May 8, 2015

Finest Hour 108, Autumn 2000

Page 13

By INDER DAN RATNU

Before we settle the question of who is “Person of the Century,” we ought to decide what made the 20th century extraordinary. I believe the significance of these hundred years resides in three “explosions” (and one near-fourth). The three are the explosions of population, of knowledge and of freedom. Together these events transformed the world from a backward, illiterate, uneducated, disease-ridden, colonized globe to a forward-looking, free, literate, democratic, educated, scientifically advanced and awakened community.

All three “explosions” compounded and were complementary to each other. All three accelerated during the latter half of the century because of a decisive upheaval in the middle of it, namely World War II, which led to the triumph of liberty. Winston Churchill virtually set off the “explosion of freedom” during the Second World War; its tsunami waves eventually reached out worldwide, either in the form of national liberation or national awakening. This triggered off the other two “explosions,” of science and population. The near-fourth explosion, a nuclear holocaust, was avoided, preserving or enabling the other three.

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Churchill’s role in the century now closing was therefore pivotal. In the first half of the century, the expansion of population and progress toward knowledge and freedom were incremental; what happened during the latter half was phenomenal. Churchill’s preserved freedom, enabling it to spread to nations who had made it prisoner—and many other nations—falsifying the cynical belief that might makes right. Churchill in his relentless war of words during the Second World War served to awaken the conscience both of the oppressors and the oppressed. He freed people who fell victim to Nazi violence, but far beyond that he freed freedom itself. After Churchill, freedom was not restricted to the handful of nations that had hitherto enjoyed it. He raised the consciousness of the rest of the world to how vital freedom was, showing how an island people were ready to defend it against a mighty continental conqueror, or die in the attempt.

Knowledgeable sources have offered us long lists of candidates for “Person of the Century.” Some have even named Hitler, Stalin, Lenin or Mao who, through their philosophy (in fact, force of arms) led great masses, mostly to their doom or to slavery. In my opinion there are only three finalists for the title: Einstein, Gandhi and Churchill. Serious thought ousts the first two, leaving only the last, the irrepressible jollyman, the master communicator, the supreme advocate of liberty.

Those who offer the name of Franklin Roosevelt, including the incumbent President of the United States, do so I think out of partisan considerations or patriotic impulse. Churchill is too heavy a personality compared to Roosevelt. One fact is enough to rule out FDR—that he squarely confronted the destroyers of freedom only after Pearl Harbor, two years and two months after Britain had taken up arms. (Truman’s Secretary of State, James Byrnes, noted in his memoirs that American support for aiding Britain actually exceeded Roosevelt’s in early 1941.) Churchill, by contrast, had argued for resisting tyranny long before Britain was even threatened. Britain was reluctant, and Churchill paid a political cost. But Hitler proved Churchill right. The result of their conflict transformed the world.

The contributions of Gandhi and Einstein, crucially important as they were, were not indispensable. Mahatma Gandhi’s contribution to the independence of India is very significant to India, less so to the world. The Mahatma showed us a superfine way to break our shackles through non-violent protest. But his ideal was not adopted by most other oppressed peoples. A thing worth doing, it was rarely done. It worked in India, and perhaps South Africa, though there too, many would argue that outside influences—trade sanctions, internal liberation movements and a minority President bent on reconciliation—had more to do with the outcome.

Einstein’s contribution in developing the human understanding of time, space and the cosmos is unparalleled. He cannot however be credited with a transformation comparable to the three “explosions,” although his contribution to the potential fourth was significant.

The contribution of Great Britain to the development of the world is broadly acknowledged. Yet Britain without three persons—Newton, Shakespeare and Churchill—would rank much lower. Absent those three, Britain’s renown would rest largely with its gradual development of democracy and its more rapid development of imperialism rather than science, literature and liberty. Newton, Shakespeare and Churchill symbolize those three fields perfectly. Churchill added something to the field of literature: Newton and Shakespeare contributed rather less to the advancement of liberty. In this sense also, Churchill stands unparalleled.

The thinkers and writers who did consider Churchill “Person of the Century” based their argument on his war leadership, his oratory and writings, his determination, his genius in many arts including painting, his championing of scientific ideas, and the length of his political career. These do not constitute his true distinction. Unbiased searchers might find his equal in these fields or qualities. What Churchill uniquely accomplished was the welding together of all those characteristics.

For example, many writers in various languages might equal or surpass Churchill’s literary achievement— but none of them were war leaders of Churchill’s stature. And, while there may be equally great war leaders, none matched Churchill’s length of service or depth of writing. Uniquely, Churchill merged all the great qualities and achievements for which individuals are celebrated. He did not surpass Gandhi in lighting the path of truth and nonviolence, but Gandhi’s contribution is qualitatively so different, so high an aspect of life, that it is not strictly comparable. It was perhaps Gandhi’s qualitative superiority that drew on his death Churchill’s remark that “he was too good to live in this world,” or Einstein’s, that “a thousand years hence people will not believe that such a man in flesh and bone had walked the earth.”

Churchill is surpassed by Einstein in scientific achievement, but Churchill’s contributions to freedom and democracy transcend his position, leaving him ahead of his rivals. Einstein contributed to the explosion of knowledge, Gandhi to the explosion of freedom; Churchill by contrast was indispensable to the explosion of freedom.

Nor does Churchill deserve the century’s plaudits because of his many awards and honours, nor because he admired and sustained the British Empire, was twice Prime Minister, or belonged to an aristocratic family. He is paramount because he defended at the most critical time in the century a cause vital for the progress of the peoples, which would in time lift them all, or nearly all, from slavery to self-energized independence. By preserving freedom at that key time, Churchill made a material difference to the life of the common man for centuries to come.

he italics above are mine, because I don’t think the universality of Churchill’s impact is fully understood. His defence of freedom had a compounding effect that even he could not have predicted— or may not have wanted to predict. It shook the foundations of oppressors including, ironically, British imperialists, paving the way for their acceptance of peoples’ right to self-government. It raised the morale of the subjugated, demonstrating the idea of freedom as not only worthwhile but actually within reach.

His actual war leadership, noble as it was, comprises poorer ground for distinction. War creates an evil stink, even among righteous warriors. Perhaps this was why a British gentleman, taken to a Hare Rama Hara Krishna Indian religious cult years back, called Churchill “as good a demon as Hitler.” As different as they were, irrespective of the causes they championed, both led their nations to violence and death. Churchill’s exemplary dimension lay not in fighting the war but fighting for the cause. Cite Churchill merely for fighting a war, and you have equally to cite Hitler—or Stalin, Mao, or Hirohito.

It was mentioned in Finest Hour’s discussions of the “Personality of the Century” that Mahatma Gandhi advised non-violent resistance to Hitler, which illustrates Mahatmas limitations from the perspective of history. For the Jews of Europe, what his advice amounted to was, “die peacefully.” Well suited as it was to India’s situation, it promised only ruin if employed against Hitler. (Nor indeed would it have worked in a Hitlerized India. Recent research by a Russian professor into Nazi archives revealed that Hitler planned to replace the British Raj with something far worse after his successful invasion of the subcontinent.)

So Churchill’s greatness lies in his linkage to the cause of liberty, Gandhi’s to truth and non-violence, Einstein’s to science. We must only decide which of these causes was the greatest: how different the world would be in the absence of any one of them.

A factor to remember is that, while Mahatma fought for freedom from the English yoke, that did not necessarily lead to freedom of the individual citizen, whereas Churchill’s effort inexorably led to the latter. True, Gandhi envisioned some measure of freedom for individuals; but his main plank was non-violence. We might say that Mahatma emphasized the means more than the goal, Churchill the goal more than the means, and for Churchill, the means included violence. Those who are not yet free today may at least glimpse a beacon burning atop a distant mountain. Had Churchill had not fought for the goal of liberty, they would see nothing.

Much has been made of Churchill’s oratory, but if that is the sole measure of greatness we must equally name Hitler, whose speeches were at least as electrifying as Churchill’s, despite the latter’s marked literary superiority. Yet oratory can only be a supporting factor in selecting the century’s greatest figure. True, the effect of Hitler’s speeches upon the German people, at least in the beginning, was greater than Churchill’s upon the British people. In their response to Hitler the German people touched an element of madness not found in Churchill or his countrymen.

On the contrary, the cunning British public demonstrated that it had a mind of its own, when, as soon as the danger was past, the very people who proclaimed him saviour turned Churchill out of office. Their praise had proven to be a deception, a camouflage. Had Hitler won the war, a similar fate for him at the hands of the German people was unthinkable. They would have borne his burden for life. Perhaps the difference between the two great enemies lay not in the relative maturity of Churchill’s speeches, but in the relative maturity of his countrymen.

Even Churchill’s famous refusal to contemplate truce, parlay or surrender has parallels. In fact, the 20th century is replete with similar examples. Hitler himself chose suicide to surrender. Ho Chi Minh refused to surrender, and one by one over two decades dealt his enemies humiliating defeats. Stalin never surrendered, nor did Stalin’s and Hitler’s recent disciples, Saddam and Castro, both arrayed against mighty antagonists. An irrepressible spirit is not in itself a century-dominating quality. A decisive victory such as Churchill or Ho achieved alone qualifies them only as great leaders of tiny nations.

Like Gandhi and Einstein, Churchill was a man for mankind. His concern for mankind found its place in many war speeches, but perhaps nowhere as well as his first speech as Prime Minister on 13 May 1940, which set the aim of his struggle and prefigured the only logical climax:

‘Without victory there is no survival… no survival for the urge and impulse of the ages, that mankind will move forward towards its goal..“

Again, the italics are mine. Here in these few words we find precisely represented the scale of Churchill’s greatness: setting mankind to move forward towards its goal. And nobody else did that.

Mr. Ratnu ([email protected]) is an Indian author writing about Churchill. His books, Layman’s Questions about Churchilland Alternative to Churchill: The Eternal Bondage, were reviewed in FH106 and are available from the Churchill Center New Book Service.