Churchill, Hitler, and "The Unnecessary War": How Britain Lost Its Empire and the West Lost the World [Hardcover]

Patrick J. Buchanan (Author)

Book Description

Release date: May 27, 2008

Were World Wars I and II—which can now be seen as a thirty-year paroxysm of slaughter and destruction—inevitable? Were they necessary wars? Were the bloodiest and most devastating conflicts ever suffered by mankind fated by forces beyond men’s control? Or were they products of calamitous failures of judgment? In this monumental and provocative history, Patrick Buchanan makes the case that, if not for the blunders of British statesmen—Winston Churchill first among them—the horrors of two world wars and the Holocaust might have been avoided and the British Empire might never have collapsed into ruins. Half a century of murderous oppression of scores of millions under the iron boot of Communist tyranny might never have happened, and Europe’s central role in world affairs might have been sustained for many generations.

Among the British and Churchillian blunders were:

• The secret decision of a tiny cabal in the inner Cabinet in 1906 to take Britain straight to war against Germany, should she invade France
• The vengeful Treaty of Versailles that muti- lated Germany, leaving her bitter, betrayed, and receptive to the appeal of Adolf Hitler
• Britain’s capitulation, at Churchill’s urging, to American pressure to sever the Anglo- Japanese alliance, insulting and isolating Japan, pushing her onto the path of militarism and conquest
• The 1935 sanctions that drove Italy straight into the Axis with Hitler
• The greatest blunder in British history: the unsolicited war guarantee to Poland of March 1939—that guaranteed the Second World War
• Churchill’s astonishing blindness to Stalin’s true ambitions.

Certain to create controversy and spirited argument, Churchill, Hitler, and “The Unnecessary War” is a grand and bold insight into the historic failures of judgment that ended centuries of European rule and guaranteed a future no one who lived in that vanished world could ever have envisioned.

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

Taking his swing at the origins of World War II, conservative pundit Buchanan incorporates the subject into his warnings, expressed in several populist jeremiads (State of Emergency, 2006), of the decline of the West. Certainly World War I, with which Buchanan begins, was a catastrophe for Western civilization whose ramifications continue to be felt. Buchanan’s interpretation generally holds that British and American participation in both WWI and WWII was avoidable if British leaders had recognized that Germany was no threat to the vital interests of the British Empire. Banking his thesis on such supposed benevolence from Wilhelm II and Adolf Hitler, Buchanan criticizes various British policies of the 1920s and 1930s (who doesn’t?), and argues collaterally with Hitler’s statements disclaiming fundamental conflicts with Britain. The weakness in Buchanan’s line of thinking, of course, is that by 1939, Hitler’s international word was worthless; yet Buchanan hinges his case on what might have happened had Britain let Hitler go after Poland in 1939 as it had Czechoslovakia. Speculating a better future had the West permitted Nazi Germany a free hand in Eastern Europe, Buchanan cites the historical costs of Britain and France having at last drawn the line against aggression. Convinced? Controversial as is his wont, Buchanan reminds his large readership that the immediate ignition of WWII can still be disputed. --Gilbert Taylor

About the Author

PATRICK J. BUCHANAN was a senior adviser to three American presidents; ran twice for the Republican presidential nomination, in 1992 and 1996; and was the Reform Party candidate in 2000. The author of nine other books, including the bestsellers Right from the Beginning; A Republic, Not an Empire; The Death of the West; State of Emergency; and Day of Reckoning, Buchanan is a syndicated columnist and founding member of three of America’s foremost public affairs shows: NBC’s The McLaughlin Group and CNN’s The Capital Gang and Crossfire. He is now a senior political analyst for MSNBC.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 544 pages
• Publisher: Crown; First Edition edition (May 27, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 030740515X
• ISBN-13: 978-0307405159
• Product Dimensions: 6.5 x 1.7 x 9.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (221 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #417,286 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

411 of 476 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars What Might (Not) Have Been May 27, 2008

By Eric Mayforth

Format:Hardcover

Patrick Buchanan has never been shy about taking positions that defy conventional wisdom. He does so again in this extremely well-written and well-documented book (there are over 1300 endnotes). Buchanan argues that both world wars, which constituted a "Civil War of the West", were not necessary and would not have taken place had unwise diplomatic decisions not been made by the major European powers.

In the opening decade of the twentieth century, Germany had a chance to form an alliance with Britain, but let the opportunity pass, as the Kaiser did not believe that England would ever reconcile with France. However, Britain did reconcile with its longtime adversaries, France and Russia, and in 1906 the British secretly agreed to back France should Germany attack. Had the Kaiser known that war with France meant war with Britain, he would have been more conciliatory, as he never wanted war with Britain. On the other hand, had Britain not been pledged to help the French when World War I did come, and had they stayed out of the war, Germany would have defeated France as they had in 1870, but there would have been no Nazi Germany and no Soviet Union as a result the war.

In the interwar years, Britain alienated longtime allies Japan and Italy, who eventually formed an alliance with Nazi Germany.

The Second World War came about, Buchanan believes, as a result of Britain's disastrous guarantee to protect Poland (which it was incapable of doing anyway). Hitler did not want war with Britain, as evidenced by the fact that he never attempted to build a strong navy. If Germany had moved east and had the democracies not intervened, Buchanan opines, Germany would have run into the Soviet Union and the result would have been a Nazi-Soviet war that the democracies would have watched from the sidelines. The totalitarian nations would have pounded each other to death, while the democracies would have had a chance to rearm and become stronger relative to a decimated Germany and a decimated Russia (and China might not have gone Communist, meaning that millions might not have been murdered there). As it worked out in real life, however, America and Britain had to push all the way eastward through France and only then into the western half of Germany. By the time that they did, the Soviets had clamped down on Eastern Europe. Buchanan judges Churchill harshly--Britain was bankrupt and lost its empire shortly after WWII.

The book is a stark assertion that history could have turned out much differently. And while Buchanan's thesis is certainly debatable (in the real world, Nazi Germany, Imperial Japan, and the Soviet Union were all gone by the end of the century--would this have happened in Buchanan's alternate scenario?), and while you may not agree with Buchanan's isolationism concerning today's world, this book is worth reading since it forces one to reexamine many previous assumptions held by most people (especially those who were born well after World War II and never have heard how history might have turned out differently) concerning the two world wars, and the book is sure to ignite debate on cable news shows and on the talk radio circuit.

123 of 147 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars He stirs the pot! August 16, 2008

By Blaine Desantis

Format:Hardcover

From all of the other reviews I have read on this book it is certainly obvious that the author has hit a hot button issue and stirred the pot.

This is the first book I have ever read by Pat Buchanan, and it has a very impressive premise. It is filled with over 1200 notes, and has a vast bibliography. Does the author have a point of view? Obviously, but then what author/historian does not wish to interpret history in their own way.

While many reviewers give much time to WW II, the real issue is WW I and the resultant Treaty of Versailles. Such a pathetic war, such a pathetic treaty, one that was so bad even the US Senate refused to ratify it, and other diplomats knew all the Treaty did was ensure another war in 20 years. The dismantling of the old Empire/Monarchy system led to many of todays bastardized countries. Countries that contain people with no common language, culture or background.

And, if you wish to criticize the premise, just look what recently happened with the Georgian invasion by Russia, and now we have US giving its own "Polish Guarantee" for missle defense. The book definitely shows that there were other views with regard to Churchill and the two World Wars, and Buchanan comes down on the side of those who feel that the wars were unnecessary. It has been over 60 years since the WW II has ended, we have seen the files, seen the paperwork and correspondence from that era, and people are now properly wondering if that war was fought for the wrong reasons. Buchanan certainly points out all the atrocities that Hitler and his Generals ordered to happen, but to me the basic premise was that Hitler could have been avoided had their been a better and more civilized peace to end WW I.

The book did take me a long time to read, but that is due to the numerous details and notes that are in the book. The author makes a very fine defense of his premise, a premise that can never be proven correct or incorrect since those decisions are always subject to personal opinion. Being married to a woman who came from Romania I can tell you that the horrors and hardship that their country had to deal with under Communism, as well as other Eastern European countries that were dominated by Communism for over 40 years, were certainly not worth the sacrifices made to rid the world of Hitler. Again, these become personal reasons and are hard to quantify to someone who has not lived in those conditions.

Definitely a stimulating read, and from all the comments I think the author has certainly brought a very relevant issue to the fore, the repercussions of which still need to be debated and studied.

Blaine DeSantis

94 of 114 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Stirring the Pot December 19, 2008

By Douglas Doepke

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase

Buchanan stakes out some pretty controversial positions here. But, agree or not, he raises questions seldom dealt with in public, and ones that go to the heart of the West's presumed moral authority in its two wars with Germany. Crucially, his is not an apologia for Hitler or the Third Reich. Their wretched horrors during WWII are acknowledged without reserve. Rather, it's an effort to put the diplomatic moves preceding WWII into a more balanced and accurate perspective than the American public is accustomed to. The results amount to a much more ambiguous mix than the history books usually allow, and should come as an eye-opener, particularly regarding Churchill's punitive role.

Churchill is often treated as a god, and not a minor one at that. A reckoning with the British politician's career is long overdue. I doubt that any non-American head of state has been more lionized in our press than the former prime minister. Of course, the focal point of hagiography is Churchill's undeniable role as a wartime leader. It's a role the author Buchanan doesn't dispute. What the author does dispute is the wider context, particularly Churchill's vaunted reputation as a statesman. It's here within an unfolding sixty-year period that Buchanan lays bear the actual record--and contrary to legend, a dismal one it is. From the British politician's earliest service through 1955, the author records again and again gross errors of judgment that helped propagate WWI, instigate WWII, facilitate Soviet expansion, and finally terminate the British Empire. It's a sobering account, to say the least, darn near the equivalent of saying Jesus erred on the Mount of Olives. Nonetheless, it's an account that can't be ignored.

Then too, Hitler is viewed less as a demonic force than as a rabid nationalist intent on retrieving German lands wrongfully expropriated by the treaty of Versailles, and as a dictator ultimately backed into a corner by Britain's reckless guaranteeing of Poland's 1939 borders. Contrary to received wisdom, Buchanan asserts that war with Hitler's Reich was not made necessary by mad global designs, the usual formula for blame. Instead, primary blame is laid on a series of British missteps originating at the ministerial level. The author's thrust here depends on accepting the view that the German Chancellor was interested only in extending influence eastward as a bulwark against the Reich's true enemy, the Soviet Union, leaving the West and their colonial holdings basically intact. This too amounts to a revisionist account and a more difficult one to substantiate. Nonetheless, the author forces a key question usually passed over as an article of faith, viz. was war with the Reich in some sense inevitable or rather the unfortunate result of diplomatic blunder.

Now, all of this would remain academic were it not for the lessons drawn from that 40-year period. Most notably, Britain's empire collapsed from accumulated reversals brought about by blundering diplomacy and the two global disasters that resulted. Britain could no longer support her maritime holdings, resulting in a loss of global primacy and a junior partnership with an ascendant USA. Pivotal in this chain is a myopic vision of where Britain's vital interests lay. They certainly didn't lie in meddling in the disposition of Central Europe, the traditional sphere of Russo-German rivalry. Yet Britain fought two debilitating wars over that disposition, when a truer view of vital interest would have counseled a more detached policy. Wisdom here would appear to lie in being able to separate the essential from the inessential, a distinction apparently muddled by several generations of British leaders.

Now, Buchanan draws lessons from this for American policy. Is meddling in such non-traditional spheres as Central Asia, Russian border regions, and across the Mid-East, producing a distinctly American brand of imperial over-stretch. A pretty strong case is made for viewing America's strength as resting on the wisdom of her forefathers in avoiding foreign adventures. It's not a return to isolationist policy that he's advocating; rather, I take it as a return to separating essential interests from non-essential and not confusing the two in fits of bravado or imperial hubris. Certainly the disastrous adventures in Iraq and Afghanistan suggest an over-stretch with the ominous consequences that follow. Nonetheless, the distinction raises the complex question how to define `vital interests' and how to calibrate them in a world of perhaps unprecedented flux following the Soviet collapse. Add to that an economic dimension surely a big part of vital interest and we glimpse the quandary of current American policy.

Understandably, the book doesn't take up the economic dimension. On the other hand, sacrificing commercial factors remains a pitfall for any purely diplomatic history such as Buchanan's. In short, to what extent were the blunders of the book the result of economic imperative rather than the ministerial myopia emphasized here. After all, a financial dimension has the potential of converting the seemingly reckless into the understandably rational, particularly where national self-interest is at stake. Nonetheless, the author has produced a provocative and worthwhile work, deserving of wide readership.