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Memoirs of the Second World War

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He said of this work, "This is not history, this is my case." That is, it's his viewpoint on events, and to some degree, his justification for the actions he took during the war. He was too modest. This is also great history from the pen of a man who was not only a great statesman and war leader, but a gifted writer. To read it is a pleasure--and a bit sad since it underlines the decline in letters since Churchill's generation. Only his speeches are more inspiring. For the few remaining purists among us, I would recommend the full six-volume set, but much is captured in this condensed version. Get it and learn not only history, but the proper use of English.

I was disappointed with this abridged history since I had already read the six volume set and loved it for all its rich detail and atmosphere.

This one-volume abridged edition left me a little flat. So much had been taken out to make it concise and easy to read that it lost a lot of voice and it especially is lacking the Churchill flavor of action and detail that makes the six volume set exciting and monumental.

Oftentimes in recorded history a leader emerges as literally the "right man at the right time", a godsend for a country desperately in need of leadership after being led to the brink of disaster. Churchill was such a leader, and Britain desperately needed him in 1939 as Hitler's armies blitzed into Poland while Chamberlain stood by powerless to stop him.

This abridged memoir of the conflict by Churchill, one of the most dynamic personalities of the last century, is a fascinating profile of leadership, offering a unique glimpse into the problems faced by the Allies as the war destroyed the shaky peace of Versailles.

Here is Churchill in all his bravado, bemoaning Britain's woefull lack of preparation, and discussing in shocking detail the problems faced by the Allies as Britain joined the conflict and tried without success to keep the Nazis out of France. You are there as Churchill finds out, to his amazement, that the French have no reserves after the Maginot Line is pierced and the Germans head, unopposed, toward Paris. You understand the tremendous burden faced by Britain as Churchill explains the efficiency of the german war machine, churning out tanks and u-boats on a daily basis at the outbreak of the war while pacifist Britain's military industry had literally ground to a halt.

This is not a battle by battle narrative of every major conflict, and the Pacific theater is in particular given short attention as Britain played a relatively minor role there. Readers interested in the specifics of troop movements, maps, etc. should look elsewhere. However Churchill provides fascinating glimpses into the leaders of the Allied powers, recounting Stalin's relentless demand that Britain and the U.S. open a second front to divert attention away from Hitler's armies. And every American's heart will swell as Churchill expresses the pride and confidence he felt as the Americans entered the war: "Hitler's fate was sealed. Mussolini's fate was sealed. As for the Japanese, they would be ground to powder. All the rest was merely the proper application of overwhelming force." Churchill's words here, and the exerpts of his speeches to Parliament, are as stirring now as they were 58 years ago when he pumped courage into the British as they endured countless bombing raids.

The book has its lapses. It seems like Churchill at times seems a little too interested in presenting his arguments for or against certain operations, (and of course as the author he is usually right), and the abridgement here seems to devote more attention to relatively minor battles like Tobruk than to the Normandy invasion and the liberation of France. However any history buff will want to consider this book required reading for a fuller understanding of WWII.

Nearly 1100 pages in length, this abridged (yes, you read that correctly!) version of Winston Churchill's Nobel Prize winning, six volume set on the history of World War II will leave many would-be scholars stunned by it's revelations. If (like me) you learned history primarily from high school and college courses and your own self-study, this volume shows how woefully inadequate your understanding of this pivotal event may be. Most surprising are the pre-war revelations of how Hitler could have been contained as early as the 1920's; if the politicians of the day were not so interested in unilateral disarmament and taken Hitler's more outrageous promises with a grain of salt, he could have been stopped several times by both Britain and France before he could have built up his armaments. In particular, British Prime Ministers Stanley Baldwin and Ramsay Macdonald are to be blamed, for their inaction allowed Germany to rearm and begin their conquests almost unchecked; by the time of Neville Chamberlain's famous Appeasment at Munich, it was already too late to prevent war. The other major revelation that will surprise many readers is detailed in the chapter entitled October in Moscow, where Churchill and Russian premier Joseph Stalin literally decide postwar, Cold War politics with the stroke of a pen. (For his part, Churchill insists he believed that Stalin understood that such an arrangement was temporary.) Through it all, Churchill spins the fascinating tale of a man who thoroughly understands both military movements and the big picture when it comes to the theatres of war. Of course, the heroic generals and leaders of the nations involved, from Roosevelt to Truman, Montgomery to Ike, are detailed, mostly with compassion for their integrity and valor. This volume is recommended for the novice and true student of history alike (if one wants more military facts and figures, especially numbers of troop movements and battle details, it is suggested he purchase the complete six-volume set.) In short, if you wish to enjoy the history of WWII, particularly from a pont of view not often taught in the United States, purchase Memoirs of the Second World War today. The surprising revelations within will give you a new perspective both of WWII and how our current political situation was determined by events that happened some sixty-plus years ago.

Readers seeking an objective, bullet-by-bullet history of the Second World War will find Churchill's seminal work wanting. For in his six-volume masterwork, nicely abridged here for the more faint of heart, Mr Churchill recounts the major political and military currents of the war from the perspective of this century's most unabashed imperialist, one often at odds with allies and opponents alike. The author is not at all reticent about emphasizing his central role in the conduct of the war, even as the rising tide of American power came to dominate the Atlantic alliance. But no matter. Using copies of his official wartime correspondence and papers as the skeleton of the work, Mr. Churchill fleshes out the carcass with an insider's account of events and personalities, tying the whole opus together into a seamless chronology of the conflict that ended forever American isolationism and European colonialism. Highly recommended for anyone wanting to know more about the Second World War or about one of the most fascinating statesmen of this or any century.

I find it indeed difficult to assess this book by Winston Churchill. I have read it with very mixed emotions. Nonetheless, I firmly believe that for any serious student of the history of World War II Winston Churchill's "Memoirs of the Second World War" is a must reading - unless he or she decides to study the full fledged, six volume, "The Second World War" itself.

However, if one is to base his entire knowledge of the war on this writing alone, treating it as the history book per se, one is likely for a big disappointment. The value of this book as a source of historical facts is questionable; its value, in my view, lies in that it is the first hand, direct, presentation of the views and ideas on the war politics by one of its biggest actors. Churchill wrote himself: "This is not history, this is my case." I agree. It is, at the same time, the best source of information one can probably get on the "state of competence" of one of the "Big Three". For in this writing Winston Churchill reveals to a large degree what he himself knew, or did not know, about various aspects of the unfolding events. However, the objectivity of his writing is to a certain degree weakened by his concerns for relations with some of the other big players in World War II. The name of Dwight Eisenhower immediately comes to mind here. At the time of this book's publication Eisenhower was the president of USA. Whatever disagreements Churchill may have had with him in 1944 and 1945, and the many he had indeed, he went long ways to smooth his criticism to not in the smallest way offend his former ally and the sitting president of the country with which he practiced the policy of "Grand Alliance". That this may have distorted the whole picture seems beyond much doubt.

I am in no position to evaluate Churchill's ideas and beliefs and confront them with the facts, in their entirety. Whether, for instance, his explanation of the fall of Singapore is correct or not is beyond my expertise. But on two subjects: Joseph Stalin and the Soviet Union and the so-called "Polish Question" I do have opinions of my own.

We now know quite well who Joseph Stalin really was and what was the true nature of the Soviet regime in those years. From that perspective Winston Churchill's assertions about Stalin himself seem rather disconcerting. Especially so, since Churchill seem to have been reasonably well versed in matters relating to the Soviet Union and its foreign policies. Unlike many left-leaning politicians both in USA and Western Europe at the time he apparently had no illusions about the character of communist experiment in Soviet Russia. This was particularly true with regard to Stalin's foreign policies. Churchill realized Stalin was "de-facto" ally of Nazi Germany all the way until the day Hitler invaded the Soviet Union.

But with the Hitler's invasion of the Soviet Union on June 21, 1941, virtually overnight, this hideous man becomes Great Britain's ally in the fight against Germany. And now that Stalin was on the same side of the barricade he became more than an ally. He, in the eyes of Churchill, seemed to have transformed into a better man. Politically and morally. Churchill spares no effort to present Stalin as an extremely intelligent man, not without sense of humor, a man with whom one can reason, negotiate and settle. On several occasions Churchill underlines importance of maintaining friendly relationship with the Soviet leader as if attempting to convince the reader, and possibly himself, that personal relationship could significantly alter the outcome of negotiations. Did he believe this or was he merely trying to justify his own conduct vis-à-vis Stalin? At any rate, I do not subscribe to a notion that just because someone finds himself on the right side of a political cause - and in the case of Stalin this was not his own choice, Hitler put him there - it makes him automatically a better being. Whoever Stalin was before German invasion he retained that character afterwards. And that simple fact demanded appropriate conclusions be drawn and remembered.

Poland, and "Polish Question", receives mixed treatment by Winston Churchill. It might even be more instructive to recognize what Churchill does not write about in the case of Poland than what subjects he dwells upon. The name of the general Wladyslaw Sikorski, Prime Minister and Commander in Chief of the Polish Government in Exile right from the Polish defeat in September 1939 until his death in the airplane accident in 1943 is not mentioned even once, not even in passing. And it is worth remembering that Poland was Great Britain's first, and for some time practically the only, ally in the war against Hitler right from the beginning till the very end. Not a single word is dedicated to the role of Polish airmen who fought with such distinction during the famous Battle of England. They were the heroes of the day then and Churchill knew perfectly well they were the best "scoring" fighters whose contribution to the victory was substantial if not decisive. More disturbing still is his complete silence on the subject of Katyn massacre. In April 1943 the Germans discovered mass graves in the forest of Katyn near Smolensk in then occupied Russian territory. Poles were inquiring with the Soviets since June 1941 about the faith of about 15,000 officers listed as Soviet prisoners of war only to be told they must have had "escaped to Manchuria". The German discovery of some 4,000 murdered and Sikorski's subsequent request for independent investigation by the International Red Cross was the pretexts for Stalin to break relations with the Poles and that was the beginning of all the subsequent troubles around the Polish Question. The truth of the Katyn massacre got swept under the carpet for years.

It is not until the summer of 1944 when the Soviets advanced to the territories of the pre-war Poland that this subject starts looming high on the agenda. Churchill apparently then realized that Stalin had his own plans concerning Poland where creation of a subservient government toped the list. To be fair Winston Churchill deserves credit for writing (and acting at the time) extensively about the Warsaw Rising of 1944. For two months the 50,000 Home Army soldiers armed with ammunition to last for just a few days fought valiantly inflicting great casualties on the Germans while the Red Army stood on the east bank of Vistula River doing practically nothing. Churchill was sincerely horrified at Stalin's refusal not only to come to military assistance himself but even to allow the Allies' planes attempting to drop supplies to land on the Soviet airfields. Churchill desperately tried to help. But Stalin had a much different agenda and for this purpose he didn't mind to allow almost a quarter million of Varsovians to perish. Roosevelt meanwhile apparently did not care. Churchill's exasperation over this issue is clearly visible and the pages dedicated to Warsaw Rising are some of the most emotionally charged in the entire book.

But it is Churchill's position on the question of new Poland's frontiers that causes most of my dismay. He openly agreed that the Soviet Union deserved additional territory at their Western frontier to boost their external security against any future threat from Germany. This was agreed in principle right from the start. It is true that in those territories ethnic Poles never constituted a majority. But that's a very poor argument. Neither Russians were a majority there. These were Belo-Russians, Ukrainians, Ormians, Jews, in short a multitude of ethnic groups who for centuries lived under the Polish-Lithuanian rule. The Russian rule they knew only since the partitions of Poland at the end of XVIII century. If anything, there would be a legitimate "border dispute", if you will, between Poland and Ukraine or Poland and Belarus. But there was not even a hypothetical question of national independence for these two nations. As it turned out, therefore, a double standard was employed: Poland was to be a one-nation, one ethnic group state while it was all right for (Soviet) Russia to be a multinational "federation". In the end Winston Churchill agreed to legalize Soviet annexation of Polish territories invaded on September 17, 1939 the basis of which was (now infamous) Molotov- Ribbentrop Secret Protocol of August 23, 1939.

With everything in the book read and digested the final impression of this, no doubt very remarkable, statesman I get, is one of a man visionary at times, perseverant, man often times of principle and yet also of a man who for the purpose of "higher good" would bend or re-interpret the facts falling victim to illusions. The same man who so forcefully condemned policies of appeasement towards Germany up until Munich agreements of 1938 would practice his own appeasement policies towards Stalin later on, clearly as a result of his own fallacies about the character of Joseph Stalin and the nature of the Soviet system. But this very same man retained the ability to disillusion himself and change own stands thus proving quite remarkable degree of intellectual and political flexibility. Unfortunately for him, as well as for the world, it is rarely sufficient to change ones mind. For if the circumstances have also changed it is usually too late. It was another matter to exact certain commitments from Stalin when the outcome of the struggle with Hitler's Germany was up in the air, quite another when Stalin's armies were approaching Vistula river. There clearly was a chance to block aggressiveness of the Soviet Union and prevent Iron Curtain from descending upon Central Europe and spare the Europe and the world Cold War - if both Churchill and Roosevelt acted firmly early on. But the many illusions about the man and the system they dealt with and lack of sufficient foresight, prevented them from achieving desirable political arrangements, namely independence of Poland and other Central European countries, something that soon afterwards became to haunt the Western Democracies for nearly half the century.

While Churchill as a politician remains controversial, Churchill as a writer, and his book, fall very close to being a masterpiece. Rich, eloquent language, clarity of point, all-in-all good balance between detail and generality and, above all, passion with which he writes about subjects he was so intimately involved with - make for terrific reading experience. If not for the certain obstructions in his "pursuit of truth", the want not to offend then still living former allies and the apparent want to justify own conduct, that all resulted in certain distortion of the picture, I would give the book highest score of 5 stars.

Winston Churchill's 'Memoirs of the Second World War,' is one of the most illuminating works on the subject ever written. Churchill tells the story of the war from the massive rearmament of Germany in the thirties to the final victory over the forces of fascism. As a general history of the war it is understandably one-sided, but as a wartime memoir it succeeds on many levels. The feelings of the British Prime Minister on the strategies, soldiers, enemies, and allies of the war are brought to the foreground with an amazing command of language. Churchill justifies many of the more controversial decsions of the war including his stand on British rearmament before the war, the terror bombing of German cities, the 'unconditional surrender' policy of the allies, and the use of the Atomic bomb. This is a finely crafted work that is a tribute to a man who could make history as well as write it.

With so many books that have been written from the American viewpoint (and I was born in the good old USA), it was refreshing to get the British view, straight from the Lion's mouth. Yes, he does make himself a bit more of a hero then he needed to, and it is a bit slanted, but what memoirs aren't? In fact this makes me very sad that Stalin and Roosevelt never wrote one, it would be wonderful to have been able to compare the three memoirs.

I really enjoyed his "proper" English tone and words. By the time I was done reading it, it almost made me wish I had read the full 4,000+ unabridged one. Perhaps one day I will find the time. A must read for anyone getting deep into WWII.

`Memoirs of the Second World War' by Winston Churchill

This abridged (6 volumes) edition of Churchill's WWII memoirs is as important today as it was when penned. One is left with a true sense of the thoughts passing through the Prime Minister's mind which led to the extraordinary choices he was to decide through the bulk of the `40's. I've always felt the European perspective of the war years was under appreciated in America, when after all, these were the souls who dealt with the ravages of war at their front door.

Churchill's beautiful prose and detailed account of all major Allied decision making is required reading for any history, and certainly any WWII aficionado. It probably should be for all American high school students, as well. Whether or not you agree with these opinions, I definitely think you'll find a passionate, wonderfully composed piece of history in this excellent abridgement from one of history's greatest intellects.

This book is one of the most comprehensive I've ever read.

I have a huge quantity of books about Second World War, including biographies of important people who took part in it; I can ensure this one is always within easy reach of my hands.
Of course, you must be conscious before reading this book that it's been written by an English leader who was responsible not only for his country but for lots more and the War itself. He wrote it, based upon his documents and remembrances of those hard days.
I didn't read the six volume set that is his thorough and complete biography, however "Memoirs of the Second Word War" is a wide-ranging book, starting in the thirties and going through all periods of war, till some time post-war.

If you have a deep knowledge of WWII, might see that some facts are missing.
In this book he does not make any mention of allies who took little but important part during those tough days. For example, he just talk about the capture of Monte Cassino , in Italy, without making any mention of Monte Castelo and Montese which resulted in prison of one entire German Division (148º Infantry) in a hard fighting, by FEB (Brazilian Expeditionary Force). These details however, do not take his merits away. On the contrary, Sir Winston Churchill show us others things that we, mere mortals, would not imagine that could be happen at that time, such as how dubious, distrustful and cheek Stalin was!
He also exposes his disagreements and discussions with American allies when they had different point of views in some issues, and shows himself as a human being and not as a superman.

We must be aware that, as he has said, "It must be not supposed that I expect everybody to agree with what I say", so it is a book to explain his point of view of this important event and not to please someone. Of course, you do not have to get this book as unique reference for researches or studies but as an addition to them.

"Memoirs of the Second War" is a masterpiece which must be read for everyone who enjoy and study WWII.