Reviews Archives - Page 8 of 11 - Richard M. Langworth

Critique Down Under: Like Shooting Fish in a Barrel

28 April 2017 Comments 0 Comments

Particularly on the Fall of Singapore (see earlier post), a new critique of Churchill misses the forest for the trees and fails on the facts. Really, Churchill made lots of mistakes worth contemplating. But these aren’t among them.

The article appeared in southwest Australia’s Sun Coast Daily on April 26th. Not exactly The Times, and if you don’t subscribe to Google Alerts you missed it. For the fun of shooting fish in a barrel, however, it’s worth a few minutes of your time.

Critique 1: Self-Interest

“Churchill had a long and varied career in politics, managing to swap parties as his career needs required.” …

Read More Read More

Fateful Questions: World War II Microcosm (1)

2 April 2017 Comments 0 Comments

Fateful Questions, September 1943-April 1944, nineteenth of the projected twenty-three document volumes, is reviewed by historian Andrew Roberts in Commentary.

The volumes comprise “every important document of any kind that concerns Churchill, and the present volume is 2,752 pages long, representing an average of more than eleven pages per day.” Order your copy from the Hillsdale College Bookstore.

Here is an excerpt from my account, “Fresh History,” which can be read in its entirety at the Hillsdale College Churchill Project.

Fateful Questions: Excerpts

Fastidiously compiled by the late Sir Martin Gilbert and edited by Dr.…

Read More Read More

Churchill Documents: The Italian Navy

23 March 2017 Comments 0 Comments

Excerpted from “The Italian Navy in The Churchill Documents, Volume 19,” by Andrew Roberts. To read the full article, click here.

Fateful Questions: September 1943 to April 1944, latest volume in The Churchill Documents, is available from Hillsdale College Bookstore. To order click here.

Andrew Roberts writes:

After the surrender of Italy to the Allies in September 1943, the Italian Fleet was apportioned between the Allied powers and absorbed into their navies. Although the Axis had by then been cleared out of the Mediterranean, the ships played a significant part in the rest of the war.…

Read More Read More

Churchill and Racism: Think a Little Deeper

13 March 2017 Comments 4 Comments

Q: Another new movie, A United Kingdom, saddles Churchill with racism. It’s the story of Seretse Khama of the Bechuanaland royal family and heir to the throne. After studying in England, he meets and marries a British woman, Ruth Williams. The South African government, which is adopting Apartheid, is troubled by the interracial marriage. It presses the Attlee government in Britain to exile Khama, which they do. Churchill is not a character in the film, but we are told that he supports Khama and will restore him if Churchill’s party wins the 1951 election.…

Read More Read More

Songs Churchill Would Love: “Willie McBride”

13 February 2017 Comments 3 Comments

Sir Martin Gilbert’s moving book, The Somme: Heroism and Horror in the First World War, ends with verses from “Willie McBride,” by the Scottish-Australian songwriter Eric Bogle, which carry an evergreen message to all generations, and capture what Churchill thought of modern war—which he tried so hard, before both World Wars, to avoid.

Sir Martin wrote that in research for the book, he and Lady Gilbert found the grave of Private William McBride, Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers, killed April 1916, two months before the Somme. Whether this was the grave of Eric Bogle’s subject is immaterial.…

Read More Read More

Churchill and the Avoidable War: Outline

31 January 2017 Comments 0 Comments

Was the war really avoidable? Yes, it was—at Munich in particular—but with great difficulty. No one can underestimate the problems in the way. And yet, tantalizing opportunities existed. "Appeasement" is not in "Churchill and the Avoidable War." It is far over-used, and broadly misunderstood. It is not popular, Churchill wrote, "but appeasement has its place in all policy." There are lessons in Churchill's Avoidable War that serve us well today. Will we listen? We rarely have.

Read More Read More

Tech Start-Ups: Dan Lyons’ Eye-Opener

28 January 2017 Comments 0 Comments

Because my son works in Silicon Valley, and has start-up experience both as an employee and a founder, I found this book of interest and devoured it in three nights. It’s the story of a journalist who, at 52, tries his hand as a tech marketer, and is gravely shocked and disappointed with the culture he discovers in a start-up tech firm with hundreds of employees and bazillions in venture capital. . Disrupted: My Misadventure in the Start-Up Bubble, by Dan Lyons. Hachette Books, $15.16 from Amazon, Kindle $13.99. . Tech morphs constantly; humanity never changes. I bookmarked descriptions which reminded me of people my son has described—and people I’ve met in my own career, which is as far away as it gets from the Silicon Valley tech world.…

Read More Read More

“The Crown”: A Not So Crowning Achievement

14 December 2016 Comments 2 Comments

The inaccuracies would be boring to catalogue. Is it really so big a deal? Not in itself. The trouble is, it advances ignorance. It's only drama, people will say. But as a result we will soon read on the web how Churchill’s stroke was kept from the Queen. How he "forced" the Royal Couple to move from Clarence House. And how he painted a scene repeatedly in his Black Dog of despair. Why do producers distort the past and expect people to believe it? Because most will? Because the screenwriter may appear at a Churchill event, praised for his achievement in selling a million copies?

Read More Read More

Nightmare Scenario by Norman Longmate

1 October 2016 Comments 0 Comments

Norman Longmate, If Britain Had Fallen: The Real Nazi Occupation Plans. Published 1972, reprinted 2012, available from Amazon in hardback, paperback and Kindle editions.

A recent kerfuffle over draping Nazi banners on beloved British icons reminds me that this has been going on a long time and is perfectly acceptable in examining historical possiblities. Take the late Norman Longmate, who offered a gripping pastiche about what might have happened in 1940. As a result, we have a glimpse of a possible alternative.

Longmate’s Yarn on the Worst Possibility

Later that afternoon with the Germans already in Trafalgar Square and advancing down Whitehall to take their position in the rear, the enemy unit advancing across St.…

Read More Read More

“Churchill’s Secret”: Worth a Look

22 September 2016 Comments 1 Comment

Churchill’s Secret, co-produced by PBS Masterpiece and ITV (UK). Directed by Charles Sturridge, starring Michael Gambon as Sir Winston and Lindsay Duncan as Lady Churchill. To watch, click here.

Excerpted from a review for the Hillsdale College Churchill Project.

PBS and ITV have succeeded where many failed. They offer a Churchill documentary with a minimum of dramatic license, reasonably faithful to history (as much as we know of it). Churchill’s Secret limns the pathos, humor, hope and trauma of a little-known episode: Churchill’s stroke on 23 June 1953, and his miraculous recovery. For weeks afterward, his faithful lieutenants in secret ran the government.…

Read More Read More