“pledge to Poland in 1939 the greatest blunder in British history” 

“Churchill devoted his life to 3 causes: preservation of Empire, keeping socialism at bay, and preventing any hostile power from dominating Europe. By July 1945, all three had been lost”

Pat Buchanan, former speechwriter for U.S. president Richard Nixon, political columnist, and doyen of the TV political chat show, believes that Winston Churchill, far from being Britain’s saviour, must take much responsibility for its involvement in two World Wars, which cost the lives of millions, destroyed the Empire and enslaved half of Europe for 50 years.

Buchanan argues that the kind of reckless, macho foreign policy pursued by Churchill and Britain will also lead to the demise of American hegemony. He says President George W Bush’s reaction to 9/11 is an example of pointless overstretching of U.S. resources.

Buchanan doesn’t seem to like the English very much, but his ideas, expressed in his latest book “Churchill, Hitler and the Unnecessary War – How Britain Lost Its Empire and the West Lost the World” (Crown Publishers) have a compelling ring of truth.

Buchanan believes that Britain could and should have stayed out of the 1^st and 2^nd World Wars. British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain’s decision to pledge that the country would go to war on Poland’s behalf in 1939 if Germany invaded was “The greatest blunder in British history,” because Britain had no way of carrying out any meaningful defence of Poland. It also misread the German intent, which was not to invade Britain, but to settle scores with Russia. If Britain had kept out of the war in 1939, it would have been much stronger when Germany had finished off Russia. Both Germany and Russia might have been massively enfeebled by the conflict anyway. Britain’s pledge to Poland also meant that Germany felt it had to move against France to avoid the dreaded two-front war.

Misunderstood Stalin, Hitler
Churchill was guilty of misunderstanding the U.S.S.R’s leader Joseph Stalin, and German Chancellor Adolf Hitler, and shares much responsibility for the sell-out of Poland and Eastern Europe which led directly to their enslavement for two generations.

Churchill was a leading war-monger in the cabinet which decided to get involved in the First World War in 1914. As Chancellor of the Exchequer in the 1920s he was most responsible for denying money to the armed forces leaving them hopelessly weak. By misunderstanding Germany’s intentions, he helped to propel Britain into the Second World War. Churchill was also a leading instigator in severing the treaty with Japan in the 1920s, which led to Japan’s isolation and policy of militarism and conquest. Churchill was part of the group which secretly agreed to go to France’s aid if attacked by Germany in 1914, but this understanding wasn’t transmitted to Germany, which might have held back if it had known.  

Buchanan said Churchill’s political career was a total failure.

“Churchill had devoted his life to three causes: the preservation of Empire, keeping socialism at bay, and preventing any hostile power from dominating Europe. By July 1945, all three had been lost,” Buchanan said.

Blundering on a colossal scale
This loss to Britain was due to blundering on a colossal scale. Buchanan said Britain and France should have written off Poland, and used the delay to rearm. Neville Chamberlain was most responsible for this, with his doomed offer to Poland. I had previously thought that Chamberlain was a most misunderstood Prime Minister, because he had said privately after the futile Munich talks with Hitler that this provided time for rearmament for the inevitable war. It seems that in fact Chamberlain, far from giving Britain time, squandered that possibility with his reckless,  pledge to Poland. Chamberlain truly was a disaster as Premier.  

Buchanan said Churchill’s aim of stopping Hitler’s plan to conquer the world was a misunderstanding. Hitler was an admirer of Britain and, according to Buchanan, had no intention of trying to break up the Empire.

Churchill had a chance to avoid war when Hitler stopped the German army on the outskirts of Dunkirk and let Britain’s army escape.

“It was he (Churchill) who rejected Hitler’s offer of peace in July 1940. Where did Hitler declare his determination to destroy the British Empire and rule the earth? How was a nation of Germany’s modest size and population to conquer the world? Was there no way to contain Hitler but declare a war in which, as Chamberlain told Joe Kennedy (U.S. ambassador to London) millions must die,” he said.

“steering gear too weak for his horse-power”
Buchanan said Hitler wanted an alliance with Britain, not its ruin. But with Churchill as leader, this wasn’t going to happen.  Hitler’s real intentions never included the invasion of Britain.

“Had he ever planned to invade England he would have built troopships, landing barges, and transports to ferry tanks and artillery across the Channel – and warships to escort his landing craft, provide fire support for the invasion, and keep the Royal Navy out of the Channel while his invasion force was crossing. He did none of this,” Buchanan said.

Confused diplomacy
Britain’s confused diplomacy in the build up to 1939 was counter-productive. Britain refused Germany a free hand in eastern Europe, which led to the temporary deal between Germany and Russia.

“Stalin used those two years to build the tanks, planes and guns, and conscript the troops that stopped Hitler at Leningrad, Moscow and Stalingrad. Thus did British diplomatic folly succeed in getting Western Europe overrun and making Eastern Europe safe for Stalinism,” he said.

Buchanan unearths some impressive allies in his criticism of Churchill, including this previous Prime Minister.

“Poor Winston. A brilliant fellow without judgement which is adequate to his fiery impulse. His steering gear is too weak for his horse-power,” said David Lloyd George.

Duped at Yalta
Churchill was duped at the Yalta talks in February 1945 when 100 million eastern Europeans were consigned to Russian tyranny. Then had the gall in 1946 in his Fulton, Missouri speech, to say “from Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic, an iron curtain has descended across the Continent,” when he had been an instigator of the process. This, after telling Parliament in 1945, ludicrously, that he knew of no government which stands by its obligations more solidly than the Russian Soviet Government

“To Churchill, the independence and freedom of 100 million Christian peoples of Eastern Europe were not worth a war with Russia in 1945. Why, then, had they been worth a war with Germany in 1939?” said Buchanan.

Buchanan says Churchill was a great war leader, but a lousy politician.

“If one traces his career from his entry into the inner Cabinet as First Lord in 1911 to his final departure from 10 Downing Street in 1955, that half century encompasses the collapse of British power. In 1911, the sun never set on the British Empire. In 1955, all was lost, save honour. India was gone. Egypt and the Suez Canal were gone. Palestine was gone. All the colonies in Asia and Africa were going. Russians and Americans were the hegemons of Europe and the Dominions were looking to Washington, not London for protection and leadership. Britain was no longer great. The long and brilliant career of the Man of the Century coincided precisely with the decline and fall of Britain as a world power and a great power,” Buchanan said.

Great Civil War of the West
Buchanan calls 1914-18 and 1939-45 the Great Civil War of the West, and wonders about the great cost in lives compared with the outcome. He says President Reagan’s winning of the Cold War without having fired a shot is a lesson to us all mainly because he avoided military intervention by defining narrowly (and probably selfishly) what were vital U.S. interests. Buchanan reckons that George W Bush has forgotten what Reagan did and is following the old policies based on hubris with his excursions into Iraq and Afghanistan. Bush’s determination to make the world safe for democracy endangers us all, according to Buchanan.

“The neoconservatives seized on 9/11 to persuade our untutored president that he had a historic mission to bring down Saddam Hussein, liberate Iraq, establish a strategic position flanking Iran and Syria, democratize the Middle East and the Islamic world, and make himself the Churchill of his generation,” Buchanan said.

He questions the sensibility of offering NATO status to Ukraine and Georgia (this was written way before Russia’s recent outrage in Georgia) saying they aren’t vital interests for the U.S.

I beg to differ. Not about Churchill, but about the implications for foreign policy today.

Nip it in the bud
The lessons of the 30s still have resonance. If, for instance, the French had been courageous enough to stop Hitler’s move in the Rhineland in 1936, that would almost certainly have put a stop to Hitler’s muscle flexing, and might even have brought him down. The point surely is that a prescient, intelligent, courageous intervention sends a clear message and may well stop a huge confrontation later. The action in Iraq might not lead to a perfectly democratic state, but it crushed an evil adventurer who had previous form in invading the weak, and destabilising an important region. If it is made clear to Russia that its bullying will not be tolerated, and that severe economic costs ensue from Georgia-like moves, it will stop.

Buchanan’s research into British 20^th century blunders in general and Churchill’s in particular ring true, but he goes too far in using this theory to denounce U.S. policy to bring down mainly Muslim regimes which, if left untouched, will breed huge trouble for the West in the future. Buchanan’s urge to retreat back to Fortress America is a long-term recipe for disaster not just for the U.S., but to its more exposed allies here in Europe. If Islamic regimes are allowed to build nuclear arsenals, this policy will end in mushroom clouds over American as well as European cities.

It might be tough to sell to the American public, but pre-emption now is a costly necessity if attacks from rogue regimes are to be contained and put down, and future peace secured.

Neil Winton – August 23, 2008