Tag: H.G. Wells

Churchill’s Novels: Escape Valves or Reality Checks?

Churchill’s Novels: Escape Valves or Reality Checks?

Churchill was motivated by Wells’s views of military science: “The irresistible Juggernaut, driving through towns and villages as through a field of standing corn—a type which Armageddon itself could not achieve….” That was an accurate description of France in 1940. Churchill himself called it “a remarkable combination of air bombing and heavily armoured tanks.” He then admonished Britons: “Arm yourselves, and be ye men of valour."

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Churchill, Wells, and Government by “Experts”

Churchill, Wells, and Government by “Experts”

Churchill shared Wells’s faith in science, but he never lost his reservations about experts. Four months after they met, he declared in Parliament: “It was a principle of our Constitution not to employ experts, whether business men or military men, in the highest affairs of State.” Four decades laster he reiterated: “Expert knowledge, however indispensable, is no substitute for a generous and comprehending outlook upon the human story with all its sadness and with all its unquenchable hope.”

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