Abstract
In his study of British grand strategy before the Second World War, Norman Gibbs was careful to note that the limitations of military power included finance and the productive capacity of industry.1 He also dismissed the myth that British weakness in the 1930s was simply the result of ‘supposed dictatorial obstinacy’ on the part of Neville Chamberlain.2 However, Gibbs was inhibited, as the author of an official history, when dealing with political personalities, and, in particular, he could not directly confront the legend of Winston Churchill as the Cassandra of the period.3 What follows may be seen as a footnote to Gibbs, in that this chapter is an attempt to compare how Churchill and Chamberlain coped with the limitations of military power. The focus is on their attitudes to the defence of Britain’s widely scattered Empire, for it was there that the imbalance between limited military power and extensive commitments was greatest.
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Notes
History of the Second World War, U.K. Military Series, N. H. Gibbs, Grand Strategy, vol. 1, Rearmament Policy (London: HMSO, 1976) esp. ch. 8.
Churchill himself gave powerful expression of the legend in his The Second World War, vol. 1, The Gathering Storm (London: Cassell, 1948).
For the scale of defence preparations in relation to national resources before 1914 see David French, British Economic and Strategic Planning 1905–1915 (London: Allen and Unwin, 1982).
G. C. Peden, ‘A Matter of Timing: The Economic Background to British Foreign Policy, 1937–1939’, History, vol. LXIX (1984) pp. 15–28.
Martin Gilbert, Winston S. Churchill, vol. V 1922–1939 (London: Heinemann, 1976) pp. 99–100, 115, 120, 237–43;
Keith Middlemas and John Barnes, Baldwin, A Biography (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1969) pp. 323–8.
D. E. Moggridge, British Monetary Policy 1924–31: The Norman Conquest of $4.86 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1972) pp. 261–2.
For Churchill arguing this point with reference to the naval programme, see Martin Gilbert, Winston S. Churchill, vol. V Companion (Part 1), Documents: The Exchequer Years 1922–1929 (London: Heinemann, 1979) p. 303.
G. C. Peden, British Rearmament and the Treasury: 1932–1939 (Edinburgh: Scottish Academic Press, 1979) p. 7.
See John Ferris, ‘Treasury Control, the Ten Year Rule and British Service Policies, 1919–24’, Historical Journal, vol. XXX (1987) pp. 859–83.
Peter Fearon, ‘The British Airframe Industry and the State, 1918–35’, Economic History Review, 2nd ser. vol. XXVII (1974) pp. 242–5.
W. S. Churchill, The World Crisis 1911–1918, vol. 1 (London: Odhams, 1938) pp. 364–82, esp. p. 370.
Michael Howard, The Continental Commitment, (London: Temple Smith, 1972) p. 141.
Churchill, Second World War, vol. III, The Grand Alliance (London: Cassell, 1950) p. 403.
G. C. Peden, ‘The Burden of Imperial Defence and the Continental Commitment Reconsidered’, Historical Journal, vol. XXVII (1984) p. 408.
Churchill, Second World War, vol. II, Their Finest Hour (London: Cassell, 1948) pp. 375, 395–7; III, pp. 219–20, 373–7.
Martin Gilbert, Winston S. Churchill, vol. VI, Finest Hour 1939–1941 (London: Heinemann, 1983) p. 1010.
G. C. Peden, ‘Sir Warren Fisher and British Rearmament against Germany’, English Historical Review, vol. XCIV (1979) pp. 29–47.
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© 1990 John B. Hattendorf and Malcolm H. Murfett
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Peden, G.C. (1990). Winston Churchill, Neville Chamberlain and the Defence of Empire. In: Hattendorf, J.B., Murfett, M.H. (eds) The Limitations of Military Power. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-21023-7_7
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-21023-7_7
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