Churchill, Hitler, and "The Unnecessary War": How Britain Lost Its Empire and the West Lost the...

Churchill, Hitler, and "The Unnecessary War": How Britain Lost Its Empire and the West Lost the World | Patrick J. Buchanan | Compelling thesis

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Churchill, Hitler,...

	Churchill, Hitler, and "The Unnecessary War": How Britain Lost Its Empire and the West Lost the World Patrick J. Buchanan Crown, 2008 - 544 pages average customer review:based on 113 reviews view larger image
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Churchill, Hitler and the Unnecessary War is a new look at the old story of World War II in Europe

Pat Buchanan is a former presidential candidate and famed political pundit who has a penchant for writing well researched modern history books. "Churchill, Hitler and the Unnecessary War" is a long sober look at how Great Britain lost its empire through diplomatic blunders.
Buchanan makes these observations:
1. Great Britain had no business going to war with Hitler in 1939 over Poland. Buchanan claims that if Poland had given Danzig back to the Reich the war could have been prevented. This is conjecture. However, Buchanan is completely on target when he notes that England had no business dealing in Central and Eastern European politics. Eastern nations came within militarily aggressive Nazi Germany's sphere of poltical rulership.
Buchanan helps the reader understand how dangerous are mutually supportive military policies such as the Triple Entete and Triple Alliance in World War I and the guarantee of help from Britain to Poland if the latter were attacked by Germany.
2, Great Britain was woefully unprepared to fight Germany in 1939. Time was needed to strengthen British arms. When war was declared the British were unable to aid the Poles and suffering a catastrophe at Dunkirk.
3. Buchanan feels that by staying out of war with Germany, the British and isolationistic inclined Americans would have left the major fighting to the Russians. The two evil dictators would have fought it out alone without the 400,000 deaths suffered by both the USA and Great Britain in World War II. Churchill and FDR were fooled by the monstrously cruel Josef Stalin who slaughtered millions of his own countrymen.
4. Buchanan believes with many historians that the cruelly harsh peace meted out to Germany at the Versailles Conference of 1919 led to the rise of German Nazis under the evil genius Adolf Hitler. The blockade of Germany led to millions of deaths including women and children. The Germans felt they had been stabbed in the back by the Western powers seeking revenge. World War I and II were really two acts of the same tragedy. Over 50 million people, most of whom were civilians, would die in World War II. The war was a European Civil War from which the world has yet to recover.
5. Weak British leaders such as Neville Chamberlain, Anthony Eden and even the great Churchill made disastrous mistakes in dealing with Hitler and Japan. Churchill ceded Eastern Europe to the cruel Stalin at Yalta believing the Georgian's promise to treat these lands with justice.
6. Churchill failed in his three main goals to: a.Keep the British Empire strong; 2. Oppose a socialistic Britain. 3. Defeat Communism. His dealmaking with Stalin led to the imposition of the Iron Curtain and the enslavement of Eastern European lands by Stalin from 1945 to 1989.
7. Churchill, says Buchanan, is also to be faulted for his hatred of India and non-whites, the use of chemical warfare in Iraq and his desire to adhere to the Morgenthau Plan to turn Germany into an impoverished rural nation. (This plan was not implemented by the US Government)
8. Buchanan says President Bush with his belief in making democracy the goal in all the nations on earth is following a failed policy of democratic fundamentalism which will led to the failure in Iraq and hatred of the US abroad in the world. Buchanan says Bush is an admirer of Churchill who also was a blunderer on the international front.
9. Buchanan is a pessimist on Western leadership and hegemony in our conflicted globe.
10. Hitler, says the author, did not want to fight Great Britain. Hitler wanted to rule the European continent while Great Britain ruled the waves and her colonies. Buchanan does not believe Hitler wanted to attack the United States but was content to reign as a European dictator. This is a debatable point.
This is a controversial book which looks with a fine toothed comb at the historical record. It is an eye opener for students of history. I believe the next American President should read this book and give one to every member of his new Cabinet.

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Compelling thesis

I've read more than a few of Pat Buchanan's books. Some are interesting, many are what I call "a pamphlet stretched out to hundreds of pages". This one is a compelling read.

This is probably one of the best books Mr. Buchanan has written. His extensive research backs up a conclusion that Great Britain, and the US, may have been better off not having gone to war with Germany twice. Poor alliances and promises sucked them into these conflicts, essentially bankrupting England.

Through the lens of history we can see that Germany didn't threaten any vital interest of either the British Empire or the United states. His research is pretty convincing that in both wars Germany had no desire, at least when they started, of tangling with England. Nor did they have the resources to threaten much of England's Empire. Maybe it would have been prudent to keep the powder dry, so to speak, and tool up the military in case war was necessary. Even the dullest student of history can conclude that both the US and England were ill prepared to go to war. Twice.

The book leaves you with some compelling questions. What would have happened between Stalin and Hitler had Britain and the US not declared war? In retrospect, ponder the decades of having to deal with the USSR.

He ties things up in the end, applying lessons from both great wars to todays time. How many times do we commit the military when no US interest is at stake. Was Kosovo worth it? how about Somalia? Do we commit the military to Georgia because ethic Russians want to be part of Russia? The parallels to Poland pre WW2 are interesting. Were those alliances with France and Poland worth the cost of the British Empire?

This book ranks up there with some of the best historical analysis I've read.

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Guaranteeing borders of other countries is a dangerous game

Patrick Buchanan and I come from very different parts of the political spectrum. I was surprised to find his theories well thought out, well supported, and generally convincing.

My favorite quote from the book: ". . . [P]reventive war is 'like committing suicide out of fear of death.'"

Buchanan's main point is that although Britain was on the winning side in both WWI and WWII, these victories were Pyrrhic. Britain's empire and its dominant place in the world were destroyed. Britain could have avoided involvement in both these wars, and the world might well have turned out better. In both wars, Britain entangled itself in a conflict in which it had no direct interest. Particularly crucial was Britain's guarantee of the borders of Poland against Nazi aggression. This essentially turned over the decision of whether or not Britain should go to war to other nations, to Britain's ultimate detriment.

Buchanan does not spend a lot of time discussing the implications of all this. In my opinion, it is quite clear that the U.S. is in serious danger of going down a similar path of arrogance leading to ultimate destruction. We would be wise to seriously rethink our national policy of guaranteeing the borders of other countries. This is quite obvious in relation to the Vietnam war, but the U.S. is still making the same mistakes elsewhere. In the meantime, the United States itself is experiencing serious declines in its financial system and quality of life.

I would call Buchanan's "Churchill, Hitler and the Unnecessary War" a don't-miss book.

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Another excellent book from Pat Buchanan

This book makes an excellent case that one of the most destructive people of the 20th Century was Winston Churchill. At first I didn't quite know how to take the argument. However, Mr. Buchannan makes the case that it was Winston Churchill who did more than any one politician to set the United Kingdom against Germany.

Most American's can understand Europe of about 1900. It was a really nice place. Yes, it was not perfect and no place is perfect. However, what is to consider is nearly 40% all immigrants to America didn't make it. It was a hard life in America and Europe was actually an easier place to live than the USA.

Buchannan really does his homework. Condider this snippet. Churchill discounts the effects of submarine and aircraft on capital ship. However, most of the capital ships lost by the United Kingdom in WWII were lost to either aircraft or submarines. This writer knows fully the debacle of when the Prince of Wales and HMS Repulse were sunk by IJN aviation units in the South Eastern Pacific just after Pearl Harbor. Churchill discounted any action by both the "racially inferior" Japanese and aircraft. He was seriously wrong on both accounts.

The book is full of stories like this. Either the British or Churchill seriously estimate a threat or invent an incident.

Buchannan makes one of the most damning indictments against a single politician of the 20th Century. When Churchill takes the office of First Sea Lord on the eve of the Great War the British empire was at the height of her power. Germany was establishing herself as a strong government with motivated and well educated workers. Russia was on the verge of Democratic reforms. France was the pearl of the west. When Churchill dies in the early 1960s the British empire is gone. Germany is destroyed. Russia is controlled by an corrupt and evil government. The former colonies of France and Britain are involved in great civil wars.

Buchannan has finally broken from the ranks of historians who say Churchill and the British leadership did no wrong in both wars. Buchannan makes a convincing argument that Churchill is a mere agent of chaos and merely spreads destruction where ever he goes. Buchannan puts the argument forward that Britain has some sort of death wish and this has poisoned Western Civilization.

It takes 50 years for objective history to be written about any one subject. WWII added another 25 years to the fact. But now the serious historian can start to get a whole picture of the 30 years wars of the 20th Century and that was caused by Britain and Winston Churchill. Yes, I accept the argument by Buchannan. He does a great job of selling his case.

Five Stars.

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Surprising, and absorbing too

Readers expecting bust-`em-in-the-chops Buchanan stuff will be surprised. Either way you view what the "chops" part implies, the author does not serve up what most people expected, considering his usual expressed views. The title should have been the giveaway that this book was going to be unusual. One "expects" Mr. Buchanan to take a dim view of President Franklin Roosevelt (he does), a critical view of Adolph Hitler (he does), but of Winston Churchill? Prime Minister put-up-yer-dukes Churchill? Scorn indeed is what serves up on the man, backed with an exhausting amount of historical logic. Gracious, how much more entertaining can a writer be! But wait - Mr. Buchanan also in the last parts of "Unnecessary War" talk about his dislike of the Iraq War, and even about our lack of national interest in places like (how lucky can your timing get!), Georgia and Poland.

If the word "isolationist" can still be used, clearly Patrick Buchanan qualifies as a medium-strength isolationist as written in "The Unnecessary War." Somewhere, about two-thirds through the book, Buchanan's main point shines through: the United States would have been far better off today NOT being lead into WWII by Winston Churchill. Rather we should have let the major totalitarian giants smash themselves into exhaustion and eventual destruction against each other. Though this point of view is not shared by many, the theme running through all this might be the unintended downstream consequences of our continual tendency to "help" everyone else in the world. Starting his story before WWI, the author spends much time building his case for the above conclusion.

The most notable weakness of "The Unnecessary War" has to be the confusing cause-and-effect reasoning Buchanan uses. Too often one reads about a particular person as being the fault of some bad event in history, only to find out that the event turned out to be benign or salutary. Same person, same event. The astute reader should be able to pick out this sort of thing as it comes along. The adventure of reading this contrarian-style history is worth picking up a copy, and takes about two weeks to go through. Don't believe all those reviewers who call "The Unnecessary War" boring!

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