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The Last Lion #2
The Last Lion 2: Winston Spencer Churchill Alone 1932-40
Alone is the second volume of William Manchester's brilliant three-volume biography of Winston Churchill. In this volume, we witness the war within, before the colossal war to come. During this period, Churchill was tested as few men are: relentlessly pursued by creditors, disowned by his own party, vociferously dismissed by the press as a warmonger, and twice nearly lost his seat in Parliament. Yet despite his personal and political troubles, Churchill managed to assemble a vast, underground intelligence network-both within the British government and on the continent-which provided him with more complete and accurate information on Germany than the British government. Recognizing the horrifying truth, Churchill stood almost alone against Nazi aggression and the sordid British and French policy of appeasement.
Manchester's luminous portrait never loses sight of Churchill the man-a man with limitations, especially his callousness toward others (including his supporters) and his recklessness, which could border on the foolhardy; but also a man whose vision was global and whose courage was boundless. Here is Churchill as a light in the approaching darkness, readying himself for the terrible stand to come.
Manchester's luminous portrait never loses sight of Churchill the man-a man with limitations, especially his callousness toward others (including his supporters) and his recklessness, which could border on the foolhardy; but also a man whose vision was global and whose courage was boundless. Here is Churchill as a light in the approaching darkness, readying himself for the terrible stand to come.
816 pages, Kindle Edition
First published October 28, 1988
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About the author
William Manchester
79 books562 followersWilliam Raymond Manchester was an American author and biographer, notable as the bestselling author of 18 books that have been translated into 20 languages.He was awarded the National Humanities Medal and the Abraham Lincoln Literary Award.
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August 23, 2017
The Last Lion 2: Winston Spencer Churchill Alone, 1932-40, another hit for William Maschester! I think nobody could have surmised better than Maschester who Winston Spencer Churchill was, as he begins the second volume of his The Last Lion trilogy:
In this secong installment, it was interesting to see Churchill out of power. The title of this installment, Alone, was specially pertinent: he was isolated in his own party, always waiting and believing now was his time. An eternal optimistic, he faced defeat after defeat but never gave up. In times of appeasement his protests against Hitler only isolated him more:
5-stars and an all-time-favorite. Highly recommend!
"...But now, fourteen years after the Armistice of 1918, the Weald (of Kent) is an idyll of peace, and the explorer on foot finds that it possesses camouflaged delights... There, among eighty sheltering acres of beech, oak, lime, and chestnut, stands the singular country home of England's most singular statesman, a brilliant, domineering, intuitive, inconsiderate, self-centered, emotional, generous, ruthless, visionary, megalomaniacal, and heroic genius who inspires fear, devotion, rage, and admiration among his peers."
In this secong installment, it was interesting to see Churchill out of power. The title of this installment, Alone, was specially pertinent: he was isolated in his own party, always waiting and believing now was his time. An eternal optimistic, he faced defeat after defeat but never gave up. In times of appeasement his protests against Hitler only isolated him more:
“Nazi aggression, one might think, should have lent support to Winston’s candidacy. At this, of all times, it seems inconceivable that Baldwin would pick a weak man to supervise the defense of England. Nevertheless, that was what he did. Baldwin said outright: “If I pick Winston, Hitler will be cross.” In his biography of Chamberlain, Keith Feiling writes that the Rhineland was “decisive against Winston’s appointment”; it was “obvious that Hitler would not like it.” As the prime minister’s heir apparent, Chamberlain encouraged Baldwin to think along these lines. He suggested that Baldwin choose a man “who would excite no enthusiasm” and “create no jealousies.””I found through Maschester's work, memorable for always including Churchill's own words, that WSC was indeed a remarkable figure: so few of his contemporaries, or none that cried it out so loud out and clear despite never being heard, captured Hitler's essence as he clearly did. In Hitler he was able to see the menace he represented for Europe and all mankind.
5-stars and an all-time-favorite. Highly recommend!
July 11, 2019
Manchester’s second volume is the shortest chronological time period of the three, yet is equally as exciting and jam-packed with information as the first. It tackles Churchill’s life, both political and personal, with the rise of the Nazis and the lacklustre activities of the British Government as its main backdrops. Manchester again depicts Churchill as a great prophet, standing alone while Hitler steamrolls not only to power, but turns Europe into his plaything. While the book is biographic in nature and should be Churchill-centric, Manchester does address a great deal of German history to set the scene. Without it, much of the underlying impetus to depict Churchill as a visionary would be lost. A must-read (after Volume One) for anyone interested in a thorough and powerful political biography of one of the world’s great statesmen, told in such detail that one cannot leave without a great deal of new insight.
Manchester tries to work in a chronological fashion as he begins the book, alternating between Churchill in the Baldwin Cabinet against the fall of the Wiemar Republic. While most of the narrative (regarding Germany) is quite well known, some of the inner workings of the British Government may be new for the reader. Once Chamberlain takes over as prime minister, Churchill is edged out and his speeches in the House shift away from domestic policy and towards the fascist uprisings in Germany and Italy. Churchill stands alone in his critique and foreboding of this ideological and military power build-up, as the British Government seeks diplomatic relations with Hitler and Mussolini. Manchester uses this isolationist theme again, after its effective use in Volume One. The isolation does not come without a cost, as his friends begin to drift away from him and the self-doubt rises. He turns to writing his numerous pieces of non-fiction, which bring him much pleasure, all while Europe is on the brink of cataclysmic change.
The aptly named sub-title of the volume can be illustrated, as mentioned before, as he remains a beacon in the night, while the Fuhrer beats his chest and begins his plan to take over the European continent, plotting to bring fascism to the mainland. Churchill was ignored post-Great War as it related to Russia’s acceptance of communism (Bolshevism), which Manchester reiterates as Churchill repeats his warnings at every opportunity, in the House and in the press. As in 1919, these pleas fall on deaf ears, leaving Churchill to contemplate what lies ahead. Chamberlain, naive and inept to his core, is more concerned with pooh-poohiong the warnings and trusting that Hitler will not cause any concern. He goes so far as to sign a Munich Pact and presumes this will quell Hitler’s need for power and territory.
Manchester is able to weave extensive discussion about the Nazi rise to power and place it against the backdrop of the view from across the English Channel. It is not only sentiment that Manchester uses as his building blocks, but the hard foundation of history, which makes the book all the better. Use of nuances and detailed historical accounts brings the book to life and sells Manchester’s theme that Churchill was surrounded by those whose interest in appeasement was stronger than any rational sentiment. Hitler did not up and decide to take these actions (as I was duped into thinking from the history books), but it was a slow and intricate chess game that Manchester describes. Chamberlain and the French cowered away under their respective rocks and could not understand why the Nazis wouldn’t just ‘be good little boys’.
Manchester fleshes out the entire Churchill, from his twice a day baths, his eccentric food habits at his country estate and even his counseling of Edward VIII prior to his abdication. Churchill is more than a stuffy cigar smoking grump whose interest lies only with climbing the political ladder. While the discussion of letter writing dissipates in Volume Two, Manchester does pull from a number of documents and presents a living history. While it can be quite detailed and even somewhat dense, the reader will surely take away a great deal from the experience and feel the advancing sense of doom with each part of the book.
Without knowing the specifics of the third volume, the reader could presume that this tome presents the least ‘growth’ of Churchill as a person, but perhaps the greatest as a politician. He used his past experiences to better ground himself and holds firm to his beliefs, even in the face of major opposition. By the end, Manchester paints a Europe in the midst of a war and crisis state that could have been averted. The ousting of Chamberlain was a must and the selection of Churchill as prime minister is the only hope Britain has of righting itself, though he cannot do it alone.
Kudos again, Mr. Manchester for your hard work and dedication to the subject. The intricate details presented make for an enlightening read and one the reader can use to better understand Britain’s role in the build-up to World War II. I look forward to the last volume and all it has to offer.
Manchester tries to work in a chronological fashion as he begins the book, alternating between Churchill in the Baldwin Cabinet against the fall of the Wiemar Republic. While most of the narrative (regarding Germany) is quite well known, some of the inner workings of the British Government may be new for the reader. Once Chamberlain takes over as prime minister, Churchill is edged out and his speeches in the House shift away from domestic policy and towards the fascist uprisings in Germany and Italy. Churchill stands alone in his critique and foreboding of this ideological and military power build-up, as the British Government seeks diplomatic relations with Hitler and Mussolini. Manchester uses this isolationist theme again, after its effective use in Volume One. The isolation does not come without a cost, as his friends begin to drift away from him and the self-doubt rises. He turns to writing his numerous pieces of non-fiction, which bring him much pleasure, all while Europe is on the brink of cataclysmic change.
The aptly named sub-title of the volume can be illustrated, as mentioned before, as he remains a beacon in the night, while the Fuhrer beats his chest and begins his plan to take over the European continent, plotting to bring fascism to the mainland. Churchill was ignored post-Great War as it related to Russia’s acceptance of communism (Bolshevism), which Manchester reiterates as Churchill repeats his warnings at every opportunity, in the House and in the press. As in 1919, these pleas fall on deaf ears, leaving Churchill to contemplate what lies ahead. Chamberlain, naive and inept to his core, is more concerned with pooh-poohiong the warnings and trusting that Hitler will not cause any concern. He goes so far as to sign a Munich Pact and presumes this will quell Hitler’s need for power and territory.
Manchester is able to weave extensive discussion about the Nazi rise to power and place it against the backdrop of the view from across the English Channel. It is not only sentiment that Manchester uses as his building blocks, but the hard foundation of history, which makes the book all the better. Use of nuances and detailed historical accounts brings the book to life and sells Manchester’s theme that Churchill was surrounded by those whose interest in appeasement was stronger than any rational sentiment. Hitler did not up and decide to take these actions (as I was duped into thinking from the history books), but it was a slow and intricate chess game that Manchester describes. Chamberlain and the French cowered away under their respective rocks and could not understand why the Nazis wouldn’t just ‘be good little boys’.
Manchester fleshes out the entire Churchill, from his twice a day baths, his eccentric food habits at his country estate and even his counseling of Edward VIII prior to his abdication. Churchill is more than a stuffy cigar smoking grump whose interest lies only with climbing the political ladder. While the discussion of letter writing dissipates in Volume Two, Manchester does pull from a number of documents and presents a living history. While it can be quite detailed and even somewhat dense, the reader will surely take away a great deal from the experience and feel the advancing sense of doom with each part of the book.
Without knowing the specifics of the third volume, the reader could presume that this tome presents the least ‘growth’ of Churchill as a person, but perhaps the greatest as a politician. He used his past experiences to better ground himself and holds firm to his beliefs, even in the face of major opposition. By the end, Manchester paints a Europe in the midst of a war and crisis state that could have been averted. The ousting of Chamberlain was a must and the selection of Churchill as prime minister is the only hope Britain has of righting itself, though he cannot do it alone.
Kudos again, Mr. Manchester for your hard work and dedication to the subject. The intricate details presented make for an enlightening read and one the reader can use to better understand Britain’s role in the build-up to World War II. I look forward to the last volume and all it has to offer.
December 3, 2023
A baboon in a forest is a matter of legitimate speculation; a baboon in a Zoo is an object of public curiosity; but a baboon in your wife’s bed is a cause of the gravest concern.”
― William Manchester, The Last Lion 2: Winston Spencer Churchill Alone 1932-40
― William Manchester, The Last Lion 2: Winston Spencer Churchill Alone 1932-40
July 31, 2016
This second of three volumes by the masterful biographer covers the critical period of European history that encompasses the run-up to World War 2. The read is not quite as fun as the first volume because for most of this period Churchill was excluded from the governments in power. But it made for a thoroughly engaging tale of his persistent efforts to wield influence to counter the unfortunate policy of appeasement that Britain and France took while Nazi Germany grew ever more powerful and aggressive.
Due to his imperialist slant of not giving ground toward independence for India and work against tariffs, he was not invited to be a Cabinet member of MacDonald’s National government in 1931 and was considered too much of a warmonger to be accepted in the subsequent Conservative regimes of Baldwin and Chamberlain. We spend a lot of time with Churchill in domestic life at his estate in Kent, Chartwell. Gardening, landscaping, building walls, painting, and writing his massive tomes on a history of his ancestor the Duke of Marlborough and a history of English speaking peoples. Totally dependent on his pen for his income, he expanded his journalistic output on an impressive array of topics from literature and history to politics and foreign policy. In the latter area, his opinions on the dangers of Hitler and poor readiness of Britain to deter his aims were muffled by restrictions on his opinions being aired in the London Times or on BBC radio. However, his columns were syndicated in hundreds of newspapers throughout the world, and his speeches of warning as a Member of Parliament, ignored time and again, slowly gained allies when he was able to share details on the pitiful military readiness of the U.K. compared to Germany from his own network of contacts among insiders in the British government and in Europe.
From the perspective of the war, it is easy to lapse into a simplistic view that it was inevitable once Hitler became Chancellor in 1933 and took supreme dictatorial power with the abolishment of democracy in Germany in 1934. But with each escalation of Nazi boldness and might—remilitarization of the Rhineland in 1936, annexation of Austria in 1938, seizure of the Sudenenland part of Czechoslovakia in 1938 and military invasion of the rest in 1939—there is plenty of room for Monday morning quarterbacks to point to alternative interventions that might have been effective. However, Manchester makes it clear that the appeasement policies of Baldwin and Chamberlain were a tragic series of mistakes often founded on deception and self-interested politics, the British public was fully collusive. Compared to France, Britain’s populace didn’t care what Hitler did in Eastern Europe. A strong Germany would be a bulwark against the treat of godless communist aggression by the Soviets in Europe. The Munich Agreement handing over the Sudetenland without Czech participation for promises of future good behavior was heralded as a glorious achievement by Chamberlain for “peace in our time.” Writing to Lloyd George at the time, Churchill noted how the choice was between war and shame, and Britain’s pick of shame meant a less favorable war later.
The Blitzkrieg invasion of Bohemia and Moravia parts of Czechoslovakia was founded on Hitler’s prediction that France and Britain would do nothing. Manchester sides with Churchill and many historians that more efforts at deterrence through the League of Nations or alliance efforts among Britain, France, and the Soviets would have been effective. The Czech’s were militarily strong though poorly equipped. The German military led by General Beck was ready to stand up to Hitler should it appear other nations would come to their aid, especially in light of a Franco-Soviet Pact. When turnover of the French government made that appear unlikely, the potential “strike” by the generals was quelled. The steamrolling of the rest of Czechoslovakia and killing of up to 250,000 in Prague alone, half of them Jewish, made a mockery of the appeasement strategy and gave the Nazis the needed success to pursue Poland only months later. Mussolini’s invasion of Albania with Hitler’s permission made it clear that alliance with Italy was no longer in the cards. With Britain and France so compliant against Nazi expansion, Stalin made a deal with the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact to divide Poland with Germany and gain free rein for the Baltic states.
Against this backdrop, we experience all the detailed efforts of Churchill to get Britain and its potential allies to work together at collaborative deterrence and rearmament sufficient to match Germany’s four million men in arms and growing air and naval power. When the invasion of Poland kicked off in 1939, treaties made it inevitable that France and England declare war. Finally, Chamberlain was forced by public pressure to bring Churchill into the cabinet, giving him the post of the Admiralty like he had in World War 1 until the Gallipoli disaster. Poland put up a noble fight with a million soldiers, but the Panzer tank corps and massive bombings quickly won out, with France committing only to only a pitiful salient under an incompetent general. The only positive outcome was the escape of about 100,000 soldiers who later served admirably with the Allies in many venues of the war. Neither France or Britain wanted to bomb the munitions factories of the Ruhr for fear of reprisals by the supremely strong Lufwaffe. Aside from lots of devastating U-boat attacks in the face of Britain’s attempt of a naval blockade, there was a long pause in action for preparation.
It was a great pleasure to experience Churchill in operation at the Admiralty House. But he soon got in trouble when U-boats got into the middle of the fleet at Scarpa Floe in Scotland and sank some capital ships. His ingenious plan to gain control of Norwegian ports as a means to block the critical transport of iron ore from neutral Sweden turned out to end in a disaster in execution. The soldiers put ashore to take the ports were not prepared with skis to manage the three feet of snow, and the cabinet chose to concentrate on the well defended port of Trondheim instead of a more critical remote northern port. Unlike Gallipoli, this debacle didn’t stick to him, but instead it served as the nudge to replace Chamberlain with a new Prime Minister and national coalition government. Lord Halifax was preferred by the leaders of Parliament, but he refused, making Churchill the only real choice. Thus, this phase of the biography ends with him making his famous speech to the House of Commons:
I would say to the House, as I said to those who have joined this Government: 'I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears, and sweat.' We have before us an ordeal of the most grievous kind. We have before us many, many long months of struggle and of suffering. You ask, what is our policy? I will say: It is to wage war, by sea, land and air, with all our might and with all the strength that God can give us: to wage war against a monstrous tyranny, never surpassed in the dark, lamentable catalogue of human crime. That is our policy. You ask, what is our aim? I can answer in one word: It is victory, victory at all costs, victory in spite of all terror, victory, however long and hard the road may be; for without victory, there is no survival.
Certainly this 900-plus page read takes some commitment, but it's worth it to fill in one's gaps in understanding about the momentous events that led to the war that killed so many millions and Churchill working behind the scenes. Most of all I came to feel the tragedy of how Churchill was wasted as the man who might of led the world to peace but ended up leading the war.
Due to his imperialist slant of not giving ground toward independence for India and work against tariffs, he was not invited to be a Cabinet member of MacDonald’s National government in 1931 and was considered too much of a warmonger to be accepted in the subsequent Conservative regimes of Baldwin and Chamberlain. We spend a lot of time with Churchill in domestic life at his estate in Kent, Chartwell. Gardening, landscaping, building walls, painting, and writing his massive tomes on a history of his ancestor the Duke of Marlborough and a history of English speaking peoples. Totally dependent on his pen for his income, he expanded his journalistic output on an impressive array of topics from literature and history to politics and foreign policy. In the latter area, his opinions on the dangers of Hitler and poor readiness of Britain to deter his aims were muffled by restrictions on his opinions being aired in the London Times or on BBC radio. However, his columns were syndicated in hundreds of newspapers throughout the world, and his speeches of warning as a Member of Parliament, ignored time and again, slowly gained allies when he was able to share details on the pitiful military readiness of the U.K. compared to Germany from his own network of contacts among insiders in the British government and in Europe.
From the perspective of the war, it is easy to lapse into a simplistic view that it was inevitable once Hitler became Chancellor in 1933 and took supreme dictatorial power with the abolishment of democracy in Germany in 1934. But with each escalation of Nazi boldness and might—remilitarization of the Rhineland in 1936, annexation of Austria in 1938, seizure of the Sudenenland part of Czechoslovakia in 1938 and military invasion of the rest in 1939—there is plenty of room for Monday morning quarterbacks to point to alternative interventions that might have been effective. However, Manchester makes it clear that the appeasement policies of Baldwin and Chamberlain were a tragic series of mistakes often founded on deception and self-interested politics, the British public was fully collusive. Compared to France, Britain’s populace didn’t care what Hitler did in Eastern Europe. A strong Germany would be a bulwark against the treat of godless communist aggression by the Soviets in Europe. The Munich Agreement handing over the Sudetenland without Czech participation for promises of future good behavior was heralded as a glorious achievement by Chamberlain for “peace in our time.” Writing to Lloyd George at the time, Churchill noted how the choice was between war and shame, and Britain’s pick of shame meant a less favorable war later.
The Blitzkrieg invasion of Bohemia and Moravia parts of Czechoslovakia was founded on Hitler’s prediction that France and Britain would do nothing. Manchester sides with Churchill and many historians that more efforts at deterrence through the League of Nations or alliance efforts among Britain, France, and the Soviets would have been effective. The Czech’s were militarily strong though poorly equipped. The German military led by General Beck was ready to stand up to Hitler should it appear other nations would come to their aid, especially in light of a Franco-Soviet Pact. When turnover of the French government made that appear unlikely, the potential “strike” by the generals was quelled. The steamrolling of the rest of Czechoslovakia and killing of up to 250,000 in Prague alone, half of them Jewish, made a mockery of the appeasement strategy and gave the Nazis the needed success to pursue Poland only months later. Mussolini’s invasion of Albania with Hitler’s permission made it clear that alliance with Italy was no longer in the cards. With Britain and France so compliant against Nazi expansion, Stalin made a deal with the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact to divide Poland with Germany and gain free rein for the Baltic states.
Against this backdrop, we experience all the detailed efforts of Churchill to get Britain and its potential allies to work together at collaborative deterrence and rearmament sufficient to match Germany’s four million men in arms and growing air and naval power. When the invasion of Poland kicked off in 1939, treaties made it inevitable that France and England declare war. Finally, Chamberlain was forced by public pressure to bring Churchill into the cabinet, giving him the post of the Admiralty like he had in World War 1 until the Gallipoli disaster. Poland put up a noble fight with a million soldiers, but the Panzer tank corps and massive bombings quickly won out, with France committing only to only a pitiful salient under an incompetent general. The only positive outcome was the escape of about 100,000 soldiers who later served admirably with the Allies in many venues of the war. Neither France or Britain wanted to bomb the munitions factories of the Ruhr for fear of reprisals by the supremely strong Lufwaffe. Aside from lots of devastating U-boat attacks in the face of Britain’s attempt of a naval blockade, there was a long pause in action for preparation.
It was a great pleasure to experience Churchill in operation at the Admiralty House. But he soon got in trouble when U-boats got into the middle of the fleet at Scarpa Floe in Scotland and sank some capital ships. His ingenious plan to gain control of Norwegian ports as a means to block the critical transport of iron ore from neutral Sweden turned out to end in a disaster in execution. The soldiers put ashore to take the ports were not prepared with skis to manage the three feet of snow, and the cabinet chose to concentrate on the well defended port of Trondheim instead of a more critical remote northern port. Unlike Gallipoli, this debacle didn’t stick to him, but instead it served as the nudge to replace Chamberlain with a new Prime Minister and national coalition government. Lord Halifax was preferred by the leaders of Parliament, but he refused, making Churchill the only real choice. Thus, this phase of the biography ends with him making his famous speech to the House of Commons:
I would say to the House, as I said to those who have joined this Government: 'I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears, and sweat.' We have before us an ordeal of the most grievous kind. We have before us many, many long months of struggle and of suffering. You ask, what is our policy? I will say: It is to wage war, by sea, land and air, with all our might and with all the strength that God can give us: to wage war against a monstrous tyranny, never surpassed in the dark, lamentable catalogue of human crime. That is our policy. You ask, what is our aim? I can answer in one word: It is victory, victory at all costs, victory in spite of all terror, victory, however long and hard the road may be; for without victory, there is no survival.
Certainly this 900-plus page read takes some commitment, but it's worth it to fill in one's gaps in understanding about the momentous events that led to the war that killed so many millions and Churchill working behind the scenes. Most of all I came to feel the tragedy of how Churchill was wasted as the man who might of led the world to peace but ended up leading the war.
May 10, 2018
A magnificent history, beautifully researched, well written ... a pleasure to read ... and lots of details I may get to use in the sequel to A FLOOD OF EVIL
January 18, 2017
A brilliant, comprehensive account of Churchill's role in the crucial time frame when England and the world refused to listen to him. I'm reading parts of this as research for my draft of a sequel to A FLOOD OF EVIL ... A Flood of Evil
Currently reading about the events that preceded Hitler's occupation of the Rhineland in 1936.
MORE TO FOLLOW
Currently reading about the events that preceded Hitler's occupation of the Rhineland in 1936.
MORE TO FOLLOW
November 27, 2016
I just finished The Last Lion Part 2: Alone, 1932-1940. It left me with a pit in my stomach. This reinforces my theory that the actions of the useful idiots: The naive, the pacifists, the isolationists, the self-loathing liberals, the peace-at-any-cost crowd are the cause of more wars and end up killing more Americans and more people than the so-called warmongers that they purport to despise. It is ironic that in this case it was Great Britain’s Tory (conservative) party that helped to create a situation that would lead to the destruction of Europe and a world war that would kill millions.
The democracies of Europe, led by Great Britain’s Prime minister's Baldwin and Chamberlain allowed Hitler to walk away from the treaty of Versailles and to rebuild the German war machine. First it was PM Baldwin who did little to rearm England followed by PM Chamberlain and his gang of appeasers. They are referred to in this book as the “Men of Munich” after their leader Neville Chamberlain guaranteed “peace in our time” by giving Hitler the Sudetenland in Czechoslovakia at the Munich conference of 1938.
According to Manchester, there was one consistent voice in Parliament warning anyone who would listen that Hitler was the greatest threat to peace in Europe and that allowing the German’s to re-arm would guarantee WWII: That man was Winston Spencer Churchill.
Read this if you have the stomach. Manchester’s The Last Lion: Alone, 1932-1940 is the best account that I have ever read of events leading up to the outbreak of WWII. In fact, I feel that this aspect of the book is far more important than the personal life of Winston Churchill. You could almost remove the sections about Churchill, the family man and the books he was writing at the time etc. Until war was declared in September of 1939, Churchill, the man of a bygone Victorian era, was ignored and ostracized by his own Tory party. He was considered “out of touch” and he sat the proverbial bench for most of the 30’s. He was appointed First Lord of the Admiralty for a second time at the outbreak of the war in September of 1939 and finally PM in May of 1940. Englishmen and ministers of Parliament remembered WSC’s consistent oration against appeasement. He was a soothsayer and every bad thing he predicted about the policy of appeasement came to be.
It was eye opening to understand the blow-by-blow account of how the war was started. Manchester explains that Hitler's Germany was bracketed between France and England in the west and Czechoslovakia and Poland in the east and behind them stood a frowning Stalin who watched as German communists were shot or imprisoned. Manchester contends that Hitler couldn't have done it alone. He needed help. He got it from the original useful idiot: Neville Chamberlain. The book affirms that the Munich agreement was really the final nail in the coffin. According to Manchester, the Men of Munich are responsible for rearming the Germans, killing the Jews, enslaving the Slavs, and toppling several democracies in Europe. Munich cost the west the Soviets as a potential ally. After Munich, Stalin signed a secret non-aggression pact with Germany because he was convinced that the democracies would never fight. The Poles were doomed. Manchester writes that “They were victims of a squalid deal between two despots whose hands were stained with the blood of the innocent.” After Munich, Churchill said of Chamberlain “You were given the choice between war and dishonor. You chose dishonor and you will have war.”
When war finally broke out in Poland, France, with the largest army in the free world, had 3 weeks where they could have invaded Germany along the western front. The bulk of the German army was fighting Poland. Instead the French hid behind their massive fortress of steel and concrete. The Poles, at one time, actually drove the German 8th army back for three straight days and England’s response was to drop leaflets over Germany to tell them the truth about Hitler and to urge her citizens to overthrow Das Furor.
The governments of the free world and all the newspapers understood what the Nazis were doing as they expanded their territories. They refrained from criticizing Hitler because they were afraid that they may provoke him. Even after England declared war, Chamberlain was still worried about offending Hitler. The French even refused to fly forays into Germany because they didn’t want to instigate the Nazis. Meanwhile the Luftwaffe patrolled over France. This is mind-boggling.
This stands as an example of what disasters befall us when good, well intended men are duped by a psychopath. Thank God the free world had a man like Winston Spencer Churchill to take up the fight.
If you are in favor of appeasement or rewarding an aggressor nation please read this book. Winston said “An appeaser is one who feeds a crocodile, hoping it will eat him last.”
The free world needs another Winston Churchill. I, for one would follow that man anywhere.
The democracies of Europe, led by Great Britain’s Prime minister's Baldwin and Chamberlain allowed Hitler to walk away from the treaty of Versailles and to rebuild the German war machine. First it was PM Baldwin who did little to rearm England followed by PM Chamberlain and his gang of appeasers. They are referred to in this book as the “Men of Munich” after their leader Neville Chamberlain guaranteed “peace in our time” by giving Hitler the Sudetenland in Czechoslovakia at the Munich conference of 1938.
According to Manchester, there was one consistent voice in Parliament warning anyone who would listen that Hitler was the greatest threat to peace in Europe and that allowing the German’s to re-arm would guarantee WWII: That man was Winston Spencer Churchill.
Read this if you have the stomach. Manchester’s The Last Lion: Alone, 1932-1940 is the best account that I have ever read of events leading up to the outbreak of WWII. In fact, I feel that this aspect of the book is far more important than the personal life of Winston Churchill. You could almost remove the sections about Churchill, the family man and the books he was writing at the time etc. Until war was declared in September of 1939, Churchill, the man of a bygone Victorian era, was ignored and ostracized by his own Tory party. He was considered “out of touch” and he sat the proverbial bench for most of the 30’s. He was appointed First Lord of the Admiralty for a second time at the outbreak of the war in September of 1939 and finally PM in May of 1940. Englishmen and ministers of Parliament remembered WSC’s consistent oration against appeasement. He was a soothsayer and every bad thing he predicted about the policy of appeasement came to be.
It was eye opening to understand the blow-by-blow account of how the war was started. Manchester explains that Hitler's Germany was bracketed between France and England in the west and Czechoslovakia and Poland in the east and behind them stood a frowning Stalin who watched as German communists were shot or imprisoned. Manchester contends that Hitler couldn't have done it alone. He needed help. He got it from the original useful idiot: Neville Chamberlain. The book affirms that the Munich agreement was really the final nail in the coffin. According to Manchester, the Men of Munich are responsible for rearming the Germans, killing the Jews, enslaving the Slavs, and toppling several democracies in Europe. Munich cost the west the Soviets as a potential ally. After Munich, Stalin signed a secret non-aggression pact with Germany because he was convinced that the democracies would never fight. The Poles were doomed. Manchester writes that “They were victims of a squalid deal between two despots whose hands were stained with the blood of the innocent.” After Munich, Churchill said of Chamberlain “You were given the choice between war and dishonor. You chose dishonor and you will have war.”
When war finally broke out in Poland, France, with the largest army in the free world, had 3 weeks where they could have invaded Germany along the western front. The bulk of the German army was fighting Poland. Instead the French hid behind their massive fortress of steel and concrete. The Poles, at one time, actually drove the German 8th army back for three straight days and England’s response was to drop leaflets over Germany to tell them the truth about Hitler and to urge her citizens to overthrow Das Furor.
The governments of the free world and all the newspapers understood what the Nazis were doing as they expanded their territories. They refrained from criticizing Hitler because they were afraid that they may provoke him. Even after England declared war, Chamberlain was still worried about offending Hitler. The French even refused to fly forays into Germany because they didn’t want to instigate the Nazis. Meanwhile the Luftwaffe patrolled over France. This is mind-boggling.
This stands as an example of what disasters befall us when good, well intended men are duped by a psychopath. Thank God the free world had a man like Winston Spencer Churchill to take up the fight.
If you are in favor of appeasement or rewarding an aggressor nation please read this book. Winston said “An appeaser is one who feeds a crocodile, hoping it will eat him last.”
The free world needs another Winston Churchill. I, for one would follow that man anywhere.
June 22, 2020
Wow! I still have goosebumps from reading the ending of Volume II of this magnificent biographical trilogy. Churchill becomes Prime Minister as Nazi tanks roll across France. At 65 years old, Churchill assumes power to take on the dominating foe that he has been warning the nation about for years.
Manchester’s writing is so powerful and descriptive, you can almost smell Winston’s cigar. Well researched and with quotes from letters, and diaries, the reality of those times become authentic, and readers can imagine their parents, a fatherless young man growing up in a small town in Kansas and their mother one of nine children on a farm that just survived the depression, ready to have their live affected by these world events.
This biography should be required reading. Right now, the rage is to understand the experiences of minorities and to right past wrongs, but they were affected by these great world events and played a role in securing our freedom too.
Winston Churchill was the kind of man born once every hundred years or so with vast talents and abilities but also many human flaws. This work provides an opportunity for readers to see the life of such a man through the lens of historical events.
I know that Manchester did not live to finish the final volume, but I am excited to begin it anyway.
Manchester’s writing is so powerful and descriptive, you can almost smell Winston’s cigar. Well researched and with quotes from letters, and diaries, the reality of those times become authentic, and readers can imagine their parents, a fatherless young man growing up in a small town in Kansas and their mother one of nine children on a farm that just survived the depression, ready to have their live affected by these world events.
This biography should be required reading. Right now, the rage is to understand the experiences of minorities and to right past wrongs, but they were affected by these great world events and played a role in securing our freedom too.
Winston Churchill was the kind of man born once every hundred years or so with vast talents and abilities but also many human flaws. This work provides an opportunity for readers to see the life of such a man through the lens of historical events.
I know that Manchester did not live to finish the final volume, but I am excited to begin it anyway.
July 11, 2014
Speech of March 26, 1936 (page 192, my book)
“When you are drifting down the stream of Niagara, it may easily happen that from time to time you run into a reach of quite smooth water, or that a bend in the river or a change in the wind may make the roar of the falls seem far more distant. But, your hazard and your preoccupation are in no way affected thereby.”
Speech of December 31,1937 (page 243)
“After all, it is a horrible thing that a race of people should be attempted to be blotted out of the society in which they have been born, that from their earliest years little children should be segregated and that they should be exposed to scorn and odium. It is very painful. Moreover, it is not only in regards to Jews that there is intolerance. Religious opinions, Protestant and Catholic alike, are subject to a prejudice of which we fondly hoped and were brought up to believe, the nineteenth century had rid the world.
...Very often when these conversations begin they go very nicely for a certain time, and then it appears that what the Germans want is that peace and good will should be translated forthwith into tangible and solid immediate benefits which they are to receive. Very often it is suggested that we should promise to do something, or give something, or, what is perhaps even more difficult, to stand by and see something or other done that may not be desirable.”
This book very persuasively reveals that the years 1931 thru 1940 were Winston Churchill’s “Finest Hour”. For most of these years Churchill stood terribly alone – his voice and writings unheeded. It was only in March, 1939 after Nazi Germany snuffed out what remained of forlorn Czechoslovakia that the gaze of those in Parliament, the media (in those days newspapers and radio) and the British people turned towards him, realizing how prescient were his words over the years. And what words – the eloquence shines into immortality!
In Parliament, in newspapers he warned again and again of Nazi Germany – he realized from its very beginnings its dark threats to the future of civilization. Whereas others saw German rearmament as a necessary correction to the “evil” of the Versailles Treaty; the march into the Rhineland (1936) as Germany entering her backyard, the Anschluss of Austria (1938) as an inevitable political union of Germanic peoples; and Munich as a necessary sacrifice to keep Hitler happy.
Churchill knew the true nature of Hitler and Nazism. If Churchill’s advice had been heeded Hitler would have been stopped.
The author correctly portrays appeasement (whether of Stanley Baldwin or Neville Chamberlain’s more active role in it) as very popular and the modus operandi of that time period. They genuinely thought they could come to terms with Hitler, not realizing that dealing with Hitler was not like dealing with another democracy (like France or Holland). Possibly, as Anthony Eden said of Neville Chamberlain – “Chamberlain knew Hitler lied, he just didn’t think he would lie to him.” Churchill knew Hitler to be a liar with an enormous appetite.
The only quibble I have is that at the time of the 1939 English and French guarantee to Poland’s territory – the author insists that Soviet Russia should have been brought into this alliance. In other words England, France and the Soviet Union would guarantee the territorial integrity of Poland. Geographically this does not make sense as the Soviet Union does not share a border with Germany. Poland for obvious historical reasons did not want Soviet troops intruding on her territory to purportedly protect Poland. For another view of this see The Deadly Embrace: Hitler, Stalin, and the Nazi-Soviet Pact 1939-1941. Also at the time of Germany’s attack on Poland – it would have been easy for the French army to launch an attack on Germany’s exposed border to France. This was another “lost opportunity”; in fact the last opportunity.
What was truly frightening and remarkable is that the author provides us with several instances of how the English government suppressed criticism of Nazi Germany for fear of offending Hitler. Many British newspapers stopped publishing Churchill’s articles as these were offensive to the German Fuhrer. The BBC would not allow Churchill to do radio broadcasts. So dominant and popular was the dogma of appeasement that they emasculated criticism of the regime they felt they could get onside with repeated concessions.
Here are a few more excerpts from the book:
Churchill – (after he became Prime Minister in May 1940) (page 681)
“as if I were walking with Destiny, and that all my past life had been but a preparation for this hour and trial. Eleven years in the political wilderness had freed me from ordinary party antagonisms. My warnings over the last six years had been so numerous, so detailed, and were now so terribly vindicated, that no one could gainsay me.”
Churchill speech of May 19, 1940 (page 686) – when Germany attacked Holland, Belgium and France in May 1940
“Behind them, behind us – behind the armies of Britain and France – gather a group of shattered states and bludgeoned races: the Czechs, the Poles, the Norwegians, the Danes, the Dutch, the Belgians – Upon all of whom a long night of barbarism will descend unbroken even by a star of hope, unless we conquer, as conquer we must; as conquer we shall.”
Isaiah Berlin on Churchill (page 687)
saw him as a leader who imposed his “imagination and his will upon his countrymen,” idealizing them “with such intensity that in the end they approached his ideal and began to see themselves as he saw them.”
“When you are drifting down the stream of Niagara, it may easily happen that from time to time you run into a reach of quite smooth water, or that a bend in the river or a change in the wind may make the roar of the falls seem far more distant. But, your hazard and your preoccupation are in no way affected thereby.”
Speech of December 31,1937 (page 243)
“After all, it is a horrible thing that a race of people should be attempted to be blotted out of the society in which they have been born, that from their earliest years little children should be segregated and that they should be exposed to scorn and odium. It is very painful. Moreover, it is not only in regards to Jews that there is intolerance. Religious opinions, Protestant and Catholic alike, are subject to a prejudice of which we fondly hoped and were brought up to believe, the nineteenth century had rid the world.
...Very often when these conversations begin they go very nicely for a certain time, and then it appears that what the Germans want is that peace and good will should be translated forthwith into tangible and solid immediate benefits which they are to receive. Very often it is suggested that we should promise to do something, or give something, or, what is perhaps even more difficult, to stand by and see something or other done that may not be desirable.”
This book very persuasively reveals that the years 1931 thru 1940 were Winston Churchill’s “Finest Hour”. For most of these years Churchill stood terribly alone – his voice and writings unheeded. It was only in March, 1939 after Nazi Germany snuffed out what remained of forlorn Czechoslovakia that the gaze of those in Parliament, the media (in those days newspapers and radio) and the British people turned towards him, realizing how prescient were his words over the years. And what words – the eloquence shines into immortality!
In Parliament, in newspapers he warned again and again of Nazi Germany – he realized from its very beginnings its dark threats to the future of civilization. Whereas others saw German rearmament as a necessary correction to the “evil” of the Versailles Treaty; the march into the Rhineland (1936) as Germany entering her backyard, the Anschluss of Austria (1938) as an inevitable political union of Germanic peoples; and Munich as a necessary sacrifice to keep Hitler happy.
Churchill knew the true nature of Hitler and Nazism. If Churchill’s advice had been heeded Hitler would have been stopped.
The author correctly portrays appeasement (whether of Stanley Baldwin or Neville Chamberlain’s more active role in it) as very popular and the modus operandi of that time period. They genuinely thought they could come to terms with Hitler, not realizing that dealing with Hitler was not like dealing with another democracy (like France or Holland). Possibly, as Anthony Eden said of Neville Chamberlain – “Chamberlain knew Hitler lied, he just didn’t think he would lie to him.” Churchill knew Hitler to be a liar with an enormous appetite.
The only quibble I have is that at the time of the 1939 English and French guarantee to Poland’s territory – the author insists that Soviet Russia should have been brought into this alliance. In other words England, France and the Soviet Union would guarantee the territorial integrity of Poland. Geographically this does not make sense as the Soviet Union does not share a border with Germany. Poland for obvious historical reasons did not want Soviet troops intruding on her territory to purportedly protect Poland. For another view of this see The Deadly Embrace: Hitler, Stalin, and the Nazi-Soviet Pact 1939-1941. Also at the time of Germany’s attack on Poland – it would have been easy for the French army to launch an attack on Germany’s exposed border to France. This was another “lost opportunity”; in fact the last opportunity.
What was truly frightening and remarkable is that the author provides us with several instances of how the English government suppressed criticism of Nazi Germany for fear of offending Hitler. Many British newspapers stopped publishing Churchill’s articles as these were offensive to the German Fuhrer. The BBC would not allow Churchill to do radio broadcasts. So dominant and popular was the dogma of appeasement that they emasculated criticism of the regime they felt they could get onside with repeated concessions.
Here are a few more excerpts from the book:
Churchill – (after he became Prime Minister in May 1940) (page 681)
“as if I were walking with Destiny, and that all my past life had been but a preparation for this hour and trial. Eleven years in the political wilderness had freed me from ordinary party antagonisms. My warnings over the last six years had been so numerous, so detailed, and were now so terribly vindicated, that no one could gainsay me.”
Churchill speech of May 19, 1940 (page 686) – when Germany attacked Holland, Belgium and France in May 1940
“Behind them, behind us – behind the armies of Britain and France – gather a group of shattered states and bludgeoned races: the Czechs, the Poles, the Norwegians, the Danes, the Dutch, the Belgians – Upon all of whom a long night of barbarism will descend unbroken even by a star of hope, unless we conquer, as conquer we must; as conquer we shall.”
Isaiah Berlin on Churchill (page 687)
saw him as a leader who imposed his “imagination and his will upon his countrymen,” idealizing them “with such intensity that in the end they approached his ideal and began to see themselves as he saw them.”
February 22, 2013
Eight hundred plus pages of Churchill in the wilderness. The book was hard to read as I found myself exasperated at a whole class of leaders, a whole nation, actually many nations, that could not see what Churchill could see. I understand that knowing the history of WWII gives me a special position to judge, but I found it nearly unbelievable almost no one for a decade did not heed the warnings in his speeches and writings.
Warned about a rearming Germany and calling for the United Kingdom to rearm, he was called hysterical. Warns about Hitler's nature as put down in Mien Kampt. He was called a warmonger. Warned not to stand for Germany taking the Rhine,he was called crazy. Warned they should not give in to Hitler on Czechoslovakia, he was called an embarrassment. When he warned Poland is next, he was told repeatedly they didn't want to get Hitler mad at Britain and appeasing him was the only way. When he is finally named Prime Minister in the last pages of the book – after war had been declared and on the very day France came under attack – the book became very enjoyable. Just fruits.
I'm very impressed with the thoroughness of Manchester and his ability to make a very frustrating story readable and enjoyable. I learned a great deal about how Hitler was allowed, no, assisted, in bringing Europe to the edge of of a cliff. Also learned more about the government of the UK.
Can't wait to read the last volume.
Warned about a rearming Germany and calling for the United Kingdom to rearm, he was called hysterical. Warns about Hitler's nature as put down in Mien Kampt. He was called a warmonger. Warned not to stand for Germany taking the Rhine,he was called crazy. Warned they should not give in to Hitler on Czechoslovakia, he was called an embarrassment. When he warned Poland is next, he was told repeatedly they didn't want to get Hitler mad at Britain and appeasing him was the only way. When he is finally named Prime Minister in the last pages of the book – after war had been declared and on the very day France came under attack – the book became very enjoyable. Just fruits.
I'm very impressed with the thoroughness of Manchester and his ability to make a very frustrating story readable and enjoyable. I learned a great deal about how Hitler was allowed, no, assisted, in bringing Europe to the edge of of a cliff. Also learned more about the government of the UK.
Can't wait to read the last volume.
April 11, 2019
The first volume of this trilogy reads like a novel. A friend of mine, based on the mixture of subject matter for volume 1 and the great writing, described reading it as "like eating candy."
This second volume was not only much shorter than many expected, but did not live up to the level of the writing in volume 1. I would learn many years later that the author was struggling with a serious case of writer's block. Which also explains why he never wrote the final volume, even though he had done a great deal of research on it.
https://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/04/ma...
4/19
I should add that given the passage of time per the imperfect Last Lion trilogy, I think it's a good thing a new bio, well-received, has recently come out to cover the whole story.
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/3...
This second volume was not only much shorter than many expected, but did not live up to the level of the writing in volume 1. I would learn many years later that the author was struggling with a serious case of writer's block. Which also explains why he never wrote the final volume, even though he had done a great deal of research on it.
https://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/04/ma...
4/19
I should add that given the passage of time per the imperfect Last Lion trilogy, I think it's a good thing a new bio, well-received, has recently come out to cover the whole story.
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/3...
February 14, 2018
What an awe-inspiring man, and what a tremendously ambitious biography. Succeeds beyond all expectation!
February 7, 2020
This is the pinnacle of longform biography. This, the second in Manchester’s trilogy, covers the relatively brief excerpt of Churchill’s life from 1932—1940, but stands on its own as a symphony that reads in three sweeping movements.
Manchester opens with an Allegro tone, visiting Churchill in his beloved Chartwell home, describing his daily routine—which sounds mundane but is really quite something.
Then the clouds roll in. The idyllic, bright, energized scenery is dimmed by the growing twilight over the horizon in Germany, within Parliament, and in Churchill’s own persona as he is cast out as an exile for staying his backbone while the Cabinet bends over backward to cater to Hitler. It wasn’t just a matter of standing by passively while he encroached on all manners of civilized life. They enabled him. Manchester draws out the facts of the matter at length in this second movement, the glum Adagio. It is tormenting to read.
Having brought us to the brink of despair, Manchester then turns to the third movement. The pace quickens and Manchester’s writing peaks alongside the action. There is a new electricity running through his pen. It’s thrilling. Hitler’s actions can no longer be ignored. He doesn’t want them to be ignored. He wants war and he gets it. Parliament must now pay for their years of appeasement. They are not the ones who can carry the fight forward. There is only one who can and everyone knows it. He bursts back onto the stage, piercing the darkness. Hope shines through.
You ask, what is our policy? I will say: It is to wage war, by sea, land and air, with all our might and with all the strength God can give us. That is our policy. You ask, what is our aim? I can answer in one word: It is victory, victory at all costs, victory in spite of all terror, victory however long and hard the road may be; for without victory, there is no survival.
Manchester opens with an Allegro tone, visiting Churchill in his beloved Chartwell home, describing his daily routine—which sounds mundane but is really quite something.
Then the clouds roll in. The idyllic, bright, energized scenery is dimmed by the growing twilight over the horizon in Germany, within Parliament, and in Churchill’s own persona as he is cast out as an exile for staying his backbone while the Cabinet bends over backward to cater to Hitler. It wasn’t just a matter of standing by passively while he encroached on all manners of civilized life. They enabled him. Manchester draws out the facts of the matter at length in this second movement, the glum Adagio. It is tormenting to read.
Having brought us to the brink of despair, Manchester then turns to the third movement. The pace quickens and Manchester’s writing peaks alongside the action. There is a new electricity running through his pen. It’s thrilling. Hitler’s actions can no longer be ignored. He doesn’t want them to be ignored. He wants war and he gets it. Parliament must now pay for their years of appeasement. They are not the ones who can carry the fight forward. There is only one who can and everyone knows it. He bursts back onto the stage, piercing the darkness. Hope shines through.
You ask, what is our policy? I will say: It is to wage war, by sea, land and air, with all our might and with all the strength God can give us. That is our policy. You ask, what is our aim? I can answer in one word: It is victory, victory at all costs, victory in spite of all terror, victory however long and hard the road may be; for without victory, there is no survival.
October 11, 2020
An eloquent voicing crying out in the wilderness a warning of war and dismissed until vindicated when that war begins, the nation and the world towards him as the last shining hope of the war. The Last Lion: Winston Spencer Churchill: Alone, 1932-1940 is the second volume of William Manchester’s biographical trilogy which deals with Churchill’s life during his political “wilderness” years as Europe slid towards war.
From the outset Manchester indicates that a biography is not just about a person, but also the times that individual lived in. It was a subtle hint that the “wilderness” years of Winston Spencer-Churchill’s political life wouldn’t follow one man be an examination about how the 1930s saw the rise of darkness on the continent and the willingness of the British upper class to do everything possible to acquiesce with it in the name of never going to war again. With the rise of Adolf Hitler in 1933, Churchill found his nemesis and began signaling the danger to the British Empire and the peace of Europe to an empty House of Commons for years while challenging the government on preparedness of the armed forces in comparison to Germany, only to be lied to in response and knowing it due to his “spy network” amongst the civil servants and military officers that saw the dangers of the Nazi. During these years, Churchill would write columns and articles in various British media and around the world warning the dangers of the Nazis only to be labeled a warmonger until Hitler set his eyes on territorial expansion and many around the continent looked to him to plead for them in front of the British public while the Nazis would always attack him in their propaganda newspapers and complain to the appeaser British ambassador. In 1936 it seemed that Churchill’s call to action had caught the national mood when suddenly his support of Edward VIII as a person if not his decisions made him the scapegoat to the national anger of the constitutional crisis by the King’s desire to marry Wallis Simpson, thus with the public angry at Churchill the national leadership dismissed his calls for action even as Hitler moved his eyes towards Austria and Czechoslovakia. With the rise of Neville Chamberlain as Prime Minister the enabling of Hitler through appeasement and undermining of their alliance with France while discouraging the German military from overthrowing Hitler which would have precluded the start of another war. Once war seemed inevitable as 1939 continued, Churchill’s outsider status for the previous decade and call for preparedness had the public calling for him to in the cabinet something Chamberlain didn’t want to do until he finally had to form a War Cabinet after declaring war. Once again First Lord of the Admiralty, Churchill literally led the British war effort as it was the Royal Navy was instantly was fighting the Germans not the Army or Air Force until the Norway and the invasion of the Low Countries in 1940 at which time the Conversative backbenchers and Labour forced Chamberlain to surrender his office and nominating Churchill to George VI.
Covering eight years of a person’s life would not normally take almost 700 pages, but as Manchester implied at the beginning of this book this is more a history of the times almost as much as it was a biography. Though Churchill is the focus throughout, the lives and actions of Stanley Baldwin, Neville Chamberlain, Adolf Hitler, and many others are covered especially in their reactions to and from Churchill. Manchester’s bias against “the Men of Munich” is overwhelmingly apparent though as an individual who fought in the war—admittedly in the Pacific—it shouldn’t surprise the reader that a veteran would not shine a good light on someone who kowtowed to Hitler’s wishes instead of having a spine. The political drama surrounding Chamberlain’s loss of support in the House and the rise of Churchill even in the shadow of the German invasion of the Low Countries is literally the best part of the book even though the reader knows the outcomes, how the two were both independent of one another though both played off one another.
Alone, 1932-1940 portrays the low ebb of Winston Churchill’s political and real life as all his eloquence falls not on deaf years but those who simply do not care until it is too late. William Manchester not only follows Churchill’s life during these eight years, but also the nation and the world he was living in and those in power that allowed Europe to go to war twenty years after the last one. Today we think it was inevitable that Churchill would rise to become Prime Minister, but to even Churchill during these years it wasn’t and this book explains why.
From the outset Manchester indicates that a biography is not just about a person, but also the times that individual lived in. It was a subtle hint that the “wilderness” years of Winston Spencer-Churchill’s political life wouldn’t follow one man be an examination about how the 1930s saw the rise of darkness on the continent and the willingness of the British upper class to do everything possible to acquiesce with it in the name of never going to war again. With the rise of Adolf Hitler in 1933, Churchill found his nemesis and began signaling the danger to the British Empire and the peace of Europe to an empty House of Commons for years while challenging the government on preparedness of the armed forces in comparison to Germany, only to be lied to in response and knowing it due to his “spy network” amongst the civil servants and military officers that saw the dangers of the Nazi. During these years, Churchill would write columns and articles in various British media and around the world warning the dangers of the Nazis only to be labeled a warmonger until Hitler set his eyes on territorial expansion and many around the continent looked to him to plead for them in front of the British public while the Nazis would always attack him in their propaganda newspapers and complain to the appeaser British ambassador. In 1936 it seemed that Churchill’s call to action had caught the national mood when suddenly his support of Edward VIII as a person if not his decisions made him the scapegoat to the national anger of the constitutional crisis by the King’s desire to marry Wallis Simpson, thus with the public angry at Churchill the national leadership dismissed his calls for action even as Hitler moved his eyes towards Austria and Czechoslovakia. With the rise of Neville Chamberlain as Prime Minister the enabling of Hitler through appeasement and undermining of their alliance with France while discouraging the German military from overthrowing Hitler which would have precluded the start of another war. Once war seemed inevitable as 1939 continued, Churchill’s outsider status for the previous decade and call for preparedness had the public calling for him to in the cabinet something Chamberlain didn’t want to do until he finally had to form a War Cabinet after declaring war. Once again First Lord of the Admiralty, Churchill literally led the British war effort as it was the Royal Navy was instantly was fighting the Germans not the Army or Air Force until the Norway and the invasion of the Low Countries in 1940 at which time the Conversative backbenchers and Labour forced Chamberlain to surrender his office and nominating Churchill to George VI.
Covering eight years of a person’s life would not normally take almost 700 pages, but as Manchester implied at the beginning of this book this is more a history of the times almost as much as it was a biography. Though Churchill is the focus throughout, the lives and actions of Stanley Baldwin, Neville Chamberlain, Adolf Hitler, and many others are covered especially in their reactions to and from Churchill. Manchester’s bias against “the Men of Munich” is overwhelmingly apparent though as an individual who fought in the war—admittedly in the Pacific—it shouldn’t surprise the reader that a veteran would not shine a good light on someone who kowtowed to Hitler’s wishes instead of having a spine. The political drama surrounding Chamberlain’s loss of support in the House and the rise of Churchill even in the shadow of the German invasion of the Low Countries is literally the best part of the book even though the reader knows the outcomes, how the two were both independent of one another though both played off one another.
Alone, 1932-1940 portrays the low ebb of Winston Churchill’s political and real life as all his eloquence falls not on deaf years but those who simply do not care until it is too late. William Manchester not only follows Churchill’s life during these eight years, but also the nation and the world he was living in and those in power that allowed Europe to go to war twenty years after the last one. Today we think it was inevitable that Churchill would rise to become Prime Minister, but to even Churchill during these years it wasn’t and this book explains why.
December 21, 2012
This was the most compelling biography I have ever read. For years I have wondered how to understand World War II-the forces that led up to it and the counties that seemed to just give up and allow Hitler and the Nazi's to take over their countries. This book weaves together the facts and the opinions of not just Winston Churchill, but the other politicians and observers in a logical, sympathetic (sometimes) way. I am going to read the preceding work and finally the WWII years so that I have a better understanding of not just the United Kingdom's attitudes, but of the European view as well. Naturally the United States plays a significantly smaller role in a biography of Winston Churchill than the UK does, but as an American I need to step back and learn from this perspective, it is quite a shock to view the war from this perspective. I kept wanting to shout, "Don't let the Germans take over," but naturally I couldn't do anything and that was so frustrating, but i does help to understand the whys of the lives that were lost and the war that was supposed to-once again-end all wars.
December 13, 2008
This second volume is good, focused on the years 1932-1940... Manchester examines the internal politics of Britain and the international diplomatic goings on of Europe at the time. Churchill is the main character of course, but Manchester keeps this book very broad and zeroes in on quite a few political figures, especially Neville Chamberlain (to devastating effect) and quite a few other European figures.
Manchester makes it easy to follow the diplomatic strategies and decisions taken by various European powers and their politicians. In his view the greatest errors were made by politicians who blindly adhered to the idea of keeping peace no matter the cost (Churchill on the other hand saw the threat and risk that this policy held, and his unheeded warnings and fears would eventually be proven accurate). Many of Britain and France's most powerful politicians would continue blindly clinging to their appeasement policy in spite of event after event that clearly contradicted their stance. In the end, Hitler was the greatest beneficiary of this policy...
Manchester makes it easy to follow the diplomatic strategies and decisions taken by various European powers and their politicians. In his view the greatest errors were made by politicians who blindly adhered to the idea of keeping peace no matter the cost (Churchill on the other hand saw the threat and risk that this policy held, and his unheeded warnings and fears would eventually be proven accurate). Many of Britain and France's most powerful politicians would continue blindly clinging to their appeasement policy in spite of event after event that clearly contradicted their stance. In the end, Hitler was the greatest beneficiary of this policy...
February 16, 2013
Utterly brilliant. A mesmerizing read from cover to cover. It was a bit jarring to realize about 250 pages in that the focus would stray only briefly and infrequently away from the growing Nazi menace and Churchill's solitary voice warning against it. But that's where the story was.
This volume, tragically, paints a horrible picture of the British policy of appeasement, which dominated the cabinet, the media, and other stakeholders, well before it was infamously embodied at Munich. Looking back now, knowing the pure evil designs and outcomes of Herr Hitler and his regime, it's shocking to see how willing the British government was to let him do his thing, often simply out of fear of offending Hitler. It's unfathomable. In that regard, reading this volume was almost like watching a train wreck. You just want to scream at Chamberlain, et al.
Looking forward to volume three...after a short break.
This volume, tragically, paints a horrible picture of the British policy of appeasement, which dominated the cabinet, the media, and other stakeholders, well before it was infamously embodied at Munich. Looking back now, knowing the pure evil designs and outcomes of Herr Hitler and his regime, it's shocking to see how willing the British government was to let him do his thing, often simply out of fear of offending Hitler. It's unfathomable. In that regard, reading this volume was almost like watching a train wreck. You just want to scream at Chamberlain, et al.
Looking forward to volume three...after a short break.
June 29, 2019
Winston Churchill's crusade to the warn the world about Hitler is painful to read about: the great admiration for the Nazis shown by so many Englishman will rile the modern reader. But the events of these years show Churchill's strength of character, which should be inspiring to anyone who has ever played the role of a lone voice crying out in the wilderness.
The audiobook narration by Richard Brown is vastly inferior to the production of volume one by Frederick Davidson, but the book itself is so excellent that listeners will find it worthwhile to press forward through this second volume of the trilogy.
The audiobook narration by Richard Brown is vastly inferior to the production of volume one by Frederick Davidson, but the book itself is so excellent that listeners will find it worthwhile to press forward through this second volume of the trilogy.
January 4, 2018
It was very difficult to read how Britain repeatedly appeased Hitler. Churchill alone spoke out over the prewar years warning Britain that Hitler was a serious threat. But Winston was ridiculed.
August 2, 2020
"Alone" is Book #2 in the three-volume biography of arguably the greatest Englishman EVER, Winston Spencer Churchill. It covers the years 1932-1940 when Churchill was a backbencher in Parliament, ignored for a ministry by his own party. He was the lone voice crying in the wilderness about Adolph Hitler. All the government, the Prime Minister, Neville Chamberlain, and even the English people wanted was peace. Peace at any price. This led to the policy of appeasememnt, of constantly saying, "This far and no further," to Hitler, but never meaning it. My shame, rage, and embarrassment for the government while reading about the Munich agreement that sacrificed Czechoslovakia as a viable state was palpable. I can only imagine how Churchill felt, although this book goes a long way in explaining it all to us.
This book wasn't as enjoyable as Book #1 b/c the Boer War and WWI are over, and Churchill had no power in the Tory government, b/c he didn't hold a Ministry position. He sure wrote a lot in these years though! There is also very little of Churchill's private life in this book, although the book begins w/ a lengthy discussion of a typical day at Chartwell, Churchill's country home. We only found out about personal events in captions of pictures, which is how we find out that Churchill's daughter, Sarah, married twice in three years, and that his second daughter, Diana, became a chorus girl! There is some discussion of the fact that Churchill's only son, Randolph, was a cad and didn't live up to his father's greatness.
Churchill did develop a thorough intelligence service, often finding out stuff from Berlin long before his own government did through his own sources. I'm sure that will come in handy when, in the next book, England is fighting the Nazis single-handedly. This book ends w/ Churchill becoming Prime Minister in May, 1940, as the Nazis are overrunning the low countries.
On to book #3, which is HUGE, around 1,050 pages. I will have invested nearly 3,000 pages of reading by the time I finish this trilogy.
This book wasn't as enjoyable as Book #1 b/c the Boer War and WWI are over, and Churchill had no power in the Tory government, b/c he didn't hold a Ministry position. He sure wrote a lot in these years though! There is also very little of Churchill's private life in this book, although the book begins w/ a lengthy discussion of a typical day at Chartwell, Churchill's country home. We only found out about personal events in captions of pictures, which is how we find out that Churchill's daughter, Sarah, married twice in three years, and that his second daughter, Diana, became a chorus girl! There is some discussion of the fact that Churchill's only son, Randolph, was a cad and didn't live up to his father's greatness.
Churchill did develop a thorough intelligence service, often finding out stuff from Berlin long before his own government did through his own sources. I'm sure that will come in handy when, in the next book, England is fighting the Nazis single-handedly. This book ends w/ Churchill becoming Prime Minister in May, 1940, as the Nazis are overrunning the low countries.
On to book #3, which is HUGE, around 1,050 pages. I will have invested nearly 3,000 pages of reading by the time I finish this trilogy.
June 30, 2025
Churchill had Hitler’s number and he started agitating against him and fascism quite early. And “alone.” He fell out of favor with his party after WW I and he was excluded from the Parliament leadership. What a shame, because he spend the next dozen years arguing for Britain’s rearmament and against Hitler. The entire book is “Churchill was steadfast, everyone else were weasels and appeasers.”
It’s a great book, but it makes me mad.
It’s a great book, but it makes me mad.
December 4, 2021
A wonderful portrayal of Churchill in the prewar years when he was out of power. This is a brilliant book that begs me to read volume 3. It is a biography and not a “life and times” but the context-setting is extraordinary.
July 5, 2020
I finished this book with several thoughts.
1. He was less than perfect. 1 affair, issues with racism (though when you compare him to Hitler and Nazi officials he's positively polite*), his bluntness, inability to live simply... they all are part of this very imperfect being.
2. I don't know the details of Manchester's illness(?) and death, but perhaps that accounts for his struggle to tell the story at times. He would get caught up in what Winston did during Baldwin's ministry and follow it for pages... and then insert a couple of pages regarding family issues that happened 2 years prior. If you're going to write a story chronologically, then tell it chronologically.
3. Unless you or I are perfect, we really can't ask that of other human beings. And as a recovering perfectionist, I'd really prefer not to project that on to others. But that means being willing to let go and forgive and that's hard. I really liked Talking to Strangers: What We Should Know About the People We Don’t Know's chapter on Chamberlain's visit to Germany.
4. I crave unity and solidarity... almost like I crave food and sleep. Realizing that helped me to understand why some people can be so set in stone about their loyalties. Perhaps it gives them what I don't have because I read and see too much. I devoured the last couple of pages, and would have done so literally if it would have done something for that quivering mass of despair hidden in the corner of my soul, because it was something that leaders** should do and could do... if they understood. But, currently, they don't.
5.(edit) You can't read this book and reports on Hong Kong arrests without starting to see things. Let hope I'm wrong.
*The joke about Gandhi to Halifax was repulsive.
**of both political persuasions. Let's not play favorites, okay?
1. He was less than perfect. 1 affair, issues with racism (though when you compare him to Hitler and Nazi officials he's positively polite*), his bluntness, inability to live simply... they all are part of this very imperfect being.
2. I don't know the details of Manchester's illness(?) and death, but perhaps that accounts for his struggle to tell the story at times. He would get caught up in what Winston did during Baldwin's ministry and follow it for pages... and then insert a couple of pages regarding family issues that happened 2 years prior. If you're going to write a story chronologically, then tell it chronologically.
3. Unless you or I are perfect, we really can't ask that of other human beings. And as a recovering perfectionist, I'd really prefer not to project that on to others. But that means being willing to let go and forgive and that's hard. I really liked Talking to Strangers: What We Should Know About the People We Don’t Know's chapter on Chamberlain's visit to Germany.
4. I crave unity and solidarity... almost like I crave food and sleep. Realizing that helped me to understand why some people can be so set in stone about their loyalties. Perhaps it gives them what I don't have because I read and see too much. I devoured the last couple of pages, and would have done so literally if it would have done something for that quivering mass of despair hidden in the corner of my soul, because it was something that leaders** should do and could do... if they understood. But, currently, they don't.
5.(edit) You can't read this book and reports on Hong Kong arrests without starting to see things. Let hope I'm wrong.
*The joke about Gandhi to Halifax was repulsive.
**of both political persuasions. Let's not play favorites, okay?
August 31, 2017
This volume covers the quietest period of Churchill's life. He is on the outside: out of Parliament, out of favor, out of work, out of funds. But he had inside information on German activity, in what to me is one of the strangest footnotes of history.
Church's curiosity and forethought prompted a request in the 1920's of the PM of state secrets concerning Germany's rebuilding. This was granted and never rescinded. New British governments were unaware of Winston's access, but he kept a pulse on every aspect of their future enemy's strength.
One learns much about the character of a person by observing their response to failure and their quotidian choices in the midst of tedium and frustrated desires. Churchill painted, built brick cottages, and wrote books. And continued his unceasing warnings that lost him popularity and favor.
It was painful to watch Chamberlain's appeasement policy miss the mark year after year after year. The irony of Winston's position is that those years of cicada-screeching made him the one all Britain turned to when his warnings came to fruition.
I docked one star because it seemed to me that Manchester went into too much detail of the politics of England in the 1930's.
Church's curiosity and forethought prompted a request in the 1920's of the PM of state secrets concerning Germany's rebuilding. This was granted and never rescinded. New British governments were unaware of Winston's access, but he kept a pulse on every aspect of their future enemy's strength.
One learns much about the character of a person by observing their response to failure and their quotidian choices in the midst of tedium and frustrated desires. Churchill painted, built brick cottages, and wrote books. And continued his unceasing warnings that lost him popularity and favor.
It was painful to watch Chamberlain's appeasement policy miss the mark year after year after year. The irony of Winston's position is that those years of cicada-screeching made him the one all Britain turned to when his warnings came to fruition.
I docked one star because it seemed to me that Manchester went into too much detail of the politics of England in the 1930's.
September 7, 2014
One of the best overviews of the run up to WWII. Amazing book about Churchill.
November 28, 2017
I thought of some alternative subtitles after reading this book. "Appeasement in our Time." "With Leaders like this, you don't need Enemies." "When war winners become losers."
I'm not trying to trivialize this modern masterpiece. It's just that, the more one reads of the foolhardy actions taken by the great European democracies after World War I regarding their future survival, the more one feels a sense of unease over the incompetence and lies which allowed a threat to world peace to gain a footing and prosper in Germany. It has been said that the seeds of World War II were sown in the way peace was restored following World War I. There may have been an inevitability to the rise of National Socialism among a populace humiliated by being labeled as the instigators of the first war, while boiling over with anger directed toward their own wartime government which capitulated before a victory over Germany's enemies or complete destruction of the country in defeat could be finalized in 1918. World War II became not so much a result of the need to revenge insults as a resetting of the state of hostilities left unfinished in 1918 that the Nazis were only too happy to commit their country on.
The subtitle "Alone" describes the position Winston Churchill was in during the 1930's, during which he was one of the few public figures who didn't subscribe to the corrosive groupthink guiding the British diplomatic direction. Winston had, by 1932, been a central figure in the government, after gaining a reputation as a war hero during several Victorian era colonial wars. He had held cabinet positions along with his position as a member of Parliament. His Victorian values prevented him from going along with the rest of the Tory-led government on Indian dominion status, and now he would view the great events of the day as an outsider.
It can be argued that the country needed someone with Winston's deep thinking serving HMG, but events would prove that his pariah status kept him from being tainted as just another insider at a time when the country was being sold down the river by its leaders. The main point of contention was Winston's instinctive and highly correct disliking of the new Nazi leadership in Germany, which would constantly run counter to the directions that a series of PM's, from MacDonald to Baldwin to Chamberlain.
By the time Stanley Baldwin took over, the mantra of diplomacy was appeasement, appeasement, appeasement. Neville Chamblerlain would become the high priest of the concept. The associates of these PM's would be yes-men or they wouldn't remain in office. The two most notorious to emerge were Chamberlain's Foreign Secretary, Lord Halifax, and the British ambassador in Berlin, the boot-licker of Hitler and the Nazi leadership, Sir Neville Henderson. These two, with the PM and Chamberlain's "Rasputin", Horace Wilson, became the "Men of Munich", those that orchestrated the sell-out of the Czechs during the Sudenten Crisis of 1938, that William Manchester methodically indicts for their actions.
As Manchester points out in the Author's Note, this work is a biography and not a history. Nevertheless, a biographer cannot make all facets of his subject's life clear without knowing that the reader understands the dynamics existing in the world while the story is unfolding. There was an awful lot going on in Winston's world, and Manchester does a masterful job of bringing the early twentieth century world into focus, especially as events transpired in Great Britain and Europe.
At the center of Manchester's story, of course, is Winston Churchill,
an ex-government minister. He retained his seat in Parliament, but would serve as a backbencher, literally an outsider within the House of Commons, not trusted or respected by most of the members of his party, which ran the government at this time. Different reasons explain his outsider status, including India, his previous defection from the Tories before returning to the party (ratting and re-ratting), and the hard-to-shake unfair (according to Manchester) reputation as the planner of the disastrous World War I Galipoli campaign. Most damning concerning Churchill's suitability to participate in government, however, was his absolute unwillingness to countenance the feckless foreign policy of his country. The two greatest victorious European powers of World War I, Great Britain and France, had established punitive conditions at Versailles which effectively would keep Germany bound with rules against re-armament so that peace in Europe would be maintained. Now, the British government was soft pedaling German rearmament, and would continue to rationalize Germany's erosion and eventual rebuke of the Versailles rules.
Manchester shows how Winston became Europe's best informed private citizen. He had at one time been given access to British military records which was never revoked, allowing him to mine a trove of military statistics up to World War II. Probably of most importance, however, was his huge network of operatives consisting of civil service and military workers who increasingly lost faith in their leadership and sent him valuable intelligence about British and even German armament manufacturing and stockpiling, at great personal risk to themselves. After the war, he would recall much of this data in charts and tables to bolster his recollection of this time in his great first volume in his "The Second World War" series titled "The Gathering Storm."
"The Last Lion 2" distressingly unfolds with the stagnation of British military preparedness while Nazi Germany became a formidable power in less than a decade. The French, Britain's ally with the largest, most powerful army in Europe at the beginning of this era, were increasingly weakened by a chaotic political scene. The one thing most of France's parties agreed on was the conviction to never again engage in vigorous action which could lead to the appalling bloodletting of World War I, and thus their army marked time inside a static defense which would prove catastrophic in 1940. Manchester writes about a corrosive spirit which permeated all strata of French society, undermining support of any measures, including expenditure of needed money, for the building of a military force which would engage a foreign enemy in the field.
A key point which Manchester presents is that the German adventurism and saber rattling of the 1930's was rationalized rather than condemned by the British government and seconded by the news media. As each German-provoked European crisis transpired, HMG tried find a reason to keep betting on the chimera of a stable Germany as a potential ally against any potential threat which may in future be posed by Russia. Winston Churchill risked, and damaged his public stature by constantly speaking publicly about the danger posed to Britain in these circumstances, and by pleading incessantly for his country to engage in efforts to form alliances with other countries to counter the German threat through the mechanism of collective security. His efforts were very effectively countered by a press which did not print his most forceful messages to a public which by the 1930's was living in a post-World War I collective post traumatic disorder.
There is a lot of great diplomatic and political history in this book. Some of the most compelling, in my opinion, occured around the time of the eventual realization by Chamberlain that Great Britain was hoodwinked, after Hitler turned the Sudentenland partition into an occupation of all of Czechoslovakia. When it became apparent that diplomatic steps needed to be explored in order to put up a challenge to a now-dominant German military, Chamberlain ineptly engaged in secret negotiations which bound England to go to war in the event of a German invasion of a Poland led by men of "dubious and unstable judgement" (p. 406).
There is a certain linearity narration of pieces of common knowledge by which history is portrayed in history class and on those endless World War II television documentaries: Great Britain and France had established a pact to go to war if Poland was invaded; Hitler invaded Poland on September 1st; Britain and France logically went to war; eventually the allies won the war ... (no wonder students are bored with history). In reality, by the time Hitler invaded Poland, HMG was trying to find a way to engage in negotiations in order to get an assurance from the Germans that they would stop fighting if they were allowed to keep Danzig, not having a clue that Hitler's earlier demands over Danzig were only a pretext for invading Poland. If Britain could negotiate a way to cop out of going to war with Germany, Chamberlain would jump at the opportunity, even if it left France in the lurch. It took two days for the government to get up the gumption to acknowledge the inevitability of a declaration of war.
Eight months later, when it was time for the Germans to invade France, Holland, Belgium and Luxembourg, Chamberlain was still hanging on to power in the face of growing vehement public disgust with his government's lackluster conduct in the war so far. Case in point: the embarrassingly disastrous attempt to fight the Germans in Norway. The government could point to some commendable actions at sea, thanks to the decision to bring Winston Churchill into the government as First Lord of the Admiralty.
Manchester's book ends at the same point as Churchill's biographical "The Gathering Storm". It is May 1940, and the German blitzkrieg across Western Europe had caught everyone by surprise. The British government was shaken by the realization of a possible defeat of France. Somehow, Britain would have to find a way to fight a war, after years of inadequate military preparedness funding, against the most powerful army in Europe. Poland and Czechoslovakia, two formerly possible allies, had been sacrificed to the German onslaught. German, and to an extent, Italian military forces were consolidating control of Europe. Russia and Germany were raping Finland and Poland respectively, while agreeing to refrain from aggression against each other. When it finally became time for the Chamberlain conservative government to leave, public opinion would elevate the one man who had the backbone, and the knowledge of the workings of government, to vigorously prosecute a war: Churchill.
In his own book, Churchill writes of going to bed the first night after the King called for him to form a government, assured that his whole previous life was preparation for his new role as PM. Manchester suggests that Churchill's outward confidence concealed deep fears over the ability of his country to survive, given the magnitude of the challenges facing it.
I'm not trying to trivialize this modern masterpiece. It's just that, the more one reads of the foolhardy actions taken by the great European democracies after World War I regarding their future survival, the more one feels a sense of unease over the incompetence and lies which allowed a threat to world peace to gain a footing and prosper in Germany. It has been said that the seeds of World War II were sown in the way peace was restored following World War I. There may have been an inevitability to the rise of National Socialism among a populace humiliated by being labeled as the instigators of the first war, while boiling over with anger directed toward their own wartime government which capitulated before a victory over Germany's enemies or complete destruction of the country in defeat could be finalized in 1918. World War II became not so much a result of the need to revenge insults as a resetting of the state of hostilities left unfinished in 1918 that the Nazis were only too happy to commit their country on.
The subtitle "Alone" describes the position Winston Churchill was in during the 1930's, during which he was one of the few public figures who didn't subscribe to the corrosive groupthink guiding the British diplomatic direction. Winston had, by 1932, been a central figure in the government, after gaining a reputation as a war hero during several Victorian era colonial wars. He had held cabinet positions along with his position as a member of Parliament. His Victorian values prevented him from going along with the rest of the Tory-led government on Indian dominion status, and now he would view the great events of the day as an outsider.
It can be argued that the country needed someone with Winston's deep thinking serving HMG, but events would prove that his pariah status kept him from being tainted as just another insider at a time when the country was being sold down the river by its leaders. The main point of contention was Winston's instinctive and highly correct disliking of the new Nazi leadership in Germany, which would constantly run counter to the directions that a series of PM's, from MacDonald to Baldwin to Chamberlain.
By the time Stanley Baldwin took over, the mantra of diplomacy was appeasement, appeasement, appeasement. Neville Chamblerlain would become the high priest of the concept. The associates of these PM's would be yes-men or they wouldn't remain in office. The two most notorious to emerge were Chamberlain's Foreign Secretary, Lord Halifax, and the British ambassador in Berlin, the boot-licker of Hitler and the Nazi leadership, Sir Neville Henderson. These two, with the PM and Chamberlain's "Rasputin", Horace Wilson, became the "Men of Munich", those that orchestrated the sell-out of the Czechs during the Sudenten Crisis of 1938, that William Manchester methodically indicts for their actions.
As Manchester points out in the Author's Note, this work is a biography and not a history. Nevertheless, a biographer cannot make all facets of his subject's life clear without knowing that the reader understands the dynamics existing in the world while the story is unfolding. There was an awful lot going on in Winston's world, and Manchester does a masterful job of bringing the early twentieth century world into focus, especially as events transpired in Great Britain and Europe.
At the center of Manchester's story, of course, is Winston Churchill,
an ex-government minister. He retained his seat in Parliament, but would serve as a backbencher, literally an outsider within the House of Commons, not trusted or respected by most of the members of his party, which ran the government at this time. Different reasons explain his outsider status, including India, his previous defection from the Tories before returning to the party (ratting and re-ratting), and the hard-to-shake unfair (according to Manchester) reputation as the planner of the disastrous World War I Galipoli campaign. Most damning concerning Churchill's suitability to participate in government, however, was his absolute unwillingness to countenance the feckless foreign policy of his country. The two greatest victorious European powers of World War I, Great Britain and France, had established punitive conditions at Versailles which effectively would keep Germany bound with rules against re-armament so that peace in Europe would be maintained. Now, the British government was soft pedaling German rearmament, and would continue to rationalize Germany's erosion and eventual rebuke of the Versailles rules.
Manchester shows how Winston became Europe's best informed private citizen. He had at one time been given access to British military records which was never revoked, allowing him to mine a trove of military statistics up to World War II. Probably of most importance, however, was his huge network of operatives consisting of civil service and military workers who increasingly lost faith in their leadership and sent him valuable intelligence about British and even German armament manufacturing and stockpiling, at great personal risk to themselves. After the war, he would recall much of this data in charts and tables to bolster his recollection of this time in his great first volume in his "The Second World War" series titled "The Gathering Storm."
"The Last Lion 2" distressingly unfolds with the stagnation of British military preparedness while Nazi Germany became a formidable power in less than a decade. The French, Britain's ally with the largest, most powerful army in Europe at the beginning of this era, were increasingly weakened by a chaotic political scene. The one thing most of France's parties agreed on was the conviction to never again engage in vigorous action which could lead to the appalling bloodletting of World War I, and thus their army marked time inside a static defense which would prove catastrophic in 1940. Manchester writes about a corrosive spirit which permeated all strata of French society, undermining support of any measures, including expenditure of needed money, for the building of a military force which would engage a foreign enemy in the field.
A key point which Manchester presents is that the German adventurism and saber rattling of the 1930's was rationalized rather than condemned by the British government and seconded by the news media. As each German-provoked European crisis transpired, HMG tried find a reason to keep betting on the chimera of a stable Germany as a potential ally against any potential threat which may in future be posed by Russia. Winston Churchill risked, and damaged his public stature by constantly speaking publicly about the danger posed to Britain in these circumstances, and by pleading incessantly for his country to engage in efforts to form alliances with other countries to counter the German threat through the mechanism of collective security. His efforts were very effectively countered by a press which did not print his most forceful messages to a public which by the 1930's was living in a post-World War I collective post traumatic disorder.
There is a lot of great diplomatic and political history in this book. Some of the most compelling, in my opinion, occured around the time of the eventual realization by Chamberlain that Great Britain was hoodwinked, after Hitler turned the Sudentenland partition into an occupation of all of Czechoslovakia. When it became apparent that diplomatic steps needed to be explored in order to put up a challenge to a now-dominant German military, Chamberlain ineptly engaged in secret negotiations which bound England to go to war in the event of a German invasion of a Poland led by men of "dubious and unstable judgement" (p. 406).
There is a certain linearity narration of pieces of common knowledge by which history is portrayed in history class and on those endless World War II television documentaries: Great Britain and France had established a pact to go to war if Poland was invaded; Hitler invaded Poland on September 1st; Britain and France logically went to war; eventually the allies won the war ... (no wonder students are bored with history). In reality, by the time Hitler invaded Poland, HMG was trying to find a way to engage in negotiations in order to get an assurance from the Germans that they would stop fighting if they were allowed to keep Danzig, not having a clue that Hitler's earlier demands over Danzig were only a pretext for invading Poland. If Britain could negotiate a way to cop out of going to war with Germany, Chamberlain would jump at the opportunity, even if it left France in the lurch. It took two days for the government to get up the gumption to acknowledge the inevitability of a declaration of war.
Eight months later, when it was time for the Germans to invade France, Holland, Belgium and Luxembourg, Chamberlain was still hanging on to power in the face of growing vehement public disgust with his government's lackluster conduct in the war so far. Case in point: the embarrassingly disastrous attempt to fight the Germans in Norway. The government could point to some commendable actions at sea, thanks to the decision to bring Winston Churchill into the government as First Lord of the Admiralty.
Manchester's book ends at the same point as Churchill's biographical "The Gathering Storm". It is May 1940, and the German blitzkrieg across Western Europe had caught everyone by surprise. The British government was shaken by the realization of a possible defeat of France. Somehow, Britain would have to find a way to fight a war, after years of inadequate military preparedness funding, against the most powerful army in Europe. Poland and Czechoslovakia, two formerly possible allies, had been sacrificed to the German onslaught. German, and to an extent, Italian military forces were consolidating control of Europe. Russia and Germany were raping Finland and Poland respectively, while agreeing to refrain from aggression against each other. When it finally became time for the Chamberlain conservative government to leave, public opinion would elevate the one man who had the backbone, and the knowledge of the workings of government, to vigorously prosecute a war: Churchill.
In his own book, Churchill writes of going to bed the first night after the King called for him to form a government, assured that his whole previous life was preparation for his new role as PM. Manchester suggests that Churchill's outward confidence concealed deep fears over the ability of his country to survive, given the magnitude of the challenges facing it.
April 14, 2018
Loved, loved, loved this book! Churchill was a unique and complicated man but a man for his time. Definitely read this!
September 20, 2019
I'm re-reading the first two books of the trilogy (more than 20 years after the first run through) to finally get to book 3, which hadn't been published at the time. Based on my really old memories, I rated them both five stars when I entered them into my Goodreads catalogue. After the second read, I'm happy to say I still think this installment deserves its five stars.
Manchester includes more than enough footnotes to demonstrate that he's fulfilled his academic obligations of writing a serious biography. And yet, like book one, his prose is so alive that it resembles (and, as I speculated in my review of the first book, perhaps foreshadows) the modern "anti-academic" style.
A few things struck me. First was Churchill's bulldog-like tenacity at maintaining his opinion of the danger of Hitler and Nazism over a very long period when "everybody" was sure he was just a crazy warmonger. In my experience, most people who can persist for long stretches holding opinions shared by virtually no one else (alien abductions, the moon landing was faked, etc.) have a sanity problem. It's too difficult otherwise. Obviously Churchill fits in the minority.
The second was a reminder of just how appealing fascism was to the English upper class, at least in comparison with communism. The naive hope that bolstering Hitler until he was ready to enter into a war with Stalin that would destroy both countries continued far past when its naivete should have been apparent.
Lastly was the criticism of the French. Certainly France's fighting ability hasn't garnered much respect in the United States during my lifetime, frequently serving as the butt of jokes, but most of Manchester's barbs are directed toward the incredible stupidity of the French leadership (military and civilian). For instance, the vaunted Maginot line didn't cover the Ardennes forest because conventional wisdom considered it impassible. Still, there were leaders who were concerned the conventional wisdom was wrong, and they erected some anti-tank barriers along the frontier. I kid you not - less than a week before Hitler's invasion, some brilliant field commander decided they were ugly and/or inconvenient and had them removed.
In one of the most pointed barbs of the book, Manchester devotes a leisurely paragraph to a description of Paris' incredible beauty. Then he delivers this:
I've never been to Paris. Maybe those who have will attest that it's better to live under tyrannical rule than lose Notre Dame and the Arc de Triomphe, but to me that sounds like a well-deserved slam.
Manchester includes more than enough footnotes to demonstrate that he's fulfilled his academic obligations of writing a serious biography. And yet, like book one, his prose is so alive that it resembles (and, as I speculated in my review of the first book, perhaps foreshadows) the modern "anti-academic" style.
A few things struck me. First was Churchill's bulldog-like tenacity at maintaining his opinion of the danger of Hitler and Nazism over a very long period when "everybody" was sure he was just a crazy warmonger. In my experience, most people who can persist for long stretches holding opinions shared by virtually no one else (alien abductions, the moon landing was faked, etc.) have a sanity problem. It's too difficult otherwise. Obviously Churchill fits in the minority.
The second was a reminder of just how appealing fascism was to the English upper class, at least in comparison with communism. The naive hope that bolstering Hitler until he was ready to enter into a war with Stalin that would destroy both countries continued far past when its naivete should have been apparent.
Lastly was the criticism of the French. Certainly France's fighting ability hasn't garnered much respect in the United States during my lifetime, frequently serving as the butt of jokes, but most of Manchester's barbs are directed toward the incredible stupidity of the French leadership (military and civilian). For instance, the vaunted Maginot line didn't cover the Ardennes forest because conventional wisdom considered it impassible. Still, there were leaders who were concerned the conventional wisdom was wrong, and they erected some anti-tank barriers along the frontier. I kid you not - less than a week before Hitler's invasion, some brilliant field commander decided they were ugly and/or inconvenient and had them removed.
In one of the most pointed barbs of the book, Manchester devotes a leisurely paragraph to a description of Paris' incredible beauty. Then he delivers this:
London is less celebrated for its beauty, though there are those who prefer it because, among other reasons, it never occurred to Londoners - and certainly not to Churchill - that England's capital should be surrendered rather than be submitted to the ravages of battle. The British were prepared to sacrifice London house by house, to be destroyed rather than dishonored. The French loved honor, but loved Paris more, as they would demonstrate before summer arrived.
I've never been to Paris. Maybe those who have will attest that it's better to live under tyrannical rule than lose Notre Dame and the Arc de Triomphe, but to me that sounds like a well-deserved slam.
April 26, 2022
Fantastic. Covers the years 1932-1940, and I'll be honest, given that the previous book covered 58 years and was only a smidge longer, I was worried that this book would be dense, and maybe even boring...how do you stay engaged for nearly 700 pages that covers only eight years? Well luckily this is like the most drama-filled eight years in the history of the world (not exaggerating). Winston's personal story actually gets overshadowed by the monumental events going on around him. The book goes into fairly good depth regarding Germany's rearmament, the Austrian Anschluss, Britain and France's awful betrayal of Czechoslovakia, and the Polish crisis. All the while Winston is warning and foretelling (accurately), but alone on a political island. It's staggering to me how the British government's policy of Appeasement was so beneficial to Germany. Regarding Neville Chamberlain, the author said that no one outside of Hitler did more to help fuel Nazi Germany's rise. Harsh, but accurate. It wasn't just Chamberlain, though. There were lots of weak leaders at this time across Europe who let WWII happen. It's infuriating to read.
Also - this book has helped redefine and reshape some of my current thinking about political events. WWII wasn't that long ago, and we can learn so much about our current world situation (both generally and specifically) by learning from the history of the past. The more history I read, the more I see how things repeat themselves.
Also - this book has helped redefine and reshape some of my current thinking about political events. WWII wasn't that long ago, and we can learn so much about our current world situation (both generally and specifically) by learning from the history of the past. The more history I read, the more I see how things repeat themselves.
April 11, 2019
This second volume wasn't quite as entertaining as the first, no boarding school adventures or prison escapes. A very large portion of this book was Winston Churchill repeatedly telling everyone Voldemort was back, and the Ministry of Magic being in denial and smearing his good name. Which was very frustrating to read with hindsight, but at the same time it is easy to imagine that after the horrors of WWI, with 100's of thousands of dead, in muddy trenches where neither army gains a foot of territory for months and years, it would be incomprehensible that any world leader would want to instigate a repeat of that war, and maintaining peace would be so desirable. It was interesting to read, and think about the role of propaganda, Hitler with his, but also the need for pro-war propaganda by the allies to gain support to confront the threat of Hitler.
I listened to the Audible version of this book, and thought the narrator's Churchill impression wasn't as good as the narrator of the first volume, but about halfway through I got used to it
The ending was quite rousing and gave me goosebumps.
Another reviewer posted this article that I thought was interesting. https://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/04/ma...
I listened to the Audible version of this book, and thought the narrator's Churchill impression wasn't as good as the narrator of the first volume, but about halfway through I got used to it
The ending was quite rousing and gave me goosebumps.
Another reviewer posted this article that I thought was interesting. https://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/04/ma...
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