By Peter David Orr

One of the most prevalent and persistent arguments against the possibility of Adolf Hitler’s escape from Berlin goes something like this: "He was far too sick to make such an arduous journey. Parkinson's reduced him to an endlessly fatigued, trembling, stooping, shuffling old man who was completely dependent upon his quack doctor for pep injections."

Rather than arguing over the subjective descriptions of Hitler's condition, this article takes a different approach: when we place Hitler's physical state alongside that of Franklin D. Roosevelt during his global foray to Yalta in early 1945, the supposed "impossibility" of Hitler traveling from Berlin to South America crumbles. Even if one grants the most exaggerated, dramatic descriptions of Hitler's health in his last days, in a clinical sense, Hitler was in far better shape than Roosevelt—who somehow survived a five-week journey totaling nearly 14,000 miles.

FDR’s Journey to the Crimea

The outward journey began on the night of January 22, 1945, when FDR departed the White House by armored train. He arrived at the Norfolk Navy Yard the following morning after a 12-hour transit to board the heavy cruiser USS Quincy. The sea leg was the longest portion of the trip, spanning approximately 4,500 miles across the Atlantic and through the Mediterranean. The Quincy maintained a steady pace for ten days, arriving at Malta on February 2.

The transition from sea to air was immediate and punishing. At 11:30 PM on February 2, FDR boarded his presidential aircraft, the Sacred Cow. The flight from Malta to the Saki airfield in the Crimea covered roughly 1,375 miles and took seven hours. While the plane could safely cruise at 22,000 feet, the pilot was forced to keep the unpressurized cabin below 6,000 feet to protect FDR’s failing heart and lungs. This altitude resulted in a significantly more turbulent and exhausting ride. The aircraft itself was a one-of-a-kind hybrid: a C-54A fuselage fitted with C-54B wings for greater fuel capacity. To accommodate a man who could not move his own legs, the plane featured a private lavatory next to a specially designed flight seat and a battery-powered elevator to hoist the President in his wheelchair.

The final leg, on February 3, was perhaps the most physically taxing: a six-hour drive in a car convoy over 80 miles of battle-scarred, mountainous roads to reach the Livadia Palace in Yalta.

FDR’s Condition: Doctors, Meds, and Treatments

FDR was accompanied by Vice Admiral Ross T. McIntire, the official White House Physician. An otolaryngologist by training, McIntire served as the public face of FDR’s health, consistently and knowingly misleading the American people with optimistic statements even as the President’s vitality evaporated. Behind the scenes, the real work was done by Dr. Howard G. Bruenn, a young Navy cardiologist who had been secretly brought in during early 1944. Bruenn thoroughly understood the gravity of FDR’s condition and traveled to Yalta to manage a heart that was literally twice its normal size.

The primary medication prescribed was Digitalis, used to strengthen the heart's contractions and slow a racing pulse. FDR’s blood pressure at Yalta was recorded at levels that would be considered a medical emergency today: ranging from 220/120 mmHg to a staggering 260/150 mmHg. To manage the stress of high-stakes negotiations while in a hypertensive crisis, he was administered injections of the sedative Phenobarbital.

Because FDR suffered from a persistent, "wracking cough," he was given codeine cough syrups throughout the trip. He also frequently used nose drops and sprays for chronic sinusitis—a condition he and McIntire often used as a "cover story" for his much more serious cardiovascular collapse. Unlike Hitler, who was a teetotaler and despised smoking, FDR puffed away on unfiltered Camel cigarettes and maintained his ritual "Martini hour" despite his doctor's attempts to limit his alcohol intake.

Not New Ailments—Just Worse

If it sounds as though FDR was at death's door, it is because he was. These acute issues were the culmination of a decades-long disability. His waist-down paralysis was usually managed by daily hydrotherapy, which he went without for the duration of the trip. He wore heavy steel leg braces and was confined to a wheelchair whenever photographers weren't present. The sheer physical strain of locking those braces and trying to "walk" by swinging his torso was a massive exertion that Dr. Bruenn desperately tried to limit to save the President’s heart.

Lord Moran, Winston Churchill’s private physician and a keen clinical observer, noted FDR's gaunt appearance, sagging jaw, and lack of focus at Yalta. He wrote in his diary: "To a doctor's eye, the President appears a very sick man. He has all the symptoms of hardening of the arteries of the brain in an advanced stage, so that I give him only a few months to live."

The Return Trip

The trip home was not a direct reversal. FDR scheduled critical summits in Egypt, hosting King Farouk, Haile Selassie, and King Ibn Saud of Saudi Arabia aboard the Quincy at the Great Bitter Lake. On February 15, he held a final conference with Winston Churchill before beginning a 12-day return voyage across the Atlantic. This leg was darkened by the death of FDR’s closest aide, "Pa" Watson, who suffered a fatal cerebral hemorrhage while at sea. Deeply depressed and physically exhausted, FDR finally reached Washington D.C. on February 28. Lord Moran’s diagnosis proved prophetic; just six weeks later, FDR died of a massive cerebral hemorrhage.

The Final Comparison: Clinical Reality vs. Historical Myth

When we strip away the dramatic adjectives used by postwar historians and look at the medical data, a startling truth emerges. The "Sick Hitler" of the Berlin bunker, even at his most exaggerated, possessed a biological vitality that Franklin Roosevelt had lost years prior. Roosevelt’s heart was failing, his lungs were congested, and his blood pressure was a ticking time bomb, yet the Allied military apparatus successfully moved him across half the planet and back.

If we are to believe the standard narrative, we must accept a biological paradox: that a man in terminal heart failure could survive 14,000 miles of travel, while a man with stable vitals and a tremor was physically incapable of a secret flight to a pre-arranged destination. The "Hitler was too sick" argument isn't based on medical science; it is a logistical double standard. When placed against the "Accepted Miracle" of FDR’s Yalta odyssey, the physical "impossibility" of a relatively mobile Hitler escaping the ruins of the Reich simply crumbles. If the dying Roosevelt could conquer the Crimean mountains and the Atlantic Ocean, the physical toll of a secret escape would have been, by comparison, a minor exertion.