The Gathering Storm: The Second World War
Read The Gathering Storm: The Second World War Online
Authors: Winston S. Churchill
Tags: #History, #Military, #World War II, #Europe, #Great Britain, #Western, #Fiction
THE GATHERING STORM
WINSTON CHURCHILL
Copyright |
The Gathering Storm
Copyright © 1948 by Winston Churchill
Cover art and eForeword to the electronic edition copyright © 2002 by RosettaBooks, LLC
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
For information address
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First electronic edition published 2002 by RosettaBooks LLC, New York.
ISBN 0-7953-0600-8
| Contents |
Book One
From War to War
1919–1939
1 The Follies of the Victors, 1919–1929
2 Peace at Its Zenith, 1922–1931
8 Challenge and Response, 1935
9 Problems of Air and Sea, 1935–1939
10 Sanctions Against Italy, 1935
14 Mr. Eden at the Foreign Office. His Resignation
15 The Rape of Austria, February, 1938
19 Prague, Albania, and the Polish Guarantee, January–April, 1939
Book Two
The Twilight War
September 3, 1939—May 10, 1940
8 The Action off the River Plate
| Maps and Diagrams |
The Hitlerite Aggressions, 1936–1939
The Polish Campaign
German and Polish Concentrations, September 1, 1939
The Inner Pincers Close, September 13, 1939
The Outer Pincers Close: The Russians Advance, September 17, 1939
Diagram of Scheldt Line and Meuse-Antwerp Line
Scapa Flow, October 14, 1939: Sinking of H.M.S. “Royal Oak”
Hunting Groups in South Atlantic
Search for “Admiral Graf Spee.” October–December, 1939
The Action with “Admiral Graf Spee”
Russian Attack on Finland, December, 1939
The Mannerheim Line, February–March, 1940
| eForeword |
One of the most fascinating works of history ever written, Winston Churchill’s monumental The Second World War is a six-volume account of the struggle of the Allied powers in Europe against Germany and the Axis. Told through the eyes of British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, The Second World War is also the story of one nation’s singular, heroic role in the fight against tyranny. Pride and patriotism are evident everywhere in Churchill’s dramatic account and for good reason. Having learned a lesson at Munich that they would never forget, the British refused to make peace with Hitler, defying him even after France had fallen and after it seemed as though the Nazis were unstoppable. Churchill remained unbowed throughout, as did the people of Britain in whose determination and courage he placed his confidence.
Patriotic as Churchill was, he managed to maintain a balanced impartiality in his description of the war. What is perhaps most interesting, and what lends the work its tension and emotion, is Churchill’s inclusion of a significant amount of primary material. We hear his retrospective analysis of the war, to be sure; but we are also presented with memos, letters, orders, speeches, and telegrams that give a day-by-day account of the reactions-both mistaken and justified-to the unfolding drama. Strategies and counterstrategies develop to respond to Hitler’s ruthless conquest of Europe, his planned invasion of England, and his treacherous assault on Russia. It is a mesmerizing account of the crucial decisions that have to be made with imperfect knowledge and an awareness that the fate of the world hangs in the balance.
The Gathering Storm is the first volume of The Second World War. In some ways a continuation of The World Crisis, Churchill’s history of World War I, The Gathering Storm is his attempt to come to grips with the terrible circumstances that gave rise to Nazi Germany and a second, even more destructive world conflict. As he notes in his preface, Churchill was perhaps the only person who held such prominent positions of power in both world wars, so he is remarkably well-qualified to tell the tragic story of war to peace to war. The Gathering Storm considers the stipulations and consequences of the Treaty of Versailles, the rise of Adolf Hitler, the capitulation at Munich and the entry of the British into the war. The volume is pervaded by Churchill’s somber feeling that the Second World War was largely a senseless and avoidable conflict, but it sets the stage for the heroism and glory that are to follow.
Churchill won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1953 due in no small part to this awe-inspiring work.
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| Preface |