by Jon Meacham.
The author stated in the introduction “Roosevelt was the better politician, Churchill the warmer human being”. This is followed in the beginning of Chapter 1, by two impressions of the first female member of Roosevelt’s cabinet, Frances Perkins. Perkins once heard a fellow politician say “Awful arrogant fellow, that Roosevelt”. Her bottom line on Churchill: “He’s pig-headed in his own way, often right and brilliant, but …”, leaving the sentence unfinished. With these teasing opening, the author successfully hooked the readers to this 370 pages of narratives of the epic friendship of the two towering figures of the twentieth century, FDR and WSC. They first met in a dinner party in the Gray’s Inn in London on July 29, 1918, when Churchill, age 43, was minister of munitions and former first lord of the Admiralty. Roosevelt, age 36, was working for the US Navy Department. They two did not make much impression on each other. They did not make contact again until September 1939, when FDR (now President) telegraphed WSC (first lord of the Admiralty again) inviting him to correspond direct on naval or other matters. WSC became Prime Minister in 1940. France was about to fall and England was to stand alone against Hitler. At about this time, England was bombarded continuously by the German Air Force. Meanwhile, there was the spectacle of Dunkirk and the threat of invasion of the British islands. It was during these dark hours that Churchill mobilized the English language and sent it to war, rallying his country with soaring words such as “I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears, and sweat”; “If the British Empire and its Commonwealth last for a thousand years, men will still say, ‘This was their finest hour’”; and, in tributes to the British fighter pilots who defeated the German Air Force in the Battle of Britain, “Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few.” The author gave detailed accounts of Churchill’s pleas to FDR for help. Partly because of the isolationist sentiment in the U.S., led by Charles Lindbergh, Churchill’s efforts were met with limited success. The major turning point was the hundreds of Sherman tanks delivered to the British after her ignominious defeat in Tobruk, in which some 30,000 British soldiers surrendered to the Germans. These tanks were instrumental in the victory in Alamein, which turned the tide in the North African theater. With the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7,1941 and the declaration of War by Hitler on the U.S. on December 11, 1941, the Anglo-American Alliance was firmly solidified. The rest, as the saying goes, is history. In this book, history is told mainly through the relationship of FDR and WSC, highlighted in a series of meetings in Newfoundland, Casablanca, Quebec, Cairo and Tehran, Yalta, and several in Washington, D. C. French Generals Henri Giraud and Charles de Gaulle attended the Casablanca meeting. Joseph Stalin of Russia was at the meetings in Tehran and Yalta while Chiang Kai Shek of China was at the two Cairo meetings. WSC was a guest in the White House when he attended the Washington meetings. It is to be noted that none of these meetings took place in the U.K. It was planned that FDR and Eleanor were to visit U.K. in the Fall of 1945 but FDR died before that. From the accounts of the formal meetings and informal gatherings, the reader can judge whether he/she agrees with the statements at the beginning of this review as well as the following selected from the author’s introduction: “Their personal faults – Roosevelt’s duplicity, Churchill’s self-absorption – were at times political virtues…” “Sometimes politicians have to pursue different courses at the same time and deceive those closest to them about what they are doing.” “While Nazism and Japanese imperialism were on the march, the West was led by human beings prone, like anyone else, to shortcoming, jealousy, and sickness – and yet capable of historic insight and courage.” Like most families, not all tidings were happy ones. There were stories of infidelity, divorce, heroism, and ill health. There were also lighthearted moments, such as, when Churchill learned of Germany’s surrender on May 8, 1945, he made sure that there was no shortage of beer in London for the celebration. Finally, the most interesting thing I learned from the book is that Churchill was an optimistic agnostic, and a most sensible quote from him about religion: “You can believe or not to believe, but it is wicked to take away the hope of people.”
(Source: Wikipedia)
Franklin Roosevelt Portrait in National Gallery, Washington, D. C.
Roosevelt and Churchill aboard HMS Prince of Wales for 1941 Atlantic Charter Meeting
(Source: Wikipedia)
Link of review in amazon.com. https://www.amazon.com/gp/customer-reviews/R1JGOS6RRTCBHJ/ref=cm_cr_dp_d_rvw_ttl?ie=UTF8&ASIN=B0000X8HWU
Placed as top review among 375 reviews as of 4/4/23
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