The avoidable war: Lord Cecil and the policy of principle, 1932-1935. Volume 1
- ISBN-10
- 1412817765
- ISBN-13
- 9781412817769
- Series
- The avoidable war
- Category
- History
- Pages
- 389
- Language
- English
- Publisher
- Transaction Publishers
- Author
- J. Kenneth Brody
Description
As historian Gordon Craig has observed, "Americans are deeply ambivalent about history, choosing instead to follow the imperative of moral absolutes; they are uncomfortable with the idea of national interest as a guiding principle of policy, preferring motivations that are nobler." What does the national interest require? What does morality command? These issues bedevil us in Bosnia and Rwanda today as they did yesterday in the Persian Gulf and in Somalia. Such questions were fully played out in the era that led up to the dominant event of our century, the Second World War. The Avoidable War details how the war, its destruction, and its consequences could have been avoided. This original interpretation of history also provides insights into ways of preserving peace that can guide contemporary diplomacy. J. Kenneth Brody describes an incomparable galley of characters: a chief villain, Hitler; a thoughtful, conflicted, and human Mussolini; a fatuous Ramsey MacDonald; an uncharacteristically silent William Churchill; a smaller than life Stanley Baldwin. Above all, he rescues from undeserved obscurity the noble and inspiring figure of Lord Robert Cecil providing a thorough, controversial reappraisal and sympathetic portrait of Pierre Laval, his policy, and his character. Brody is the first to tell the story of the Peace Ballot, the first modern public opinion poll, created by Cecil in 1935. In this privately organized referendum on issues of war and peace, the British voted overwhelmingly in support of disarmament and morality rather than the national interest. Unfortunately its results helped bring on the war they worked so hard to avoid as, instructed by the Peace Ballot, the British met brute force with arms limitations proposals, the love of peace, and exalted ideals. Under cover of those ideals they betrayed a trusting ally, France. In doing so, they reaped a whirlwind of wartime consequences. The first of a two-volume series sheds new and original light on the origins of the Second World War. It is a study of both modern British history and a period of French history usually consigned to darkness. It also explores the role of morality in policymaking. This is a very human story of the passionate devotion to peace and justice of the proponents of the Peace Ballot and their supporters, and of the paradoxical and perverse result they achieved.
Get the book
Other editions
-
- 1999-01-01
- 388 pages
- Ebook
- Transaction Publishers
-
- 2022-03-30
- 502 pages
- Paperback
- Hachette UK
-
- 2022-03-22
- 432 pages
- Ebook
- PublicAffairs
Similar books
-
Summary of Kevin Rudd's The Avoidable War
By , Everest MediaPlease note: This is a companion version & not the original book.
-
The Improbable War: China, the United States and the Continuing Logic of Great Power Conflict
By Christopher CokerThe Improbable War explains why conflict between the USA and China cannot be ruled out.
-
Has China Won?: The Chinese Challenge to American Primacy
By Kishore MahbubaniKishore Mahbubani, a diplomat and scholar with unrivalled access to policymakers in Beijing and Washington, has written the definitive guide to the deep fault lines in the relationship, a clear-eyed assessment of the risk of any ...
-
Yugoslavia: An Avoidable War
By Nora BeloffIn this outstanding appraisal of the modern history of Yugoslavia and the factors surrounding its break-up, Nora Beloff takes sacred tenets of received wisdom and subjects them to close analysis.
-
Churchill and the Avoidable War: Could World War II Have Been Prevented?
By Richard M. Langworth" Here is a transformative view of Churchill's prescriptions, and the degree to which he pursued them in the decade before the war.
-
Twelve American Wars: Nine of Them Avoidable
By Eugene G. WindchyPaymaster Willis Cox and Naval Cadet Leonard Sargent talked to hundreds of people in seven different provinces. Sargent reported that the Filipinos had established a quiet and orderly society that desired independence.
-
Destined for War: Can America and China Escape Thucydides's Trap?
By Graham Allison... Niccolò, 120 Mackenney, Richard, 251 Mackinder, Halford, 126 Macmillan, Harold, 200 MacMillan, Margaret, 68–69, ... 105 Morocco, 73,78, 222 Morris, Edmund, 97,317n65 Nelson, Horatio, 263 Netherlands, 45, 51–53, 74, 190, 247–50, 255, ...
-
The Avoidable War: Pierre Laval & the politics of reality, 1935-1936
By J. Kenneth BrodyVolume 2 brings the story to a close, detailing the tragic denouement of this crisis"--Publisher's description.
-
The Long Game: China's Grand Strategy to Displace American Order
By Rush DoshiIn The Long Game, Rush Doshi draws from a rich base of Chinese primary sources, including decades worth of party documents, leaked materials, memoirs by party leaders, and a careful analysis of China's conduct to provide a history of China ...
-
Avoiding War with China: Two Nations, One World
By Amitai Etzioni258 (National Defense University Institute for National and Strategic Studies, June 2012), 2. 29. Dan Blumenthal, “The US Response to China's Military Modernization,” in Strategic Asia 2012–13: China's Military Challenge, ed.