A LITTLE PERSPECTIVE
Re: Daniel Mandel’s Appeasement’s
Oscar:
Your review of The King’s
Speech is unquestionable on its facts but highly
informed by hindsight. The entire British establishment favored
appeasing Germany until very late; and in 1939, nobody knew what
was happening to the Jews inside the Reich, or what fate was
planned for them. Even Churchill didn’t find out until two brave
escapees arrived to inform the West; horrified, he did what he
could, but hundreds of thousands, as Martin Gilbert has pointed
out, were already dead.
Churchill’s political eclipse after his championing of
Edward VIII was very brief, as events proved him right over Hitler;
but so also was George VI’s reputation as an appeaser. Churchill
later admitted, “Thank God I was wrong” about Edward, while saying
of George, “We couldn’t have had a better King.”
A little perspective is in order. King George VI was
scarcely alone in supporting Chamberlain and appeasement. A whole
generation had been wasted in World War I, as Alistair Cooke
elegantly put it during the 1988 Churchill Conference: “The British
people would do anything to stop Hitler, except fight him. And if
you had been there, ladies and gentlemen — if you had been alive
and sentient and British in the mid-Thirties — not one in ten of
you would have been with Churchill.” If anything, this magnifies
Churchill’s courage in persisting to tell the truth at his own
political expense — in those “wilderness years” that were perhaps
his true “finest hour.”
Best wishes,
— Richard M. Langworth
CBE
Eleuthera, Bahamas through 15 April
Editor,
Finest Hour
www.winstonchurchill.org
Daniel Mandel
replies:
I hold to the view I expressed that “The
King’s Speech is primarily a personal story which is under no
obligation to rehearse George’s record on appeasement beyond the
little attention it devotes to the subject by way of necessary
background. But it is under some obligation to provide a background
that is truthful, not deliberately falsified.” As it didn’t, I
wrote my piece.
Mr. Langworth correctly points out that George’s views on
propitiating the dictators were commonplace and indeed
indistinguishable from that of much of the British establishment.
But he also says, I think mistakenly, that only with hindsight was
it obvious that these views were perilously defective. That might
apply to the general British public. But it cannot apply so easily
to the establishment — if by this we mean the King, the
government, the diplomats, the intelligence services and so on —
which suffered from no shortage of relevant information (much of it
excluded from the press) even before 1939.
Contrary to Mr. Langworth’s view that “in 1939, nobody
knew what was happening to the Jews inside the Reich,” a good deal
was in fact known, even though the full-scale policy of
extermination lay in the future. The Nuremburg racial laws; the
expulsion of 15,000 Polish-born Jews en masse without
their property or resources; the establishment of prison camps for
Jews and political dissidents; the exclusion of Jews from
commercial life and the professions and so on, all occurred before
1939. George’s observation to Halifax approving the Chamberlain
government’s efforts to stem the flow of Jewish refugees to
Palestine, to which I referred in my piece, was made after the
nation-wide Kristallnacht pogrom of November 1938. I don’t
think George or anyone else by this point could have been in any
doubt about the desperation of the situation.
Mr. Langworth says Churchill’s eclipse as a result of his
championship of Edward VIII during the abdication crisis was “very
brief, as events proved him right over Hitler.” Much might depend
on how we define “very brief.” As Churchill could not summon a
substantial opposition to Munich and remained excluded from office
until the actual outbreak of war, it seems to me fair to say, as I
did, that his misjudgment over Edward helped cost him three vital
years.
I don’t think it can be said that George’s partiality for
appeasement was “brief,” however defined, since it subsisted
throughout the entire pre-war Nazi period and — though I didn’t
dwell upon this — into the war itself. As late as May 1940, when
the possibility of coming to terms with Hitler was under discussion
in Whitehall, George offered to intercede with the Labor Opposition
Leader, Clement Attlee, to urge him to join the government in a bid
to preserve Chamberlain in office. When Chamberlain resigned three
days later, George “of course, suggested Halifax,” the
pro-appeasement Foreign Secretary, to succeed him. Had Halifax not
refused, George would have handed him, not Churchill, the seals of
office. “We couldn’t have had a better King,” said Churchill — but
only after the war, when George had changed his mind about
Churchill’s leadership and worked to assist him in preserving
British morale.
But I certainly agree with Mr. Langworth that Churchill’s
courageous anti-appeasement, in a time of widespread delusion and
blindness, “magnifies Churchill’s courage in persisting to tell the
truth at his own political expense — in those ‘wilderness years’
that were perhaps his true ‘finest hour.’”
TOO UPBEAT
Re: Ross
Kaminsky’s E.J.’s
Broken Record:
I believe Ross Kaminsky is a bit too upbeat when he
states: “the federal government won’t
technically go broke — but it can sure seem like it has when
exploding entitlements and interest payments consume 100% of tax
revenue — projected to happen within 30-40 years if we don’t
reform Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security. “
If you check the current budget, you’ll see that the
future nightmare scenario has already come to pass: our taxes
barely cover entitlement spending, and we are borrowing for
everything else. Per Wikipedia (citing CBO Historical tables), 2010
budget outlays were 3.456T. If I subtract discretionary (.660T) and
Defense (.689T), I get 2.107T for entitlements, mandatory, and
interest. When compared to receipts of 2.162T, we are, for all
intents and purposes broke today.
The future will arrive much earlier than most
expect.
— Marc
Fleuette
Financial Advisor
Ross Kaminsky
replies:
I’ve received a couple of
comments about my being too optimistic and I certainly take the
point. I do believe that the U.S. will always find a way to
nominally pay its bills even if it means monetizing our debt and
destroying our currency, though I hold some hope that it won’t come
to such a bad end for our nation.
I would also note that my intent with the article was not
a discussion of how outrageous, ridiculous, even immoral our
federal budget is. I and others have done that elsewhere and will
do so again all too frequently, I assume. (Friday’s
news from the CBO is just the latest
fodder.) Instead my focus was on the left’s view that
America’s various governments are not “broke” because America still
has some rich people left. Indeed, I was trying to make a moral
point almost as much as an economic one.
In the interest of keeping the attention on the outright
theft which the left glibly proposes as rational economic policy, I
may have come across as more optimistic about the federal budget
than I actually am.
WELL-RESPECTED?
Re: Paul Chesser’s
Michael Mann Goes to the Zoo:
The latest contribution by Paul Chesser was a bit
humorous, and cowardly. In it, Paul included quotes from some
of his “climate pals” who attacked a well-respected climate
scientist (Mike Mann).
I am always struck with a bout of indigestion when someone
prints quotes from their “pals” yet decides not to give the names
of those “pals.” Hey Paul, do they even exist? Are your friends
courageous enough to make attacks but not courageous enough to have
their names attached to those attacks? Cloaking your “pals”
in anonymity is embarrassing, and cowardly…. Sort of like a
school-yard bully that challenges someone to a brawl but then
doesn’t show up at the appointed hour.
Frankly, I expect higher standards from contributors at
The American Spectator.
Oh… by the way… you can use my name. I actually
stand by my words.
— Dr. John
Abraham
Associate
Professor
University of St.
Thomas
School of
Engineering
DEFUND NOW
Re: The Prowler’s
Hands Off the Obamacare Slush Fund:
Defunding Obamacare will not only be good politics, but it
will help bring down the deficit now and save our health care
system later. Republicans promised to defund this abysmal
policy and they must do it. They should link it to
legislation the Democrats desperately want and are afraid to
kill. By appearing to be squeamish the House leadership is
hurting itself in the polls which means it is hurting the
Republican brand in the run up to 2012. Defund, repeal and
replace.
— Michael Tomlinson
Camp Leatherneck, Afghanistan
UNDERSTANDING DANIELS
Re:
Philip Klein’s
Scapegoating Mitch Daniels:
Your article on Mitch Daniels is right on the mark. I
called Rush Limbaugh several weeks ago to defend Mitch Daniels
because his “truce” is about priorities and realities
not philosophy. Had I made it on air (held on for 1 hour and 45
minutes only to be told I would be called back the next day and
wasn’t), I would have pointed out President Reagan’s switch from
being a “pro-abortion” governor to being a “pro-life”
President — in words only.
Mitch Daniels may be a bit too honest to run for President
but, if he won, we would have an honest, true conservative who
would achieve more fiscally, socially, and from a national security
standpoint all while paying the bills in the mean
time.
Too bad!
— John L. Sorg
Indianapolis,
Indiana
WISEACRES
Re: James B. Brinton’s
A Great White Fleet for the 21st Century:
This is a wonderful idea. If you want to have some fun
with it, consider what would happen if you demilitarized a carrier
and gave it to the UN to manage. It would be an object lesson in
international cooperation and efficiency. For those of you who are
irony impaired, it would be a complete disaster.
— Roger
Great article! Well thought out. I’ve got a good source of
money. We can take it out of the Peace Corps fund and eliminate the
program.
— Curt W.
THE ART OF COMPROMISE
Re: Peter Hannaford’s
It’s Daylight Nuisance Time:
Make daylight savings time year-round or abolish it
altogether?
I like the idea of splitting the difference, so as not to
hurt anyone’s feelings. Just set the clocks ahead half an hour one
spring and make it permanent. We’ll call that “compromise
time.”
— Karl Lembke
NEGATIVE VIBES:
Re: R.
Emmett Tyrrell, Jr.’s
Barbour Out On the Hustings:
Put the crack pipe down — President Obama is a two
termer. Have a great day!!
— Noel Bourne
Rustlings on the hustings? Hmmm… I don’t think
so
— Mimi Evans
Winship
YES, BUT
Re: Quin Hillyer’s
Budget Battles Demand Perspective:
OK, Quin. If incrementalism will get us there, fine, but
we don’t have much time left to defund Obamacare before it’s no
longer a cub, but a bear. Just sayin’!
— Mike Showalter
Austin, Texas
