The Hidden Influences Controlling World Events: A Bigger Version of The Big Picture

The networks of power and influence which shape world events are often hidden, composed not of famous political leaders, but rather of financial administrators. These networks have large umbrellas of effect, including liberals and conservatives, right-wingers and left-wingers, and wide spectrum of political parties.

In this context, it becomes clear that political conflicts presented as important to the general public by the news media are in fact diversions, secondary and tertiary events, removed from the real power brokers who control large parts of the world economy. Financial machinations are primary; political intrigues are at most shadows of the more foundational monetary blocs.

The public is misled into following elections and legislative disputes, while the real impacts are generated by boards of governors who manage large banks. The officers of the major private banks around the world, as historian Gary Allen writes, have more control over governments than presidents, prime ministers, senators, or judges:

Eventually these international bankers actually owned as private corporations the central banks of the various European nations. The Bank of England, Bank of France and Bank of Germany were not owned by their respective governments, as almost everyone imagines, but were privately owned monopolies granted by the heads of state, usually in return for loans. Under this system, observed Reginald McKenna, President of the Midlands Bank of England: “Those that create and issue the money and credit direct the policies of government and hold in their hands the destiny of the people.” Once the government is in debt to the bankers it is at their mercy. A frightening example was cited by the London Financial Times of September 26, 1921, which revealed that even at that time: “Half a dozen men at the top of the Big Five Banks could upset the whole fabric of government finance by refraining from renewing Treasury Bills.”

Major international crises, and their resolutions, are often navigated, not by politicians or diplomats or military officers, but rather by bankers. This was the case, e.g., in the creation of the Dawes Plan, and the global tensions which caused the plan to be created.

By the early 1920s, it had become clear that the terms of the Versailles Treaty were unrealistic. The treaty obligated Germany to make large reparation payments to the nations which had won the First World War. The payments were so large, in fact, that they were impossible.

Europe was simultaneously on the brink of an economic collapse and on the brink of war. The solution would not be the result of prime ministers and presidents practicing diplomacy; nor would it be the result of military leaders and their battle plans. Peace would be preserved by financial arrangements.

Charles Dawes, who orchestrated this resolution, was not a sinister figure in some international conspiracy. To the contrary, he was an Ohio-born lawyer, who practiced law first in Omaha, Nebraska, and then later in Chicago. Aside from law, his passion was music, and he composed a song which became a number one pop hit. No, Charles Dawes was not a member of some nefarious conspiracy. He received the Nobel Peace Prize for his work in avoiding war and avoiding economic collapse in Europe.

The dynamics of the situation in Europe in the early 1920s reveals, however, how a global conspiracy could wield immense power through the banking system. Financial operatives can bypass a nation’s official or elected leadership and have significant power.

Had Charles Dawes not been a benevolent and decent man, he could have exploited the situation to gain personal influence in multiple nations simultaneously.

The example of the Dawes Plan shows that there are opportunities for an international conspiracy to gain significant power by using the financial system and bypassing both civilian and military leadership. The same is true for a domestic conspiracy within any one nation. The question to be posed is not whether such a thing is possible. Rather, it must be asked whether such a thing has already happened.

A Brief History of Slavery: Its Origins, and How It Invaded America

How did slavery arrive in America? It seems to have come primarily from Asia. When people from northeast Asia invaded America across what is now the Bering Strait, they brought with them the cultures which would take root in South America, Central America, and North America.

After occupying the Americas, these conquerors set up their own civilization, which included a robust program of slavery, as historian Matt Walsh writes:

The institution goes back 10,000 years or more to the Neolithic Revolution. As long as human society has had agriculture, it has had slaves to do the work. The soil on every continent on Earth, save Antarctica, has been tilled by slaves. Slavery was a common and almost unquestioned practice everywhere, all over the world, among nearly all people, for many thousands of years.

Although the word ‘slavery’ is often used, it is still worth pausing to define it. The first element of this definition points to unremunerated labor: slaves work and do not get paid for working, or do not have the right to demand payment, even if they are paid.

A second element of the definition indicates that slaves are treated as property. The property rights which owners can normally exercise over possessions like land and houses are, in conditions of slavery, exercised over human beings.

Although there are variations and differences between, e.g., slavery as practiced by Aztec as compared to the Benin Empire, or as practiced by the Maya as compared to the Kongo, the points of the definition constitute a common thread among regional variations. ‘Kongo’ is the ancient predecessor of the modern Congo. Matt Walsh notes:

Slaves were traded as commodities as far back as Ancient Egypt.

Slavery in any form is dehumanizing. To buy and sell human beings, and to claim the right to treat them in any arbitrary way, even to kill them, — and to claim that right based on their status as property — is why many people find slavery to be a moral monstrosity.

The first recorded effort to undermine the institution of slavery is found in the Mosaic laws. In his legislation, Moses codified temporal limits to slavery — that it would not be a lifelong condition, but rather that slaves would be set free. He also decreed that slaves could not be treated with arbitrary harshness.

While incremental, the laws of Moses were the first significant effort to erode slavery. The effects were slow. Slavery would persist for a few more centuries his own society, and for a few more millennia in other societies.

The foundation of slavery, the reason for its institution and persistence, is primarily economic, as Matt Walsh points out:

Arab traders would conduct their own raids in Africa, capturing African villagers and shipping them back to the Arabian peninsula for sale.

At various times and various places, slavery has been a big business. Certain regional economies have not only allowed slavery, but rather depended on it. This was the case in the southern United States between 1790 and 1865; it was even more the case on other continents, as historian Matt Walsh notes:

In the Sub-Saharan slave trade, established about 1,000 years before the United States came into being, young boys were routinely castrated and then sold into forced labor in Asia, the Middle East, or within Africa. It’s worth noting that slavery was not fully abolished in Africa until 1981.

Slavery was practiced at some point in time or another in almost every part of the world. Europe was the first large region to eradicate slavery. The long-term ripple effects of the Mosaic innovation drove the Europeans to abolish slavery. The anti-slavery movements in North America, typified in individuals like Roger Williams, who led the movement which abolished slavery in Rhode Island in the 1650s, was a direct outgrowth of European culture, which was in turn an extension of Mosiac legal and ethical logic.

Although the forms and goals of slavery changed when European settlers arrived in the Americas, its basic nature did not. Because slavery de-humanizes and objectifies the slave, the slave is perceived as an “other” — the natives of the Americas, before the arrival of Europeans, treated people who were not of their own tribe as “other” and often enslaved them, as Matt Walsh explains:

Slavery was commonplace in the Americas well before European settlers showed up. Native American tribes enslaved each other, often by conquest and capture.

The civilizations of the Americas routinely practiced human sacrifice before the arrival of Europeans. The connection between slavery and the pre-religious superstitious phase of human sacrifice is clear: The slave would have no choice about being a vicitim of these rituals.

In Mesoamerica, a slave would often have his period of servitude ended when he was ritualistically butchered as a human sacrifice, which was a widespread practice in the region for hundreds of years.

Slavery has not been entirely eradicate from the world. It persists, even in places where it is technically illegal. There are still markets where human beings are bought and sold like animals.

While slavery persists in some remote areas, most modern nations have succeeded in erasing it from their societies, and most cultures have solidified an anti-slavery ethic among their people.

China had slavery for 3,000 years and only officially abolished it in the 20th century, though unofficially it still exists today.

Slavery existed in ancient times in nearly every part of the world. It came to the Americas many centuries prior to the first European settlers. The social and cultural forces which led to the end of slavery made themselves first felt in the Ancient Near East, next in Europe, and then in the Americas.

When the United States ended slavery between 1863 and 1865, other nations followed the example: Brazil ended its slavery sytem in 1888, Cuba in 1886, and Madegascar in 1896. Egypt, Morocco, Yemen, China, and Thailand followed suit in the twentieth century.

Communism Is a Product of the Wealthy Elite: The Poor Do Not Embrace Marxism

The international communist conspiracy has so thoroughly permeated educational institutions and the media that its propaganda is now assumed as common wisdom. What has become a familiar telling of events is a deliberate — and often successful — attempt to hide events.

According to the usual narrative, communism and socialism are embraced and promoted by poor people, by exploited workers, in a bid for justice and better treatment. In reality, communism and socialism are created and promoted by the wealthy elite, as historian John Stormer writes:

Communism is commonly believed to rise out of poverty. Yet, Fidel Castro was a product, not of the cane fields of Cuba, but of the halls of Havana University.

Karl Marx, it will be remembered, was the child of an upper-middle-class family, and received an exclusive university education. His father was a successful lawyer, and his parents owned a vineyard. Never during his lifetime did Karl Marx work for a wage, or work to support himself and his family. Instead, his efforts went into speechmaking, writing, and organizing, as he lived off of the privilege of his family and his wealthy supporters.

In the course of contradicting the propaganda which is nearly omnipresent in textbooks and classrooms, two questions will arise: Why would the wealthy support communism and socialism, if those ideologies advocate the dismantling of their privilege? Why would the poor not enthusiastically embrace the ideas which claim to liberate the downtrodden?

Among the elite supporters of communism and socialism, one may discern two types. On the one hand, there is the naive believer, who with true goodwill thinks that he will help his fellow man by advocating for these beliefs. On the other hand, there is the cynic, who understands that any attempted implementation of these ideologies will inevitably result in a concentration of power and wealth in the hands of a few.

Among the poor, there are many who understand that communism and socialism are systems which fail to generate opportunities. Yet that is precisely what the poor need and want: a chance at something better.

There are those in poverty who are deceived into supporting some communist or socialist movement, but they are often quickly alerted to the fact that their lives do not improve after the installation of some government which bears the name of these ideologies.

Joseph Stalin was not a simple peasant rebelling at the oppression of the Czar. He became a communist while studying for the priesthood in a Russian Orthodox seminary.

It is the case, in every instance of a political takeover by a government which represents, or claims to represent, these ideologies, that the poor find no relief. Not only that, but the poor are often subjected to greater hardship under their alleged benefactors.

This is the situation in every case in which such a takeover has happened. It is also the situation in any conceivable or possible scenario of a such a takeover.

The instigators, leaders, and promoters of communism and socialism are inevitably wealthy, privileged, and elite. It is difficult to find a revolutionary leader who was a member of the lower classes. Examples from Russia in 1917, to China between 1927 and 1949, and in Cuba between 1953 and 1959, are representative of other communist revolutions in history, as John Stormer details:

Dr. Cheddi Jagan, communist premier of British Guiana, became a communist, not as an “exploited” worker on a plantation of a British colonial colony, but as a dental student at Chicago’s Northwestern University.

It is necessary to articulate statements which are nearly the exact opposite of what is commonly believed: Communism and socialism are created and promoted by the wealthy, the privileged, and the elite, for the purpose of maintaining and increasing their wealth and power. The notion that communism and socialism intend to, or can, help the poor is a notion created to deceive, to dupe naive but well-intentioned people into helping the communist and socialist movements. The poor and the working class generally reject communism: some do so outright, seeing that it fails to offer them opportunities; others do so only after learning the bitter lesson of having at first supported these movements, only later to be alerted to the harsh reality that these movements will simply worsen their lot.

Numbers and Statistics: Understanding the Coronavirus Pandemic

Worldwide discussions bring clarity, but often not answers, to questions about the COVID-19 pandemic, because investigations are removed from the political debates within any single nation. As calmer investigations, not overheated by regional politics, proceed, it is clear that one key word is “estimation,” indicating that numbers presented about the virus are not definite, but rather merely preliminary.

Into nearly every sentence written or spoken about the Coronavirus, the adverbs “probably” or “approximately” should be inserted, if they are not already present. The phrase “on average” should also be added.

It is perhaps excusable, but nonetheless wrong, to see any number as indicating a precise value. In the case of a virus, the existence of which was not known as recently as a year ago, any number must be seen as an educated guess.

When the pandemic first gained the attention of the world in March 2020, several months after low-level media reporting and a bit of biological research had begun, any numbers used in reporting about the virus were vague and often off-target by an order of magnitude, as this November 2020 newspaper text from Michigan suggests:

When on March 10 the state announced its first two cases, 532 people already were sick with what was later confirmed to be coronavirus.

The real number was many times that. University of California Berkeley researchers have estimated for every confirmed case in the spring, Michigan had 12 undetected cases.

The testing mechanisms for the virus were hastily-developed. Significant numbers of false positives and false negatives were present but often ignored in the summary conclusions drawn from the crude data.

In urban areas, the concern is cases going undetected because people can have coronavirus and not realize it. University of Michigan epidemiologist Ryan Malosh cited estimates of “three to six missed cases” for every one confirmed.

Further ambiguity affected the numbers as the precise percentage of asymptomatic, or mildly symptomatic, cases was unknown. Every estimate of that percentage seemed to be higher than the last, but remained a mere guess.

Pathologists in Germany, for example, argued about how many people died from COVID-19. Of those patients whose death certificates indicated Coronavirus as the cause of death, some researchers guessed that as many as 85% of them died of that cause. Other researchers indicated that fewer than 50% died from COVID-19.

The ordinary newspaper-reading citizen is left bewildered. If major research universities can’t sort this out, who can? The fact remains that many questions about the pandemic remain unanswered, and will likely remain so for several years.

The Climate is Safer Now: Fewer Climate-Related Disasters

In 2019, an inexperienced Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez stated that “the world is going to end in twelve years if we don’t address climate change.” She quickly faced a barrage of criticism, even from climate activists and from the leaders within her own political party, to retract the statement.

Angry because she’d been called out by members of her own Democratic Party and by fellow climate activists, the congresswoman, affectionately known as AOC, attempted to fine-tune her message via one of her appointees, as Michael Shellenberger writes:

An AOC spokesperson told Axios, “We can quibble about the phraseology, whether it’s existential or cataclysmic.” But, he added, “We’re seeing lots of [climate change–related] problems that are already impacting lives.”

But if that’s the case, the impact is dwarfed by the 92 percent decline in the decadal death toll from natural disasters since its peak in the 1920s. In that decade, 5.4 million people died from natural disasters. In the 2010s, just 0.4 million did. Moreover, that decline occurred during a period when the global population nearly quadrupled.

In fact, both rich and poor societies have become far less vulnerable to extreme weather events in recent decades. In 2019, the journal Global Environmental Change published a major study that found death rates and economic damage dropped by 80 to 90 percent during the last four decades, from the 1980s to the present.

Humans are now less likely to suffer from climate-related or climate-caused disasters. The predicted droughts aren’t causing the migrations of thousands of refugees. The predicted rising of sea levels hasn’t devastated towns and villages around the world.

For humans on planet Earth, life expectancy has risen over the last two decades, and the number of people living in poverty has decreased. Although climate activists have predicted disaster and misery since the 1990s, and perhaps even earlier, those predictions have shown themselves to be inaccurate.

The Beginning of the End of Chiang’s Government in China: Espionage Networks Pave the Way for the Communist Takeover

In early 1941, Chiang Kai-shek, the leader of China, obtained information from his military intelligence communities that Japan was not only going to continue its war against China, but rather that it was also going to expand its war effort to attack additionally the various nations of southeast China. The expansion of Japanese aggression beyond China and into southeast Asia meant war with Britain and France, because southeast Asia was composed mainly of British and French colonies.

Even before Japan attacked Pearl Harbor, U.S. involvement in the Pacific war was inevitable. America would enter the conflict because of its alliances with Australia, Britain, and France, and also because the Philippines and other islands in the area were U.S. protectorates, territories, or possessions.

As the leader of China, Chiang Kai-shek welcomed U.S. and British involvement in the war, because it meant that China would have allies against Japan. Until that point in time, China had faced Japan almost alone.

Chiang, however, was fighting two wars at once. The external war was Japan’s attack on, and invasion of, China. The internal war was a raging civil war between Chiang’s government and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Starting in 1927, the CCP had been committed to the violent overthrow of the Chinese government. Lasting over two decades, the Chinese Civil War would leave millions dead.

When the Japanese attacked China in 1937, a ceasefire in the civil war was declared, and the CCP promised to cooperate with the Chinese government in a mutual effort to defend China against the Japanese. But the CCP kept its promise at best partially. The soldiers of the CCP were organized into the “New Fourth Army,” which was supposed to coordinate its activities with the armies of China and take orders from the Chinese high command. But the Fourth Army sometimes didn’t follow orders, or did so only deliberate delay.

As dangerous as the Communists were, however, Chiang was forced to pay more attention to the Japanese invasion, because it presented a more urgent danger. He was delighted that the United States would support China against Japan. But what he didn’t know was that the U.S. representative, sent to facilitate cooperation between America and China, was actually a Soviet spy.

Neither the U.S. government, which sent Lauchlin Currie to China as its representative, nor the Chinese government which happily received him, realized that he was part of a Soviet Socialist espionage network, as historian Jay Taylor writes:

This development was good news for Chiang. Despite all the staggering defeats, failures, and losses of the past three years, as well as the stupendous problems of trying to run a government, economy, and army in exile and of virtual international isolation, Chiang had remained steadfast in his belief that he and China would eventually prevail over Japan. Because of the Soviet factor, he would never be as certain about the ultimate outcome of the struggle with Mao’s CCP, but that problem could be tackled later. What was important now was that while the Fourth Army Incident and its aftermath were still reverberating inside China, the informal Sino-American alliance was developing rapidly. Most importantly, President Roosevelt had included China in his new and dramatic Lend-Lease Bill, which was intended primarily to save England through the provision of vast amounts of war matériel. The President had also decided to send a personal representative to talk with Chiang. The representative, Lauchlin Currie, played a key role in the White House on Far Eastern affairs, although his official titles of personal economic adviser and administrative assistant to the President had nothing to do with foreign affairs and he knew little or nothing about China. Currie, however, had another unusual distinction — he was a member of a group of officials in Washington whom Moscow considered its “agents of influence.” Most of these men and women were motivated by personal ideals, sympathy for the Soviet Union, hatred of fascism, and liberal economic and social views. Some, like Currie, were not members of the Communist Party and probably were at most democratic-socialists, but they believed that the fascist threat overrode most other considerations and that in promoting the interests of Moscow and providing it sensitive information they were also serving the interests of their own country. They would have objected to being called “agents of influence,” but at the minimum they showed atrocious judgment. After all, the Soviet Union was then allied to Nazi Germany, suggesting that their ideological motivations were not, after all, primarily antifascist.

Currie’s assignment from President Roosevelt was to liaise between the United States and China, specifically for the purpose of bolstering the war effort against Japan. But Currie’s own objective was to undermine the Chinese government and strengthen the CCP’s attempts to overthrow that government.

Chiang Kai-shek was happy to receive aid from the United States. He made substantial requests for more.

When Chiang received Currie in Chungking on February 10, the American informed him that the United States would soon deliver to China US$45 million of arms and military equipment. After an expression of thanks, Chiang also asked for financial assistance to help stabilize the Chinese currency (the fabi), and assistance in improving the Burma Road. But this was only the beginning. On March 31, T.V. Soong presented Currie a comprehensive request on behalf of the commander in chief, including 1,000 military aircraft and arms for thirty divisions. Some of the airplanes were needed to equip a new Chinese Air Force unit to be led by Claire Chennault, a crusty, retired U.S. Army Air Force Captain with the “honorific” title of Colonel. Since 1937, Chennault had been advising Chiang and directing the training of what remained of the Chinese Air Force.

The connection to the U.S. was vital to the Chinese war effort. Yet that connection had to go, in part, through Lauchlin Currie, a permanent enemy of Chiang Kai-shek and the Chinese government.

The Soviet Socialist government was at that time allied with Hitler’s National Socialist (“Nazi”) government.

The Soviets were also allied with the CCP. Hitler was allied with the Japanese, who had invaded and were still attacking China.

So the civil war inside China, between the CCP and Chiang’s nationalist government, was linked to the war outside China, with the CCP allied to the Nazis, the Soviets, and the Japanese, while Chiang’s government was allied to the United States.

The 1937 ceasefire between the CCP and Chiang’s government was tenuous at best. Both sides were as eager to fight each other as they were to fight the Japanese.

Thus Chiang was shocked when Lauchlin Currie flatly stated that the CCP and Chiang’s government should consolidate and form a united front against the Japanese:

Currie also passed on to Chiang Roosevelt’s hope that the KMT and the CCP would be able to form a true united front to fight Japan. Taken aback, Chiang replied that it was his view that the CCP’s principal loyalty was to the Communist International and the Soviet Union. The Communists, he said, did not want to see an alliance among China, America, and Britain. At the time, Chiang’s assertion was an undeniable fact. But Currie did not agree with any of these premises and he left Chiang with the clear impression that in the coming war, the Americans would have one goal — defeat of the Germans and the Japanese — and since the CCP was part of the united front against Japan, it would also be considered a friend. Chiang understood that his strikingly different view of the CCP would bedevil the most important foreign relationship he and his government would ever have. But aside from this issue, Chiang was immensely pleased by the visit — an alliance with the powerful United States seemed likely within a year.

Because Lauchlin Currie was operating as part of the Soviet espionage network, he was indifferent to Chiang’s assessments of the situation in China, indifferent to Chiang’s requests, and indifferent to Chiang’s views. But Currie was eager to relay opinions and requests of the CCP to the U.S. government.

Chiang’s political party was called the Kuomintang (KMT). The CCP worked to form a negative impression of the KMT in Currie’s mind, a false impression which Currie would then carry back to Washington, D.C.

Before leaving Chungking, Currie met privately with Zhou Enlai, who was very positive and convivial, portraying the Communists as patriotic reformers interested in democracy and full of praise for the idea of U.S. support for China against Japan. Zhou, however, warned that the KMT leader’s policies could lead to a civil war and a collapse of the resistance. He was not so frank as to mention that his party at that moment continued vehemently to oppose a U.S.-China alliance, fearing that Japan’s defeat by such a partnership would give Chiang a powerful claim to leadership.

Currie faithfully carried Zhou Enlai’s pro-communist messages back to Washington, D.C.

(Because of varying transliteration, Zhou Enlai is also known as Chou En-Lai.)

Lauchlin Currie was only one of several Soviet agents who were working inside the U.S. government. These operatives had a number of tasks. One of them was to weaken American enthusiasm for Chiang’s government, and thereby aid the CCP in its efforts to overthrow that government.

The international communist conspiracy, promoted by the Soviet Socialists, did indeed eventually influence America’s policy. As seen above, the U.S. wanted a united front between the CCP and Chiang. It was hopelessly naive to imagine that the Chinese communists would work together with Chiang’s government to defend China against the Japanese.

The CCP would rather wait while Japan shredded China and Chiang’s government, which would make it easier for the Communists to assume control, once the country and the government were thus weakened. The CCP was allied with the Soviet Socialists, who were, in turn, allied with Japan and with the Nazis. The Chinese Communists were thus allied with Japan.

In Washington, Currie and others succeeded in reducing the amount of aid which Chiang would receive from the United States. By influencing U.S. foreign policy this way, Lauchlin Currie and the other Soviet spies inside the American government contributed to the final downfall of Chiang’s government in 1949, contributed to the establishment of a ruthless Communist dictatorship in China, and contributed to the death of millions of Chinese.

The fact that the Communists took control of China has led to an amazing number of deaths. Between 1958 and 1961, the CCP operated a program known as ‘The Great Leap Forward.’ The result was the starvation of at least 30 million Chinese people, the execution of at least 2.5 million, and the forced suicides of at least another 1 million. These numbers represent the lower end of the ranges reported.

The CCP organized another wave of violence from 1966 to 1976 and called it ‘The Cultural Revolution.’ Estimates vary substantially: the CCP executed between 1 million and 20 million people during this program.

The Great Leap Forward and The Cultural Revolution were the two most violent periods of Communism’s rule over China. Other periods also included mass executions and the deaths of prisoners in camps.

Lauchlin Currie does not bear sole responsibility for the millions of Chinese who suffered and died. The fall of Chiang’s government and the rise of the CCP led to one of the most horrifying catastrophes in history: it led to mass murder and it led to the widespread violation of human rights in China.

Controversy Among Historians: What Caused WWII?

In most history textbooks, the beginning of WW2 is placed either at Hitler’s invasion of Poland in 1939, or more accurately, at Japan’s 1937 invasion of China. Some more nuanced authors might even assign it to Japan’s 1931 invasions of Manchuria.

In any case, the starting point of the war is one thing; its causes are another.

Many authors simply identify the war’s causes as irrational militaristic national socialism on Hitler’s part, and as irrational militaristic imperialism on Japan’s part. These explanations seem simplistic, a sort of deus ex machina, and attribute the world’s most horrifying war to mental illness among a very small handful of people.

Reflection will hint at the notion that there must be more to the story. Millions of people aren’t mobilized based on a dozen people’s mental illness. The scores of other nations involved in the conflict didn’t declare war simply because of psychological illness among a tiny number of people.

By analyzing the diplomatic interactions between various nations in the late 1930s, historian A.J.P. Taylor argues that WW2 could have been avoided, had British diplomats taken certain steps. Taylor’s book is controversial — some scholars disagree passionately with Taylor — and the academic study of history generally abstains from counterfactual speculation. Nonetheless, Taylor’s writings are fascinating.

In the final days before the war in Europe began, diplomats were working feverishly to avoid armed conflict. On August 30, 1939, the Nazi government offered a compromise solution to Poland; the disagreement had been over city of Danzig, a German city which the Poles had annexed in the wake of WW1.

The compromise offer extended by Hitler’s government on August 30, called for the Poles to release Danzig to return to Germany, but offered the Poles continued economic rights in the city. The countryside surrounding the city would have a referendum, an election allowing it to decide for itself whether it would stay with Poland or return to German citizenship.

Had Poland even considered the offer — not necessarily accepted it — it would have bought more time for diplomats to seek further compromises and negotiations. But Poland rejected the offer outright.

The grave complicating factor was Britain’s treaty with Poland, signed in early 1939, which guaranteed British support should Poland find itself in a war with the Nazis. Had Britain not signed such a treaty in the first place, or had it found a way out of the treaty in the second place, Poland would have had a motive to find a peaceful solution to the Danzig situation. As it was, Poland felt confident that it could take on the Nazis, and the Soviet Union as Hitler’s ally, because it expected that both France and Britain would defend against Nazi and Soviet attacks on Poland.

In the wake of Poland’s refusal to negotiate, the Nazis declared war on Poland, and military action began on September 1, 1939.

Had the war remained a local conflict between Germany and Poland, it would have been small and brief.

Britain, however, faced a momentous decision: would it abide by its agreement to defend Poland? Would France do the same? The British government briefly considered alternatives, e.g., a negotiated ceasefire with Germany. In the end, Britain declared war on Germany. France did likewise.

French diplomat Georges Bonnet worked, in the very last hours, to stop the declaration of war. He hoped to draw Mussolini, who at the time was not strongly bound to Hitler, to apply pressure on Germany. France, like Britain, was bound by treaty to Poland, and Poland expected the French to launch a major military offensive against Germany’s western border. Such an attack would have diverted German troops from the attack on Poland. But the French had no intention of mounting such an attack.

Bonnet’s frantic, last-minute efforts are chronicled by A.J.P. Taylor:

Yet both the British and French governments, the French especially, went on believing in a conference which had vanished before it was born. Hitler had initially replied to Mussolini that, if invited to a conference, he would give his answer at mid-day on 3 September. Therefore Bonnet, and Chamberlain with him, strove desperately to postpone a declaration of war until after that time, even though the Italians no longer intended to invite Hitler or anyone else. Bonnet conjured up the excuse that the French military wanted the delay in order to carry through mobilisation, undisturbed by German air attack (which, they knew, would not occur anyway — the German air force was fully employed in Poland). Chamberlain conjured up no excuse except that the French wanted delay and that it was always difficult to work with allies. In the evening of 2 September he was still entertaining the House of Commons with hypothetical negotiations: “If the German Government should agree to withdraw their forces then His Majesty’s Government would be willing to regard the position as being the same as it was before the German forces crossed the Polish frontier. That is to say, the way would be open to discussion between the German and Polish Governments on the matters at issue”.

Britain and France declared war on Germany on September 3, 1939. It was, at that point in time, a largely symbolic act. Britain had few combat-ready military units, and none were near Poland, nor could they be in Poland soon. No significant French or British military action began immediately.

The debate inside the British government was intense. Neville Chamberlain spoke indecisively in Parliament. When Chamberlain was done speaking, Arthur Greenwood rose to speak, encouraged by fellow MP Leo Amery, demanding more decisive action.

Thus it was possible for both France and Britain to continue to seek a diplomatic solution, although they did so clumsily. So even after a declaration of war, before major hostilities commenced, communications between the countries continued:

This was too much even for loyal Conservatives. Leo Amery called to Arthur Greenwood, acting leader of the Opposition: “Speak for England”, a task of which Chamberlain was incapable. Ministers, led by Simon, warned Chamberlain that the government would fall unless it sent an ultimatum to Hitler before the House met again. Chamberlain gave way. The objections of the French were overruled. The British ultimatum was delivered to the Germans at 9 a.m. on 8 September. It expired at 11 a.m., and a state of war followed. When Bonnet learnt that the British were going to war in any case, his overriding anxiety was to catch up with them. The time of the French ultimatum was advanced, despite the supposed objections of the General Staff: it was delivered at noon on 8 September and expired at 5 p.m. In this curious way the French who had preached resistance to Germany for twenty years appeared to be dragged into war by the British who had for twenty years preached conciliation. Both countries went to war for that part of the peace settlement which they had long regarded as least defensible. Hitler may have projected a great war all along; yet it seems from the record that he became involved in war through launching on 29 August a diplomatic manoeuvre which he ought to have launched on 28 August.

Winston Churchill emerges, in A.J.P. Taylor’s account, as having blundered England into war — a war that might have been avoidable. Under closer examination, Churchill emerges as a mixed figure: on the one hand, his moral instincts were outraged at Hitler’s aggressiveness, and he also nobly wished to preserve the British empire; but on the other hand, Churchill’s irrational hatred of Germany, which predated Hitler by many decades, may have propelled him, and Britain with him, too hastily into war, a war which turned out to be a pyrrhic victory for Britain, which proceeded to lose its empire in the immediate postwar years, having overextended itself in the war.

Some British historians have opposed Taylor’s account of the events of the 1930s, because this narrative would mean that Britain, and to a lesser extent France, was in a position to avert, or at least diminish the war.

If Taylor is correct, the war could have been contained, and would have been a local conflict between Germany and Poland. The Soviet Union wouldn’t have been pulled in.

The world will probably never know whether or not Taylor is correct. Counterfactuals do not belong to the realm of documented or evidential history. But Taylor’s investigations and detailed narratives, in any case, direct attention to often-ignored aspects and events of the late 1930s.