Winston S. Churchill, Volume V, by Martin Gilbert
Maaranen, Steven
BOOKS IN REVIEW - "Winston S. Churchill, Volume V, Churchill, 1922-1939 Martin Gilbert / Houghton-Mifflin / $30.00 in recent years Sir Winston Churchill has suffered that debunking criticism almost universally...
...If we have anything to be grateful for, it is simply that collectively the Arabs have never managed to implement the boycott with real efficiency...
...They are not, I think, aware of the fact that the near-thirty-yearold boycott was designed for use against, has been used against, and...
...Churchill's refusal to make concessions to Nazi Germany, and his advocacy of British rearmament, was, on the surface, a marked departure from the line he had followed during the twenties...
...Later in his term as Chancellor, Churchill superintended Britain's return to the gold standard, and extracted heavy cuts in defense spending in order to stimulate the economy...
...Each "opinion round-up" is prepared with the assistance of the Roper Center, the oldest and largest archive of sample survey data in the world...
...It was not merely French pacifism, and satisfaction with the status quo in Europe, that underlay his confidence...
...The motives of a leader who jumps from one policy to a contrary one in accordance with the tides of public opinion "must be examined more studiously than if he swims against it...
...John P. Roche King Features Syndicate the(vie economist AEI Defense Review Please enter my subscription to Public Opinion magazine...
...Of all tyrannies in history the Bolshevist tyranny is the worst, the most destructive, and the most degrading...
...He knew that circumstances often forced statesmen to actions which, while necessary to attain good ends, were by no means choiceworthy in themselves...
...Gilbert decisively corrects the distortions and false accusations levelled by Churchill's contemporaries, and allows us to assess Churchill anew as a statesman...
...The extravagant and fanatic lengths to which the Arabs are sometimes prepared to go, however, are indicated by the refusal of Saudi Arabia to grant port space to an American ship, National Peace, because it had once, under a previous name, Memory, carried on trade with Israel...
...He was branded an enemy of European conciliation when he questioned the wisdom of the World Disarmament Conference in 1932...
...It is relevant to add that, despite the foot-dragging of successive administrations, Congress has been consistently prepared to defend the freedom of American companies (most recently in the Export Administration Amendments Act of 1977) to work in spite of foreign pressure...
...Sarkes Tarzian Inc...
...In this sense, Prittie and Nelson's title is at once more comprehensive than one might expect, and less comprehensive than the truth...
...The evidence of Volume V suggests that it did...
...The first was geopolitical, and was fully elaborated in his Marlborough and later in his History of the English Speaking Peoples...
...By crossing the floor twice, and achieving high office in both cases, Churchill provoked charges of opportunism and unsteadiness...
...It was galling to Churchill himself...
...It has since been formalized in a coordinating committee with headquarters in Damascus and representatives on most Arab-oriented Chambers of Commerce throughout the world...
...Both of these works noted a remarkable continuity in British foreign policy which Churchill described in March 1936: "For four There is opportunity in America...
...The existence of France's parliamentary institutions promised moderation in her policies...
...It's called Public Opinion...
...Churchill saw the issue between the West and Bolshevism as one between "such order as we have been able to build up since the dawn of history" and "an animal form of barbarism....Between them...there can, as Lenin rightly proclaims, be neither truce nor pact...
...France was also, as he argued in April 1933, the "sole great surviving democracy in Europe...
...Washington, D.C...
...In short, "the only way a man can remain consistent amid changing circumstances is to change with them while preserving the same dominating purpose...
...To Churchill, only the enduring justice of the allies' cause could make acceptable their descent to such methods as the bombing of open towns...
...The following year he rejoined the Conservative Party...
...During the twenties Churchill urged tolerance of German perversity, and a policy of easing her just grievances at a pace that would not arouse the apprehensions of France...
...That is a questionable matter, but could still be considered within their rights...
...Second (the secondary boycott), they refuse to trade with companies who trade with Israel...
...and yet that it is not true enough...
...Most such criticism stems from the numerous political controversies which marked Churchill's long career, especially in the years 19221939...
...Co-edited by two experienced observers of the political scene, Seymour Martin Lipset and Ben J. Wattenberg, every issue features articles by prominent writers, journalists and scholars interpreting public sentiments both here and abroad...
...and often given...
...There's a new magazine around that may help people make better use of all the public opinion data that pollsters keep turning out...
...Because of the character and situation of France, he had no apprehension of French aggression: "I am sure that France,...which is the most pacific nation in Europe at the present time, as she is, fortunately, the most efficiently armed, would never attempt any violation of the Locarno Treaty, and, least of all, in opposition to the country with which she is in such amicable relations—Great Britain...
...Yet "any man or state who fights on against Nazidom will have our aid...
...The heart of civilization is the subordination of the governors to "the settled customs of the people and their will as expressed through the Constitution...
...The boycott had its origin in events which took place long before the state of Israel was founded...
...Zip Make checks payable to: American Enterprise Institute • Department 380 1150 Seventeenth Street, N.W...
...Under dire circumstances actions might have to be taken which may yet be justified by necessity—perhaps survival itself...
...When the economy collapsed under Steven Maaranen is an assistant professor of political science at Claremont Men's College in California...
...He could not take the advice of "degenerate people" that such clashes as that between the Bolsheviks and the 34 The American Spectator June/ July 1978 for people who care what other people think...
...BOOK REVIEW Winston S. Churchill, Volume V, 1922-1939 Martin Gilbert / Houghton-Mifflin / $30.00 in recent years Sir Winston Churchill has suffered that debunking criticism almost universally accorded great men by what Churchill himself called "a peculiar type of brainy people...
...As late as the winter of 1938, while Neville Chamberlain was appeasing Hitler, Churchill's political fortunes were so low that a serious attempt was mounted to unseat him from his own constituency...
...and with the accretion of their oil wealth the Arabs have certainly been making the boycott more effective in recent years...
...A distinction should be made," he argued, "between two kinds of political consistency...
...Such was the geopolitical lesson learned by Britain...
...And along with the articles, there is a 16-page display of current opinion data from major survey organizations across the country...
...He faced, as had Lincoln, the question of whether a democratic government must, of necessity, either be "too strong for the liberties of its own people, or too weak to maintain its own existence...
...and that individual Arab countries have always ignored its provisions when these do not suit their national interests...
...We are still forced to distinguish between right and wrong, loyalty and treachery, health and disease, progress and anarchy...
...The boycott has three interlocking dimensions...
...Thus, for example, a company in Pritain who trades in engineering goods might find itself blacklisted because it buys its stationery from a company which sells stationery in Israel...
...In 1933 he commenced a prolonged campaign to increase British defense spending...
...The supporters of the India Bill from all parties supposed that he was attempting to return to public office by advocating an irresponsible and demagogic cause...
...Equally important in determining right policy was the character of regimes, particularly the character of the British nation itself which, while protecting its own interests, served a higher cause as well...
...20036 Name Address City State The American Spectator June/July 1978 35 White Russians were "six of one and halfa-dozen of the other...
...All that has been swept away...
...It was promised a Land Rover manufacturing plant in Egypt, but never got it...
...Their right to trade with other companies in their own city is questioned...
...But the danger remains...
...That is why, admirable though much of what Congress has done is, it is still to be regretted that the White House and the Treasury have invariably been slow to implement the legislative rules that would oblige all companies 36 The American Spectator June/ July 1978...
...Their rightto make appointments and promotions according to their own commercial judgment is challenged...
...Signs of political instability and nascent rearmament in Germany troubled Churchill in the first years of the thirties...
...Churchill's rearmament campaign flew in the teeth of the powerful democratic tendency towards pacifism...
...In 1936 his support of Edward VIII and Mrs...
...Simpson was widely viewed as an attempt to form a "King's Party" to supplant Baldwin's government...
...British Leyland, my own country's largest, domestically-owned automobile manufacturer, gave up its assembly plant in Israel, and joined the Arab-British Chamber of Commerce...
...In 1925 he played a major role in breaking the General Strike, further convincing the British left of his rashness and bellicosity...
...On first advocating a united cause with Stalin on 22 June 1941, Churchill publicly reflected on his twenty-five year opposition to Communism: "I will unsay no word that I have spoken about it...
...On the narrow criterion of military strength, France ought to have been Britain's potential enemy on the continent in the early thirties...
...The Arab boycott is, indeed, an instrument of war against the freedom of citizens of all countries to express and act upon their opinions and beliefs...
...Steven Maaranen the pressure of the world depression, Churchill's economic judgment was assailed...
...That is why we are opposing Bolshevism," he said in 1919...
...that at the extremities of political life, for example during war, there is no absolute or infallible rule that tells a statesman what can and cannot be done...
...For six years Churchill relentlessly opposed every step of the bill's passage, despite such aspersions on his motives and a visible weakening of his political power—the result of his obdurate support of a lost cause...
...Here, on the basis of their motive principles and not from transitory necessities, Churchill drew the line between good and evil regimes...
...Such regimes, Nazi and Bolshevik, incorporated atrocities into the theory and practice of governing, and Churchill labeled them barbarian...
...One can hardly complain about that, since they consider themselves to be in a state of war with her...
...In contrast to the slow and muddled response characteristic of most public men in Britain, Churchill's reaction was swift...
...Churchill instead viewed the rise of dictatorship as the latest manifestation of the enduring political question: freedom or servitude, justice or barbarism...
...Or—more obviously sinister—the same company might be blacklisted because it trades with another company which has a Jew on its board...
...Ford is not the first case of a company —and most of the brave and successful ones are American—defying the boycott without suffering its penalties...
...And if any part of that assertion be doubted, one need only look at the terms of a form which the government of Saudi Arabia insists must be completed by any company trading within its borders...
...That is why we fought Kaiserism and that is why we would fight it again...
...Danger would come only if these views continued to dominate thinking once the conditions that gave rise to them had passed...
...From 1929 through 1935 Churchill led the "diehard" opposition to the government's bill to move India towards Dominion status...
...The apparent inconsistency of this bold declaration with his support for a BritishFrench-Russian alliance in 1936, and his conclusion of the alliance with Stalin in 1941, can certainly be criticized...
...It was these principles, Churchill pointed out, that had "shaped the free, ordered, tolerant Civilization of the British Isles and British Empire," and for which Britain had become the principal custodian...
...The great and fundamental fact, however, is the extent to which the Arab world desperately needs western goods and western technology...
...In Volume V of the official biography, Martin Gilbert continues the task of his earlier volumes—confronting the accumulated criticisms of Churchill's deeds and policies...
...Patrick Cosgrave is a political columnist for the London Spectator...
...A just people might reluctantly use these tactics under the force of circumstance, but they could never accept them as everyday methods and must always bear the weight of their use upon their conscience...
...In 1924 Churchill returned to public office as Chancellor of the Exchequer in Stanley Baldwin's second government...
...about President Carter...
...Not viewing the world through the filters of ideology, he did not see Hitler as the personification of the last stages of capitalism, or as the unpalatable but perhaps necessary instrument of upper-class reaction against Communist-inspired, working-class agitation...
...As shown by Gilbert, Churchill's strategic view had two prime components...
...None of these objectives was inconsistent with Churchill's desire to evolve a pacified Europe, or with his overall strategic view...
...In effect, Britain's role on the world scene was an extension of her civilization...
...Bloomington, Indiana The American Spectator June/ July 1978 33 hundred years the foreign policy of England has been to oppose the strongest, most dominating Power on the Continent, and particularly to prevent the Low Countries falling into the hands of such a Power...
...Churchill's position is far different from that of a regime which views such methods as commonplace or legitimate instruments of rule...
...To those modern scholars who view statesmanship as the unvarying application of universal rules of action, Churchill remains an enigma...
...When his alarm at the rise of Hitler proved justified, he only earned the enmity of many who had ignored his warnings...
...But in the twenties Germany was a defeated nation and, though smarting under a treaty it considered unjust, was nonetheless capable under the auspices of the Weimar constitution of maturing into a moderate democratic regime...
...As one commentator said, "the engine room still has a Jewish heart...
...It arose from attempts by Arab nationalists to boycott the activities—commercial and otherwise—of the Jewish community in Palestine...
...One year — $12 ^ Two years — $22 Please send me more information about the following AEI publications: ^ Regulation ^ AEI Defense Review ^ The AEI Economist All AEI periodicals are available through the AEI Associates Program...
...French armed forces dwarfed those of Britain or Germany, yet Churchill never tired of repeating "Thank God for the French Army...
...Churchill's resistance to the fascistdictators was but another application of principles which had made him Britain's earliest and most implacable foe of Soviet Communism...
...Quantities of information about the activities of third-country companies are often demanded by the boycott authorities...
...Churchill fared little better in other policy battles in the thirties...
...The British nation is the foe of tyranny in every form...
...and it is at this point that their desire to disrupt and distort the internal commercial affairs of third countries—and the rights and activities of third-country companies—becomes most apparent...
...Now it is erecting a $150 million plant in Egypt as well...
...The Nazi triumph in 1933 led him to reverse his policy towards Germany and British armaments...
...Did Churchill's career, despite the seeming contradictions, display such a guiding purpose...
...is being used against Jews, whether they are of American, British, or any other nationality...
...defense spending . . . big business . . . the women's movement...
...Churchill was often called opportunistic or quixotic, yet he himself had warned about the misunderstanding of consistency in public affairs...
...The immense value of Prittie and Nelson's book lies in its worldwide coverage—relentless, detailed, and cumulative—of the operations and ramifications of the secondary and tertiary boycotts...
...The scope for distortion of, and damage to, the interests of individuals and especially small companies (vulnerable because they have fewer resources than .the giants) is obvious and considerable...
...Stipulations about the company's trading and employment practices are laid down...
...And, of course, the only power that can ensure equal treatment for all its own companies is the third-country government...
...As he explained in 1938, civilization "means a society based upon the opinion of civilians...
...Far from considering it a threat, Churchill saw French military strength as the surest guarantee for European peace...
...As long as the Arabs are unable to divide western companies from one another, or play one off against the other, they invariably back down on their threats...
...And, even if all the humiliating and sometimes disabling conditions are met, there is no guarantee of advantage gained...
...The mastery of the continent by any single power, even a friendly one, would have left the island a junior partner, essentially at the disposition of the senior...
...The Saudis require a "solemn" declaration "that this company is not a Jewish company, nor controlled by Jews or Zionists...
...Churchill saw "a universally valid hierarchy of ends, but...no universally valid rules of action...
...His policy was to resist oppression whatever its ideological guise...
...BOOK REVIEW The Economic War Against the Jews Walter Henry Nelson and Terence Prittie / Random House / $10.00 Patrick Cosgrave Pr he most important thing to say, and to say immediately, about Prittie and Nelson's book is that its title is at once challenging and true...
...when he later attacked the government for inadequate defense preparations in the face of German rearmament, both his consistency and motives were widely questioned...
...They are even less aware that the boycott machinery has been employed against individuals who are not Jewish but who admit—as I do myself—to the description "Zionist," meaning someone who supports the right of the state of Israel to exist...
...Or as he put the matter more colorfully to his private secretary, "If Hitler invaded Hell, I would at least make a favorable reference to the Devil in the House of Commons...
...It was just as essential, in formulating foreign policy, to take account of the ideas and principles which directed the conduct of other nations...
...Most Europeans and Americans who are politically aware know that the Arab nations refuse to trade with Israel and refuse to trade with companies who trade with Israel...
...The British alliance with the Soviet Union was but one of many distasteful expedients which Churchill not only accepted but actively sought during his public career...
...He believed that Britain's evenhanded foreign policy (exemplified by Locarno), combined with the quiet atrophy of British military spending (down to a level appropriate to a nonthreatening Europe), was the proper way to compensate Germany for her enforced poverty of military power...
...Let me give an example...
...racial quotas . . . human rights Public Opinion, a new bimonthly magazine of the American Enterprise Institute, not only explores opinions on those issues, but analyzes their underlying meaning and the events that produced them...
...In civilized states, the rule of warlords and the life of the armed camp "gives place to parliaments, where laws are made, and independent courts of justice in which over long periods those laws are maintained...
...The Wall Street Journal Other AEI Periodicals " There are in the United States perhaps a dozen topflight public opinion analysts and now, mirabile dictu, they are going to appear in one location, a new bimonthly magazine, Public Opinion, . . . A real winner...
...The most abhorrent tactics might be required to preserve the good cause...
...Third (the tertiary boycott), they refuse to trade with those in third countries' who trade with those who trade with Israel...
...Nor do they seem improvident in light of the facts and opportunities of the time...
...Ford Motor Company, on the other hand, simply ignored communications from the Boycott Office, and retained its Israeli plant...
...Until the true character and intention of a man or regime became clear, the momentary use of extreme tactics did not instantly place him beyond the pale...
...the extinction of those institutions in Germany was a sinister portent: "one of the things which we were told after the Great War would be a security for us was that Germany would be a democracy with Parliamentary institutions...
...But a "statesman in contact with the moving current of events and anxious to keep the ship on an even keel and steer a steady course may lean all his weight now on one side and now on the other...
...To Churchill, Britain's heritage was no less than civilization itself...
...To understand its insidious nature one must grasp the way it works, and the extensiveness of its ambition...
...First (the primary boycott), Arab countries refuse to trade with Israel...
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...The boycott is, thus, a planned cancer, working its way through western commercial society...
...To meet each great challenge Britain had always avoided the road of least resistance—an alliance with the predominating European power—and had instead forged alliances of small states to forestall the overweening ambitions of the great power, be it Spain, France, or Germany...
...He had been appalled by the Bolshevik revolution...
...Yet Churchill knew that the very thing that made the democracies good-natured also made them vulnerable...
...His arguments in each case when contrasted can be shown to be not only very different in character, but contrary in spirit and opposite in direction: yet his object will throughout have remained the same...
Vol. 11 • June 1978 • No. 8
