Bold, Honest, Direct

“Mr. Prime Minister,” a reporter said, “can you tell us generally about the plans for the future, probably beginning with Europe?”

“Our plans for the future,” Churchill replied, “are to wage with war until unconditional surrender is procured from all those who have molested us, and this applies equally to Asia and to Europe.”

Roosevelt beamed. “I think that word ‘molestation’ or ‘molesting’ is one of the best examples of your habitual understatement that I know.”

The reporters tittered. “I am curious to know,” another asked, “what you think is going on in Hitler’s mind?” The titter turned to boisterous laughter.

“Appetite unbridled, ambition unmeasured – all the world!” the prime minister said. “There is no end of the appetite of this wicked man. I should say he repents now that he did not curb his passion before he brought such a portion of the world against him and his country.”

“Do you care to say anything about Mussolini and Italy?”

Churchill scowled. “I think they are a softer proposition than Germany.”

On it went, query and response, and the reporters were so beguiled that by the end they had interrupted with laughter twenty-one times.

The Allies had no intention of keeping Italian territory after the war, or of matching Axis barbarites, Churchill added. “We shall not stain our name by an inhuman act.” As for the Italian people, they “have sinned – erred – by allowed themselves to be led by the nose by a very elaborate tyrrany.” But they “will have their life in the new Europe.”

Churchill rose to his full five feet, seven inches. “We are the big animal now,” he said, “shaking the life out of the smaller animal, and he must be given no rest, no chance to recover.”

- The Day of Battle, by Rick Atkinson, page 25. Part two of his “Liberation Trilogy.”


Can you imagine any politician of our day speaking so boldly, honestly, and directly? I know there’s a current rethinking of FDR as a savior re: the Great Depression (I am somewhat convinced by a few arguments I’ve read that his domestic policies did, in fact, prolong it), but how refreshing would it be to have someone of his caliber – and he is half as bold, honest, and direct as Churchill – lead America in today’s global environment?