Expose Churchill anglais

 WINSTON CHURCHILL

Childhood and beginnings

                   1-Family and childhood

Winston Leonard Spencer-Churchill was born on November 30 1874, in Blenheim Palace, in the Oxfordshire, in the UK.

His father Lord Randolph Henry Spencer Churchill was a politician.

His mother Jennie Jerome was the daughter of the owner of The New York Time.

Like every children of rich people, he had a nurse Miss Everest, with whom he was very near.

He go to St George School at the age of 7, a prestigious school. He didn't often see his parents, this lake of affection, will harden him.

His father decided him to study in a military school because of his insufficient school results for become a politician like him. So he go to Harrow School, who his still today a great university, in 1888 at the age of 14. He join the Harrow Rifle Corps. After he fail twice the exam for enter to The Royal Military College of Sandhurst. In 1893, his parents preoccupied about his success make him take lessons in the Captain James Establishment. Where-after he was accept at Sandhurst.

Some people say that he had a stammer and he do everything for correct it.

He just married at 34 years because, he was obsessed with his career. He married Clementine Hozier on the 12 September 1908. They had 5 children: Diana, Randolph, Sarah, Mary and Marigold who died soon after her birth.

                   2-The young soldier

In 1895, he was appointed second lieutenant. The same year his father and his nurse dead, he was very affected by that, because he admirate a lot his father, and he consider his nurse like “his favourite friend”. In Cuba he did his baptism of fire in 4th Queen's Own Hussars.

In 1897 became known by his war reports in news papers.

He stand out during the War of Boers, for his victories and his escape from the detention centre for prisoner of war.

          3-Political Beginnings

He was elected in 1900 for seat at Oldham at the General Election. At the Parliament he joined the Conservative Party(directed by Lord Hugh Cecil). In 1904, he joined the Liberal Party with the request of Henry Campbell-Bannerman. In 1905, when the Liberal Party overthrow the Government and Henry was elected Prime Minister, he designated Churchill Under Secretary of State for the Colonies (for South Africa). He won the 1906 General Elections in Manchester North-West with the majority for the Liberal Party. In 1908, Herbert Henry Asquith was nommed Prime Minister, he promoted Churchill to the Cabinet as President of the Board of Trade. He proposed a law imposing a minimum wage. In 1909 he set up a Labour Exchange for unemployed people find a job. Churchill's proposed solution to the suffragette issue was a referendum on the issue, but Asquith wouldn't like so women's suffrage remained unresolved after the 1WW.

In 1911 he appointed First Lord of Admiralty and he continued his post into the 1WW

He put strong emphasis into modernisation and using aeroplanes in combat, he undertook flying lessons himself.

              4- First World War

Churchill was involved with the development of tank. He appointed the Land-ships Committee, which oversaw the design and production of the first British tanks. In 1915 he was one of the political and military engineers of the disastrous Gallipoli Campaign in Dardanelles. After that, he took much of the blame for the fiasco. In 1916 he was given the temporary British Army Rank of lieutenant colonel, served in the Western Frond, commanding the 6th Battalion of the Royal Scots Fusiliers. He made 36 forays in the No Man's land while in command in Ploesteert. In 1917, he was appointed Minister of Munitions and in 1919 Secretary of the State for War and Secretary of the State for Air. He was the main architect of the Ten Year Rule, a principle that allowed the Treasury to dominate and control strategic, foreign and financial policies under the assumption That " There Would Be No great European war for the next five or ten years".

He was a staunch advocate of an intervention in Russian Civil War, declaring that the Bolshevism must be “strangled in its cradle” but the Government aren't agree with that.

               5- Inter-war

He was a signatory of the Anglo-Irish Treaty of 1921, which established the Free Irish State. To protect British Maritime interest, he engineered part of the Irish Free State agreement to include 3 Treaty Port (Queenstown, Berehaven and Lough Swilly) which could be used as Atlantic bases by the Royal Navy.

The Conservative Party withdrew from the Coalition Government after Chanack Crisis. Causing general elections in 1922, which he will not be elected because of an illness that prevented to campaign. He left the Liberals, following the merger with the Liberals and the Labour, something he does not approve.

Stanley decided to appointed Churchill Minister, fearing the association of Churchill, Lloyd Georges and FE Smith, 3 great speakers, what might have endanger him into the Parliament. So in 1924, he was appointed Chancellor of the Exchequer (Ministre des finances). One year later he official rejoined the Conservative Party, commenting that  "anyone can rat, but it takes a certain ingenuity to re-rat”.

He makes the decision of the return of the Gold Standard (étalon d'or), a money, that he will consider as the biggest mistake of his life. This decision leaded the country in an economic crisis. Coal Industry was very affected, and in 1926 it's the General Strike. After the defeat of the Conservative Party in 1929, he were disagree with his Party and ideas, so he took a political isolation. He was founder of the India Defence League, a group for preservation of British power in the colony because he was opposed to India's independence. His first great speech was the 7/02/1934 when he said it was necessary to rebuilt The Royal Air Force and create a Ministry of Defence.

II-Second World War

On the 03/09/1939, the day Britain declared war on Germany, Churchill was appointed 1st Lord of Admiralty, like during 1WW. As such he was a member of Chamberlain's small War Cabinet.

         1- “We shall never surrender” (nous ne nous rendrons jamais)

On the 10/05/1940, hours before the German invasion of France, Chamberlain the Prime Minister of this Time resigned because of a lake of confidence of the country. Lord Halifax turned down the post, so Chamberlain organised a meeting between Halifax, Churchill and David Margesson. The government Chief Whip led a recommendation of Churchill, & George VI asked Churchill to be Prime Minister. He created and took the additional position of Minister of Defence.

In June 1940, he asked the neutral Irish state to join with the Allies saying that the UK would push for the Irish unity, but de Valera declined the offer.

British public and political sentiment favoured a negotiated peace with Germany but Churchill refused to consider an armistice. Al thought sometimes personally pessimistic about Britain's chances for victory, he told Hastings Ismay on the 12/06/1940 that “You and I will be dead in 3 months' time“ if they negotiate peace. His use of this rhetoric hardened public opinion against a peaceful resolution and prepared British for a long war.

Churchill stated in his “finest hour” speech to the House of Commons on the 18/06 “I expect that the Battle of Britain is about to begin” (je pense que la bataille d'Angleterre est sur le point de commencer). By refusing an armistice with Germany, he kept Resistance alive in British Empire & created the basis for the Allied counter-attacks of 1942 to 1945, with Britain serving as a platform for supply of the Soviet Union & the liberation of Western Europe.

 He put his friend industrial & journalist Baron Lord Beaverbook, in charge of aircraft production. It was his business acumen that allowed Britain to quickly gear up aircraft production and engineering, which eventually made the difference in the war. One historian has called its effect on Parliament as “electrifying”.  Churchill made some famous fiery speeches like  “we shall fight in France, we shall fight on the seas and oceans, we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air, we shall defend our island, whatever the cost may be, we shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender.” (Nous nous battalions en France, nous nous battalions sur Les mers et les océans, nous nous battrons avec une confiance croissante et de plus en plus de force dans l'air, nuos défendrons notre île, quel que soit le coût peut-être, nous, nous battrons sur les plages, nous nous battrons sur les terrains d'atterrissage, nous nous battrons dans les champs et dans les rues, nous nous battrons dans les collilnes, nous ne nous rendrons jamais.) On the 10/11/1942 in response to an Allied victory he said “This is not the end. It's not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.” (Ce n'est pas la fin. Ce n'est meme pas le début de la fin. Mais il est peut-être la fin du début). He created at Bletchley Park a decryption centre of enemies codes, and the SOE ( Special Operation Executive) a logistical and organizational support in foreign countries to Resistance. He  participated in the Casablanca Conference with Roosevelt and Charles de Gaulle since the 14/01 to the 23/01 in 1943. They made a unified commitment to continue the war with an unconditional surrender, that he wasn't fully agree.

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