that wraps up our time. again i'm sure he will stick around. [applause] thank you for attending today's event. the book signing will be outside of the auditorium. >> former editor-in-chief of simon and schuster and author of many books including the most recent at comes out this fall,

but then, churchill. where were you in the 1930s and 40s? >> i was a child born in 1933 that my wife moved back and forth. >> but to be remembered about the late 30s and early 40s? >> i remember the outbreak of the war and i describe that. i remember being bombed on a limited level before it started.

altogether i think it was the most uncomfortable traveling i've done in my life. >> world war ii began septembe september 31. when did dunkirk occur and would have been? >> the basic story that i wanted to write about is pressed into four days and nights as the british army and the belgians having collapsed find that they

make their way back to the channel ports and it's a kind of miracle to evacuate over 350,000 men is extraordinary is now 860 dots and personal boats because they were being bombed so it is a miraculous floor.

>> it is one of the moments when the plaintiff the greatest victory they lost the war and had an opportunity to crush the army on the beaches of dunkirk it is disputed by the generals of persons they would sit and rest and they gave an opportunity to organize a and when they were sure that we are in 20 invading them. >> when did this ocher? >> the 26th and 27th.

it might be possible to take 20 or 30,000. we took off 350,000. now without their artillery and in most cases they wanted to. for the naval officer it was hard to get into.

it's full of supplies for the troops that had a lot to where they were. >> was this a case of snatching victory out? >> it was defeated, yes. more than that because until dunkirk, there was still a running quarrel between winston churchill who would bend the preferred candidate to replace the minister and he had already opened up the discussions with

the italian ambassador in lond london. it's what the terms were in with a peace settlement with the. churchill was extensively against it but recognized first of all the substantial number of the members of the conservative party at any price. it's from the majority of the party still regarding nigel chamberlain that remained of their prime minister when they roam the at the replacement of the teams he was the successor

to the. speed to or the public at that point. so in that cabinet she was obliged at any rate to the arguments seeking out peace terms quicker rather than not as we are already in the process of doing so. he gave them an opportunity in the cabinet and the house of commons. so it's not just the defeat also

ending a. we've done the unexpected and miraculous. the harder core of its back to the united kingdom. it changed at the notion of defeat and a willingness to engage to be less destructive. it changed into a kind of confidence. if necessary it even did from

may, 1942 june 22, 1941 when they attacked the soviet union. it is an extraordinary achievement they managed to do that between the defeat and determination to go out to the end. that is due to two factors. it is uncanny admiration. there were bottles of beer, sandwiches, everything. and once they felt that, they felt they could go on. so that is one important factor.

another important factor is a bit if everybody to hope that they were possible with making mistakes and of course it was courageous. one man that was 84-years-old assailing his own sailboat involved the men and women stealing their votes.

they run to the beach and it's blown up with soldiers and then they get them up to the larger boats. that is what has to be done, so it was ordinary. you couldn't have a more inspiring moment. it's the factor most responsible

in the 1940s it might be possible to arrange a negotiated peace with germany and as churchill put it should stepping on a slippery slope and he was right. they put 1 foot further it would have led us. >> how did they end up in dunkirk?

>> once the french got to the south they had no option. at the same time, the power and the resourceful planning swept the german forces up because what on earth would the purpose be. it was by design cutting the

british army off and taking one by one the channel ports so they end up on the beach of dunkirk and they took every other channel. there was only one left and that was a very unsuitable place in many ways. it was not an easy port to get to. that is a major factor as it goes down of course it extends out. it was every reason so there was

no choice. they had to go there. in fact nobody could do that. it involved either going south are going north around which would be the journey of about 73 nautical miles. one was a dangerous route and then across the channel

dangerous because they had all of their artillery pointed out. also exposed everybody to the aircraft and the boats so it wasn't a short trip. you couldn't make the trip directly across. >> how long have you been thinking about writing this book at least from the american perspective it is a little bit underreported. >> there's there is a huge dealo be released.

i suspect americans will know all about it. my wife begged me not to write another long biography. it takes four years to do and that i should do a shorter book. why don't you write a book about dunkirk. younger than i am but she remembered some parts of course and i thought to myself that's not a bad idea. i became more and more interested because nobody had

dealt with step-by-step the way in which we went into the war and how we ended up in memphis and it's a great untold story taken out of context but not the entire story as a chronological story with so many different people and characters. the voices come through so clearly and then they took their chances from the english channel.

after may 10, 1940 but happened to natural chamberlain? >> shhe would take his place in the cabinets and had to be animosity to separate and to trust each other. churchill insisted chamberlain should remain the head of the conservative party. and chamberlain did and once the war had begun, he was a very firm voice that was surprising.

one is to reinstate an understanding of what he was about and what he saw. in fact he was a strong and tough politician something to the equivalent of an english lyndon b. johnson. he had immense political skills and was a very powerful personality. so they sold their political careers destroyed. he made the mistake of assuming he could out negotiate. he had in mind two things.

one is the reluctance of anybody that would flip through the first world war to see another. the other is he knew that the gunfighters and radar would be ready for combat until 1940. since it was the greatest secrets there was no way to tell the british that they would have to wait until 1940. but he knew that we had to buy time so he bought time. the british and the french had to buy time.

>> the newest book is coming out in september called a loan, britain, churchill and dunkirk to defeat into history thank you for spending a few minutes with us on book tv. booktv. >> it is a pleasure to see you again. as many of you know i am a joyful practitioner of social media. i'm there every day. i was an early adopter of facebook.

the first website appeared in my 20s and 30s so i thought it was cool watching a website loading on my old monitor by a little modem next to my desk was going and i thought this was the coolest thing ever. i thought this was the beginning of a new age of enlightenment but it's not. what it has done is create a huge swamp full of intellectual saboteurs who are making people stupid. we are starting to do studies that show people that spend time clicking through webpages are actually dumber than when they started because the we have the illusion of gain knowledge. the example i often use in the

book is tell a child, tell an tn adolescence without fossil fuels and they will say okay, fossil fuels because they are made up of dead dinosaurs, what happens after clicking and browsing that student will say i know a lot about fossil fuels but they won't. all the pages they've blown through now and many times they don't realize they have been testing people to ask them did you know this before you searched it and they would say yes. they can't difference between acquire your knowledge and that's scary because it also raises the question of how much you can manipulate people with search results. the other thing we're finding is people believe the first results

are truer than the next page. think about that for a minute and when it comes to things like public policy. that is how we fell swoop, manipulate the search engine and when some one says soup, campbell's, progressives an in e right way that it pops up in the order. starting out with political candidates or foreign-policy issues it's why the russians have prospered this because they are really goodat it. i don't like the way the president and everybody else use the term fake news. fake news has a specific meaning to me. it means a lie that is the prickly concocted and sent out into the media through the

internet or other dwelling to pollute the public debate intentionally and knowingly it isn't a biased story, it isn't an erroneous story. you can watch this and other programs online at booktv.org ..