Churchill letters predicted war 2 years before it began

The Post and Courier ^ | Saturday, February 7, 2004 | AP

[yonif]

WASHINGTON--Winston Churchill predicted World War I two years before it broke out, Library of Congress scholars discovered in a newly unearthed collection of the British prime minister's letters.

The letters to Churchill's cousin, the Duke of Marlborough, have not been seen in decades, Librarian of Congress James H. Billington said.

As first lord of the Admiralty in 1912, Churchill updated his cousin on the war between Turkey and an alliance of Balkan states. Churchill took a stand against the Turks.

"But the European situation is far from safe and anything might happen," he wrote. "It only needs a little ill will or bad faith on the part of a great power to precipitate a far greater conflict."

Two years later, the assassination of Austrian Archduke Franz Ferdinand provided the spark that Churchill foresaw. Turkey took Germany's side in the war, and a bloody, unsuccessful campaign against Turkish territory cost Churchill his cabinet post.

The duke donated the letters to the library at the urging of Bainbridge Colby, secretary of state under President Wilson, but they were misfiled. Daun Van Ee, a military historian at the library, found them as he was preparing an exhibit on Churchill's life. "Churchill and the Great Republic" opened Thursday at the Library of Congress.

While on a visit Wednesday to see the exhibit, the prime minister's 63-year-old grandson spoke of his grandfather's reputation for prophecy. He said a classmate at Harrow, the elite boys' school, recalled hearing the future hero of World War II tell a friend: "Well, maybe I'll go into the army, but I shall save London. There will be a great crisis which I can't foresee the details of. ... I shall save England and the empire."

Churchill was also prescient about the postwar Soviet Union. "As early as 1942," the younger Winston Churchhill said, "he was privately voicing -- I know this from a conversation I had with the late Prime Minister Harold Macmillan -- great anxiety about what would be the shape of Europe at the end of the war, with Germany defeated and the Red Army at the heart of Europe."

One letter vividly describes the 1898 Battle of Omdurman in Sudan.

"The battle was a wonderful spectacle," Churchill wrote. "I had the good luck to ride through the charge unhurt -- indeed untouched -- which very few can say. ... The whole thing was a matter of seconds -- for as you may have gathered, we burst through their line and formed up the other side. The loss was most severe -- 1 officer and 21 men killed, 9 officers and 66 men wounded and 119 horses out of only 320. Such a proportion and such a loss has been sustained by no regiment since the Light Brigade -- forty years ago."

[Jackson Brown]

While on a visit Wednesday to see the exhibit, the prime minister's 63-year-old grandson spoke of his grandfather's reputation for prophecy.

His grandson, who is editing another pile of his unpublished writings, says he warned about the dangers of Islamic Fundamentalism way back in the 20s.

[yonif]

wow

[xJones]

Churchill was amazing. He had no personal mechanical ability, but he promoted British tanks in WWI and forsaw tanks as a future leading weapon of war.

Turkey took Germany's side in the war, and a bloody, unsuccessful campaign against Turkish territory cost Churchill his cabinet post.

Gallipoli. What a strange turn of events that was.

[FreedomCalls]

His parrot is even amazing -- still alive today. There are some doubts though.

[DeaconBenjamin]

The attack might well have succeeded if the allied naval forces weren't so inexplicably cowardly in the Bosporus.

[Leroy S. Mort]

If you haven't seen this, rent it or buy it. Amazing film.

[tbg681]

Churchill KNEW EVERYTHING...that was important...

[xJones]

The attack might well have succeeded if the allied naval forces weren't so inexplicably cowardly in the Bosporus.

The battle should never have been lost. The whole thing was jinxed, so to speak.

[optik_b]

"The battle should never have been lost. "

Why do you think it should not have been lost? I've always seen it described as an ill-conceived and poorly planned. Sending men armed with nothing but bayonets, to charge a trench fortified by heavy machine gun fire.

[ninonitti]

Ditto's watched it last night........"A Great Man"

[Susannah]

A friend of mine has a cousin who works at the Pentagon and sent her the following info on early terrorists:...

(One important thing to note beforehand,is that Muslims detest pork because they believe pigs are filthy animals. Some of them simply refuse to eat it, while others won't even touch pigs at all, nor any of their by-products.To
them, eating or touching a pig, its meat, its blood, etc., is to be instantly barred from paradise and doomed to hell.)

Just before World War I, there were a number of terrorist attacks on the United States by; you guessed it, Muslim extremists.

So General Pershing captured 50 terrorists and had them tied to posts execution style. He then had his men bring in two pigs and slaughter them in front of the, now horrified, terrorists.

The soldiers then soaked their bullets in the pigs blood, and proceeded to execute 49 of the terrorists by firing squad.

The soldiers then dug a big hole, dumped in the terrorist's bodies and covered them in pig blood, entrails, etc.

They let the 50th man go. And for the next forty-two years, there was not a single Muslim extremist attack anywhere in the world.

[Jackson Brown]

You might want to check this --

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&ie=ISO-8859-1&q=Muslim+attacks+General+Pershing&btnG=Google+Search

[xJones]

He says Charlie may have picked up his repertoire of swear words from the wartime leader, who was voted the Greatest Briton in a BBC poll last year.

Oh, would that the tale of Churchill's Charlie were true. But Churchill's family says he never had a bird, and so it looks like the story that "was too good to be true", wasn't.:)