Churchill

[SLUDGE FACTORY]

Churchill was pissed by lunchtime every day. The biggest role he played was rallying the people. Britain would have lost the war without Russia and the USA. Operation Barbarossa and Pearl Harbour were two of the best things that ever happened to Churchill.

his armies took a savage beating on the Eastern front whilst the rest were getting attacked on the western flank , if hitler hadn't gone back on his promise not to attack Russia then Winston Churchill wouldn't have had the adulation he received

[kendoddsdadsdogsdead]

his armies took a savage beating on the Eastern front whilst the rest were getting attacked on the western flank , if hitler hadn't gone back on his promise not to attack Russia then Winston Churchill wouldn't have had the adulation he received

...hitler was talking to whales

[A Quiet Monkfish]

Churchill was a great admirer of Fascism, check out some of his speeches from the 20s and 30s, he even negotiated with Hitler before War broke out and was very aware of what Hitler was doing to the jewish community-do some research people

It's 2020. You can't sneeze anywhere on the planet without a few billion people knowing, yet the Chinese continue to keep a couple of million Uigher Muslims in Concentration camps, remove children from parents, sterilize 100, 000's, and until the last couple of months' the 'free 'World has looked on..

[WJ99mobile]

You really aren't in touch with reality.

Sorry you lot are correct. Just reading up on the subject.

Bloody fascinating but that rice story just got me in the stomach

[the other bob wilson]

Reading through the comments it's interesting that in any discussion on Churchill, WW2 and his leadership throughout, is the main topic of discussion. Obviously that's his legacy and no suprise what he will be most remembered for.

But Wartime and the events during are very exceptional and I wonder if you took WW2 out of the picture, how would you appraise Churchill then?

From the little I have read about him, his time in politics seemed generally unremarkable and it was quite likely that he was racsit and had no time for the working/poorer classes. Happy for people to correct me on this.

What I find interesting is that despite leading Great Britain to victory in the War, the people of the time removed him as prime minister by voting Atlee and his labour goverment into power, straight after. That labour governemt ushered in transformative social legislation to rebuild the nation, something that would not have happened under Churchill I assume (I'm not a labour voter BTW).

He's a complex and devisive figure, easy to see why he triggers a lot of debate.

I know less about WW2 and Churchill than I should, but your fourth paragraph is on something that has always intrigued me. If Churchill was the great leader he is portrayed as being these days, how on earth did the Uk turf him and his party out of power so soon after the war for a Labour Party with the sort of radical policies that usually mean almost certain defeat at the ballot box? There must have been more going on than meets the eye as presented by how he is portrayed today.

[LeningradCowboy]

I know less about WW2 and Churchill than I should, but your fourth paragraph is on something that has always intrigued me. If Churchill was the great leader he is portrayed as being these days, how on earth did the Uk turf him and his party out of power so soon after the war for a Labour Party with the sort of radical policies that usually mean almost certain defeat at the ballot box? There must have been more going on than meets the eye as presented by how he is portrayed today.

The greatest factor in Labour's dramatic win appeared to be their policy of social reform. In one opinion poll, 41% of respondents considered housing to be the most important issue that faced the country, 15% stated the Labour policy of full employment, 7% mentioned social security, 6% nationalisation, and just 5% international security, which was emphasised by the Conservatives.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1945_U...neral_election

[ToTaL ITK]

Why are you banging on about something almost a hundred years ago? you don't have enough to think about with Covid 19?

[goats]

In war, you have to make some awful, awful decisions. Churchill was in charge at the time, and the buck stopped with him. Looking back, maybe things could have been done differently, but no country at war would willingly hand over a fleet of heavy warships to it's enemies.
The fact that France was willing to let Germany seize them says a lot more about France, and their plans at the time. Britain really was on it's own at that time, and Churchill was the man we needed to lead us.

Exactly this, crucial decisions needed to be made under massive pressure in a losing position for many years....people seem to forget this, like they want to try and forget our history. It appears doing anything that was deemed ok or normal for that time is now abhorrent and wiped clean if possible....whatever next hey....about time a Great Britain was renamed? I mean, we aren’t really that great are we?

[jon1959]

Exactly this, crucial decisions needed to be made under massive pressure in a losing position for many years....people seem to forget this, like they want to try and forget our history. It appears doing anything that was deemed ok or normal for that time is now abhorrent and wiped clean if possible....whatever next hey....about time a Great Britain was renamed? I mean, we aren’t really that great are we?

I always thought the 'great' in Great Britain was for 'big' not for 'eminent' or 'important' or 'powerful' or any of the other synonyms that suggest Fantabulous Britain. It was to distinguish this island from Little Britain (aka Brittany).

[Tuerto]

It's 2020. You can't sneeze anywhere on the planet without a few billion people knowing, yet the Chinese continue to keep a couple of million Uigher Muslims in Concentration camps, remove children from parents, sterilize 100, 000's, and until the last couple of months' the 'free 'World has looked on..

I'm no fan of the chinese government, although they've taken more people out of extreme poverty than any other government on earth with state funded projects, better health care, more support for rural areas and huge investment in education.

[Rjk]

Exactly this, crucial decisions needed to be made under massive pressure in a losing position for many years....people seem to forget this, like they want to try and forget our history. It appears doing anything that was deemed ok or normal for that time is now abhorrent and wiped clean if possible....whatever next hey....about time a Great Britain was renamed? I mean, we aren’t really that great are we?

or perhaps the mystique around Churchill is wearing off and we are finally able to start fairly evaluating him as a country

[Elwood Blues]

And a complete lack of Civil Liberties

Witness Hong Kong!

[SLUDGE FACTORY]

...hitler was talking to whales

Well that doesn't make them any more intelligent because hitler lost

[Elwood Blues]

Reading through the comments it's interesting that in any discussion on Churchill, WW2 and his leadership throughout, is the main topic of discussion. Obviously that's his legacy and no suprise what he will be most remembered for.

But Wartime and the events during are very exceptional and I wonder if you took WW2 out of the picture, how would you appraise Churchill then?

From the little I have read about him, his time in politics seemed generally unremarkable and it was quite likely that he was racsit and had no time for the working/poorer classes. Happy for people to correct me on this.

What I find interesting is that despite leading Great Britain to victory in the War, the people of the time removed him as prime minister by voting Atlee and his labour goverment into power, straight after. That labour governemt ushered in transformative social legislation to rebuild the nation, something that would not have happened under Churchill I assume (I'm not a labour voter BTW).

He's a complex and devisive figure, easy to see why he triggers a lot of debate.

In fact all the main parties had agreed to implement the recommendations of the Beveridge Report of 1942 which was the basis of the Welfare State

So there would have been a National Health Service under a Conservative government as well.

[jeepster]

In fact all the main parties had agreed to implement the recommendations of the Beveridge Report of 1942 which was the basis of the Welfare State

So there would have been a National Health Service under a Conservative government as well.

If you think that would have happened not a chance

[Wash DC Blue]

Never knew this message board was such a hotbed for Epistemology.

[SLUDGE FACTORY]

In fact all the main parties had agreed to implement the recommendations of the Beveridge Report of 1942 which was the basis of the Welfare State

So there would have been a National Health Service under a Conservative government as well.

Why did the tories try to stop it happening then ?

[SLUDGE FACTORY]

Never knew this message board was such a hotbed for Epistemology.

Bertrand Russell..........get out of the cab !

[Wash DC Blue]

Bertrand Russell..........get out of the cab !

😁😁

[xsnaggle]

Phew well done Winnie, it was only 1300 lives!!

It was those lives or the lives of the British sailors of the Mediterranean and atlantic squadrons that could have been sunk by those ships combined with the modern diesel Italian cruisers which would have led to the starvation of the good people of Malta and it's loss together with probably the loss of Gibraltar and the war in the Med, no invasion of Italy and the extension of the war by god knows how long and all the people that would have killed, not to mention we may have lost.

the officers and crews were given the opportunity to sail out go to UK and join the free french navy but declined, stating they were part of the vichy french state which was a German controlled puppet government set up after the french surrender.

[xsnaggle]

Could we bomb south of France at the time?

They weren't in the south of fFance and they weren't bombed. They were in the french Algerian port of Oran and Admiral Cunningham sent a destroyer into the harbour to ask them to join him. They refused not realising the whole British Med fleet was sitting outside with all its guns (Including 3 battle ships) trained on them. Or perhaps they did know but thought that the British wouldn't fire. Wrong!!!

[xsnaggle]

it's impossible not say we would have lost the war without Churchill we had many other military leaders. considering new played a pretty minor role in the second world war it's a bit of a stretch.

When Churchill took over Chamberlain and Halifax were already in touch with The Italian Government asking if Mussolini could broker a face saving deal with Adolf.
It was only the fact that at that moment the Italians invaded Abyssinia that stopped them doing it.

[xsnaggle]

Correction-Without Russia.

But Russian only survived long enough to fight back because we and the USA supplied them with tanks guns aeroplanes and other equipment without which they wouldn't have been able to hold the German army back long enough for General winter to get involved. Hundreds of british sailors died on the Murmansk convoys so Russia could "win" the war.

[Sparticus_Mills]

When Churchill took over Chamberlain and Halifax were already in touch with The Italian Government asking if Mussolini could broker a face saving deal with Adolf.
It was only the fact that at that moment the Italians invaded Abyssinia that stopped them doing it.

There's so much wrong with that, I don't know where to start.

[xsnaggle]

the UK had 2.5% of the war casualties. do you really think that if someone else was in charge the outcome of the war would have been different?

unfortunately we've had decades of propaganda in this country convincing us that Churchill saved the day.

I recently saw a couple of opinion polls that were held in France, one just after the war and another a couple of years ago. they asked who was most responsible for the allied powers winning the war, the options were UK, France, USA and Russia.
in the survey just after the war Russia were massively out in front, with like 75% or more of the responses.
whereas in the recent poll the USA and UK were the highest.
only goes to show what 70 odd years of Hollywood movies and other propaganda have done to influence the public's perception

Well one thing is for certain, it wasn't the french!!!!