line of reasoning is rubbish for the following reasons. a, we did not have sufficient landing craft in 1943. in fact the shortage of handing craft was the main reason why the invasion was delayed from play to june 1944. the luffwaffer wasn't effectively destroyed until 1944. in 194e, it posed a terrible threat to the invasion. and rc,ed u-boat had not beep eliminated. and the army needed the harsh lessons of fighting in the mediterranean, during 1943, to sort itself out. and only during the battle for normandy, did it develop into the very effective fighting force, which achieved the great breakout in central france in late july, 1944. and churchill in fact delayed the invasion of northern europe for the wrong reasons. he wanted to attack italy and

then advance northeastward into central europe to preempt the red army's occupation. this was militarily unsound. but it shows his determination to save central europe, something which did not concern the americans. and they saw this as an example of churchill playing politician for the post-war period. they could not have been more wrong in underestimating the soviet intention to impose a huge corridor across eastern and central europe. the point was churchill was proved right-to-delayed the invasion, whether or not it was for the wrong robes. and now, the whole allied strategy of the second world war had been determined at the conference in november 1943. stalin within the driving seat partly because of the successes of the red army that year and partly because he would claim that the ove yet union was fighting the bulk of varment and suffering casualties.

roosevelt attempting to curry favor with stalin was cutting himself loose with his alliance with churchill. he was even agreeing with stalin behind churchal's back and making jokes that -- certainly about the british attempt to hold on to the empire. it was roosevelt who put paid to churchill's hope to save central europe. the decision and the fact that the main allied effort would be to attack germany and france and northern europe manipulate that the soviet occupation of central europe and the bullpen would become inevitable and there would bing in the allies could do about it. roosevelt with high-minded naiveness, rejected any idea of spears of influence after the war but churchill well aware stalin would do the utmost to turn the countries into satellite states went to moscow in 1944 to try to save something from the approaching disaster. the only country le could hope

to save was greece and thus keep the soviets out of the eastern mediterranean. this was the much criticized, percentage agreement, where churchill conceded control of bulgaria and romania and yugoslavia which all lay directly in the path of the red army. it play have been immoral but it was the only form of politic that was likely to work with stalin. and the conference is sometimes betrayed as the great betrayal but who was the betrayer of central and southern europe. it wasn't church. , if anybody was on court, it was roosevelt who thought he could charm stalin into behaving well in the occupied areas and continue the grand alliance into the post-war period. and to make it worse, roosevelt refused to discuss tactics with churchill when they met before the conference started. he did not want stalin to think the western powers were ganging

u on him. needless to say, stalin still didn't trust him but he was in a strong position. he knew exactly what he wanted, white the -- wile the british and americans had no agreed program of what they wanted to chevy. in addition stalin through his spies in britain and the united states and through having various sun begged the american delegations in delta, learned precisely where the risk lay between the two western allies. and he exploited them with great cunning and confidence. because he held all of the trump cards with the red army already on the ground in central europe and the n.a.k.v. seizing all possible opponents to soviet rule. the agreement atial that to a large degree simply reflectededed realities of a military decision made at tehran. roosevelt however had two key objectives atial that. one was to get stalin to agree to the great dream. the united nations organization

and the other was to persuade stalin to join the war against japan almost immediately after the defeat of germany. for churchill, the stumbling block was poland and stalin's attempt to impose his own puppet government on the country. roosevelt was simply not prepared to support churchill in a showdown on the matter, if it placed in jeopardy, his two projects. in the circumstances, stalin's ruthless determination was bound to win. finally, churchill's anger over stalin's brutal repression in poland came to a head in play 1985, just after the german surrender. he asked for a planning exercise to see if it item be possible to push back the red army, to enforce compliance of the agreement on free elections in poland this was code named operation unthinkable. after detailed study, they had to come back to him and say

that, without support from the united states, it really was unthinkable. poland and all of the other countries occupied by the red army were doomed to over 40 years of communististic leadership. but nobody with a trace of lel elect yul honesty can say the fault was churchill's. ladies and gentlemen, winston churchill was made certainly not a liability to the free world. he was our greatest asset. thank you so much. [applause] >> now supporting the motion, historian norman stone, professor of international relations at phil kent university, an cora from 1984 to 1997. he was the professor of modern history at oxford and a frequent commentator in international press and mrs. satchel's policy writer and a speechwriter. his books include "hitler and

warled war i" and "atlantic and its enemies" will be published next year. norman stone. >> ladies and gentlemen i play begin by saying, i'm a war baby, it goes -- somewhat against the grain to be standing here saying what i'm about to say. not only am i a war baby, can i remember the orange juice, it is horrible. and my -- my photograph was taken in a crash for the working mother, which was then used as labour party propaganda in glasgow. i must look out for it again, because i looked terribly winsome. the problem with this kind of vet ration of churchill is the

perspective on many things and as it happens, i say this with tongue and cheek, richard ovary has said, very blatantly that churchill was gold atial that and andrew roberts who i taught and my sense. has written a whole book on churchill, which i think shows, something of what i want to say, which is the myth is dangerous. it was dangerous. and now the first big thing that i think the opposition are missing out, is that churchill was first and foremost an imper ralist. he was a product of the wonderful world of answers. and the hoard who was not a stupid man was vice roy of india and he was asked how long are we going to stay in india, as vice roy, as if forever. 40 years later it is over. and i put it to you that the attempt of the imperialist to save the empire in the 1920's

and 30's especially. well it was just as gandy said, millions of acres of bankrupt real estate was fatal. why do we live with the problem of pakistan which was occupying most of the newspapers most of the time. and precisely because the british got india wrong in the 1930's, churchill in the lead. he said india is no more of a nation than the equator. that sort of thing is dangerous. all right, if you propose to be the emperor of the equator yourself but not a very good idea and then it misled churchill into this extraordinary strategy of trying to fight in the far east when he was already having his hands full with -- with problems in the english channel. what an extraordinary way to behave. and i put that thing first as the great -- churchill's greatest, well his exreatest failure. and the sculingts out of india was all well for my generation, we didn't have to put up with

the sort of nonsense the french had in vietnam, let alone algeria but it was a pretty terrible thing for the indians themselves and to some extent still is. let's not be too smug about that. the next thing i like to point out is that -- is it terribly sensible strategy, in 1944, 1945, to bomb germany, to bits? and the speakers on my side, have talked about that. you all know the sins of bombing cities -- of bombing cities in berlin. i think jeffrey wheatcroft who is in the audience pointed out the extraordinary saidism with which it was carried on. an utterly harmless town, but it voted nazi, it is simply obliterated at the very end of the war.

why? why was this carried on? and now, leaving the ins and outs of the bombing offensive on one side, is it not a little bit silly, in 1944, and 1945, to be bombing into the ground a country with which you're going to be milt tarell allied through your four years -- three or four years later. why was it -- i can remember myself, the glee with which as a small boy, i would look at the pictures of the hanged war criminals, and read about it. it was the world when the daily express would lead with a headline, as george or well said, babies burned. and terrible sad disistic business but it was also very bad reality politic, whatever its moral qualities. there were very good journalists in england during the war. olin lawyer who was nearly the leader of the social democrats would have been our man.

and went on to say can i help with planning for your post-war germany and said the best thing you could do is go and work in an aircraft factory. that's the sort of thinking that was going on about jrmnie. another extraordinary case. you'll have seen this film or at least maybe seen it, in which quite inappropriately tom cruz is -- tom cruise is made to play a german and aeries crat. are they going to do elton john as anna karina. and the 12th of july raid failed. there was a list of all of the germans that approached them during the war to see if peace could be picked up. they were picked up by the gestapo the following day. that seems to me to argue something going very badly wrong. it is understandable, that if we're going to sven rate churchill, he should have been

like de gaulle and seemed much further ahead. as things were, what he did see was -- wass an england in close alliance with the united states. ds perfectly true to say that he got out of it, for us, a privileged existence. the continent oflp europe was wrecked. and the england which i grew up and scotland, i'm sorry i'm old-fashioned, british, you'll forgive me if i don't say britain. and the england i grew up in, was -- was remarkably prosperous. it seemed to be doing very well and then suddenly in comparison, with the rest of the part of europe, it went down. you'll remember the times in the 1950e7's, when you looked at your passport and felt rather dread of traveling to somewhere on continental europe which simply worked better. and now, obviously, i'm in the blaming churchill for that but, i think there was a mood of national complacency which

developed which grows around the sort of view of churchill, the right little, tight little island which had fought its corner and had planned its war effort with great distinction, which had emancipated women during the war and -- the result of all of that was the sort of thinking which went into the labor government of 1945 a -- and i wonder really if there's a single shution, created out of that period, which we wouldn't want to -- toe to amend seriously if we could be time machined back into it. to that extent, the -- with churchill cult has certain amount of responsibility, we thought we had done absolutely wonderfully, who would like us, et cetera, et cetera. in fact, poor old germans were getting their act together. in a way that we simply failed to do. we caught up again, i think in the 1980's and it was a very interesting period to go through. but let us not fall for this

smug sven ration of churchill. there is as pat buchanan said, 1940, a wonderful moment to read about in history. but the rest -- i have got my doubts. thank you. [applause] >> our final speaker, opposing the motion, is richard ovary, professor of history at exodder university and author of 20 books about the second world war, the history of air power and the history of hitler and stalin. most particularly his book "hitler's germany and stalin's russia" and the most recent book, with the did the 1939 countdown to war." richard ovary. well, i have to say it is

difficult, with such a distinguished panel. i know you're all dying toe get your teeth into it. but i'm going to -- to round off the debate. now, i thought it would be difficult really but in fact, i heard a lot of history discussion and strategy, discussion of the gold standard. and nothing of which seems to me is really germane to the case that the opposition is trying to make. what is this case? well, i took the motion to mean that if churchill had acted very differently, or if he had not been there at all, things would have been better for the free world. now listening to -- our opponents, you would think for a moment that britain had lost the first world war and the second world war. and every now and then, i'm having to do a double take with listening to this catalog of awful crimes that churchill was supposed to be responsible for. now i want to approach the question in two ways i can i

think have not been talked about so far this evening. one is i think and with respect to my distinguished -- the distinguished opposition, that there's a from found misunderstanding about the nature of the historical process and particularly the nature of the historical process is in which churchill himself was an actor. and the second point i'm going to make is to come back to this question about a liability for the free world. this question of freedom of liberty which was so central at churchill's own values is something i think we not talked about very much this evening. now the first and most obvious thing about the history is you can't blame one person for all of this. without listening to what the opposition is say, i had to pinch myself again and said, are we talking about stalin or hitler. here's somebody able to wave a wand, get a decision in forced and get his way, and drive through things which were bad

for the free world. it wasn't like that, historical processes don't work like that. churchill, though he didn't like it, of course, had to wage war just as he was a chancellor having to wage an economic war by committee. and the important thing too which i think we not heard niff about tonight is that churchill for all of his misjudgment and none of us argued he was perfect was able to take advice, did hitler take advice? not very well. churchill was wimming to take advice. he took advice on a wide range of issues. not only that of course, but the process with which he was concerned, whether the first world war or municipal in addition, whether the second world war and fighting the battle of britain or decisions about overlord, he want the only person involved in all of these processes. hundreds of people were involved in this decision making. and indeed in many cases, we're talking about historical processes which were quite beyond his control.

or the control of any politician during the period that we're talking about. and what i think the opposition has done is make churchill the lightning conductor for all of their own gripes about what went wrong with the historical story in the 20th century. and many of the issues that we heard about already, churchill was largely a spectator, the rise of communism in china, and the establishment of communism in the parts of asia. even eastern europe, what could churchill have done about eastern europe. it is enough, it is one thing to say that churchill was responsible for the deaths of -- of the expulsion of 13 million germans, et cetera. but we all know that there was very little that the west could do by the end of the second world war to expel the soviet union, from eastern europe. certainly nothing that churchill would have done on his own. and churchill was not on his own. he operated with other politicians and took advice from the combined chiefs of staff and took advice from his own political stars.

this is not a churchal only story, this is churchill in -- in the the historical processes and his relationship to those processes is something we always need to bear in mind. what is interesting, i think, is has churchill himself, recognized, more clearly than many other people, the limitations of action. what he could and could not do. and he also recognized i think his own limit tazes. it is only the churchill industry over the last 20 or 30 years, which has made him into a kind of saint and woe all doubt his miracles. in fact, churchill recognized his own limitations as well. and he was triff erin, i would argue, by a world historical vision which very few other war-time leaders or leaders from the interwar years enjoyed. during the crisis, that's what we're talking about. that's the meat of what we're talking about. the crisis in the middle east, and it was in the middle of the

century. that vision was a important one. now the core of that vision is a view of liberty, you need to remember that the motion before us tonight is about the free world, it is not about, you know, a world that -- that we might dream up or like or think about. but it is about this core question of freedom. and churchill is not the best person to talk about it. he didn't want to give freedom to the indians. he came from a particular class. he had a deep loathing of communism and didn't like the labour party, but what churchill was driven by was a deep hatred of tyranny. he knew what it was. he had an old-fashioned view of inge lish liberty, well, it seems old-fashioned today but it is a very important view, i think of english liberty, pfs fundamental. it was about the rule of law. it is about parliamentary government. it was about pumental freedoms. and now you might think that's a piece of rhetoric, but in fact

it is essential to -- to that churchillian vision. churchill was a warrior for the liberal age. and we need to remember that the liberal age was in deep crisis in the 1930's and 1940's. indeed when churchill came to pass in 1940, there was almost no democracy left in europe. the high point of the crisis years of 1941 and 1942 , it looked as if a liberal age which britain had -- had a -- played a large part in creating, was on the point of extinction. we need to remember the nature of the crisis that churchill is trying to -- to confront. this is no a better strategy here, a better economic policy there. he saw this as essential crisis of civilization and many of his people saw it that way as well. it seems to me that churchill's

critical contribution is really to understand those values and to align britain with them at a moment of acute crisis. in world history. and even if his -- his speech was rhetorical and long-winded, even if it was blind to problems of a democratic empire, i would still argue, that this is an important part of his legacy. and i want to finish by quoting churchill's last speech in the house of commons, 1955, parting speech. and -- the day made dawn he said when fair play and love for one's fellow men and for justice and freedom will enable tormented generations to march forth serene and triumphant, from the hideous place we have it to dwell. it play not work perfectly or quite as he saw it, but i think that exemplifies the kind of -- of approach that churchill had

to world issues. whatever we think of his rhetoric or its affect. a man committed to the survival of these core value, hostile to tyranny and its stoifling and inhuman consequences can surely 07b8 be regarded in the long run as an asset. thu. [applause] >> before i come to you for your questions, we're going to have a half hour of questions, fit to be put to our panel from anybody in the audience, i'm going to give you the results of the vote as you came in. so, before the debate, for the motion, 118, against the motion, 1,167. but don't knows, 422.

and that's the interesting number. so, let us now have your questions. there are people with microphones, ready to come to you. i would like you to stand up when you put your first question, there's one over here. and there's one here already. and i like you to stand up and speak clearly, obviously, a lot of people have to hear you. and i would take groups of questions. i'll take groups of questions, in twos and threes so that -- we can get a -- a swing of questions going. and yes? >> could i ask the -- those opposing the motion to deal with what i think are -- as one of mr. cannon's most serious allegations against churchill which is that effectively, the first world war precipitated events that led inevitably to the disaster of the second and that churchill's blidge rennes obstructed the possibility of avoiding the first world war by

obstructing the kaiser's last efforts to get off the look. >> thank you. other questions, one here? that one. and the one up here perhaps that i can't see. this light is very difficult to deal with. yes. >> yes. i -- i have the impression on both sides of the argument speakers have slightly tiptoed around the issue of -- what was really crucial about 1940. and my question therefore is this. if churchill had not stood out as he did against km mice and discussion with hitler and with the fascist, what would the consequences have been? after all, the soviet union was in alliance with nazi germany and the united states was neutral. >> thank you. >> let's -- a third question, right over there. >> could we get a microphone there and then we'll start the answers. >> poland loomed quite large in

the debate on both sides. and i wondered on this anniversary, what, whether -- what to make of the russian allegation that you suspect the polish guardeners as agents and whether mr. buchanan could substantiate the things he said when he's been writing that hitler was a potent part of the pact. >> fine thank you. three questions there. and blidge raines and -- what was crucial about 1940 and the further question. >> well to answer the first one first, i don't believe that winston churchill did obstruct the kaiser's desperate need for peace in 1914. when -- it strikes me there was an attempt by germany to use the assassination of the arch duke and the crisis that kim ka from it to extend the power of the

central powers and winston churchill did nothing but his job, as far as the admirality. as for the second. for the second, you are absolutely right, a peace dool in 1940 would have been disastrous. for britain. not least because as you say, america waunts in the war and russia was -- was allied to our enby. but also, it would have -- meant, that we as a nation, would no longer have had that vigor and that -- that ability to -- to -- to stay in the game in a way that we desperately needed to. whichever side won, either the russians or the germans, and finally of course poland, the putin government is playing an extremely sinister and unpleasant game with the 70@anniversary. they know as well as anybody that the real trigger if the outbreak of the second world war was not the agreement, but the nazi soviet pact. [applause]

>> i'll talk to the gentleman who made the point about poland. the truth is as i wrote, i believe that ato feel hitler did not want war with poland after the czech republic crumbled, poland anticipated to take them apart. and the hand went to scrermnie. what germ germany wanted after march was simply the return of danzig and they were willing to negotiate it with the poles. if he wanted war with poland instead of alliance he would have demanded the whole corridor and that would have led to war. chamberlain himself felt danzig 95% german and 350,000 people should be returned to germany, rather than be a cause of war. and now the poles got their -- british war guarantee which was the greatest blunder in british

history, the british empire nation saying, if hitler attacks poland, which they couldn't save and they had -- british had no plan to save, we will go to war on behalf of poland. thus giving polish colonels a junta of polish colonels the power to bring the british empire and nation into war. . .

>> i am afraid i must reject absolutely everything you said there. [applause] four-star, himself acknowledged that and it was not the point, it was just an excuse. he was interested in occupying poland as a later springboard for the invasion of the soviet union, and it was the first stage in the east. apart from that, the whole idea that the nazi offer to poland was in any way any sort of guarantee, the polls it were not tempted for a moment. they knew perfectly well what hitler was really about. they were caught in a totally impossible position between two very predatory tyrants on both sides. chamberlain, after the humiliation of seeing in the

german occupation of prague, had no option but to offer poland a guarantee in those circumstances, because britain had already -- >> may respond to that? they did have an option. the option that chamberlain had was to recognize after czechoslovak a crumbled, that as -- the option he should have taken was the same one the americans took after world war ii when stalin this side of his bludgeons -- on his pledges -- if the british had said when czechoslovakia crumbled, we are getting together with the french and telling hitler, if you cross into belgium, holland, or france, you are at war with great britain. hitler never wanted war with the british empire or the british nation, and he was always willing to pay a price for it.

churchill was the one going chamberlain to give that guarantee. >> moving on, i want some more questions. to tell the people in the upstairs that you must move to the microphone to ask your questions. there is one microphone there and one microphone there. the slight problem is that the lights are so blazingly strong that i cannot see whether you are there are not. i can see that there is some money there. -- there is somebody there. >> it is said that various civil servant gave him a casket with all the treaties that germany had signed under the nazi. s what is it that the proposition believes that anybody could do to deal with hitler? surely that is naivete beyond belief, and if they break every treaty showing there was no alternative but to go to war. >> is there a question over

here? >> who started the war? listening to those in favor of the motion, it sounds to me as if britain started the war and churchill started the war. maybe i have got my history wrong. i thought it was hitler. that was the first question. the second question is, who had to do with central and eastern europe? i thought it was the americans and roosevelt and roosevelt's desire to create a united nations and deal with stolid accordingly. >> right. norman. >> the braker of treaties. it is perfectly true, it did not go by the spirit of munich. [laughter]

some of those treaties which it was alleged to have broken were averse i and all that. there is a very good argument for the appeasement strategy of to about 1938, and then something those incredibly wrong. if you talk to people, people who were there in 1939, they say as far as we all were concerned, the war review -- the war really broke out in the summer of 1939. we all just expected it. when 1940 comes along, we got a tiny little whiff of it in this country in 1982 over the falklands war, which i supported. at the time, i was in a fairly small minority in academic life. the feeling was powerful. these things are simply not

rational. there was one rational calculation behind it all. hitler had threatened to bomb western cities and exaggerated the amount of bombing he could do. we were making more fighters and the germans were. you could say whatever the excuse, we will go to war. i agree, it looks now product of a mad house as many set at the time. in its way, it is the rationalization of a nightmare that is coming true. i agree with you that this is not all the fault of churchill. >> what about this question about who started the war? >> it was pretty straightforward, i would have thought.

nonetheless, if one picks up that gentleman over there who pointed out about the casket is absolutely right. it was hitler's birthday. he was given a casket containing all the treaties that had been signed since he had become the fuehrer. only those after 1933, an important ones like the anglo german naval treaty of 1935. the private secretary joked that hitler had broken every single one of them. ladies and gentlemen, that is not a man that you can do a deal with. >> more questions?

let's have three questions from theire. >> thanks for a very interesting evening. if churchill was more a liability than an asset, who could possibly have done a better job? [applause] >> we know that nazism stood for oppression. in the 1930's, the conference made it apparent what their ulterior motive was in regard to the jews. why did the proponents not acknowledge overy's point that churchill saw through although bullshit? listening to the proponents, i know that the courageous few men who stood up to chamberlain and halifax with their -- thank god they were there alongside churchill.

[applause] >> who would have done a better job? >> although i must admit that question does not overwhelmingly interest me, i will give an answer to it. [laughter] i want to get back to fighting the war, because i am more interested in that than who started at, although i am fully prepared to believe that hitler did. in terms of the notion of a good chief executive, someone who can take good decisions, a church till of course was renowned for being in a chaotic decisionmaker. the whole notion of this a moderate campaign and the norway campaigns were good examples -- the sumatra campaign. somebody who was actually very efficient at being a chief

executive, of making decisions, not in a chaotic way but in a clear, precise, and considered by and moving on was clement attlee. i am not a supporter of the labor party, but he actually as deputy prime minister of the second world war is the great unsung chief executive. in his own government afterward, the fact remains that he was a very efficient and well organized and chief executive. he would have actually been a much more efficient prime minister at making the proper decisions than churchill's very chaotic method of making decisions. >> many credit the conference as the beginning of the holocaust.

that occurred on january 31 of 1942, 2.5 years into the war. who started the war? hitler started the war on september 1, 1939. on september 3, britain and france declared war on germany. why? to honor a war guarantee to poland that they could not honor, they had no plans to honor, and they did not, in this sense, the french army told polls on the 15th day the whole french army will be thrown against germany. the british told the poles, if they bomb warsaw, we bomb berlin. they did not, and soda poles suffered this horrendous -- so at the poles suffered this horrendous fake. the french and british, her road

as they were, could not conceivably honor -- heroic as they were. the british and french should have done what they did when stolen dishonored the yalta agreements -- win stalin dishonored the yalta agreements. if britain had done that, i believe that hitler wanted no war in the west, and a lot of things he might want to do in the east, but if you cannot prevent it, why do you declare war? >> there is an important issue within that war, which is no war, no holocaust. >> it is an absolutely monstrous thing to say. the holocaust started far earlier than that conference. [applause]

the ss or killing of jews in poland as soon as the invasion of poland took place. they killed up to 1 million jews before the conference, and all the conference did was to organize the disgusting industrialization of the massacre of the jews. that predated the conference to extend of over 1 million people. [applause] >> i thought one of the best points was made by norman stone, which was the pointlessness of the bombing of germany in the closing stages of the war, which seems counterproductive and

immoral, frankly. >> many people see the second world war as a war for freedom. i would like to take up churchill's attitude toward india. he opposed the government of india and was less than enthusiastic about the mission in 1942. does this blemish his image as a great war leader? >> the whole question of the bombing of germany has two sides. one is the military side and one is the moral side. and the military side, one has to acknowledge the fact that it was a second of front. it does not justify the bombing of hamburger or dressed in or anything like that. -- hamburg or dresden.

they would not have had to withdraw the bulk of the fighting units from the eastern front to defend the right. that allowed the major breakthroughs of the eastern front. as was pointed out, the creation of the bombing force was almost a monster. once it had been created, it is very hard to stop it, and that is one of the terrible effects of the industrial and the manpower investment which had been made in bomber command, and why it was so difficult to stop it toward the end. there, churchill was certainly at all. he should have reined in harris well before, and he certainly should have stopped those bombings in 1945. the bombing of dresden was deliberately and directly requested by the red army to

prevent the transfer divisions from the western front to the eastern front. it was the western blood guilt regarding the soviet union. >> it could have been diverted just as much if the tax had gone as the americans suggested -- if the attacks had gone as the americans suggested, not against industrial cities and women and children and so on. if you reduce the british effort to its essentials, is taking american dollars in order to kill defenseless women and children. >> are we debating what is strategic to do or what is moral to do? >> in this case, there were very strong strategic arguments that

the americans adopted when they got around to it. they said he should concentrate on the targets that matter. >> church hill opposed the indian independence. >> he opposed it in 1935. he did nothing to oppose it in 1948. i notice that norman seemed to blame the bad transfer of power in india it on churchill. he was leader of the opposition. the key point is that the best thing that could have happened for india between 1939 and 1945 was to keep the japanese out. when they got to the philippines, that killed 17.2% of the population there. the great struggle that took place in burma stop the japanese, and that is something that ought to be put down to churchill's credit. >> any further comments on that?

everyone downstairs is very silent. >> i have a question. it was mentioned that deliberately -- gallipoli. in reading his body, it does not look that clear. he had a strategy that was working -- reading his biography. it was to go when and capture easton wilistanbul. if french battle ship was sunk, and the british high command then reconsider the whole strategy, which would have been one if they had persevered. it gave the opposition time to

rearm and stage a brilliant defense in gallipoli at the cost of several hundred thousand allied lives. was it really churchill, or was it that his plan was not carried out, and the responsibility is the british high command who changed the whole plan? >> norman, you are a turkish expert picks if i can only suggest, go and have a look at the battlefield and think back to the circumstances of 1915. they were having to roll cans of water in full view of turkish rifle fire in order to keep hundreds of thousands of men on that baron peninsula. you have to look at the contours' on the map.

>> when you walk up the battlefield, see the trenches and the mountainous terrain. it seems impossible. the whole idea is that it was going to be captured so quickly that the turks would not be able to reinforce. when they did, that was the point at which we should have pulled out. winston churchill -- it was a fascinating, brilliant scheme that went horribly wrong and then was reinforced badly. winston churchill large his lesson. he never overrule the chiefs of staff and the second world war in the way he did in the first. >> a couple of questions from down here. who has the microphone here? 1, 2, 3. >> this is a question about which is the greater liability

on assets. >> the arguments about churchill's politics and colonial strategy, don't you think he was more a liability to the free world? >> mr. buchanan, we are not today living with the consequences of gallipoli norris suffering the consequences of going on the gold standard, or any of the other consequences due to churchill's errors. we are suffering the consequences are enjoying the results of one single man who was available at the time, who was able to make the right decision.

surely the rest of the world has enjoyed the benefits they are up. how are you equate the consequences -- a minor consequences of the errors he has done against the consequences of the great that he did? [applause] >> could you speak more clearly? >> after hearing the argument of the opposition about churchill's politics and colonial strategy, churchill was more a liability to great britain but an asset to the free world. >> pat, would you like to respond? >> let's take churchill from

1911 to 1945. when he came into office as first lord of the admiral to, britain was the first nation on earth. the british empire was the greatest in person from. i believe the british empire and the united states for the two greatest forces for human advancement in history. when churchill left in 1945 as prime minister after two wars, 100 million europeans were dead. all the old empires including the british empire were crumbling or work on. germany was smashed. stalin was in complete control of eastern and central europe. the americans had gone home, and as an robert said, winston churchill was going to westminster out in missouri to the college there to say and our current had descended upon europe. i think those two wars, in my judgment, or the more wounds -- are the moral ones that may lead

to the death of our civilization. for all his heroism, winston churchill was the leading british proponent of taking his nation into both those wars and turning them into world wars. >> may have a go at this? the decisions that he took in terms of economics denuded the ability of this country to rearm effectively and fight the war. just look at afghanistan today. what is it that the armed services are insufficiently well-equipped? because gordon brown has not manage the economy properly. the economy has direct consequences on the ability to prosecute a war. let's come to the second world war. the gallipoli campaign became the paradigm of for all of churchill's this passion to strategy efforts. norway, crete, there is soft

underbelly, impenetrable. it became the paradigm for his entire strategy. we are told that the second front could not have been conducted in 1943. let's look at the arguments. we are told there was insufficient landing craft. there was more shipping, including landing craft, used in the cicely campaign in july 1943 than in the normandy campaign a year later. -- in the sicily campaign. it is not rocket science. they could have been built, if churchill had not procrastinated over the second front. we are told that the lived off of had superiority -- the luf twaffe.

they had air superiority over northwest france, etc. from early 1943. they will come back and say the typhoon had all these problems, structural problems. all of these were rectified by the end of 1942, and the typhoon was the air superiority fighter which established air superiority over northwestern. we are told that we cannot have had in 1943 because of the u- boat's menace. there were 19 different divisions employed in sicily. most of those came from the united states. but came across despite the u- boat's threat. only eight divisions were employed in the normandy

landings. the normandy landings eventually rose to 47 divisions. by the end of 1942, the u.s. had 73 divisions, with 5.5 million men. the british had 27 divisions domestically, 38 divisions abroad. 138 divisions in total. we are told -- >> we will give you a chance to continue that. we have come to the time when we have to vote. you have your voting card. will you tear it into and put the appropriate one in the tin that will come around. if you cannot decide, drop the entire ticket into the tin. while this is happening, i am going to ask our speakers to

offer eight sum up of their case. beginning with richard overy. >> summing up for our side is not going to be difficult to do. >> can we keep talking a bit quieter, because it is hard to be heard. >> having heard all the arguments from the other side, there seems to be a great deal of nitpicking about live issues of strategy and tactics. it does not seem to me to be answering or serving the proposition itself. we have tried to stick closely to the proposition and arguments against it, but the curious thing, churchill is still all over the place.

who declares war? neville chamberlain. he is trying to make out that neville chamberlain has churchill behind and he is somehow some kind of puppet. what we are hearing is kind of a counter history, which seems to me does not serve our cause very well at all. if we come back to the central issue of the proposition, that he was more a liability than an asset. much of what we have heard this evening persuades me that he was more a liability. [applause] >> norman stone. >> i very much approved when richard overy said yes, it was a war against tyranny. it was a war against tyranny which ended up with europe underwear churchill himself said in 1949 was worse tierney

than adolf hitler's'. we have established that a lot of what churchill did before 1940 is just not really defensible. i would stress this unrealistic imperialism. it is such a strange age to read about, the 1930's. richard overy has done a very good book on the morbid side of it. i think the unreality of that whole period was summed up by what the league of nations did, it said it can we discuss the standardize asian of level crossings in europe? it is an unreal world. indian, churchill is to unreel a figure.

-- churchill is too unreal a figure. >> for those who seem to have attacked churchill all over the place and all at different times during his career, in fact, they have not landed a single convincing local, just a series of pinpricks ended pricks -- pinpricks and nitpicks. it stretches the imagination. pat buchanan's view of history certainly seems to be a highly original one, particularly when it comes to the united states and roosevelt. it is almost as if churchill is responsible for everything that went wrong, but roosevelts attempt to win over stalin, it was that fatal combination of

arrogance and charm that he thought would somehow win him around. it was a total failure. obviously one excess churchill's ... and loss and things like that, but one has to look at the overall picture, and that is, he was a great asset to the free world. thank you. [applause] >> i think richard is absolutely right to stick to the proposition. in terms of his decision making, what policies and strategies he actually implemented. he implemented policies that immensely damaged the economy. the strategies he employed in world war ii, that if we had stuck to them to this day, we would have still been fighting the second world war to this very day. in respect of the 10 million

people who died in the last year of the war, the range of things i was talking about before, and i have plenty more of them, demonstrates that it could and should have been done in 1943. mike one big final thing i want to say is that the 10 million people who died in the last year of the war, more than anybody responsible for perpetuating the war, keeping it going longer than it needed to have gone or should have gone, was churchill. [applause] >> andrew roberts. >> if we had undertaken to early across channeled attack in 1943, it would have set back the war to our three years. the vital thing was to ensure that did not happen. with the proposition -- with

opposition are doing is mixing up cause and effect again and again. the collapse of british power did overlap with the core of winston churchill, but there is no cause and effect. both elf hitler and the kaiser were committed to trying to destroy the power of the country, and it was winston churchill who prevented it. [applause] >> andrew roberts said that the great moment of winston churchill's career was the iron core -- arnn curtain speech. in 1920 he knew better than anyone else about the bolsheviks and spoke up and urged intervention. what happened to him in 1942 through 1945 when he was over there with style and dividing up europe, saying keep the baltic republics? what happened to him there?

these are all a consequence of what winston churchill told fdr in 1941 when he asked him, what should recall this war? churchill said we should call it the unnecessary war, because there was never at work more easily avoidable than this one. our point is that many of the blunders that led to this war and led to the disaster that came out of it in eastern europe and for the british empire were directly attributable to winston spencer churchill'. [applause] >> i want to keep this going, because there are interesting points on both sides. the case about the economy and the fact that churchill was responsible for the fact that we were not ready, and the economy was not able to meet the demands on it. >> again, this is quite wrong. we went into the gold standard in 1925.

churchill gave up being chancellor of the exchequer in 1929. it was not until at least five years later that he was begging for proper amounts of money to be spent on the defensive this country. it was a full 10 years after that that we finally went to war, so i cannot see that can be blamed on winston churchill. pretty much everything tonight has been blamed on him. the weakness of the british economy in the late 1930's was not his fault. he had already been in the wilderness for nine years. >> research of cambridge has clearly demonstrated that, so i am afraid that is true as i stated it. >> cambridge economists have demonstrated a lot of things. [applause] >> i am very willing to discuss the economics with you if you feel capable and competent, at any time.

>> i want each side to consider this more general question, because from the people who oppose the motion, we have heard them say that churchill made mistakes. everyone made mistakes. on the other side, they are being blamed as the liability for the free world. how extensive are you prepared to agree the mistakes that churchill made work, and that their ramifications did significantly have a counter effect? >> this is not an accountancy examination here. >> it is a debate, richard. >> what we are doing on this side is simply saying that there is a counterfactual argument being stated. if churchill had not been there, things would have been very different. how much better with a b? we have no idea. we don't -- we do know that he

played a vital part. without him there to engage public enthusiasm and to maintain that commitment, things might have been very much worse. >> the fact is, dresden was not a defenseless city. many gave their lives of flying a 13 hour round trip to bomb dresden, which was a center of electrical trades in that part of southern germany. it was a point at which through the combined bomber offensive, the increase of the production of german munitions suddenly trails off at the time of the bombing in 1943. the idea that it was some kind of war crime must not just go and criticize. [applause]

>> the question of the errors being a computer will component of laying out churchill. >> you can go to the errors listed. norway, yes, he was responsible for that. he was the first to be embarrassed that chamberlain was blamed for it, and acknowledge his own mistake there. sumatra and the eastern edge rainey and some of those wild schemes, which certainly did lose men and items. when it came down to the key decisions, the ones that really affected the conduct of the war, churchill basically got it right. yes, he was wrong perhaps on d-

day, but he was certainly right to have delayed it. there is no doubt about that. >> i want to turn to the other side and put to use something that has only been mentioned in passing, something i think the audience would regard as very significant. churchill's eloquence and his oratory and his capacity to inspire the nation. how can that not be an asset? >> is certainly an asset, there is no question about it. the principal way of inspiring the nation is actually through military victories rather than through speeches. but you need the inspiration when you are losing. >> the point is, what are you losing? is it a lack of inspiration, or is it the wrong strategy? in respect to clement attlee, which i am amazed to find i am defending this evening, he would

probably have made a more strategic decisions were correctly. i do not want to make a big thing about him being a great war leader. at least the important point is that by making the right decisions, the right strategic decisions, then you start winning victories. once you start winning victories, that is the best possible thing for morale. when you are losing because the strategy is wrong, then of course the net result is that you need to fall back on a churchill in order to inspire you in your darkest days. >> pat buchanan? >> churchill was undeniably eloquent. his speeches were magnificent. they are still heard in the united states, and he is spoken of highly in all the colleges and universities. you have to ask yourself this.

as nigel said, he was inspiring a nation to stand up and resist the german army which had thrown the british army of the continent at dunkirk. his eloquence was splendid, but what explains why great britain, the greatest empire on earth, one of the greatest nation on earth, is in such desperate straits and almost defenseless at that. in time and was not winston churchill and some of the decisions he made, gutting the british fleet, was he not in large part responsible himself for the desperate straits in which this nation found itself? [laughter] [applause] >> we are awaiting the results of the vote at any moment.

what -- while i still have this array of historians here, i will ask the more general question about the writing of history. 70 years we have been celebrating recently. it is the telling of history shifting and a critique of church till now, for the first time, on the agenda because the generations who remember the war are growing old and perhaps for getting are not speaking of it, and younger people are making different judgments? >> funny enough, it is rarely the younger people who are writing anti churchill books. the revisionist history still seems to be written by people of a certain age, although the second world war is moving from the realm of memory into the realm of history. churchill revisionism is still pretty much a minority fetish.

[laughter] i like to ask each of you as historians with you filled your moving into a combat zone with the revision is now for the first time. >> most historians do not debate the way we have been debating tonight. we have heard a distorted history from the other side. historians have been thinking critically about churchill for years. it is not something that has just been invented. it may be that the popular image of churchill is different from the historians image of churchill. the idea that somewhere or other this is something we are having to come to terms with for the first time is simply not the case. we are trying to come to terms with the kind of history we have been hearing this evening, which seems to be a distortion of historical reality. [applause]

>> i agree entirely with richard. most historians have always seen the two sides, the black and white, or the strengths and weaknesses in churchill. it is only really been in the last 15 or 20 years that you have had a tense to undermine -- attempts to undermine the permissive churchill, as if he were perfect, which has never been the case. the revisionist myths that are more dangerous, and that is a complicated area to get into now. >> are you part of a new, growing approach to this subject? >> i think that history has always undergone revisions. there is nothing new in that at all. periodically there have been revisionist account of churchill and the pulse -- in the past.

i am sure that will always be the case. i must just finish on something that richard said before we all got together here. he said that given all the fuss about these things, he wishes that the second world war had not broken out in the first place, and i concur with that. [applause] >> i have the results. against the motion, the number has increased to 1194. for the motion, the number has also increased to 181. i beg your pardon, 34 people do not know. who are they? >> stand up. [laughter]

>> so the motion is not carried, but what an interesting evening we have had. on your behalf, i would like to thank everyone. [applause] just to say that each of them will be out in the hall where there many books are on sale. thank you. [applause] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2009] >> amar on "washington journal," wall street journal reporter neil kinnock talks about the role of so-called czars in the

obama administration and throughout history. chuck hawkins previews the new five weeks series, meltdown legacy, which looks at how the u.s. financial situation has changed the entire country. gary genser, chairman of the commodity futures trading commission discusses the collapse of lehman brothers, the current economy, and regulation. and they talk about the website, whorunsgov.com. the commission on wartime contract in iraq and afghanistan holds an oversight hearing on the u.s. state department. our live coverage begins at 9:30 a.m. tomorrow on c-span3. >> thousands of people protesting what they call out of control government spending marched to the u.s. capitol in

downtown washington saturday. freedom works foundation, a conservative organization led by former house majority leader dick armey organized several groups from across the country for what they are calling a taxpayers march on washington. here's a portion of the rally with dick armey. >> in case i run into nancy pelosi, i want to be able to prove to hurt you are really here. -- prove to hurt your really here. we wanted to be here today because we have one beautiful nephew and 10 very beautiful grandchildren, and we wanted them to see grandma and grandpa here fighting for their freedom together. we would like to start out by asking you, how many of you are here because you love your grandchildren? how many of you are here because you think america made them

great promise when they promised the blessings of liberty for ourselves and our posterity, and you expect your government to make good on it? with the federal government just decided to go wrong over a year ago and tried to bail out wall street, which tried to tell them it will not work, and it did not work. when the first launch a stimulus did not work, what did the government do? if it doesn't work, do more. we tell them that would not work. then we had the election, and president obama came in and said we are going to give you change you can believe in. what did he give us? more of the same. that did not work. then we tried to tell them it would not work. in april we said we have to get organized. we have our tea parties all over the world, all of the nation. how many of you were at a tea party last april 15?

what did they say about us? we were not real. we did not know what we were talking about. do not listen to those folks. we said we have to keep going and keep trying. we showed up in august at the town hall meetings. what did they say about us? they are not real. they did not know what they are talking about. they will go away. did you go away, or are you back? you are back. we are so proud to be here with you on behalf of our grandchildren. i want to just bring one clear idea. not too long ago, president barack obama stood right there on that stage and he said the one singular pledged a commitment that we asked of every elected official in america at every level, he pledged a commitment of fidelity to the united states

constitution. >> winston churchill said about the american constitutional convention that it was the greatest entrepreneurialism act of courage for liberty in the history of the world, and it deserves to be respected. these were learned people. there was no word, no phrase, no

sentence they got into the constitution by accident. they knew what the meaning of the word'is"was, and they wrote exactly what they meant. it does not take a genius to read it and understand it and know what it says. if you cannot do that, we will buy you a dictionary. we are here today to fulfill a commitment. when benjamin franklin walked out of that constitutional convention, he was asked by lay on the street, what kind of government did you give us? -- got a lady on the street. he said i gave you a republican -- a republic, if you can hold it. we are here today to hold it. [applause]

the one thing they knew of all other things when they wrote the constitution was that liberty was a gift given to mankind and anne arundel owned by the lord god almighty, and it is the duty of a government to protect its. we protect and cherish freedom because it is precious in its own right, but because it works, so let's give them a message. freedom works. freedom works. thank you for letting me be here. ♪

♪ who moer than self their country loved and mercy more than life ♪ america, america may god thy gold refine till all success be nobleness and every gain divine. ♪

o beautiful for spacious skies for amber waves of grain ♪ for purple mountain majesties above the fruited plain america, suite america vijay sweet america,

god shed his grace on the. he crowned thy good with brotherhood from sea to shining sea. i wish i had somebody to help me saying this. ♪ america, america, god shed his grace on thee. he crowned thy good with brotherhood from sea to shining sea.

♪ >> you can see the entire rally monday night at 8:25 p.m. eastern on c-span2. >> up next, "q&a" with author christopher called will. then a discussion on the legacy of winston churchill. after that, a look at the impact today of the health-care debate back in the clinton in ministration. -- the clinton administration. >> on monday, the house considers authorization for nearly $3 billion for the year 2014 for energy department based research on gas efficient turbines and hybrid vehicles. also, consideration of a measure

that would change federally subsidized student loans. the house gavels in monday, with legislative work starting at 2:00 eastern. that is live on c-span. the senate also returns on monday to work on fiscal year 2010 federal spending. senators are considering $122 billion for transportation and housing programs. they will dabble in at 2:00 p.m. eastern for an hour of general speeches. at 3:00 p.m., the senate will begin legislative business. like coverage of the senate at c-span2. >> next month, a unique look at our nation's highest court, its role, traditions, and history. >> i do not think it is an understatement to say that this building would not be here if it had not been for the