Subscribe now and receive weekly newsletters with educational materials, new courses, interesting posts, popular books, and much more!
Second World War
The Churchill Project - Hillsdale College > Second World War
Feeding the Crocodile, Belgium, 1940: Was King Leopold Guilty?
13
Oct
2017
1
By RICHARD M. LANGWORTH
Daniel Wybo requested this essay on King Leopold and Churchill’s remarks about the May 1940 Belgian surrender. Mr. Wybo’s interest is through his father, who fought in the battle to defend the canal at Ghent-Terneuzen. Taken prisoner by the Germans, the elder Wybo escaped and became part of the Belgian underground. “My father was always bitter about how our King was treated,” Mr. Wybo writes. “He was distressed by the great lies propagated about his actions.” Churchill, it will be seen, tried to correct the worst of those lies.
Nolan’s Dunkirk: “Don’t Let’s Be Beastly to the Germans”
07
Aug
2017
By RICHARD M. LANGWORTH
Dunkirk, produced by Christopher Nolan, sets out to portray the 1940 rescue of the Allied armies from the clutches of Hitler’s Wehrmacht in terms of courage, heroism, survival, and a few examples of cowardice. In that he succeeds admirably. In terms of context—in conveying an understanding of what Dunkirk was about—he fails utterly.
Fresh History: “The Churchill Documents,” Volume 19
10
Feb
2017
5
By THE CHURCHILL PROJECT
The longest biography in history takes a long step to completion with publication of The Churchill Documents, Vol. 19, Fateful Questions, September 1943-April 1944. Fastidiously compiled by the late Sir Martin Gilbert and edited by Dr. Larry Arnn, these 2700 pages serve up another fresh contribution of documents crucial to our understanding of Churchill in World War II. It is a vast new contribution to Churchill scholarship.
“Wresting Victory…from the Narrowest of Margins”
12
Jan
2017
By THE CHURCHILL PROJECT
Question: I am editing a volume of papers and speeches by Field Marshal Lord Bramall, former Chief of Defence Staff and Chief of the General Staff here in Britain. He has quoted a saying from Churchill which I cannot pin down, and I wonder if you have it: “All the great struggles in history have been won by superior will power wresting victory in the face of odds or upon the narrowest of margins.”
Did Churchill Exacerbate the Bengal Famine?
08
Apr
2015
25
By THE CHURCHILL PROJECT
Reviewing a recent book, The Churchill Factor, by London Mayor Boris Johnson, a reviewer repeated a widespread canard that Winston Churchill caused the Bengal Famine. This allegation false; Churchill did everything he could in the midst of world war to save the Bengalis, and without him the famine would have been worse.