Jonathan Schneer is the author of the new book Ministers at War: Winston Churchill and His War Cabinet. His other books include The Balfour Declaration and The Thames. He is a professor of history at Georgia Tech, and he lives in Decatur, Georgia.
Q: Why did you decide to
focus on Winston Churchill and his War Cabinet, and what lessons can be drawn
from the way the various ministers worked together?
A: I had been casting about
for a subject I could treat as an historian of modern Britain, and that would
also interest readers. I read Doris Kearns Goodwin’s book, Team of Rivals, and
thought: I can do that – for Winston Churchill and his wartime government.
There are lessons to be
drawn. Churchill’s team included socialists who believed in nationalizing the
means of production, and Conservatives who believed in free enterprise. The
ideological gap dividing them was wider than the gap dividing Tea Party
Republicans from liberal Democrats in the United States today.
But the members of
Churchill’s coalition suppressed their differences when they had to, and worked
together for the good of the country.
They understood the need for compromise. Of course they faced a great
crisis, but I hope American politicians can learn to compromise without facing
an emergency of equal proportions.
Q: One of the other figures,
besides Churchill, who plays a big role in the book was Lord Beaverbrook. How
would you describe the relationship between the two?
A: Beaverbrook is a
fascinating character. He was born in Canada, not rich, but he made a fortune
as a young man, moved to Britain and made more money as the owner of a chain of
newspapers.
He was the Rupert Murdoch of
his day. He loved political intrigue. He loved to pull strings behind the
scenes. But also he got a lot done in a day. He did not delegate authority, but
oversaw almost every aspect of his newspaper business.
Churchill had known him
during World War I, when Beaverbrook served as Minister of Information. They
became friends during the interwar period, drinking, smoking cigars, gambling
at cards, gossiping about politics. (Churchill’s wife, Clementine, thought Beaverbrook
a bad influence on her husband.)
The two men were both
right-wing Conservatives, but they split over appeasement, which Beaverbrook
favored. Nevertheless Churchill called on Beaverbrook when he became Prime
Minister. He knew Beaverbrook’s capacity for hard, concentrated work, and made
him Minister of Aircraft Production, at which Beaverbrook proved a great
success.
The two remained fast
friends. They still, drank, smoked, intrigued, and played cards – at which
Churchill always lost. Beaverbrook got on with Churchill, but not with anybody
else. He rowed with everybody and kept threatening to resign. Churchill kept
refusing to accept his resignation.
After the Battle of Britain
Beaverbrook finally did resign, but later in the war Churchill would appoint
him to various Cabinet positions.
One last thing: in early 1942
Beaverbrook concluded that he could run the War Cabinet better than Churchill. He
thought he could ride the movement demanding a second front against Germany to
relieve pressure on Russia into Ten Downing Street.
For a time it looked as
though the two friends would turn upon each other. But Beaverbrook dropped the campaign,
for complicated reasons, and the friendship continued for life.
Q: What accounted for
Churchill's fall from power in 1945?
A: That is the great
question. To answer briefly: a majority of people in Britain turned left during
the war. They saw that the government took all sorts of powers to make sure
people had enough to eat, and shelter, and medical care, and other things, and
they saw no reason why the government shouldn’t continue doing so once the war
was over.
Also people felt immense
gratitude for Russia. Hitler had been bombing England; then in June 1941 he
started bombing the Soviets. And the Soviets took it. They didn’t fold, as
every other continental power had done.
So first of all British
people were simply grateful to Russians for bearing the brunt of the war. Then
they began to think that the Russian Government must be doing something right
since Russia continued to fight, and they concluded that it was Russia’s
planned economy that explained it. So British people concluded they should have
a planned economy too, not just for the duration of the war, but during
peacetime as well.
Moreover, even though
Churchill was a Conservative and people admired him, they associated the
Conservative Party with the appeasement policies of the 1930s, which had gotten
Britain into a terrible fix, and also with the unemployment and depressed
economy of the 1930s. They didn’t want to go back to that.
And finally people thought
that Churchill knew a lot about war, but wasn’t much interested in domestic
matters (they were right), and that therefore he would not be the right man to
govern Britain once the war was over. All these reasons combined to produce a
Labour landslide in the General Election of 1945.
Q: What are you working on now?
A: I think I am going to
write a book about the “Lockhart Plot.”
Bruce Lockhart was a British diplomat sent to Russia in January 1918
shortly after the Bolsheviks seized power.
His mission was to persuade
the Bolsheviks to keep Russia fighting against Germany. But the Bolsheviks were
determined to get out of the war, even if it meant signing a humiliating peace
treaty with Germany. This is what they did.
Lockhart concluded that
Britain’s interests would be best served if the Bolsheviks fell from power and
a new regime replaced it and re-entered the war. He conspired with other
British agents, and with Americans and French, to overthrow the Bolshevik
regime and to kill Lenin and Trotsky. Also he had fallen in love with a
beautiful (married) Russian woman, Moura Benkendorff.
How much the British
Government knew and approved of the Lockhart Plot remains an open question, one
I hope to answer. It is an amazing story, with much drama, some violence, and
not a little poignancy, and moreover of real historical significance.
Q: Anything else we should
know?
A: I don’t want to leave the
impression that Churchill’s War Cabinet suppressed their differences all
through the war. Far from it. They generally suppressed them during the period
of greatest emergency, after France fell and before the USSR and USA joined the
fight against Hitler.
Even during this most
dangerous period, however, June 1940-December 1941, they argued and carped and
sniped and maneuvered against one another.
And once it became clear that
Britain would not lose the war, because Germany could never defeat the combined
forces of the British Empire, the Soviet Union and the United States, they
often gave vent to their differences, especially the ideological ones.
But Churchill proved to be
not only a great inspirer of his countrymen through his wonderful speeches, but
also a great manager of men. He kept his “team of rivals” going for four more
years, encouraging, sympathizing, exhorting, joking with him.
He did whatever it took to
keep them working together until the defeat of Germany was absolutely certain. Churchill
had many faults which should not be overlooked, but his ability to keep the
team in harness was extraordinary and crucial.
--Interview with Deborah Kalb
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