Never Give In! (70 page)

Once again the British Commonwealth and Empire emerges safe, undiminished and united from a mortal struggle. Monstrous tyrannies which menaced our life have been beaten to the ground in ruin, and a brighter radiance illumines the Imperial Crown than any which our annals record. The light is brighter because it comes not only from the fierce but fading glare of military achievement such as an endless succession of conquerors have known, but because there mingle with it in mellow splendour the hopes, joys, and blessings of almost all mankind. This is the true glory, and long will it gleam upon our forward path.

‘GOVERNMENT OF THE PEOPLE BY THE PEOPLE, FOR THE PEOPLE’

16 August 1945

House of Commons

In those countries, torn and convulsed by war, there may be, for some months to come, the need of authoritarian government. The alternative would be anarchy. Therefore it would be unreasonable to ask or expect that liberal government – as spelt with a small ‘l’ – and British or United States democratic conditions, should be instituted immediately. They take their politics very seriously in those countries. A friend of mine, an officer, was in Zagreb when the results of the late General Election came in. An old lady said to him, ‘Poor Mr Churchill! I suppose now he will be shot.’ My friend was able to reassure her. He said the sentence might be mitigated to one of the various forms of hard labour which are always open to His Majesty’s subjects. Nevertheless we must know where we stand, and we must make clear where we stand, in these affairs of the Balkans and of Eastern Europe, and indeed of any country which comes into this field. Our ideal is government of the people, by the people, for the people – the people being free without duress to express, by secret ballot without intimidation, their deep-seated wish as to the form and conditions of the Government under which they are to live.

ALAMEIN: ‘THE TURNING POINT IN BRITISH MILITARY FORTUNES’

25 October 1945

Alamein Reunion Dinner, Royal Albert Hall, London

It is of Monty, as I have been for some time allowed to call him, that I speak especially tonight. The advances of the Eighth Army under his command will ever be a glittering episode in the martial annals of Britain and, not only of Britain but, as the Field Marshal has said, of the mighty array of Commonwealth and Empire which gathered around this small island and found its representation in all the desert battles. Field Marshal Montgomery is one of the greatest living masters of the art of war. Like Stonewall Jackson, he was a professor and teacher of the military science before he became an actor on the world stage. It has been my fortune and great pleasure often to be with him at important moments in the long march from Mersa Matruh to the Rhine. Either on the eve of great battles, or while the struggle was actually in progress, always I have found the same buoyant, vigorous, efficient personality with every aspect of the vast operation in his mind, and every unit of mighty armies in his grip.

He is now discharging a task of enormous responsibility and difficulty in the administration of shattered and ruined Germany and we look to him to help those misguided and now terribly smitten people through the sombre winter which is approaching. I cannot doubt that after that he has further first-rate contributions to make to the future structure of the British Army. I therefore feel it an honour that he should have proposed my health and that he should have wished to associate me here with the Eighth Army and its glorious victory.

‘WE DID NOT FLINCH, WE DID NOT FAIL’

31 October 1945

Harrow School

As a youth, I always wanted to play the kettledrum, and when that could not be arranged I thought I would like to be leader of the school orchestra. That could not be arranged either, but eventually, and after a great deal of perseverance I rose to be the conductor of quite a considerable band. It was a very large band and played very strange and formidable instruments. The roar and thunder of its music resounded throughout the world. We played all sorts of tunes, and we finished up the concert with ‘Rule, Britannia!’ and ‘God save the King.’ . . . (
Cheers.
)

This is a time when the voice of youth will be welcomed in the world. We have come out of this struggle in many ways impoverished and with many burdens and the future is by no means clear. Always remember you are citizens of a country which holds its own in the very foremost ranks of the nations of the world and is entitled to receive from all of them a tribute of respect, because it was on our country that the whole brunt of the burden fell for more than a year of saving civilisation and the world. We did not flinch, we did not fail.

‘THE UNNECESSARY WAR’

16 November 1945

Joint Meeting of the Belgian Parliament, Brussels

Churchill had an unwavering conviction that, had the democracies
–
including the United States – stood together to resist aggression in the 1930s, the Second World War could have been avoided.

The ties between Great Britain and Belgium found their culmination in the great struggle from 1914–1918. It was hoped that the wars were over. Yet we have witnessed an even more destructive worldwide struggle. Need we have done so? I have no doubt whatever that firm guidance and united action on the part of the Victorious Powers would have prevented this last catastrophe. President Roosevelt one day asked what this war should be called. My answer was, ‘The Unnecessary War.’ If the United States had taken an active part in the League of Nations, and if the League of Nations had been prepared to use concerted force, even had it only been European force, to prevent the rearmament of Germany, there was no need for further serious bloodshed. If the Allies had resisted Hitler strongly in his early stages, even up to his seizure of the Rhineland in 1936, he would have been forced to recoil, and a chance would have been given to the same elements in German life, which were very powerful especially in the High Command, to free Germany of the maniacal Government and system into the grip of which she was falling.

‘An Iron Curtain has descended!’ Westminster College, Fulton, Missouri, 5 March 1946.

Do not forget that twice the German people, by a majority, voted against Hitler, but the Allies and the League of Nations acted with such feebleness and lack of clairvoyance, that each of Hitler’s encroachments became a triumph for him over all moderate and restraining forces until, finally, we resigned ourselves without further protest to the vast process of German rearmament and war preparation which ended in a renewed outbreak of destructive war. Let us profit at least by this terrible lesson. In vain did I attempt to teach it before the war.

‘AN IRON CURTAIN HAS DESCENDED’

5 March 1946

Westminster College, Fulton, Missouri

This is Churchill’s famous ‘Iron Curtain’ speech, in which he alerts America and the world to the fact that Soviet Russia, the West’s erstwhile comrade-in-arms, has become its mortal enemy. Its impact was enormous. The Soviets choose to date the Cold War from that moment, instead of from the real moment which was, of course, their occupation of the nations of Central and Eastern Europe. The reason that Churchill made the long journey to deliver this speech in the heart of the American Mid-West was that he knew he would be speaking at the feet of the President of the United States, Harry S. Truman. The kernel of his message to America was not to repeat the mistake that it made in 1918 of retreating into isolation, urging her instead to lead the free world in forging a defensive alliance that would safeguard freedom and secure the peace. The creation of the NATO Alliance in 1949 was everything he had hoped for.

I am glad to come to Westminster College this afternoon, and am complimented that you should give me a degree. The name ‘Westminster’ is somehow familiar to me. I seem to have heard of it before. Indeed, it was at Westminster that I received a very large part of my education in politics, dialectic, rhetoric, and one or two other things. In fact we have both been educated at the same, or similar, or, at any rate, kindred establishments.

It is also a honour, perhaps almost unique, for a private visitor to be introduced to an academic audience by the President of the United States. Amid his heavy burdens, duties, and responsibilities – unsought but not recoiled from – the President has travelled a thousand miles to dignify and magnify our meeting here today and to give me an opportunity of addressing this kindred nation, as well as my own countrymen across the ocean, and perhaps some other countries too. The President has told you that it is his wish, as I am sure it is yours, that I should have full liberty to give my true and faithful counsel in these anxious and baffling times. I shall certainly avail myself of this freedom, and feel the more right to do so because any private ambitions I may have cherished in my younger days have been satisfied beyond my wildest dreams. Let me, however, make it clear that I have no official mission or status of any kind, and that I speak only for myself. There is nothing here but what you see.

I can therefore allow my mind, with the experience of a lifetime, to play over the problems which beset us on the morrow of our absolute victory in arms, and to try to make sure with what strength I have that what has been gained with so much sacrifice and suffering shall be preserved for the future glory and safety of mankind.

The United States stands at this time at the pinnacle of world power. It is a solemn moment for the American Democracy. For with primacy in power is also joined an awe-inspiring accountability to the future. If you look around you, you must feel not only the sense of duty done but also you must feel anxiety lest you fall below the level of achievement. Opportunity is here now, clear and shining for both our countries. To reject it or ignore it or fritter it away will bring upon us all the long reproaches of the after-time. It is necessary that constancy of mind, persistency of purpose, and the grand simplicity of decision shall guide and rule the conduct of the English-speaking peoples in peace as they did in war. We must, and I believe we shall, prove ourselves equal to this severe requirement.

When American military men approach some serious situation they are wont to write at the head of their directive the words ‘overall strategic concept’. There is wisdom in this, as it leads to clarity of thought. What then is the over-all strategic concept which we should inscribe today? It is nothing less than the safety and welfare, the freedom and progress, of all the homes and families of all the men and women in all the lands. And here I speak particularly of the myriad cottage or apartment homes where the wage-earner strives amid the accidents and difficulties of life to guard his wife and children from privation and bring the family up in the fear of the Lord, or upon ethical conceptions which often play their potent part.

To give security to these countless homes, they must be shielded from the two giant marauders, war and tyranny. We all know the frightful disturbances in which the ordinary family is plunged when the curse of war swoops down upon the breadwinner and those for whom he works and contrives. The awful ruin of Europe, with all its vanished glories, and of large parts of Asia glares us in the eyes. When the designs of wicked men or the aggressive urge of mighty States dissolve over large areas the frame of civilised society, humble folk are confronted with difficulties with which they cannot cope. For them all is distorted, all is broken, even ground to pulp.

When I stand here this quiet afternoon I shudder to visualise what is actually happening to millions now and what is going to happen in this period when famine stalks the earth. None can compute what has been called ‘the unestimated sum of human pain’. Our supreme task and duty is to guard the homes of the common people from the horrors and miseries of another war. We are all agreed on that.

Our American military colleagues, after having proclaimed their ‘over-all strategic concept’ and computed available resources, always proceed to the next step – namely, the method. Here again there is widespread agreement. A world organisation has already been erected for the prime purpose of preventing war. UNO, the successor of the League of Nations, with the decisive addition of the United States and all that that means, is already at work. We must make sure that its work is fruitful, that it is a reality and not a sham, that it is a force for action, and not merely a frothing of words, that it is a true temple of peace in which the shields of many nations can some day be hung up, and not merely a cockpit in a Tower of Babel. Before we cast away the solid assurances of national armaments for self-preservation we must be certain that our temple is built, not upon shifting sands or quagmires, but upon the rock. Anyone can see with his eyes open that our path will be difficult and also long, but if we persevere together as we did in the two world wars – though not, alas, in the interval between them – I cannot doubt that we shall achieve our common purpose in the end.