Allies at War: The Bitter Rivalry Among Churchill, Roosevelt, and De Gaulle [Hardcover]

Simon Berthon (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 10, 2001

Roosevelt, Churchill, De Gaulle. They held the destiny of the Free World in their Allied hands as Nazi forces stormed through Europe in the 1940s. In public, these three extraordinarily powerful men stood firmly together against Hitler. They inspired their troops and gave their nations confidence in the prospect of victory. History has made of them giants of diplomacy and unparalleled masters of strategy. Yet, in private, their relations with each other were marked by turbulence, distrust, duplicity, and ruthlessness, as this new volume in the annals of World War II history dramatically shows. A tie-in with a joint BBC/PBS special scheduled for American television in the fall, this revelatory chronicle by Simon Berthon documents an antipathy that would significantly color Allied policy and alter the postwar relations of France with Britain and America. Throughout the war in Europe, Berthon shows, Churchill and Roosevelt stood at odds with the imposing and, to them, “unreliable, uncooperative, and disloyal” Free French leader Charles De Gaulle—to the extent that they kept the Anglo-American invasion of North Africa a secret from him and sought an alternative commander. And even as late as 1943, Roosevelt supported the oppressive and collaborative Vichy government based on misinformation fed to him about De Gaulle. Probingly, with access to official archives never before available, Berthon explores an alliance as it turns profoundly sour and shows how De Gaulle not only heroically held his ground in the cause of a Free France but ultimately implemented against the “Anglo-Saxon powers” his own revenge.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Berthon's narrative accompanies his forthcoming PBS telecast about Charles de Gaulle's struggles once France fell to the Nazis in 1940 to play the modern Joan of Arc. Aged 49 and a one-star general for only three weeks, he had flown to London five days before Paris was surrendered. Legally, Marshal P‚tain's collaborationist regime at Vichy represented France, but de Gaulle almost singlehandedly established the exile "Free French" to continue the war from England and some of the colonies. In Berthon's view, de Gaulle had four enemies Germany, Vichy, a skeptical Churchill and a hostile Roosevelt. This hostility, fed by at best half-truths from Roosevelt's rightist links to P‚tain ambassador Admiral Leahy, State Department adviser Charles Murphy and Secretary of State Cordell Hull more than by Churchill, shackled and even undermined de Gaulle. Berthon describes vividly the wartime climate of duplicity and distrust: Churchill tried to "straddle the two Frances"; de Gaulle compensated for his powerlessness with haughty pride; Roosevelt (for whom "France had lost all right to...respect by her abject failure in 1940") excluded de Gaulle from all decisions affecting France. Relations worsened in victory, when the French embraced de Gaulle and reality forced British/U.S. recognition of his legitimacy. In Berthon's opinion, Churchill equivocated, and U.S. players were villainous. Though he makes little of de Gaulle's postwar promotion of the myth of mass French resistance to fascism, his wartime de Gaulle is convincingly heroic. None of the three leaders comes off well which may give the book a controversial edge. 8 pages of b&w illus. (Oct.)Forecast: The three-part TV series is scheduled to run in 2002; in the meantime, the book is a History Book Club selection and should have broad appeal to readers of WWII titles.

Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

Berthon's fascinating account of the relationship among Franklin Roosevelt, Winston Churchill, and Charles de Gaulle accompanies this fall's three-part BBC/PBS series Allies at War. Series producer Berthon shows that each had far from absolutely positive feelings about the others and that while the relationships changed over time, they were hardly the picture of mutual support one might expect from Allied leaders fighting the Axis. The troubled relationships stemmed from the three leaders' different politics, goals, and personalities. The fall of France produced the rise of Charles de Gaulle, whom FDR never took seriously until the very end of the war. Churchill, who initially admired de Gaulle, was trapped by his dependence on FDR into undermining the French. Churchill is presented as a source of good advice, but FDR often received far from good advice. In some ways, de Gaulle emerges indirectly as the hero of this story despite his many personality flaws. Though this is not a new story, and the absence of footnotes may bother scholars, it is nonetheless a readable and captivating glimpse into the personalities and goals of the three Allied giants. Recommended for public libraries. William D. Pederson, Louisiana State Univ., Shreveport
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 356 pages
• Publisher: Carroll & Graf; First edition. edition (October 10, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0786709499
• ISBN-13: 978-0786709496
• Product Dimensions: 9.5 x 6.5 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,150,954 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A Fine Study of De Gaulle, Churchill and Roosevelt in WWII, July 17, 2002

By 

John Kwok (New York, NY USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Allies at War: The Bitter Rivalry Among Churchill, Roosevelt, and De Gaulle (Hardcover)

Simon Berthon's fine overview of General De Gaulle and his complex relationships with Churchill and Roosevelt raises more questions than it answers. I couldn't help but wonder whether a more concilliatory attitude towards De Gaulle by Churchill, and especially, Roosevelt, might have led to a more harmonious postwar relationship between the United States and France during the Cold War. Certainly France's independent foreign policy seems at times designed to be spiteful of U. S. interests; no doubt this is part of a bitter legacy stemming from De Gaulle's difficult relationships with the wartime leaders of Britain and America. Berthon does a fine job portraying De Gaulle as a stern man of principle motivated solely by what he thought was in France's best interest, not his own. Despite flaws in pacing and occasional typos, "Allies at War" is a revealing look at a largely overlooked saga of World War Two, and hence deserves my strong recommendation to those interested in Allied politics during the course of the war.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Interesting Glimpse into Personalities, December 29, 2001

By 

Roaming Seer "RoamingSeer" (USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Allies at War: The Bitter Rivalry Among Churchill, Roosevelt, and De Gaulle (Hardcover)

Allies at War presents the story behind the scenes of de Gaulle, FDR, and Churchill. Reading the letters between these men and their internal conversations is very revealing. FDR comes across as being judgemental and surrounding himself with many incompetent cronnies. FDR's political manuevering is interesting as he switches sides, or seems to, from appeasement of the Vichy government to flirting with the Free French as election polls dictate many of his actions. Churchill comes across as temperamental and authoritarian. Although Churchill deeply admired de Gaulle, he is willing to appease FDR's hatred for de Gaulle because of the enormous military aid which the United States can bring to bare to win the war. Charles de Gaulle comes across as man of principle who is very temperamental and outspoken. Many of the outbursts seem unforgiveable in the eyes of Churchill and FDR but often are simply honest remarks and answers to questions asked by the press.

The editors did a poor job of correcting typo and grammatical mistakes in this book. Also, Berthon's pacing appears off kilter. One feels the author rushes to finish the book. FDR's flirtation with Stalin and its effect on the leaders is explored in only the slightest degree. Berthon summarizes the effect of these after war tensions in a very short chapter of fifteen pages. De Gaulle's criticizing of America's Vietnam War as a "detestable war, since it leads a great nation to ravage a small one," is portrayed as resentment against America for FDR's bad treatment of him during WWII; the author never justifies this last judgement with any collaborating facts.

In conclusion, this book reveals some insight into the often contentious relationship between the three leaders. De Gaulle comes across as a man of courage, intelligence, morality, with a deep passion for France. De Gaulle sets his own course, unwilling to be a pawn of either England or the U.S. and in so doing becomes instrumental in Frances regaining its position as an important European power. Churchill comes across as the man stuck in the middle acting as a bulwark to hold the allies together. FDR is seen as a man of little conscious bent on winning the war his way, whatever the cost.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars good idea, not convinced by the conclusions, July 31, 2009

By 

A. Vander Dussen "WWII historian" (Cypress, CA United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Allies at War: The Bitter Rivalry Among Churchill, Roosevelt, and De Gaulle (Paperback)

Digging into private papers and declassified information, this book attempts to use the Roosevelt/Churchill/De Gaulle triangle to explain postwar divisions between the allies. In the author's view, De Gaulle is the proud French patriot, Churchill the mediator, and Roosevelt the unscrupulous guy wearing the black hat. If only Roosevelt had treated De Gaulle with more respect, we are told, French-American relations would have been smoother.

While the author sheds light on Roosevelt's repeated attempts to influence the Vichy French and provides detailed explanations of the machinations behind operation torch and d-day, there is little background information. It's almost as if the French and Americans had no history before WWII, leaving a once pristine relationship vulnerable to Roosevelt's capricious designs for American power in the post WWII world.

Obviously, this is not the case. French attempts to absorb American troops under French command in WW1 are well documented, with General John Pershing fighting a continuous battle to maintain his postion against French pressure. Interwar relations between America and France were little better. Seen in this light, French-American relations during WWII were simply a necessary reaction to the Nazis, similar to the tenuous US-USSR relationship, which immediately dissolved upon Germany's defeat.

Furthermore, even if Roosevelt was the bad guy, as the author contends, his obstacles to US-French cooperation should have been removed by his death. Instead, US-French relations deteriorated throughout both the Truman and Eisenhower administrations. Eisenhower might have been De Gaulle's strongest American ally during the war, which seemed to make no difference at all to the French later on.

Realistically, De Gaulle's French patriotism was directly at odds with the growth of American power, regardless of the identity/charactor of the American president. So in hindsight the Roosevelt/Churchill/De Gaulle relationship is interesting, but not nearly as historically significant as the author contends.