Churchill—Hero or Villain?

September 14, 2024

HERE'S MY TAKE

Sir Winston Churchill got more than his share of media coverage lately. The recovery of the stolen Churchill “Roaring Lion” portrait by Ottawa police this week provided a poetic twist, but the overall narrative is tragic. The attention was prompted by social media influencer Darryl Cooper, whom Tucker Carlson introduced on his podcast as “the best and most honest popular historian in the United States today.” Cooper described Winston Churchill as “the chief villain of the Second World War” and argued he was “primarily responsible for the war becoming what it did, becoming something other than the invasion of Poland.” 

Churchill is long dead, and World War II is established history, so it is tempting to ignore this kerfuffle. However, 34 million-plus views of this 2-hour and 18-minute interview, not to mention the widespread media and social media debate (with a surprising number taking Cooper’s side) prompts alarm. This isn’t the space to directly counter Cooper’s arguments. There is plenty of that available online—I’ll just link to my seminary history professor Michael Haykin’s Substack or this National Interest piece, Debunking Tucker Carlson’s Darryl Cooper Interview, for those looking for that. My reflections here are more about a society that is vulnerable to this sort of misinformation and why that might matter.

I suspect most would concede that the present generation of North Americans lives with significantly less historical and foreign policy literacy than preceding generations. Such a claim is always complicated with factoids that seem to suggest the opposite: significant immigration levels mean there are more diaspora North Americans who follow events in countries of origin than ever before; technology makes it very easy to follow news and media from abroad, resulting in greater foreign engagement; and social justice or identity politics result in the take-up of global causes at an unprecedented rate. However, I would argue that while each of these speaks to an in-depth focus on particular foreign issues at never-before-seen levels, this is taking place without the benefit of historical literacy about how we arrived at our present moment.

Albert Mohler helpfully points out that while it is important to understand our heroes, “warts and all” acknowledging the mistakes, misjudgments, and even disasters (Gallipoli being only one example) that they make, turning that critique into an overview of leadership “driven by conviction” and into a narrative of Churchill as villain “is far more dangerous” than “historical revisionism.” Says Mohler: “You want to know the truth? Well just read Mein Kampf by Adolf Hitler. Just look at the Wannsee Conference proceedings about the Holocaust. The fact is, there’s just overwhelming evidence that if anything, even Winston Churchill had underestimated the evil of the Nazi regime, and furthermore, the imperialist ambitions of Adolf Hitler.”

One cannot ignore the fragile contemporary political context within which this lands.

Ever since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, there has been division, especially within the North American political right, regarding this conflict. Tucker Carlson has been perceived as pro-Russia throughout, noting that “Russia is only protecting its interests and security” and suggesting that the U.S. would act similarly “if such a situation developed in neighbouring Mexico and Canada.” In Tuesday’s U.S. presidential debate, Former President Trump carefully avoided answering the question of whether he wanted Ukraine to win the war. He simply said he wanted the war to stop, to avoid the continuing loss of life, suggesting he could make it happen if he were in office. Vice-President Harris’s response was that if Trump were president, “Putin would be sitting in Kyiv with his eyes on the rest of Europe,” preparing to invade Poland next. Interestingly, this division on the right and questions regarding support for Ukraine mirror the division on the North American political left regarding Hamas’s attack on Israel. In each case, leaders often sidestep questions of direct endorsement of the violation of international borders and the international rule of law as they seek the continued support of North Americans who are more sympathetic to the cause of the invaders than the invaded.

As one of the many who has inherited a legacy of sacrifice for the freedoms we enjoy today (my grandparents are among those honoured as “the righteous among the nations” at the World Holocaust Remembrance Centre), I am aware that it took a previous generation’s leadership driven by conviction to grant us the freedoms that the liberal democratic West has enjoyed during my lifetime. I’m not naïve about the strategic national self-interest that muddies these issues and the choices made. Critiquing the policies and strategies implemented by those whom we’d consider allies in a cause remains entirely legitimate.

To be sure, history and self-interest play a role in why North Americans are focused on Russia-Ukraine and Hamas-Israel at present and less so on the four other major wars currently ongoing in which there were over 10,000 combat-related deaths in each last year. (There are actually 110 ongoing wars today, although the count depends on one’s definition of armed conflict.) Each is tragic and every life lost is as much an image-bearer of God as the next and should be lamented. My sympathies for Ukraine and Israel and agreement that Western countries have a role to play in them in no way means I am indifferent to these other conflicts, with a “whatever happens over there is their fault” attitude.

So what’s the difference? In part, the rule of law on which the international order depends is at stake. Both Russia and Hamas violated internationally established norms and borders. I don’t doubt the sincerity of the Russians (or at least of President Putin) in believing that the Russians and Ukrainians are a single people with ties that go back at least a millennium. The persistence of the Ukrainians in the war has demonstrated that most Ukrainians do not agree. Similarly, I understand the aspirations and sense of injustice felt by the Palestinians at the establishment of the state of Israel in 1948 just as I understand the opposite aspirations and injustice experienced by many Jews in Israel.

It is one thing for people to have different nationalistic aspirations, religious beliefs about their destiny, or particular views of what is fair and just as it applies to contested territory given the complicated history of modern (or ancient) times in this broken world. It is another to turn a blind eye, minimize, or rewrite history in a manner that ignores the wrongness of violating established borders and peaceful processes to impose your will on others.

Western leaders on both the left and the right are guilty (understandably in part, given the complicated politics that accompanies this) of engaging in pragmatic rather than conviction-driven leadership. But for those who believe in political and religious freedom as a moral good (and not just a pragmatic way to live together), there are times when conviction-driven leadership is required. That means ensuring truthful stories get told about how we got to where we are—with both the good and bad parts exposed—as well as a conviction to respect the rule of law and the rights of others and to come to their defence when these are broken.

That brings us to the necessity of defending Sir Winston Churchill’s reputation, not because everything he stood for was exemplary, but because of the decisive leadership he provided at a time when the consequences of losing would have been devastating. Sorry, Darryl Cooper, but casting Churchill as a villain and lionizing Hitler and the Nazis, is dangerous and needs to be opposed. And while we are at it, thank you Ottawa police for finding the portrait of Churchill so that the roaring lion can be restored to his rightful place.

WHAT I’M READING

AI X 2

Preparing for a staff session on artificial intelligence, I came across a few articles that I found particularly useful. This February essay in Noema suggests that A.I. provides an opportunity to “push back against the process started by computerization—to extend the relevance, reach and value of human expertise to a larger set of workers.” The result might actually be an expanded labour market although one that values different things than are mainstream today. The second was a summary of an A.I. forum held by our friends at Praxis Labs which provided “A Redemptive Thesis for Artificial Intelligence.” The piece outlines six presumptive directions along with six accompanying redemptive directions that provide a careful Christian framework within which some of these questions can be considered.

A Now Former Trustee

American businessman Joseph Edelman took to the pages of the Wall Street Journal to share his reasons for resigning as a member of Brown University’s Board of Trustees. In response to the Board’s proposing a vote to divest the university of any holdings in Israel, Edelman writes: “I am concerned about what Brown’s willingness to hold such a vote suggests about the university’s attitude toward rising antisemitism on campus and a growing political movement that seeks the destruction of the state of Israel….The university leadership has for some reason chosen to reward, rather than punish, the activists for disrupting campus life, breaking school rules, and promoting violence and antisemitism at Brown.”

Bet You Weren't Aware

Anyone who watches live sports is aware of the avalanche of sports betting advertisements that have overwhelmed the airwaves in recent years. My Cardus colleagues released two reports this week and while I knew the matter was concerning, learning that the average monthly spend for sports bettors was $283 (net loss over winnings), or 3.2% of average annual income, surprised me. The literature suggests that gambling losses of over 1% of income are associated with depression, substance abuse, and divorce.

Homebuilding Capacity

A new report suggests that whatever political efforts are undertaken to address current housing supply issues will be complicated by constraints. Ongoing labour shortages are the most significant. However, the available supply of materials, financing and regulatory constraints combine to make the lofty goals being set by political proposals unattainable.

MEANINGFUL METRICS

Who Cares?

Statistics Canada launched a new set of questions on their social survey focused around caring for others, and the first set of results are in. One-third of Canadians report having provided unpaid care for someone with a serious illness, something that 9% of Canadians report having. Seventy-seven percent indicated that they were willing to help a close family member in need, while two-thirds would offer to help a close friend. While 98% of Canadians agree that the support of family and friends is important for those living with serious illness, 77% thought that caring for those with serious illness is primarily the responsibility of government. This ties into a report from the UK I read last week regarding the increased dependence on technical means in nursing, leading to the conclusion that “we are forgetting how to care.”

TAKE IT TO-GO

What's Left?

The terms “left” and “right” can be confusing. It’s rightly left to the context to determine if you are interpreting things right. So yes, I’ll admit to not being sure if I was right in believing lawyer Mickey Hawler’s advice to his associate. He told her to “grab the seat that will put you on the judge’s left…It’s a left-brain, right-brain thing. People are more agreeable to people on their left.” This is midway in the fifth book of the Lincoln lawyer mystery series. And if you got this far, you know the right thing to do is to look for mis-directions. In fairness, the author left the preface with his reader informed that “the characters and events in this book are fictitious” and any resemblance to real life is entirely coincidental. I googled to see if there were any scientists left who thought this thing about being on the judge’s left was right, but unless I did not do it right, I left his advice as not being right.

It took a few more hours before I had left reading the book to solve the mystery. It wouldn’t be right to offer a spoiler, but I don’t think it’s from left field to observe that a few of the novel’s characters who likely thought the right verdict had been delivered were not feeling right about how they had conducted themselves. But isn’t that what you are usually left with at the end of any rightly written mystery novel? And isn’t it right that newsletter writers, if they are also doing their jobs right, will not have left you in a similar state? 

Speaking of a similar state, whatever direction you were facing when you started reading this, if you turned 90 degrees following the instruction every time you met either a left or right, you’d now be facing the exact same direction you were when you started. I asked my wife to double-check to see if my math was right, but she thought I had left my mind. Good thing I deleted the sentence about the Wright brothers having left Kitty Hawk with their plane or she would have told me to take off.  

So after that thought, there is nothing left to write.

Until next week.