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Jewish World Review Dec. 30, 1999 /21 Teves, 5760
Chris Matthews
A new book by historian Paul Lukacs, "Five Days in London, May 1940," tells how close we came to losing
the battle.
Adolf Hitler had triumphed in Europe. Czechoslovakia,
Poland, Belgium, the Netherlands, Norway and France
had fallen. Marooned on the continent were 200,000
British soldiers. The British foreign minister was Edward
F.L.W. Wood, the Viscount Halifax, who wanted to try
yet again to appease Hitler. His plan was to begin
negotiations with the German leader using the help of
Italian dictator Benito Mussolini, who had not yet entered
the war.
Churchill, Britain's new prime minister, saw the trap. He
knew that Hitler's best offer would be a demand that his
country cease rearming. Worse yet, the Fuhrer might
insist England turn over the force that had guarded the
island nation for centuries: the great British fleet.
There was a more immediate danger, Churchill
recognized, in parleying with Hitler. If the British people
saw their leaders making any offer to the Axis powers,
whether it be to give Gibraltar to the Italians, or its lost
African colonies to Germany, they would lose all resolution. Why should they
surrender their lives to a cause that could be bought?
On May 28, the gutsy Churchill, who had spent a decade warning of the Nazi
menace, made his move. Calling a meeting of the entire British cabinet, he made
his case for all-out war, whatever happened to the country's army still trapped
at the French port of Dunkirk.
"Nothing which may happen in this battle can in any way relieve us of our duty
to defend the world cause to which we have vowed ourselves," he told the 25
men around the table. "Of course, whatever happens at Dunkirk, we shall fight
on."
The reaction stunned Churchill to his soul:
"There occurred a demonstration which surprised me. Quite a number seemed
to jump up from the table and come running to my chair, shouting and patting
me on the back. I am sure that every minister was ready to be killed quite soon,
and have all his family and possessions destroyed, rather than give in.
A week later, with British troops evacuated from the continent, Churchill
expressed those sentiments to his nation and the world in a speech that changed
the course of the century. He warned Hitler that the British people would fight a
German invasion in the streets and in the hills, that they would never surrender.
"We shall go on to the end. And if, which I do not for a moment believe, this
island, or a large part of it, were subjugated and starving, then our empire
beyond the seas would carry on the struggle, until, in God's good time, the
New World, with all its power and might, steps forth to the rescue and
liberation of the old," he said.
The New World did come to Britain's rescue. In 1941, Japan foolishly
attacked Pearl Harbor. Hitler then declared war on the United States, an act of
folly even the best minds of history still cannot fathom.
By envisioning all that in May of 1940, Winston Churchill saved his country
from a sordid deal and the world from a Hitler
12/28/99: Candidate Gore's separation anxiety
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