Elliott Roosevelt (September 23, 1910 – October 27, 1990) was an American aviation official and wartime officer in the United States Army Air Forces, reaching the rank of brigadier general.

As a reconnaissance commander, Roosevelt pioneered new techniques in night photography and meteorological data-gathering, but his claims to a distinguished record on combat missions have been largely discounted.

After the war ended, he faced an investigation by the United States Congress on charges of corruption, including accusations that he had recommended the purchase of the experimental Hughes XF-11 reconnaissance aircraft ahead of a Lockheed model that was believed to be superior.

Instead, he worked a series of briefly held jobs, beginning with advertising and settling in broadcasting in the 1930s, including a management position in the Hearst radio chain.

After controversial involvement in the Air Mail Scandal and a secret attempt to sell bombers in civilian disguise to the USSR, he was hired as vice president of the Aeronautical Chamber of Commerce (see Aerospace Industries Association), a post he held until 1935.

His appointment in the middle of the 1940 election campaign caused a furious political row, although General Henry H. Arnold, the Chief of the Air Corps, asserted that there was no pressure or nepotism involved.

In the summer of 1941, Roosevelt searched for and located air base sites in Labrador, Baffin Island, and Greenland and reported on conditions in Iceland and along the rest of the embryonic North Atlantic ferry route.

Despite having poor eyesight and being classified 4-F (unfit), he also became a pilot and reportedly flew 89 combat missions by the time of his inactivation from the United States Army Air Forces (USAAF) in August 1945.

At a dinner during the Tehran Conference, Joseph Stalin proposed to round up and shoot some 50,000 German officers and technicians after the war in order to permanently incapacitate Germany.

This led to a long campaign for the U.S. adoption of this British aircraft, as Roosevelt held the American counterparts (modified Boeing B-17Cs and early Lockheed P-38s) to be inadequate and unlikely to survive in contested airspace.

From Maison Blanche, Algeria, and after the fall of Tunis, La Marsa near ancient Carthage, Roosevelt pioneered new tactics, including night aerial photography and obtained before and after imagery of Rome during that city's first heavy bombing on 19 July 1943.

[12][13] After the war, Roosevelt no longer played a significant role in aviation, although he maintained a private pilot's license and owned a small aircraft.

He briefly served as the president of short-lived Empire Airlines of New York (1946), citing his influence with the Civil Aeronautics Board (CAB), which, however, did not result in route awards.

Upon their arrival in Los Angeles, Roosevelt and his group were met by eight limousines arranged by John W. Meyer, a publicist and former nightclub owner who was employed by Hughes Aircraft Company.

[15] The aircraft had already been turned down ten months earlier by Chief of Army Air Forces Material Division Oliver P. Echols, for being inadequate for military service; it was considered unlikely to become successful for numerous reasons, wooden construction and Hughes's limited facilities among them.

In his own defense, Roosevelt testified that he never heard of the XF-11 until General Arnold let him know about it, and that several of the parties appeared to have taken place on days when he was out of the country on active duty.

In 1973 during the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations hearings on corruption, Roosevelt was accused of involvement in an assassination plot on the Bahamanian prime minister.

In 1968, he and an "alleged mobster front man," Michael J. McLaney, offered Louis Mastriana US$100,000 (equivalent to $876,000 in 2023) to assassinate Prime Minister Lynden Pindling.

The assassination plot was conceived after Prime Minister Pindling's failure to issue a gambling license to an associate of Meyer Lansky, (whom Michael J. McLaney worked for until his conviction in 1971).

With James Brough, Roosevelt wrote a highly personal book about his parents called The Roosevelts of Hyde Park: An Untold Story, in which he revealed details about the sexual lives of his parents, including his father's relationships with mistress Lucy Mercer and secretary Marguerite ("Missy") LeHand[10] as well as graphic details surrounding the 1921 paralytic illness that crippled his father.

Published in 1973, the biography also contains valuable insights into FDR's run for vice-president, his rise to the governorship of New York, and his capture of the presidency in 1932, particularly with the help of Louis McHenry Howe.

A sequel to An Untold Story with James Brough, published in 1975 and titled A Rendezvous With Destiny, carried the Roosevelt saga to the end of World War II.