[spidergareth]

(Original post by Dahut)
Why didn't they bomb Auschwitz, why didn't they let Jews into Britain?

One of the main reasons Roosevelt refused to bomb Auschwitz or believe any of the few jews that had escaped from the camps was because he simply did not believe such a thing was happening. It was completely unprecedented to have an entire camp dedicated to murder. In hindsight of course it was stupid not to bomb the train lines coming in, but at the time no-one really had any idea what was going on.

As for not letting the jews in, you have to remember that america and Britain were both quite anti-semitic at the time. Roosevelt did not want to weaken his support in the southern states. If we let in several hundred thousand Tibetans today to protect them from the Chinese, imagine what the daily mail would say!

[Aj12]

(Original post by anonstudent1)
Who is being arrogant. I'm simply saying the over glorification of Winston Churchill may not be accurate.

Haha you must know the quote history will be kind to me for I intend to write it. He was a great wartime leader and did a lot for this country and was a great man. However he was not perfect and hindsight is a beautiful thing you can look back and see what he should have done differently but at the time like all leaders he believed what he was doing was right.

[gladders]

(Original post by anonstudent1)
His racism was just part of the reason and even back in his time his imperialistic attitude, that often went hand in hand with his racist remarks, was by no means accepted by everyone, particularly outside Britain. However like I said that was just one of the reasons I outlined that I was disappointed by some of what Churchill did.

I think racism is too strong a word for what Churchill believed. I'd call it paternalistic - chauvinistic, perhaps - but not racist. Churchill was a strong believer in fair play, and while he believed the British to be the epitome of the gentleman, he was adamant that the rights of Englishmen are the rights of every person.

In the early 1900s, shortly after he entered government, he raised holy hell in the government over a tribal leader in South Africa. The government wanted to transport the local troublemaker to the Pacific to get him out of the way. Churchill angrily protested, saying the tribal leader deserved a proper trial, and even then transportation was illegal, and he should face the same type of punishments anyone else would.

And as someone has already said - for pete's sake, it was over 100 years ago. Churchill was verging on radical compared to some of the men of his day.

Context mate, context.

[anonstudent1]

(Original post by gladders)


I think racism is too strong a word for what Churchill believed. I'd call it paternalistic - chauvinistic, perhaps - but not racist. Churchill was a strong believer in fair play, and while he believed the British to be the epitome of the gentleman, he was adamant that the rights of Englishmen are the rights of every person.

In the early 1900s, shortly after he entered government, he raised holy hell in the government over a tribal leader in South Africa. The government wanted to transport the local troublemaker to the Pacific to get him out of the way. Churchill angrily protested, saying the tribal leader deserved a proper trial, and even then transportation was illegal, and he should face the same type of punishments anyone else would.

And as someone has already said - for pete's sake, it was over 100 years ago. Churchill was verging on radical compared to some of the men of his day.

Context mate, context.

There is also strong evidence to suggest that he ordered troops to fire on miners in Britain for striking. He is quoted as saying "I hated Indians, they are a beastly people" and said he hoped that the feud between the Muslim League and Indian congress would be bitter and bloody (up to a million people would die in India shortly after this as a result of the tension between the two"
I am in no doubt that he had qualities and was the great and inspirational leader that Britain needed in wartime. I am just against the over glorification of people.

[gladders]

(Original post by anonstudent1)
There is also strong evidence to suggest that he ordered troops to fire on miners in Britain for striking. He is quoted as saying "I hated Indians, they are a beastly people" and said he hoped that the feud between the Muslim League and Indian congress would be bitter and bloody (up to a million people would die in India shortly after this as a result of the tension between the two"
I am in no doubt that he had qualities and was the great and inspirational leader that Britain needed in wartime. I am just against the over glorification of people.

You're absolutely right to feel that way too. I suppose that side of him will out when I reach that stage of may biography of him. It's quite reasonable he got more right-wing as he got older, and he was certainly one for black-and-white, once he had picked his side. His earlier years are replete with examples of his radicalism.

I think what it was was that Churchill was very sympathetic and tolerant of different races and of the working class, so long as it conformed to his world-view of a benevolent ruling class dispensing favours to a grateful working class - which made sense as a world view for Victorian England. But the world changed in the 50 years from the turn of the century, and the working man and the races of the Empire weren't prepared to take it lying down.

It's not so much that Churchill was a troglodyte or anything like that - as said already, his worldview can only be understood, appreciated, and if necessary condemned, with a full consideration of the world he grew up in. To say he's racist or anything from our perspective is unfair on the man.

[Time Tourist]

Not another "Let's all recycle one of our genuine national heroes as a pantomine villain" thread, in which we judge him by the standards of todays left-libral elite.

[anonstudent1]

(Original post by Time Tourist)
Not another "Let's all recycle one of our genuine national heroes as a pantomine villain" thread, in which we judge him by the standards of todays left-libral elite.

Did you even read the OP . The only part of the criticism that loses power based on the time and context are the accusations of racism. That was just ONE part of the criticism. Also regardless of Churchill's views, you think the only people who are against racism are "todays left-liberal elite"...

[/dev/null]

So, what you are really trying to say is:

Sir Winston Churchill is dissapoint.

[Abbadon27]

If you look at anybody long enough you will always find undesirable comments, actions and beliefs.

[anonstudent1]

(Original post by /dev/null)
So, what you are really trying to say is:

Sir Winston Churchill is dissapoint.

I'm trying to say that despite being a great wartime leader he was very flawed and has been over glorified over the years. He is more popular now then he was after the war. He lost the election in 1945.

[gladders]

(Original post by anonstudent1)
I'm trying to say that despite being a great wartime leader he was very flawed and has been over glorified over the years. He is more popular now then he was after the war. He lost the election in 1945.

Actually Churchill was enormously popular in 1945 - the Conservative Party wasn't. It had been in power since the early 1930s, and was tarred with the stigma of appeasement and the failed attempts at economic recovery of the post-Crash years. Labour offered something new.

If Churchill had stood as a Labour MP, he'd have won an even bigger majority than Attlee did, I would wager.

[calvinhobbesliker]

As many have already pointed out, Churchill was needed to save Britain from falling. Unfortunately, he was an imperialist, and thus he looked down on Indians. But keep in mind that all of us have flaws, and I'm willing to bet that most of us(including me) looks down on some group of people, for whatever reason.

[Craig_D]

(Original post by Dahut)
Why didn't they bomb Auschwitz

There were civilians inside? They would directly kill themselves more than would be saved by doing so.

why didn't they let Jews into Britain?

100,000 were.

[DivinityofReason]

(Original post by anonstudent1)
Has anyone else felt rather disappointed, the more they researched about Churchill. The man was often incredibly stubborn about many things when he was clearly wrong, although he was right in his need for a firm stance against Hitler and the need for Britain to rearm. However what I found most disappointing was the fact that he portrayed himself and allowed himself to be seen as the "lone voice" against Hitler and the axis, when this was in fact not true. Although the view was not the majority, there was a sizeable minority and he was certainly not the first or lone voice to speak out against Hitler or the need to rearm. He also supported Japan in the Manchurian crisis and supported Mussolini until 1937. What I found Just as disappointing were some of racist remarks and behaviour, although I can understand this was a different time. His attitude toward India, his comments towards Gandhi and his support of Edward VIII all go some way to showing this. (Research a little and you will find more evidence for the last part). Do you think it is time we stopped worshipping this highly flawed man so much?

Churchill was one of the world powers at the time who instigated a coup in Iran, which at the time was a democracy, they replaced the democracy with a puppet leader (the shah).
Since that moment on Iran has hated Britain and other western countries and this has caused many many problems and many cost millions of lives.
That was Churchill's biggest mistake.

[Catilina]

Churchill is just Britains overglorified leader, almost every country has one. And I´m not saying he wasn´t a good leader, I´m just saying he gets more praise today than he deserves. What made him so popular is that he led the country during a crisis which happened to end well for the country.
Lets face it, Churchill wasn´t doing everything in Britain at that time, a lot of people were responsible for how things ended. In fact he did a good job but he would have been replaceable. Of course Churchill is always in a good light because of Britains policies before he came into office, and because of Chamberlain.
The fact is that political leaders during good times will never be seen as the greatest ones, Churchills popularity has barely anything to do with him, it´s about the war and the british victory

[TShadow383]

(Original post by Martyn*)
He was a Freemason from 1901 to 1965. Wonder why Churchill did nothing about the Jewish Holocaust? Very suspicious indeed.

This is the most painfully retarded thing I've ever read.

[Laertes]

Churchill was overrated.

[Life_peer]

(Original post by anonstudent1)
Has anyone else felt rather disappointed, the more they researched about Churchill. The man was often incredibly stubborn about many things when he was clearly wrong, although he was right in his need for a firm stance against Hitler and the need for Britain to rearm. However what I found most disappointing was the fact that he portrayed himself and allowed himself to be seen as the "lone voice" against Hitler and the axis, when this was in fact not true. Although the view was not the majority, there was a sizeable minority and he was certainly not the first or lone voice to speak out against Hitler or the need to rearm. He also supported Japan in the Manchurian crisis and supported Mussolini until 1937. What I found Just as disappointing were some of racist remarks and behaviour, although I can understand this was a different time. His attitude toward India, his comments towards Gandhi and his support of Edward VIII all go some way to showing this. (Research a little and you will find more evidence for the last part). Do you think it is time we stopped worshipping this highly flawed man so much?

I have seen a documentary film about Sir Churchill a couple of days ago and if all the information presented there were correct, he was not perfect, but it has not made me disappointed. We can not deny that he was a great leader in those times, though.

[big-boss-91]

(Original post by anonstudent1)
Has anyone else felt rather disappointed, the more they researched about Churchill. The man was often incredibly stubborn about many things when he was clearly wrong, although he was right in his need for a firm stance against Hitler and the need for Britain to rearm. However what I found most disappointing was the fact that he portrayed himself and allowed himself to be seen as the "lone voice" against Hitler and the axis, when this was in fact not true. Although the view was not the majority, there was a sizeable minority and he was certainly not the first or lone voice to speak out against Hitler or the need to rearm. He also supported Japan in the Manchurian crisis and supported Mussolini until 1937. What I found Just as disappointing were some of racist remarks and behaviour, although I can understand this was a different time. His attitude toward India, his comments towards Gandhi and his support of Edward VIII all go some way to showing this. (Research a little and you will find more evidence for the last part). Do you think it is time we stopped worshipping this highly flawed man so much?

he was a great man, but don't forget that he is also human too. Every human being is flawed

[Shortarse1]

(Original post by Dahut)
Why didn't they bomb Auschwitz, why didn't they let Jews into Britain?

Bombing Auschwitz would just have killed the jews. Also, some people were allowed to come to Britain, just not the whole of Europe who wanted to escape Naziism. On top of that, if I'm correct, the allies never new about the final solution until the closing days of the war.