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15 - Churchill As International Statesman

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 January 2023

By
David Reynolds
Edited by
Allen Packwood
Allen Packwood
Affiliation:
Churchill College, Cambridge
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Summary

The chapter examines Churchill’s role on the international stage and his summit diplomacy with Roosevelt and Stalin. Faced with the surprise collapse of France in 1940, he was forced to seek new partners, assiduously courting the United States while seizing the opportunity of an alliance with the Soviet Union. The result was that he had to juggle the conflicting demands of Roosevelt and Stalin, embarking on strenuous personal diplomacy in the face of declining British influence. The chapter reviews the key decisions of the major meetings before looking at their postwar legacy in Churchill’s attempts to advance European reconciliation and his ultimately unsuccessful bid to resume summitry with the Soviet Union.

Keywords

allianceCoalitionCold WarFranceRooseveltSoviet UnionsummitStalinUnited StatesSecond World War
Type
Chapter
Information
The Cambridge Companion to Winston Churchill , pp. 296 - 315
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2023

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References

Further Reading

Churchill, W. S., The Second World War, 6 vols. (London: Cassell & Co., 1948–54)Google Scholar
Colville, J., The Fringes of Power: Downing Street Diaries, 1939–1955 (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1985)Google Scholar
Danchev, A. and Todman, D. (eds.), War Diaries, 1939–1945: Field Marshal Lord Alanbrooke (London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2001)Google Scholar
Dilks, D. (ed.), The Diaries of Sir Alexander Cadogan, O.M. 1938–1945 (London: Cassell, 1971)Google Scholar
Gilbert, M., [OB] Winston S. Churchill, vol. 6, Finest Hour 1939–1941 (London: Heinemann, 1983)Google Scholar
Gilbert, M., [OB] Winston S. Churchill, vol. 7, Road to Victory (London: Heinemann, 1986)Google Scholar
Kimball, W. (ed.), Churchill and Roosevelt: The Complete Correspondence, 3 vols. (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1984)Google Scholar
Reynolds, D., In Command of History: Churchill Fighting and Writing the Second World War (London: Allen Lane, 2004)Google Scholar
Reynolds, D. and Pechatnov, V. (eds.), The Kremlin Letters: Stalin’s Wartime Correspondence with Churchill and Roosevelt (London: Yale University Press, 2018)Google Scholar

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