The Second World War

by Winston S. Churchill

  At our first meeting we were about three hours together, and I soon comprehended his personal dynamism and the outstanding importance of his mission. This was the height of the London bombing, and many local worries imposed themselves upon us. But it was evident to me that here was an envoy from the President of supreme importance to our life. With gleaming eye and quiet, constrained passion he said:

  “The President is determined that we shall win the war together. Make no mistake about it.

  “He has sent me here to tell you that at all costs and by all means he will carry you through, no matter what happens to him—there is nothing that he will not do so far as he has human power.”

  Everyone who came in contact with Harry Hopkins in the long struggle will confirm what I have set down about his remarkable personality. And from this hour began a friendship between us which sailed serenely over all earthquakes and convulsions. He was the most faithful and perfect channel of communication between the President and me. But far more than that, he was for several years the main prop and animator of Roosevelt himself. Together these two men, the one a subordinate without public office, the other commanding the mighty Republic, were capable of taking decisions of the highest consequence over the whole area of the English-speaking world. Hopkins was of course jealous about his personal influence with his Chief and did not encourage American competitors. He therefore in some ways bore out the poet Gray’s line, “A favourite has no friend.” But this was not my affair. There he sat, slim, frail, ill, but absolutely glowing with refined comprehension of the Cause. It was to be the defeat, ruin, and slaughter of Hitler, to the exclusion of all other purposes, loyalties, or aims. In the history of the United States few brighter flames have burned.

  Harry Hopkins always went to the root of the matter. I have been present at several great conferences, where twenty or more of the most important executive personages were gathered together. When the discussion flagged and all seemed baffled, it was on these occasions he would rap out the deadly question, “Surely, Mr. President, here is the point we have got to settle. Are we going to face it or not?” Faced it always was, and, being faced, was conquered. He was a true leader of men, and alike in ardour and in wisdom in times of crisis he has rarely been excelled. His love for the causes of the weak and poor was matched by his passion against tyranny, especially when tyranny was, for the time, triumphant.

  Meanwhile the Blitz continued. But with a difference. At the end of 1940 Hitler had realised that Britain could not be destroyed by direct air assault. The Battle of Britain had been his first defeat, and the malignant bombing of the cities had not cowed the nation or its Government. The preparations to invade Russia in the early summer of 1941 absorbed much of the German air-power. The many very severe raids which we suffered till the end of May no longer represented the full strength of the enemy. To us they were most grievous, but they were no longer the prime thought either of the German High Command or of the Fuehrer. To Hitler the continuance of the air attack on Great Britain was a necessary and convenient cover to the concentration against Russia. His optimistic time-table assumed that the Soviets, like the French, would be overthrown in a six-weeks campaign and that all German forces would then be free for the final overthrow of Britain in the autumn of 1941. Meanwhile the obstinate nation was to be worn down, first by the combination of the U-boat blockade sustained by the long-range air, and secondly by air attacks upon her cities and especially her ports. For the German Army “Sea Lion” (against Britain) was now replaced by “Barbarossa” (against Russia). The German Navy was instructed to concentrate on our Atlantic traffic and the German Air Force on our harbours and their approaches. This was a far more deadly plan than the indiscriminate bombing of London and the civil population, and it was fortunate for us that it was not pursued with all available forces and greater persistence.

  During January and February, the enemy were frustrated by bad weather, and, apart from attacks on Cardiff, Portsmouth, and Swansea, our Civil Defence Services gained a well-deserved breathing-space, by which they did not fail to profit. But when better weather came the Blitz started in earnest over again. What was sometimes called “the Luftwaffe’s tour of the ports” began in early March. It consisted of single or double attacks, which, though serious, failed to cripple our harbours. On the 8th and for three succeeding nights Portsmouth was heavily attacked and the dockyards damaged. Manchester and Salford were attacked on the 11th. On the ensuing nights it was the turn of Merseyside. On the 13th and 14th the Luftwaffe fell for the first time heavily on the Clyde, killing or injuring over two thousand people and putting the shipyards out of action, some till June and others till November. The heaviest blows did not fall till April. On the 8th the concentration was on Coventry, and in the rest of the country the sharpest impact was at Portsmouth. London had heavy attacks on the 16th and 17th; over two thousand three hundred people were killed, more than three thousand seriously injured. The enemy went on trying to destroy most of our principal ports by attacks prolonged in some cases over a whole week. Bristol was mauled. Plymouth was attacked from April 21 to 29, and though decoy fires helped to save the dockyards this was only at the expense of the city. The climax came on May 1, when Liverpool and the Mersey were attacked for seven successive nights. Seventy-six thousand people were made homeless and three thousand killed or injured. Sixty-nine out of a hundred and forty-four berths were put out of action, and the tonnage landed for a while was cut to a quarter. Had the enemy persisted the Battle of the Atlantic would have been even more closely run than it was. But as usual he turned away. For two nights he battered Hull heavily, where forty thousand people had their dwellings destroyed, the food stores were wrecked, and the marine engineering works were crippled for nearly two months. In that month he struck again at Belfast, already twice raided.

  The worst attack was the last. On May 10 the enemy returned to London with incendiary bombs. He lit more than two thousand fires, and by the smashing of nearly a hundred and fifty water mains, coupled with the low tide in the Thames, he stopped us putting them out. At six o’clock next morning hundreds were reported as out of control, and four were still glowing on the night of the 13th. It was the most destructive attack of the whole night Blitz. Five docks and seventy-one key points, half of which were factories, had been hit. All but one of the main railway stations were blocked for weeks, and the through routes were not fully opened till early June. Over three thousand people were killed or injured. In other respects also it was historic. It destroyed the House of Commons. One single bomb created ruin for years. We were however thankful that the Chamber was empty. On the other hand, our batteries and night fighters destroyed sixteen enemy planes, the maximum we had yet attained in night fighting.

  This, though we did not know it, was the enemy’s parting fling. On May 22 Kesselring shifted the headquarters of his air fleet to Posen, and at the beginning of June the whole force was moved to the east. Nearly three years were to pass before our Civil Defence organisation in London had to deal with the “baby Blitz” of February 1944 and the later onslaught of the rockets and the flying bombs. In the twelve months from June 1940 to June 1941 our civilian casualties were 43,381 killed and 50,856 seriously injured, a total of 94,237.

  It is not possible in a major war to divide military from political affairs. At the summit they are one. It is natural that soldiers should regard the military aspect as single and supreme, and even that they should speak of political considerations with a certain amount of disdain. Also the word “politics” has been confused, and even tarnished, by its association with party politics. Thus much of the literature of this tragic century is biased by the idea that in war only military considerations count and that soldiers are obstructed in their clear, professional view by the intrusion of politicians, who for personal or party advantage tilt the dread balances of battle. The extremely close, intimate contacts which prevailed between the War Cabinet, the Chiefs of Staff, and myself, and the total absence of party feeli
ng in Britain at this time, reduced these discords to a minimum.

  While the war with the Italians in North-East Africa continued to prosper, and the Greeks battled valiantly in Albania, all the news we got about the German movements and intentions proved every day more plainly that Hitler was about to intervene upon a large scale in the Balkans and the Mediterranean. From the beginning of January I had apprehended the arrival of German air-power in Sicily, with the consequent menace to Malta and to all our hopes of resuming traffic through the inland sea. I also feared a movement of German troops, presumably armoured, into Tripoli. We could not doubt that their plans were progressing to establish a north-and-south passage through Italy to Africa, and at the same time and by the same measures to interrupt all our movements east and west in the Mediterranean.

  On top of this now came the menace to the Balkan States, including Greece and Turkey, of being enticed or coerced into the Hitler empire, or conquered if they did not comply. Was the same hideous process we had witnessed in Norway, Denmark, Holland, Belgium, and France to be reproduced in South-East Europe? Were all the Balkan States, including heroic Greece, to be subjugated one by one, and Turkey, isolated, to be compelled to open for the German legions the road to Palestine, Egypt, Iraq, and Persia? Was there no chance of creating a Balkan unity and Balkan front which would make this new German aggression too costly to be worth while? Might not the fact of Balkan resistance to Germany produce serious and helpful reactions in Soviet Russia? Certainly this was a sphere in which the Balkan States were affected by interest, and even, so far as they allowed it to influence their calculations, by sentiment. Could we from our strained but growing resources find the extra outside contribution which might galvanise all these States, whose interests were largely the same, into action for a common cause? Or ought we, on the other hand, to mind our own business and make a success of our campaign in North-East Africa, let Greece, the Balkans, and it might be Turkey and all else in the Middle East, slide to ruin?

  There would have been much mental relief in such a clear-cut decision; and it has found its adherents in the books of various officers occupying subordinate positions who have given us their views. These writers certainly have the advantage of pointing to the misfortunes which we sustained, but they had not the knowledge to consider sufficiently what the results of the opposite policy might have been. If Hitler had been able, with hardly any fighting, to bring Greece to her knees and the whole of the Balkans into his system and then force Turkey to allow the passage of his armies to the south and east, might he not have made terms with the Soviets upon the conquest and partition of these vast regions and postponed his ultimate, inevitable quarrel with them to a later part of his programme? Or, as is more likely, would he not have been able to attack Russia in greater strength at an earlier date? The main question which the ensuing chapters will probe and expose is whether His Majesty’s Government by their action influenced in a decisive, or even in an appreciable manner, Hitler’s movements in South-East Europe, and moreover whether that action did not produce consequences first upon the behaviour of Russia and next upon her fortunes.

  Throughout January and February good news continued to reach us from the Middle East. Malta had been reinforced and survived by the skin of its teeth the first fierce onslaught of the German Air Force in Sicily. The conquest of the Italian Empire in Eritrea, Somaliland, and Abyssinia was in process of completion. The Desert Army had advanced five hundred miles in two months, destroyed an Italian army of more than nine divisions, and seized Benghazi and all Cyrenaica. But in spite of these victories, so grave and complex were the issues, both diplomatic and military, which were at stake, and General Wavell had so much on his hands, that at the meeting of the Defence Committee on February 11 it was resolved to send the Foreign Secretary and General Dill, the Chief of the Imperial General Staff, to join him in Cairo. From there Eden, with Wavell, Dill, and other officers, flew to Athens, to confer with the Greek King and Government. At the meeting the Prime Minister, M. Korysis, read him a statement setting forth the outcome of the Greek Cabinet discussions in the past day or two. As this statement formed the basis of our action, I set forth the material part in full: “I desire to repeat most categorically that Greece, as a faithful ally, is determined to go on fighting with all her forces until final victory. This determination is not limited to the case of Italy, but will apply to any German aggression … whatever the outcome and whether Greece has or has not any hope of repulsing the enemy in Macedonia, she will defend her national territory, even if she can only count on her own forces.” The Greek Government made it clear that their decision had been taken before they knew whether we could give them any help or not. Mr. Eden then explained that we in London, in full agreement with the Commanders-in-Chief in the Middle East, were resolved to give Greece the fullest help in our power. Military conferences and staff meetings were held all night and the next day, and on the 24th Eden sent us the following most important telegrams:

  We were all impressed by frankness and fair dealing of Greek representatives on all subjects discussed. I am quite sure that it is their determination to resist to the utmost of their strength, and that His Majesty’s Government have no alternative but to back them whatever the ultimate consequences.… We are all convinced that we have chosen the right course, and as the eleventh hour has already struck felt sure that you would not wish us to delay for detailed reference home. The risks are great, but there is a chance of success.…

  On these messages, which carried with them the assent of both Dill and Wavell, it was decided in the Cabinet to give full approval to the proposals.

  Mr. Eden now went on to Angora and had long discussions with the Turks. His account was not encouraging. They realised their own dangers as acutely as we did, but were convinced that the forces we could offer them would not be sufficient to make any real difference to an actual battle. As they had no offensive power they considered the common cause would be better served by Turkey remaining out of the war until her deficiencies had been remedied and she could be employed with the maximum effect. If attacked she would of course come in. I well understood how perilous the position of Turkey had become. It was obviously impossible to consider the treaty we had made with her before the war as binding upon her in the altered circumstances. When war had broken out in 1939 the Turks had mobilised their strong, good, brave army. But this was all based upon the conditions of the First Great War. The Turkish infantry were as fine as they had ever been, and their field artillery was presentable. But they had none of the modern weapons which from May 1940 were proved to be decisive. Aviation was lamentably weak and primitive. They had no tanks or armoured cars, and neither the workshops to make and maintain them nor the trained men and staffs to handle them. They had hardly any anti-aircraft or anti-tank artillery. Their signals service was rudimentary. Radar was unknown to them. Nor did their warlike qualities include any aptitude for all these modern developments.

  On the other hand, Bulgaria had been largely armed by Germany out of the immense quantities of equipment of all kinds taken from France and the Low Countries as a result of the battles of 1940. The Germans had therefore plenty of modern weapons with which to arm their allies. We, for our part, having lost so much at Dunkirk, having to build up our home army against invasion and to face all the continuous pressure of the Blitz on our cities as well as maintain the war in the Middle East, could only give very sparingly and at the cost of other clamant needs. The Turkish army in Thrace was, under these conditions, at a serious and almost hopeless disadvantage compared with the Bulgarians. If to this danger were added even moderate detachments of German air and armour the weight upon Turkey might well prove insupportable.

  The only policy or hope throughout this phase of the ever-extending war was in an organised plan of uniting the forces of Yugoslavia, Greece, and Turkey; and this we were now trying to do. Our aid to Greece had been limited in the first place to the few air squadrons which had been sent from Egypt when Musso
lini first attacked her. The next stage had been an offer of technical units, which had been declined by the Greeks on grounds which were by no means unreasonable. We now reach the third phase, where it seemed possible to make a safe and secure Desert flank at and beyond Benghazi and concentrate the largest army of manœuvre or strategic reserve possible in Egypt.

  So far we had not taken any steps which went beyond gathering the largest possible strategic reserve in the Delta and making plans and shipping preparations to transport an army to Greece. If the situation changed through a reversal of Greek policy or any other event we should be in the best position to deal with it. It was agreeable, after being so hard pressed, to be able to wind up satisfactorily the campaigns in Abyssinia, Somaliland, and Eritrea and bring substantial forces into our “mass of manœuvre” in Egypt. While neither the intentions of the enemy nor the reactions of friends and neutrals could be divined or forecast, we seemed to have various important options open. The future remained inscrutable, but not a division had yet been launched, and meanwhile not a day was being lost in preparation.

  CHAPTER XVII

  THE BATTLE OF THE ATLANTIC

  THE only thing that ever really frightened me during the war was the U-boat peril. Invasion, I thought, even before the air battle, would fail. After the air victory it was a good battle for us. It was the kind of battle which, in the cruel conditions of war, one ought to be content to fight. But now our life-line, even across the broad oceans, and especially in the entrances to the Island, was endangered. I was even more anxious about this battle than I had been about the glorious air fight called the Battle of Britain.

  The Admiralty, with whom I lived in the closest amity and contact, shared these fears, all the more because it was their prime responsibility to guard our shores from invasion and to keep the life-lines open to the outer world. This had always been accepted by the Navy as their ultimate, sacred, inescapable duty. So we poised and pondered together on this problem. It did not take the form of flaring battles and glittering achievements. It manifested itself through statistics, diagrams, and curves unknown to the nation, incomprehensible to the public.