Was Truman the best of the US Presidents of all time?
- Posted on February 5, 2023
- News
- By Akta Yadav
- 383 Views
Truman:-
It will be an exaggeration to state Harry Truman, the 33rd President of the US, is the most prominent leader the state has ever seen. One might throw their case for Washington, Roosevelt, or Lincoln when a debate of such stature arises. But it will not be far-stretched to consider Truman as one of the greatest, if not the best if we look at this incident from 1947.
Truman
The winter of '47 had to be one of the craziest and most dreadful winters one had to face in their lifetime, especially the people from Europe. The horrors of the 2nd World War were not over, and its repercussions started hitting the people in Europe, already. Millions of people were facing starvation in the continent, triggered by wartime destruction, drought, and the coldest winter in over a century.
But what followed next are some steps that would awaken the humanity inside you and me. The United States decided to tackle the problem by exporting grains to the affected countries and they very much did so. But the need grew massively, so massive that even the mighty US were left scratching their heads.
To avoid an apocalypse sort of situation, Europe needed approx. 100 million bushels of grains(or 300cr kg) before Christmas. The crux of the situation: the US didn't have any grain to send anymore.
In a situation where the life and death of millions depended on Truman, he didn't disappoint. He formed an emergency food committee, headed by the then-business mogul, Charles Luckman. What followed rest is history.
The committee persuaded people to eat one bread less, and avoid poultry and eggs on Thursdays and eggs on Mondays. The motto behind the campaign was, “Save Wheat. Save Meat. Save the Peace.” Luckman succeeded in persuading the common people to sacrifice their food, but it wasn't enough.
So he decided to target the largest consumers of grains, which weren't surprisingly humans but chickens. They decided to kill 136 million baby chickens to meet up with the demand for grains.
But all these measures weren't enough as the committee was still deprived of 20 million bushels of grain.
Here, Luckman played his masterstroke. He knew the amount of grain that could be retrieved from the alcohol-producing industries. But the road wasn't straightforward. The giant industrialists rejected Luckman's initial plan, however, the desperate business tycoon found a way. He convinced the industrialists of Truman's backing and the public image of these industrialists had they not cooperated with the committee. He finally won the vote 14:7, in his favor.
The 100 million sines qua non was finally met and delivered on time, saving millions of people from starvation and a potential war.
Truman
But the road wasn't smooth for people in the US, particularly for Truman and the committee. Thousands of people lost their jobs in the winter, many lost their businesses while catering to the need abroad. Whether the killing of millions of chickens was justified or not would be a whole other case. If it was genuine goodness of Truman that compelled him to take such a bold step or the fear of the Soviets and people turning communists, we will probably never know. But what we know and will remember is the act of Harry Truman and his committee in the face of adversity, and the power of people uniting on a common front. The event will be forever attached to the golden pages of history, and deservingly so.
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