''Churchill, Hitler and the Unnecessary War: How Britain Lost Its Empire and the West Lost the World'' is a book by
Patrick J. Buchanan
Patrick Joseph Buchanan (; born November 2, 1938) is an American paleoconservative political commentator, columnist, politician, and broadcaster. Buchanan was an assistant and special consultant to U.S. Presidents Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford, an ...
, published in May 2008. Buchanan argues that both world wars were unnecessary and that the
British Empire
The British Empire was composed of the dominions, colonies, protectorates, mandates, and other territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom and its predecessor states. It began with the overseas possessions and trading posts e ...
's decision to join the wars had a disastrous effect globally. One of Buchanan's expressed purposes is to undermine what he described as a "Churchill
cult" in
America's elite. Buchanan focuses particularly on how
Winston Churchill
Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill (30 November 187424 January 1965) was a British statesman, soldier, and writer who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom twice, from 1940 to 1945 during the Second World War, and again from ...
helped influence
Britain
Britain most often refers to:
* The United Kingdom, a sovereign state in Europe comprising the island of Great Britain, the north-eastern part of the island of Ireland and many smaller islands
* Great Britain, the largest island in the United King ...
into the world wars with
Germany
Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...
in 1914 and in 1939.
Synopsis
Buchanan argues that it was a great mistake for Britain to fight
Germany
Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...
in both world wars, which he argues was a disaster for the whole world.
World War I
Buchanan argues that
Britain
Britain most often refers to:
* The United Kingdom, a sovereign state in Europe comprising the island of Great Britain, the north-eastern part of the island of Ireland and many smaller islands
* Great Britain, the largest island in the United King ...
had no quarrel with
Germany
Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...
before 1914, but the great rise of the
Imperial German Navy
The Imperial German Navy or the Imperial Navy () was the navy of the German Empire, which existed between 1871 and 1919. It grew out of the small Prussian Navy (from 1867 the North German Federal Navy), which was mainly for coast defence. Kaise ...
, spearheaded by Admiral
Alfred von Tirpitz
Alfred Peter Friedrich von Tirpitz (19 March 1849 – 6 March 1930) was a German grand admiral, Secretary of State of the German Imperial Naval Office, the powerful administrative branch of the German Imperial Navy from 1897 until 1916. Prussi ...
, was a "threat to Britain" that led the British to bring back to European waters the bulk of its
Royal Navy
The Royal Navy (RN) is the United Kingdom's naval warfare force. Although warships were used by English and Scottish kings from the early medieval period, the first major maritime engagements were fought in the Hundred Years' War against ...
and to make alliances with
Russia
Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and Northern Asia. It is the largest country in the world, with its internationally recognised territory covering , and encompassing one-eig ...
and
France
France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans. Its metropolitan area ...
. Buchanan asserts that was a disastrous policy that "tied England to Europe" and created the conditions that led the British to involvement in the war.
On the other hand, Buchanan asserts that the greatest responsibility for the breakdown in Anglo-German relations was the "
Germanophobia" and zeal for the
Entente Cordiale
The Entente Cordiale (; ) comprised a series of agreements signed on 8 April 1904 between the United Kingdom and the French Republic which saw a significant improvement in Anglo-French relations. Beyond the immediate concerns of colonial de ...
with France of the
British Foreign Secretary
The secretary of state for foreign, Commonwealth and development affairs, known as the foreign secretary, is a minister of the Crown of the Government of the United Kingdom and head of the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office. Seen ...
,
Edward Grey. In assessing responsibility for the course of events, Buchanan asserts that the British could have easily ended the
Anglo-German naval arms race
The arms race between Great Britain and Germany that occurred from the last decade of the nineteenth century until the advent of World War I in 1914 was one of the intertwined causes of that conflict. While based in a bilateral relationship tha ...
in 1912 by promising to remain neutral in a war between Germany and France.
Buchanan calls "
Prussian militarism
Militarism is the belief or the desire of a government or a people that a state should maintain a strong military capability and to use it aggressively to expand national interests and/or values. It may also imply the glorification of the mili ...
" an
anti-German myth invented by certain British statesmen and that the record of Germany supports his belief that it was the least militaristic of the European Powers. Buchanan says that until 1914, German
Kaiser Wilhelm II
, house = Hohenzollern
, father = Frederick III, German Emperor
, mother = Victoria, Princess Royal
, religion = Lutheranism (Prussian United)
, signature = Wilhelm II, German Emperor Signature-.svg
Wilhelm II (Friedrich Wilhelm Viktor ...
had not fought in a war but
Winston Churchill
Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill (30 November 187424 January 1965) was a British statesman, soldier, and writer who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom twice, from 1940 to 1945 during the Second World War, and again from ...
had served in three wars: "Churchill had himself seen more war than almost any soldier in the German army."
Buchanan claims that Wilhelm was desperate to avoid a war in 1914 and accepts the German claim that it was the Russian mobilization of July 31 that forced war on Germany. Buchanan accuses Churchill and Grey of getting Britain to enter the war in 1914 by making promises that Britain would defend France without the knowledge of
Cabinet or
Parliament
In modern politics, and history, a parliament is a legislative body of government. Generally, a modern parliament has three functions: representing the electorate, making laws, and overseeing the government via hearings and inquiries. Th ...
.
Buchanan calls the British "hunger
blockade
A blockade is the act of actively preventing a country or region from receiving or sending out food, supplies, weapons, or communications, and sometimes people, by military force.
A blockade differs from an embargo or sanction, which are leg ...
" of Germany in
World War I
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
"criminal" and accepts the argument of British economist
John Maynard Keynes
John Maynard Keynes, 1st Baron Keynes, ( ; 5 June 1883 – 21 April 1946), was an English economist whose ideas fundamentally changed the theory and practice of macroeconomics and the economic policies of governments. Originally trained in ...
, who wrote in his 1919 ''
The Economic Consequences of the Peace'' that the
reparations
Reparation(s) may refer to:
Christianity
* Restitution (theology), the Christian doctrine calling for reparation
* Acts of reparation, prayers for repairing the damages of sin
History
*War reparations
**World War I reparations, made from G ...
that were imposed on Germany in the
Treaty of Versailles
The Treaty of Versailles (french: Traité de Versailles; german: Versailler Vertrag, ) was the most important of the peace treaties of World War I. It ended the state of war between Germany and the Allied Powers. It was signed on 28 June ...
were "impossible" to pay.
World War II
Buchanan hypothesizes that
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...
could have been avoided if the Treaty of Versailles had not been so harsh toward Germany. Buchanan views the treaty as unjust toward Germany and argues that German efforts to revise Versailles were both moral and just. As a result of their humiliation at Versailles, Germans became more
nationalistic
Nationalism is an idea and movement that holds that the nation should be congruent with the state. As a movement, nationalism tends to promote the interests of a particular nation (as in a group of people), Smith, Anthony. ''Nationalism: T ...
and ultimately put their confidence in
Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler (; 20 April 188930 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician who was dictator of Nazi Germany, Germany from 1933 until Death of Adolf Hitler, his death in 1945. Adolf Hitler's rise to power, He rose to power as the le ...
. Buchanan argues that Britain, France,
Italy
Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...
, and Czechoslovakia all indirectly assisted
Hitler's rise to power
Adolf Hitler's rise to power began in the newly established Weimar Republic in September 1919 when Hitler joined the '' Deutsche Arbeiterpartei'' (DAP; German Workers' Party). He rose to a place of prominence in the early years of the party. Be ...
in 1933.
Weimar-era German leaders like
Gustav Stresemann
Gustav Ernst Stresemann (; 10 May 1878 – 3 October 1929) was a German statesman who served as chancellor in 1923 (for 102 days) and as foreign minister from 1923 to 1929, during the Weimar Republic.
His most notable achievement was the reconci ...
,
Heinrich Brüning
Heinrich Aloysius Maria Elisabeth Brüning (; 26 November 1885 – 30 March 1970) was a German Centre Party politician and academic, who served as the chancellor of Germany during the Weimar Republic from 1930 to 1932.
A political scienti ...
, and
Friedrich Ebert
Friedrich Ebert (; 4 February 187128 February 1925) was a German politician of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD) and the first president of Germany from 1919 until his death in office in 1925.
Ebert was elected leader of the SPD on t ...
were all responsible German statesmen, according to Buchanan, and were working to revise Versailles in a manner that would not threaten the peace of Europe, but they were undermined by the inability and unwillingness of Britain and France to cooperate. Buchanan calls
Hitler's foreign policy program more moderate than the war aims sought by German Chancellor
Theobald von Bethmann-Hollweg
Theobald Theodor Friedrich Alfred von Bethmann Hollweg (29 November 1856 – 1 January 1921) was a German politician who was the chancellor of the German Empire from 1909 to 1917. He oversaw the German entry into World War I. According to bio ...
's ''
Septemberprogramm
The ''Septemberprogramm'' (, literally "September Program") was a memorandum authorized by Chancellor Theobald von Bethmann-Hollweg of the German Empire at the beginning of World War I (1914–18). It was drafted on 9 September 1914 by the Chancel ...
'' in World War I. Buchanan contends that Hitler was interested in expanding into only Eastern Europe and did not seek territory in
Western Europe
Western Europe is the western region of Europe. The region's countries and territories vary depending on context.
The concept of "the West" appeared in Europe in juxtaposition to "the East" and originally applied to the ancient Mediterranean ...
and
Africa
Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent, after Asia in both cases. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of Earth's total surface area ...
. Moreover, Buchanan argues that once Hitler came to power in 1933, his foreign policy was not governed strictly by
Nazi
Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in ...
ideology but was modified ad hoc by pragmatism.
Buchanan says that Hitler regarded the
Franco-Soviet Pact
The Franco-Soviet Treaty of Mutual Assistance was a bilateral treaty between France and the Soviet Union with the aim of enveloping Nazi Germany in 1935 to reduce the threat from Central Europe. It was pursued by Maxim Litvinov, the Soviet foreig ...
as an aggressive move directed at Germany and that it violated the
Locarno Treaties, and he adds that Hitler had a strong case. Hitler utilized the claim of the violation of Locarno as a diplomatic weapon against which the French and the British had no answer. Buchanan argues that Hitler's public demands on Poland in 1938 and 1939, namely the return of the
Free City of Danzig to the Reich, "extra-territorial" roads across the
Polish Corridor
The Polish Corridor (german: Polnischer Korridor; pl, Pomorze, Polski Korytarz), also known as the Danzig Corridor, Corridor to the Sea or Gdańsk Corridor, was a territory located in the region of Pomerelia (Pomeranian Voivodeship, easter ...
, and Poland's adherence to the
Anti-Comintern Pact
The Anti-Comintern Pact, officially the Agreement against the Communist International was an anti-Communist pact concluded between Nazi Germany and the Empire of Japan on 25 November 1936 and was directed against the Communist International (C ...
were a genuine attempt to build an anti-Soviet German-Polish alliance, especially since Buchanan argues that Germany and Poland shared a common enemy, the Soviet Union. Buchanan claims that Hitler wanted Poland as an ally against the Soviet Union, not an enemy.
Buchanan agrees with British historian
E. H. Carr
Edward Hallett Carr (28 June 1892 – 3 November 1982) was a British historian, diplomat, journalist and international relations theorist, and an opponent of empiricism within historiography. Carr was best known for '' A History of Soviet Rus ...
, who said in April 1939 about the Polish "guarantee": "The use or threatened use of force to maintain the ''status quo'' may be morally more culpable than the use or threatened use of force to alter it." Buchanan maintains that Hitler did not want a war with Britain and that Britain should not have declared war in 1939 on an
Anglophile
An Anglophile is a person who admires or loves England, its people, its culture, its language, and/or its various accents.
Etymology
The word is derived from the Latin word ''Anglii'' and Ancient Greek word φίλος ''philos'', meaning "frien ...
Hitler who wanted to ally the ''Reich'' with Britain against their common enemy the Soviet Union.Buchanan calls the
Morgenthau Plan
The Morgenthau Plan was a proposal to eliminate Germany following World War II and eliminating its arms industry and removing or destroying other key industries basic to military strength. This included the removal or destruction of all industr ...
of 1944 a genocidal plan for the destruction of Germany that was promoted by the vengeful
Henry Morgenthau and his deputy, Soviet agent
Harry Dexter White
Harry Dexter White (October 29, 1892 – August 16, 1948) was a senior U.S. Treasury department official. Working closely with the Secretary of the Treasury Henry Morgenthau Jr., he helped set American financial policy toward the Allies of World ...
, a way of ensuring Soviet domination of Europe, with Churchill being amoral for accepting it.
Buchanan argues that the
Holocaust
The Holocaust, also known as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe; ...
would not have developed the scale that it did without Hitler's invasion of Poland and then the Soviet Union, as he would not otherwise have been in control of most European Jews. Buchanan argues that if Churchill had accepted Hitler's peace offer of 1940, the severity of the Holocaust would have been greatly reduced.Endorsing the concept of
Western betrayal
Western betrayal is the view that the United Kingdom, France, and sometimes the United States failed to meet their legal, diplomatic, military, and moral obligations with respect to the Czechoslovak and Polish states during the prelude to and ...
, Buchanan accuses Churchill and Roosevelt of turning over Eastern Europe to the Soviet Union at the
Tehran Conference
The Tehran Conference ( codenamed Eureka) was a strategy meeting of Joseph Stalin, Franklin Roosevelt, and Winston Churchill from 28 November to 1 December 1943, after the Anglo-Soviet invasion of Iran. It was held in the Soviet Union's embass ...
and the
Yalta Conference
The Yalta Conference (codenamed Argonaut), also known as the Crimea Conference, held 4–11 February 1945, was the World War II meeting of the heads of government of the United States, the United Kingdom, and the Soviet Union to discuss the post ...
.
Buchanan also writes that the United States should have stayed out of the events of World War II. However, because the United States insisted for the
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the European mainland, continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...
to sever the
Anglo-Japanese Alliance in 1921, Japan ultimately aligned itself with the Axis and later attacked
Pearl Harbor
Pearl Harbor is an American lagoon harbor on the island of Oahu, Hawaii, west of Honolulu. It was often visited by the Naval fleet of the United States, before it was acquired from the Hawaiian Kingdom by the U.S. with the signing of the R ...
. Buchanan blames Churchill for insisting to the British Cabinet in 1921 to give in to pressure to end its alliance with Japan.
Buchanan ends his book with an attack on former President
George W. Bush
George Walker Bush (born July 6, 1946) is an American politician who served as the 43rd president of the United States from 2001 to 2009. A member of the Republican Party, Bush family, and son of the 41st president George H. W. Bush, he ...
and argues that just as Churchill led the British Empire to ruin by causing unnecessary wars with Germany twice, Bush led the United States to ruin by following Churchill's example in involving the United States in an unnecessary
war in Iraq
This is a list of wars involving the Republic of Iraq and its predecessor states.
Other armed conflicts involving Iraq
* Wars during Mandatory Iraq
** Ikhwan raid on South Iraq 1921
* Smaller conflicts, revolutions, coups and periphery confli ...
, and he passed out guarantees to scores of nations in which the United States has no vital interests, which placed his country in a position with insufficient resources to fulfil its promises. Finally, Buchanan highlights the symbolism of Bush placing a bust of Churchill in the
Oval Office as evidence that Bush's
neoconservative
Neoconservatism is a political movement that began in the United States during the 1960s among liberal hawks who became disenchanted with the increasingly pacifist foreign policy of the Democratic Party and with the growing New Left and count ...
foreign policy was influenced and inspired by Churchill.
Reviews
The book was sixteenth on its first week on ''
The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...
''
bestseller list.
MSNBC
MSNBC (originally the Microsoft National Broadcasting Company) is an American news-based pay television cable channel. It is owned by NBCUniversala subsidiary of Comcast. Headquartered in New York City, it provides news coverage and politi ...
observed that Buchanan joins historians who are more critical of British involvement in World War II.
The book has received mostly negative reviews. Canadian journalist
Eric Margolis in the ''
Toronto Sun
The ''Toronto Sun'' is an English-language tabloid format, tabloid newspaper published daily in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The newspaper is one of several ''Sun'' tabloids published by Postmedia Network. The newspaper's offices is located at Pos ...
'' endorsed Buchanan's study as a "powerful new book."
Margolis wrote that neither Britain nor the United States should have fought in World War II and that it was simply wrong and stupid that millions of people died to stop the 90% German
Free City of Danzig from rejoining Germany.
Margolis accepts Buchanan's conclusion that the British "guarantee" of Poland in March 1939 was the greatest geopolitical blunder of the twentieth century.
Jonathan S. Tobin in ''
The Jerusalem Post
''The Jerusalem Post'' is a broadsheet newspaper based in Jerusalem, founded in 1932 during the British Mandate of Palestine by Gershon Agron as ''The Palestine Post''. In 1950, it changed its name to ''The Jerusalem Post''. In 2004, the paper ...
'' gave Buchanan's book a negative review and suggested the author is
antisemitic and representative of a "malevolent" form of
appeasement.
American writer
Adam Kirsch
Adam Kirsch (born 1976) is an American poet and literary critic. He is on the seminar faculty of Columbia University's Center for American Studies, and has taught at YIVO.
Life and career
Kirsch was born in Los Angeles in 1976. He is the son of ...
, in ''
The New York Sun
''The New York Sun'' is an American online newspaper published in Manhattan; from 2002 to 2008 it was a daily newspaper distributed in New York City. It debuted on April 16, 2002, adopting the name, motto, and masthead of the earlier New Yor ...
'', attacked Buchanan for using no primary sources, and for saying there was a
conspiracy
A conspiracy, also known as a plot, is a secret plan or agreement between persons (called conspirers or conspirators) for an unlawful or harmful purpose, such as murder or treason, especially with political motivation, while keeping their agre ...
by historians to hide the truth about the two world wars.
Kirsch acidly remarked that if that was the case, Buchanan did not need only secondary sources to support his arguments.
He accused Buchanan of hypocrisy for denouncing Churchill as a
racist who was opposed to non-white immigration to Britain while demanding the same in the United States.
He wrote that Buchanan's apocalyptic language about the West in decline owed more to
Oswald Spengler
Oswald Arnold Gottfried Spengler (; 29 May 1880 – 8 May 1936) was a German historian and philosopher of history whose interests included mathematics, science, and art, as well as their relation to his organic theory of history. He is best kno ...
than to American conservatives.
He also argued that Buchanan's heavy reliance on
Correlli Barnett
Correlli Douglas Barnett CBE FRHistS FRSL FRSA (28 June 1927 – 10 July 2022) was an English military historian, who also wrote works of economic history, particularly on the United Kingdom's post-war "industrial decline".
Early life
Barnett ...
's 1972 book ''The Collapse of British Power'' as a source reflects the fact that both Buchanan and Barnett are two embittered conservatives unhappy with the way history worked out, and they prefer to talk about how much nicer history would have been if Britain had not fought in the two world wars or the United States and Britain in
Iraq
Iraq,; ku, عێراق, translit=Êraq officially the Republic of Iraq, '; ku, کۆماری عێراق, translit=Komarî Êraq is a country in Western Asia. It is bordered by Turkey to the north, Iran to the east, the Persian Gulf and K ...
.
In a hostile review, the American journalist
David Bahnsen called Buchanan's book an "anti-semitic piece of garbage"
and accused Buchanan of being unique in that he posited the
Holocaust
The Holocaust, also known as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe; ...
as an understandable, if excessive, response to the British "guarantee" of Poland in 1939.
British journalist
Geoffrey Wheatcroft
Geoffrey Albert Wheatcroft (born 23 December 1945) is a British journalist, author, and historian.
Early life and education
Wheatcroft is the son of Stephen Frederick Wheatcroft (1921–2016), OBE, and his first wife, Joyce (née Reed). He w ...
, in a review in ''
The New York Review of Books
''The New York Review of Books'' (or ''NYREV'' or ''NYRB'') is a semi-monthly magazine with articles on literature, culture, economics, science and current affairs. Published in New York City, it is inspired by the idea that the discussion of i ...
'', complained that Buchanan had grossly exaggerated the harshness of the Treaty of Versailles by observing that most historians think that Germany started World War I and that Buchanan's criticism of the British "area bombing" of cities in the war pays no attention to how limited Britain's options seemed to Churchill in 1940.
[.] Wheatcroft wrote that Buchanan cited right-wing British historians like
Alan Clark
Alan Kenneth Mackenzie Clark (13 April 1928 – 5 September 1999) was a British Conservative Member of Parliament (MP), author and diarist. He served as a junior minister in Margaret Thatcher's governments at the Departments of Employment, Tr ...
,
Maurice Cowling
Maurice John Cowling (6 September 1926 – 24 August 2005) was a British historian and a Fellow of Peterhouse, Cambridge.
Early life
Cowling was born in West Norwood, South London, son of Reginald Frederick Cowling (1901–1962), a patent agen ...
, and
John Charmley
John Denis Charmley (born 9 November 1955) is a British academic and diplomatic historian. Since 2002 he has held various posts at the University of East Anglia: initially as Head of the School of History, then as the Head of the School of Mus ...
when they stated that Britain should never have fought Germany or at least should have made peace in 1940, but he ignored the wider point that Clark, Cowling and Charmley were making: they viewed the United States rather than Germany as the British Empire's main rival.
Hungarian-American historian
John Lukacs
John Adalbert Lukacs (; Hungarian: ''Lukács János Albert''; 31 January 1924 – 6 May 2019) was a Hungarian-born American historian and author of more than thirty books. Lukacs was Roman Catholic. Lukacs described himself as a reactionary.
L ...
, in a review in ''
The American Conservative
''The American Conservative'' (''TAC'') is a magazine published by the American Ideas Institute which was founded in 2002. Originally published twice a month, it was reduced to monthly publication in August 2009, and since February 2013, it has ...
'', compared Buchanan to
David Irving
David John Cawdell Irving (born 24 March 1938) is an English author and Holocaust denier who has written on the military and political history of World War II, with a focus on Nazi Germany. His works include '' The Destruction of Dresden'' (1 ...
and argued that the only difference between the two was that Irving used lies to support his arguments while Buchanan used half-truths.
Lukacs commented that Buchanan cites the left-wing British historian
A.J.P. Taylor
Alan John Percivale Taylor (25 March 1906 – 7 September 1990) was a British historian who specialised in 19th- and 20th-century European diplomacy. Both a journalist and a broadcaster, he became well known to millions through his televi ...
only when it suits him; when Taylor's conclusions are at variance with Buchanan's views, Buchanan does not cite him.
Lukacs objected to Buchanan's argument that Britain should have stood aside and allowed Germany to conquer Eastern Europe as Buchanan ignores just how barbaric and cruel Nazi rule was in Eastern Europe in World War II.
Finally, Lukacs claimed that Buchanan has often been accused of
Anglophobia
Anti-English sentiment or Anglophobia (from Latin ''Anglus'' "English" and Greek φόβος, ''phobos'', "fear") means opposition to, dislike of, fear of, hatred of, or the oppression and persecution of England and/or English people.''Oxford ...
. Lukacs felt that Buchanan's lament for the British Empire was a case of
crocodile tears
Crocodile tears, or superficial sympathy, is a false, insincere display of emotion such as a hypocrite crying fake tears of grief. The phrase derives from an ancient belief that crocodiles shed tears while consuming their prey, and as such is p ...
.
Lukacs concluded that Buchanan's book was not a work of history but was a thinly-veiled admonitory allegory for the modern United States with Britain standing in for the United States; and Germany, Japan, and Italy standing in at various points for modern
Islam, China, and Russia.
British journalist
Christopher Hitchens
Christopher Eric Hitchens (13 April 1949 – 15 December 2011) was a British-American author and journalist who wrote or edited over 30 books (including five essay collections) on culture, politics, and literature. Born and educated in England, ...
, in a review in ''
Newsweek
''Newsweek'' is an American weekly online news magazine co-owned 50 percent each by Dev Pragad, its president and CEO, and Johnathan Davis, who has no operational role at ''Newsweek''. Founded as a weekly print magazine in 1933, it was widely ...
'', claimed that Buchanan ignored the aggression of Imperial Germany and said Wilhelm openly encouraged Muslims to wage
jihad against the Western colonial powers during World War I, conducted the
Herero and Namaqua Genocide
The Herero and Namaqua genocide or the Herero and Nama genocide was a campaign of ethnic extermination and collective punishment waged by the German Empire against the Herero (Ovaherero) and the Nama in German South West Africa (now Namibia). I ...
in
German South-West Africa
German South West Africa (german: Deutsch-Südwestafrika) was a colony of the German Empire from 1884 until 1915, though Germany did not officially recognise its loss of this territory until the 1919 Treaty of Versailles. With a total area of ...
, and supported the
Young Turks government while it committed the
Armenian genocide
The Armenian genocide was the systematic destruction of the Armenian people and identity in the Ottoman Empire during World War I. Spearheaded by the ruling Committee of Union and Progress (CUP), it was implemented primarily through t ...
.
Hitchens argued that Imperial Germany was dominated by a "militaristic ruling
caste" of officers and ''
Junker
Junker ( da, Junker, german: Junker, nl, Jonkheer, en, Yunker, no, Junker, sv, Junker ka, იუნკერი (Iunkeri)) is a noble honorific, derived from Middle High German ''Juncherre'', meaning "young nobleman"Duden; Meaning of Junke ...
s'' who recklessly sought conflict at every chance, and that it was simply nonsense for Buchanan to write of Germany being "encircled" by enemies on all sides before World War I.
See also
*
John Charmley
John Denis Charmley (born 9 November 1955) is a British academic and diplomatic historian. Since 2002 he has held various posts at the University of East Anglia: initially as Head of the School of History, then as the Head of the School of Mus ...
*''
The Death of the West
''The Death of the West: How Dying Populations and Immigrant Invasions Imperil Our Country and Civilization'' is a 2001 book by paleoconservative commentator Patrick J. Buchanan, in which the author argues that western culture is dying and will ...
''
*''
Hitler's War
''Hitler's War'' is a biographical book by British author David Irving. It describes the Second World War from the point of view of Nazi Germany’s leader Adolf Hitler.
It was first published in April 1977 by Hodder & Stoughton and Viking Pre ...
''
References
Sources
* .
External links
* .
"Nazis 'offered to leave western Europe in exchange for free hand to attack USSR'" ''The Daily Telegraph''. London,
"Churchill's War" by David Irving– lecture on YouTube
{{DEFAULTSORT:Churchill, Hitler And The Unnecessary War
2008 non-fiction books
Anti-British sentiment
Books about Adolf Hitler
Books about foreign relations of the United Kingdom
Books about international relations
Books by Patrick J. Buchanan
English-language books
History books about World War I
History books about World War II
History books about the United Kingdom
Non-fiction books about diplomacy
Non-fiction books about war
Non-interventionism
Opposition to World War II
Paleoconservative publications
Winston Churchill