Winston Churchill: Defender of Democracy

Page 2 of 7

• 1. A statesman transformed
• 2. Threat of invasion
• 3. Unfailingly brave
• 4. Man of the people
• 5. Grand alliance
• 6. Achievements of war
• 7. Find out more
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Threat of invasion

Chamberlain resigned, the man whom most Conservatives wanted in his place (Lord Halifax) declined to serve, and Churchill took on the job. It was astonishing, and a measure of his uniqueness, that he did so with calm assurance and a conviction that this, at last, was the realisation of his destiny: to lead his beloved nation in an all-out war for survival and for the universal values it represented.

If the challenge looked formidable on 10th May, it looked infinitely worse six weeks later. The British army's escape from capture at Dunkirk was hailed as a salvation but of course it was, in military terms, a shocking setback. The continental ally whom Britain had relied on to face the German army had surrendered, Italy had come in on the German side, and Hitler was master of Europe from the Arctic Circle to the Bay of Biscay.

'It was easy in such circumstances to despair and to look for a way out ...'

In addition, the French navy was likely to fall into German hands, German U-boats would soon have bases on the Atlantic, German bombers would be able to take off from bases close to Britain's coasts, and, worst of all, now that the Germans were able to mass on the Belgian coast, Britain was facing the first serious threat of invasion since 1805. It was easy in such circumstances to despair and to look for a way out of a war that seemed impossible to win.

Any leader but Churchill would probably have done so - with no other imaginable consequence than that Britain would have become (like Vichy France) a subordinate cog in Hitler's imperial machinery, with a subservient right-wing authoritarian government dedicated to racial discrimination. Churchill, however, saved his country from that humiliation.

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Published: 2002-06-14