OT: The Truth About Winston Churchill - Andrew Roberts

A very interesting review of Winston Churchill’s involvement in WWII which also cleared up some misconceptions I had about the war.

The bad news, it’s almost two hours long which I though were very well spent. Your attention span might vary.

Andrew Roberts is an English historian, journalist and member of the House of Lords. He is the Roger and Martha Mertz Visiting Research Fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University and a Lehrman Institute Distinguished Lecturer at the New-York Historical Society. He is a New York Times bestselling author, having written dozens of books including biographies of Napoleon Bonaparte (2014) and Winston Churchill (2018)

The Captain

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Let me guess. He wasn’t perfect. He did things, that in hindsight might have been ill-advised? He didn’t do some things he should have because he was, shall we say "a man of his times. " Was partially responsible for WWII or actually caused WWII? (I’ve seen this trending up in recent months. Don’t tell me there’s no such thing as conspiracies)

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That’s very charitable. He is a piece of S… His policies caused “bengal famine” and killed 3 million people.

Who needs conspiracies?? When the truth is more horrible.

When 6 million jews are killed in holocaust the world erupted and remembers to date. But when you kill 3 million Indians you are a fuc@@@ng hero to West.

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How many Native Americans do you suppose succumbed to the takeover of their lands by Europeans? How many indigenous people’s were eliminated in Australia long before Churchill was even alive? How many Vikings killed how many Gauls, and how many Aztecs beheaded how many rivals.

The history of the world is replete with mankind’s cruelty to mankind. We just witnessed the elimination of health care for millions and the sure closing of rural hospitals, to the cheers of many.

So Stalin starved millions into submission? The Holodomor is swept under the rug of humanity along with all the others. Big surprise. We are a terrible species, in truth. Bees and ants and others cooperate without this sort of evil Darwinian combat; I wonder what it is that makes us this way?

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But there are people who are bandwidth insufficient.

No one cares in the West about Syria and Yemen. The Arabs do not bring that up. Instead leveraging public opinion in the West with propaganda on SM.

Being a Holocaust surviver I have pondered over the years how the most highly civilized nation on earth could fall to such depths of depredation. Simple adjectives like good and evil cannot explain it. The most telling proverb is, “The Road to Hell is Paved with Good Intentions.” To answer your question…

We need to study the ideologies developed by various tribes at various times. These ideologies, know by many names like cults, religions, faiths, morals, and politics, are the shields that allow for most of human savagery.

We also need to beware epithets. How is it possible that Socialists can be called “Extreme Right?” The German National Socialists are called extreme right by a group that is to their left, the Communists. They were mortal enemies. In fact the world is divided between Nationalists and Internationalists. The world is also divided by faith which allow Crusades and Jihads, depending on your tribe. Faiths also divide and multiply.

Non of the above is meant to justify anyone or anything. It is meant to ask people to think through their snap judgements of what is good or evil.

Why would a Holocaust surviver seek a German passport? How did Japan and Germany make peace with the West?

The Captain

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Very simple. There was a complete change with an attitude against dictators.

We keep discussing the American slide into dictatorship. You are the no show.

The thing that buys you off is the offer of a tax cut. You do not even live here. It is an ideological failure that has produced most of the US debt.

We are not crying wolf but if we were the wolf in the fable finally does show up.

Our opposition is lost in antisemitism. That will be commandeered later.

BTW the opposition no long pays any attention to racism, misogyny, or homophobia. Antisemitism first is their policy. They demand being listened to. Conservative Arabs who would kill them fill their SM feeds with propaganda day and night. People asking for donations are ripping them off.

Please label off-topic posts like this “OT.”

Wendy

Done!
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The Captain

My original draft was longer and covered more history but the others who have posted already summed up much of it, at least as well as I can, so I’ll keep this mostly to the Churchill references. To wit:

A lot of miscasting here.. Both sides do it. As you say, who needs conspiracies when you have the truth Except even with the truth people have to miscast and misrepresent to pile on. Their point, and the truth are simply never good enough.

He wasn’t perfect.

I’m sure the sarcasm in my statement was not lost on you but you put it forth that I was an apologist.

That’s very charitable. He is a piece of S… His policies caused “bengal famine” and killed 3 million people.

His policies were wartime decisions based on resource allocation. I suppose you think it would have been better letting the other guy win due to undersupplied troops? Of course you do. You just said so. Now, as a policy decision it still falls under “wasn’t perfect”. You make decisions in their own time and not 80 yrs later when they might look nicer on the internet.

When 6 million jews are killed in holocaust the world erupted and remembers to date. But when you kill 3 million Indians you are a fuc@@@ng hero to West.

Disingenuous at best. Just plain Wiggy at worst. Churchill did not have a “policy” of killing Indians Hey, let’s see if we can kill 'em all. They were in the end, casualties of war. Way different from the other guy whose policy actually was “Hey let’s see if we can kill 'em all. “

More insight: The world didn’t erupt over 6 million Jews. That came later as a political construct. NOBODY regards Churchill as “hero to the West” because 3 million Indians happened to die due to the exigencies of war and, OK, yes, his decisions were part of that. What are you even talking about?

I am not an apologist for anybody. Why? Because I actually know things. And understand them. And keep them in context and I don’t care what my friends think. While there are plenty of villains, I do not believe in heroes or saints. Why is he lionized? (And others, Washington, Mao…) Because people have this “thing” about it.

The people who perceive the world and history as “These are the Good People and those are The Baaaad People, like a 1950’s, sci-fi B movie, sound just like those who are slaves to religion or the modern professional atheist class who think running some numbers like a clever child is all the knowledge one needs. You have chosen what to believe, what to think and there is no reasoning.

Not to trivialize this but sometimes art can be insightful – Star Trek TOS, Season 1 episode 5 The Enemy Within.

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Precisely. The notes he wrote and what you are saying are no different. You are an apologist, nah, you are no different from him. I didn’t say then but saying it now.

Someone says these people are not worth living let us kill them is bad… and someone saying I need those resources for me and these people are not worth living let them die.. both are same. If you are a supporter of Hitler you are a n@#i and if you celebrate Churchill you are no different in my view. Both wants to kill others because they think those people are not worth living. Who the heck are you to decide who gets to live???

Why make it personal? This thread is about Churchill.

The Captain

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I didn’t, he made it. There are times, when you need to call out. An ignorant person, without proper reading of history, Yes I understand West whitewashes their atrocities, still, and with bias justifying killing directly 3 million people by choice should deserve the contempt.

Denny,

It is personal. Churchill is lauded but the full story of the man is hell for a lot of people.

Speaking of honesty, the public is beginning to realize the minority that are Islamists are dishonest murders.