Weiss summed up Crowley's management style this way: "Based on his own success in Washington, he had concluded that sound administration meant clearly demarcating lines of authority between agencies and, within each, finding the right staff and giving it only the most basic guidance and coordination".
[2]: 162 Weiss' evidence for Crowley's hand in creating the FEA is a memo he sent to James Byrnes on September 21, 1943, giving his "assessment of the conflict and confusion among the economic agencies operating abroad."
His lengthy memorandum argued that "the major culprit was the State Department, which interfered with (or micromanaged) the execution of policy when it should only formulate and coordinate it.
[2]: 162 Weiss explains: "The British … were complaining of difficulty in dealing with 'conflicting jurisdictions' in North Africa; and the New York Times was emphasizing 'uncertainty regarding the representative spheres of OEW (Office of Economic Warfare), Lend-Lease, and OFRRO (Office of Foreign Relief and Rehabilitation Operations) … friction between OEW and the War Food Administration as regards foreign food purchases".
Naturally the author sketches the career of administrator Leo Crowley (p. 22,25,26) and his organization of the FEA: In 1955 Harry Truman recounted in detail in his Memoirs an early incident in the breakdown in the alliance with Russia after the war: