Introduction

The coming of the Second World War in Europe is the classic morality tale of international politics. The dramatis personae are more than flesh-and-blood personalities buffeted by impersonal forces; the principal characters stand for good and evil, light and darkness, with few shades of grey in between.

For Churchill, the prime mover in world affairs was human agency. The war occurred because statesmen made certain choices — either maliciously calculated or from naively optimistic motives. World war might have been prevented had alternative courses been taken. British and French leaders could have stopped Hitler had they armed more rapidly, stood firm in March 1936 over the Rhineland or in September 1938 over Czechoslovakia, and forged a coalition with Soviet Russia to deter war or, if deterrence failed, to wage it successfully from the start. What is compelling about Churchill's account is that it appeals to our urge to frame the past in the form of a clear-cut narrative that places human agency at the centre of the story.

Yet interpreting the 1930s as a morality tale obscures more than it illuminates. Singling out statesmanship as the key determinant in world politics neglects the way in which material and political circumstances restricted choices. Similarly, to see force as the only true instrument in inter-state relations erases the tangible role played by norms, ideas and values in shaping international structures and national strategies. Giving due weight to these fundamentals of political life throws into sharp relief the moral dimension of what was at stake in the 1930s, without turning the chief personalities into cardboard caricatures of abstract qualities. With these remarks in mind, this chapter will dispute Churchill’s view that ‘there was never a war more easy to stop’ than the Second World War.