Churchill's American Network by Cita Stelzer
Winston Churchill may have been wrong about many things, but he judged correctly on the most important decision of his career: standing against Hitler despite the prospect of defeat. Without Churchill, Europe would have fallen to the Nazis and with it, the European empires in Africa and elsewhere. Unlike many British politicians, Churchill was implacably opposed to cutting a deal with Hitler; he knew Britain couldn’t hold out alone for long and gambled on aid from the U.S.
Churchill’s American Network explains why he thought the odds of U.S. intervention were in his favor. For decades before World War II, Churchill (his mother was American) was a regular on the American speaking circuit, earning enormous fees for his thoughts on many subjects, and networking at every opportunity. He made friends with politicians, titans of finance as well as Charlie Chaplin; by the time war began, he had the ear of Pres. Franklin D. Roosevelt and could work against the nation’s prevailing isolationism.
The author finds that Churchill had two motivations for his American jaunts. He genuinely believed in an alliance of English-speaking nations sharing common values and he needed money to support his inveterate gambling and expensive life. Churchill was tireless and prolific, and his name was familiar to literate Americans who never heard him speak. During the 1930s, his byline appeared in 34 American magazines, spreading his fame for his opinions on nearly every topic.
