the kind of turnaround in the future. so he began with his inroads into central europe. each country followed a similar but not identical pattern , because stalin really was still trying to keep up the appearance of reelections, coalition, and so on. he did not want to provoke the west into reacting. but as i mentioned earlier, in each of these countries he had , hand-picked communist leaders who had lived in moscow during the war. many of them who survived the terror -- many of them were not -- were dropped into their respective countries. in poland, i mentioned the government was set up in 1944. in keeping with this idea that free elections would be successful for the communists, inheld a referendum in 1946 june. and things seem to go quite well for the communist. this was a refer

yalta 2.0.about this, essentially, is about russia and how trump treats russia, how merkel reacts.simistic view? john: many issues the last five or six years may end up on angela merkel's shoulders. let's say donald trump is serious about putting more pressure on european governments to spend more money on military protection. let's say he threatens to suspend u.s. membership of nato. that puts angela merkel in a position where she has to decide does western europe increased defense spending to stand up to the russian military threat or does she do deals with vladimir putin? that she has up -- does she of russianfact influence on western europe's borders? preparedxtent is she to arm up and help ukraine? or will there be a tacit acceptance of the fact that rush is a sphere of influence extends further into europe -- that russia's sphere of influence extends further into europe. julie: what strikes me is how plausible these scenarios are. i encourage all of you to check it out on the bloomberg, bloomberg.com, the pessimist's guide to 2017. john freire -- john fraher, thank you so muc

let's talk about yalta 2.0. russia and how trump treats russia and how merkel reacts.t is the outcome? ofthe difficult decision most of these issues over the last five or six years may well end up on american shoulders. let's say donald trump is serious about putting more pressure on european governments to spend more money on their military protection. let's just say he threatens to upend the u.s. relationship with nato. merkel will be in a position where she has to decide does western europe increase money to stand up against the russian military threat? or does she learn to deal with vladimir putin? does she accept the fact that the russian spear of influence does override her? this has huge implications for a country like ukraine which is stuck between russia on the one hand and western europe on the other. to what extent should be puke -- should she be prepared to arm up in ukraine or will there be an acceptance of the fact that russia is there and extending much further into eastern europe and may have been the case? vonnie: that was john fraher from the pessimis

and everybody expects things to be changed dramatically, sanctions to be lifted and putin to allow yalta5. >> there's plenty he can give away. >> there's plenty he can give away. but, you know, he could, you know, often putin you know to start from scratch, let's forget nato, you know, the entire global security infrastructure that has been built after world war ii, now could be at stake, and we don't know whether it will be in american interests or, you know, interests of exxon mobil. america is still the leader of the free world. experts know that putin has been going after them. we have reports one after another pointing at putin, putin's russia. not in china, not in iran, squarely to putin, for hackling and meddling in foreign governments. >> imagine the two of them in the room finally, imagine how that goes. >> look, it could be anything. to begin with, trump could hope for a grand bargain, but it could end in very bad relations, which could be a very bad disaster, because trump could get mad and start doing something unimaginable. so i think it's great danger that the foreign polic

. >> for richard and chris both, at yalta at the end of world war ii where he had a meeting of churchill, stalin, and truman. should harry truman have a demanded that the russians and stalin remove their troops from eastern europe and we go to the aid of these innocent people after world war ii? >> the answer is a no, i think truman did the right thing. this was the man who was repaired -- was prepared to use nuclear force. the right thing to do was what they did. you fortify the west, have the marshall plan and put pressure in places where you can make a difference, which are places where itria and greece was not clear. you have the nato arrangement. the difference between permanent and temporary sounds great, but no one knows where this line is. the principle is, the longer the but there is no per se rule. with yourbled rhetorical ability, but going back to your point. feelsttacking b and a some sense of morality and needs to step in. i would go into the issue of it is not clearly cut. we go in with selfless ideals about helping somebody. owing back the last 30 or 40 last, -- going bac