journal of european integration history revue d'histoire de l ...

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Klaus Larres
did not lie in the development of any convincing alternative strategies with which he
attempted to challenge Prime Minister Attlee’s policies. Neither did he contribute
much to drawing up new Conservative policies for the future. He left those important
but tiresome occupations largely to Rab Butler, Lord Woolton and Anthony Eden, his
heir apparent. 49 The new leader of the opposition concentrated instead on addressing
matters of global concern. Those he found much more interesting and stimulating.
Above all, his references to the East-West conflict and to the unity of Europe received
great attention. As far as the latter issue was concerned, Churchill largely followed
the ideas which he had developed during the Second World War.
Churchill’s original contribution to addressing the many problems of the postwar
world, therefore, did not consist of his vague and ambiguous calls for European
unity. His unique contribution can be found in his repeated calls for negotiations
with the Soviet Union to overcome the post-war differences among the Big
Three. Although he observed that an “iron curtain” had descended across the European
continent and that Moscow could only be impressed by a show of force, he
did not believe that Stalin sought to provoke the outbreak of yet another war.
Therefore, he made it his business to call upon the nations of the world to arrive at
a peaceful settlement of the conflicts which had led to the East-West divide. He
explained his ambition in full during a speech in the House of Commons in late
January 1948 by pointing out that he wanted “to arrive at a lasting settlement” with
the help of “formal diplomatic processes”. Otherwise there seemed to be a “very
real danger in going on drifting too long”. 50
However, Churchill had not suddenly ‘gone soft’ on Communism. He pursued a
twin-track approach. 51 He argued that the Soviet Union first had to be impressed by
western unity of purpose, military preparedness and political, economic and military
strength. Only then would negotiations with Moscow be viable in order to settle
the Cold War amicably and without either side losing face. He had already
expressed the view in August 1945, with reference to the atomic bomb, that there
were “three and perhaps four years before the concrete progress made in the United
States can be overtaken”. During this period it was all-important to re-organize
international relations in a peaceful way and establish an international atomic control
agency, if a nuclear war between East and West was to be avoided. 52
However, by 1948 that “breathing space” had almost been exhausted. Churchill
became increasingly unhappy with the approach the American administration was
taking to the Cold War. Both President Truman and his Secretary of State, Dean
Acheson, seemed to believe that the west was inferior to the Soviet Union as far as
49. See LARRES, Politik der Illusionen, pp.40-41; P. ADDISON, Churchill on the Home Front, 1900-
55, London 1993, pp.386 ff.; also J. RAMSDEN, The Age of Churchill and Eden, 1940-1957, London
1995; F. A. MAYER, The Opposition Years: Winston S. Churchill and the Conservative Party,
1945-51, New York 1992.
50. H.C. Deb., 5th series, vol.446, 23 Jan. 1948, cols.560, 561.
51. S. J. LAMBAKIS speaks of a “carrot and stick approach”. See his Winston Churchill: Architect of
Peace: A Study of Statesmanship and the Cold War, Westport, Ct. 1993, p.111.
52. “There is not an hour to be wasted; there is not a day to be lost”. Churchill, “Debate on the Address”,
H.C. Deb., 5th series, vol.413, 16 Aug. 1945, col.80.