April 30, 2013

Finest Hour 153, Winter 2011-12

Page 4

Despatch Box



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I am delighted to be quoted in Finest Hour 152 (page 5), and I really meant what I said. In fact I am using the story of Admiral Fisher and WSC (page 56) on one of the Army’s web pages (The Army Knowledge Exchange). There is considerable debate in the Army at the moment about “weight on the man,” and the extraordinary burden that our soldiers are carrying in Afghanistan, up to 40-50 kilos. It’s the classic balance of “firepower, protection and mobility.” Admiral Fisher and Churchill would have understood this well. Our copies are put to good use and create debate.

I am sure the great man would have been delighted. His portrait is in the hall of Government House, seen by the many “great and good” who visit. We put copies in the guest rooms where they are often commented upon, always favourably, especially by some very senior Americans.
Maj. Gen. P C Marriott CBE, Commandant, Royal Military Academy, Sandhurst

Editor’s response: Thank-you, sir. Your note about “weight on the man” reminds me of Churchill’s 1941 query to his War Secretary, hearing that a division was enforcing a seven-mile cross-country run on every soldier from privates to generals: “Who is the general of this division, and does he run the seven miles himself? If so, he may be more useful for football than war. Could Napoleon have run seven miles across country at Austerlitz? Perhaps it was the other fellow he made run.”

From Paul Courtenay: Your four young chaps at our London conference made an excellent impression and seemed to enjoy it, while profiting from what they heard. We introduced them to Lady Soames and told them they’d one day be able to tell their great-grandchildren of this encounter! Many thanks for making it all possible.

Bombing in the Afterlight

Your “Leading Myths” (http:// bit.ly/jVWSme) is an excellent source but fails to mention one of the greatest myths of all: that Churchill committed war crimes by ordering Bomber Command to bomb German cities, which is often repeated by people with govern- ment grants to support their views, e.g., the government-funded Canadian War Museum in Ottawa:

“Mass bomber raids against Germany resulted in vast destruction and heavy loss of life. The value and morality of the strategic bomber offensive against Germany remains bitterly contested. Bomber Command’s aim was to crush civilian morale and force Germany to surrender by destroying its cities and industrial installations. Although Bomber Command and American attacks left 600,000 Germans dead, and more than five million homeless, the raids resulted in only small reductions in German war production until late in the war.”

The words “against Germany,” instead of something more neutral, like “during the war,” indicates considerable bias. A book was published in the UK entitled, Among the Dead Cities: Was the Allied Bombing of Civilians in WWII—A Necessity or a Crime? It seems that some taxpayers’ money also went to that author. Perhaps some sort of international alliance to promote factual history might help.
Murray Balascak ([email protected])

Editor’s Response: One of our “Leading Myths” does touch on the bombing issue. See “Churchill bombed Dresden as payback for Coventry” (http://bit.ly/miyrYK). See also Sir Martin Gilbert’s “Churchill and Bombing Policy” (http://bit.ly/o5dh6k) and Christopher Harmon’s “‘Are We Beasts?’ Churchill and the Moral Question of World War II ‘Aerial Bombing'” (http://bit.ly/nmFaFX).

The text you quote assumes the re- sults were “small” and omits that one allied leader, Churchill, questioned the bombing on moral grounds. It is nothing more than we hear regularly in what Churchill called “the afterlight,” by those who fail to consider the situation at the time. As Churchill’s daughter often says: “You have to remember that nobody knew then if we were going to win.”

At first the bombing campaign was the only way Britain could strike back, amid incessant demands by Stalin for action in the west. Sir Martin has shown it was the Soviets who asked for the bombing of Dresden. I am no expert at how much damage Bomber Command did, but few at the time though the effects “small.” The Soviets didn’t. Churchill questioned the morality of the policy long before any other allied leader—a footnote often lost in the shuffle.

From John Plumpton, Toronto: We should not miss the main or principal point of the CWM exhibit. The museum’s mandate is as much to educate as it is to honour and flag-wave. All the museum is trying to say is that it is a “contested” issue, as Mr. Balascak’s letter shows. Significant historians worked on the wording; it was changed under pressure by veterans, and what we see is the final compromise. If I were taking students I would certainly want them to consider and debate why it is a contested issue.

Coincidentally, I spoke in November on the “Politics of Memory,” focusing how memory and memorial events are also political events and how politics evolves as the generations pass. The American Civil War in the South is the best example but I also address the issue of bombing.

Pieter Geyl said that “history is an argument without end,” and Voltaire was right when he said, “history is a pack of lies we play on the dead,” particularly when moral as well as historical perspectives are involved. I understand Mr. Balascak’s viewpoint but I also understand a friend who participated in the Dresden bombing and never forgave himself.

Toyeing Around (3)

I just completed Richard Toye’s Churchill’s Empire. I imagine that his file cabinets are stuffed with marked-up Churchill books and documents containing every negative quotation made by and about WSC in ninety years, with emphasis on Africa.

One glaring error is on page 278, where Toye says that the UN plan for partition of Palestine [in 1948] was rejected by the Jews. With sixty-six pages of notes, Toye certainly was busy. I hesitate donating this paperback to the local library.
David Druckman, Chicago

Editor’s response: The book was reviewed rather sympathetically in FH 147 and I’ve since come to regret it, because the author’s previous Lloyd George and Churchill was lambasted in FH 137, and should have warned us. We’re constantly hearing of new errors and feverish accusations in Churchill’s Empire. (The first two installments are “Toyeing Around” in FH 149:5 and “True and Trite” in FH 150:9.) Your discovery is another example of the perfervid cheap shots. We’d donate it, but not to a library.

What Led to Hitler

Anent the William Griffin article (FH 152: 32-36), a major question we debated was whether or not Churchill thought World War I led directly to Hitler and the other dictators, Lenin, Stalin and Mussolini. I argued that Churchill blamed them not on World War I, but the mistakes at Versailles.

After publication I ran across the quotation that proves this argument: In his final volume of World War II memoirs, Triumph and Tragedy, Churchill reprinted a note he sent on 26 April 1945 to Sir Hugh Knatchbull-Hagessen, then British Ambassador to Belgium:

“Personally, having lived through all these European disturbances and studied carefully their causes, I am of opinion that if the Allies at the peace table at Versailles had not imagined that the sweeping away of long-established dynasties was a form of progress, and if they had allowed a Hohenzollern, a Wittelsbach, and a Habsburg to return to their thrones, there would have been no Hitler.” —Editor

Richard Burton

I question the note in Datelines (FH 152:6) about the new video of “The Valiant Years,” which states that Richard Burton (the narrator) disliked Churchill. I had the impression that Burton worshiped Sir Winston.

I had been asked to be an “adviser” for this film, so that no great mistakes in presentation would appear. I set up an office in Jermyn Street with Patrick Macnee (later to play John Steed in “The Avengers”) and worked every day for hours with Richard Burton, since all his recordings were done in London. In 1953, when I was working for WSC, I was with the family at The Old Vic to hear Burton as Hamlet. It was quite marvellous and WSC embarrassed the family by speaking along with Burton during his favourite passages. Richard came down to the front of the stage to speak the great Shakesperean words with Churchill— the audience were ecstatic!
Jane Williams, England

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