In recent days, with the Ukraine War, the coronation of Charles III, as well as some Evangelical commentaries tangentially connected to these issues, I've been reminded of the still extant Churchill Cult and the inroads it has made within the Christian community. This needs to be addressed.
I've written before in reference to the rather cynical nature
of Winston Churchill's Iron Curtain speech given at Fulton, Missouri during his
1946 tour of the United States. While often cast as prescient and heroic, some
at the time saw him in a different light – a bitter man out of office, and one
making trouble. Some were aware of additional ironies, some of which would not
become fully revealed to the public until decades later – that Churchill had
played a role in dividing up Europe by means of percentages during his October
1944 meeting with Stalin in Moscow. He played a role in creating the very
Soviet sphere that he warned against in 1946 and as such the famous and
celebrated Missouri episode is something of a farce.
The speech itself is often praised and usually reckoned as
one of the opening chapters of the Cold War. Also referred to as the Sinews of
Peace, this piece of celebrated rhetoric has not been universally praised by
historians and Christians in particular should also cast a very cynical eye
upon what Churchill was doing. In fact, given its context and its invocation of
God and Scripture, Christians should condemn the speech and reckon it
hypocritical and self-serving at the least, if not delusional and obscene once
the full context is considered.
Invoking fears of war and tyranny that remained in the world
and the nascent threat of the Soviet Union, Churchill demonstrated utter blindness
(to say the least) concerning the bloodbaths unleashed by the British Empire in
the concluding days of the war and in the years immediately following. The
British Empire is cast as some kind of liberal, altruistic, and beneficent
power but the historical record reveals its brutality, hypocrisy, and the
massive death toll that resulted. Even as Churchill spoke, the British were
engaged in a rather nasty fight with the Zionist Jews in Palestine who rejected
British claims to a mandate. British Malaya was boiling and would soon erupt
into open war as the people of the peninsula rejected British domination and
the extraction of their resources. The Mau Mau movement was coming together in
Kenya as the East African people were tired of being exploited and whipped by their
British masters. The full rebellion would take place under Churchill's final
round as Prime Minister (1951-1955) and the British record in Kenya during this
period is one of abomination that continues to be covered up and propagandized
to this day.
India was in the process of dissolving after suffering nearly
two centuries of British rule and millions dead as a result of its wars and
policies – including several million dead just in the 1940's while Churchill's
government was in power. In 1947, another million would die during Partition,
which is also viewed as an unfortunate situation exacerbated (at least in part)
by British machinations and interests.
The notion that somehow peace reigned or would reign under
British rule was absurd. Churchill believed the UN required new sheriffs –
clearly a desire to promote a new Anglo-sphere, one that he had to know would
come to be dominated by the United States.
As already touched on, like all Western politicians he
invokes Scripture and God and yet twists them to his own political ends. Certain
types of sacrally-minded Christians fall for these antics, but those who remain
focused on New Testament should be wary of such uses (and the politicians who
invoke them) as well as offended as the Word of God is perverted and wed to the
causes of the flag, sword and the coin.
In his speech, Churchill offers a kind of backhanded praise
of Russia – he knew full well that they paid the heaviest price in the war and
he also was keenly aware of their security concerns which ironically are still
with us 80 years later. But after his brief, if weak acknowledgement of
Russia's role in defeating Hitler, he immediately launches into provocation.
We're left to ask – what was the USSR going to do? Were they
going to just walk away from Eastern Europe and let the chips fall where they
may or make certain that buffer states were established? Despite the implied
aggression of The Truman Doctrine, Stalin did in fact stick to the agreement
with regard to Greece and left its communist partisans in the 1946-49 Civil War
out to dry. Germany was destroyed, but the future was uncertain and some of
Russia's fears would be stoked in the coming years with the creation of NATO
and in particular the creation and re-arming of West Germany as well as its
membership in the ostensibly defensive treaty – one that history has
demonstrated to be otherwise.
Churchill beats the drums of war in preparation for a new European
if not global conflict. The former (and future) Prime Minister clearly rejects
containment and polarity and argues for what later would be called a rollback
policy. This is militarism and some of the American leadership realized it –
and resented it.
Was Churchill prescient or engaged in wishful thinking? Like
many other militarists he often seemed to play a role in what could be
described as the self-fulfillment of prophecy, helping to bring about the
situation that he warned about – which may or may not have actually been a
threat to begin with.
His supposed wisdom regarding Germany and the rise of Hitler
is a bit rich considering his one-time support for Mussolini and Franco, and
the role he previously played in expanding WWI, driving Ottoman Turkey into the
arms of the Central Powers – and Churchill would later play a significant role
in the Dardanelles Campaign, his militarism in that case bringing about his
temporary downfall in the face of a terrible British defeat.
The sheer brutality of the British Naval Blockade of Germany which
began under Churchill in the capacity of Lord of the Admiralty ultimately led
to hundreds of thousands of deaths and helped set the stage for Hitler, giving
him a foothold and audience in bitter and broken post-war Germany.
Reckless, politically self-serving, derisive of any who opposed
Britain and its Empire, he seemed always eager to push for war.
And the record is clear that in 1945 he was ready to tear up
the Yalta Agreement as well as the secret Percentages arrangement, and under
the auspices of Operation Unthinkable initiate a new war with the USSR – which
would have utilised tens of thousands of freed Nazi POW's as soldiers in the
new alliance against Stalin.
The Soviets knew about this plan which never came to be, but
they knew there were those in the West pushing for a new war – this question ties
in with some of the conspiracies surrounding the death of US general (and plan
supporter) George Patton in December 1945. Whether he knew of the plans is up for
debate but he had openly advocated for war with the USSR and said the Allies (in
fighting Germany) were fighting the wrong enemy.
These Western advocates of an attack on Russia viewed a
Soviet War as inevitable and wanted to fight sooner rather than later. This thinking
would continue to exert influence in the corridors of power right up to the
time of the Cuban Missile Crisis.
And certainly after August 1945 with the American
introduction and use atomic weapons, Stalin had every reason to fear a new
phase of Western aggression. This history has been ignored in the West but it's
still playing out even today in the calculations of Vladimir Putin vis-à-vis
the American Empire and NATO.
Is it any wonder that Stalin sought to secure a buffer? And
then to hear Churchill's speech – with its militarism and its revisionism? What
were the Soviets supposed to think? An Iron Curtain? Churchill helped to create
the division and then with his sabre rattling, as well as his thwarted invasion
plans from less than a year before, it's no wonder the USSR was seeking to
harden these lines and close these societies – not just to exodus but outside
influence and subversion.
The whole Missouri episode is rather unbelievable once it is
understood. And while lauded in the West as the saviour of civilisation,
Churchill was long despised in the East as the populations there believed they
had been sold out. And as far as Churchill's war record – it was mostly
failures. He receives praise for refusing to surrender – made possible by the
truly impressive victory in the Battle of Britain. The argument is this victory
kept Britain in the war and as such it was able to serve as a base for the
later invasion of Normandy. But this clearly overrates the importance of the
D-Day invasion. The aerial bombing of Germany (based out of Britain) was
probably more important in the grand scheme of things but that's hardly without
controversy either. As far as the liberation of France, that was important, and
D-Day was the largest amphibian landing in history that would (perhaps) not
have been possible had Churchill surrendered in 1940. Regardless, the fighting
on the Western Front was not central to the defeat of Nazi Germany – it was the
Russians that defeated Nazi Germany in the East during the epic battles of
1941-1945. This upsets Western narratives and is rejected by Western court
historians but a serious inquiry is forced to acknowledge this reality – which
admittedly re-casts the whole narrative about 'The Good War'.
Churchill's crowning moment was 1940 and his rallying of the
nation in the face of the Blitz and the Battle of Britain. No one can take that
away from him. But apart from this brief shining moment (if that's how we
Christians should reckon it) his career is marked by bombast and mostly by
failure. And indeed, by the end of the war the British public had wearied of
him and he was handed a rather stunning defeat in the summer of 1945. He would
return a few years later but he was granted little in the way of glory at the
end of the war – in many respects his victory lap was taken in the United
States. But the legend grew.
One can understand why the world admires him, particularly
those associated with the British Empire. But why Christians would – especially
American Christians, is a bit of puzzle and in reality says far more about them
than it does Winston Churchill.
Instead of being condemned as a militarist, warmonger, and
perhaps a fool – Churchill is lauded as the grand statesman, the wise old man
and defender of Western Civilisation, which is inevitably confused with
Christianity and the Kingdom of God.
The American Right has romanticised him to the point of
creating a cult and his spectre haunts men such as John Bolton and the late
John McCain – fanatical warmongers quick to turn every diplomatic dispute into
another 'Munich' and a call to remember Churchill's warnings.
In terms of British politics, there really have been no
leaders even attempting to approach his stature until just recently. While Margaret
Thatcher as a woman wouldn't have been able to pull it off (though she tried
with the Falklands), Boris Johnson clearly sees himself as a kind of Churchill
2.0 – or did. It is certain that even now he's angling for a comeback. This would-be
Churchill-ism certainly played out in Johnson's machinations vis-à-vis Ukraine,
but unlike Churchill (who was also known to stretch the truth) Johnson was ultimately
taken down by his lies and we can hope his career is really and truly ended.
American Evangelicals have signed on with great fervency to
this Churchill Cult – for that is what we must call it.
One immediately thinks of Southern Baptist leader Albert
Mohler who praises and invokes Churchill at every opportunity. James Dobson
apparently had a large painting of Churchill in his office and somehow in his
warped thinking equated his role as an Evangelical culture warrior with
Churchill's supposed vigilance vis-à-vis fascism and Hitler. I'm not sure how
it can be argued that Churchill stood for family values but in romanticised
narratives the truth plays a small part.
The Faith and Freedom Coalition, an organisation led by the
corrupt Evangelical lobbyist Ralph Reed even hands out a Churchill Man of the Year award which has been given to such
luminaries as Dobson, Newt Gingrich, and Mike Huckabee. While no fan of
Churchill, this is just a bit too much.
Evangelicals played no small role in the kerfuffle over
Obama's removal of the Churchill Bust in the Oval Office – which turned out to
be a misunderstanding, though given Obama's familial history with regard to
Kenya, who could blame him?
And no one should be surprised to learn that the Dominionist
King's College in Manhattan named one of its houses after Churchill – once
again his name being equated with the defense of Western Civilisation and its
values.
And then of course in recent days we have the constant
comparisons made between Churchill and Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelenskiy –
whom we shall revisit momentarily.