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England in the second half of the 19th - early 20th centuries. How England fought in World War II England in World War II

By the beginning of the XX century. England lost its first place in terms of industrial production, but remained the strongest maritime, colonial power and financial center of the world. In political life, the restriction of monarchical power and the strengthening of the role of parliament continued.

Economic development

In the 50-70s. Britain's economic position in the world was stronger than ever. In subsequent decades, the growth of industrial production continued, but much more slowly. In terms of the pace of development, British industry lagged behind American and German. The reason for this lag was that the factory equipment installed in the middle of the 19th century was outdated. Its renewal required large capitals, but it was more profitable for banks to invest in other countries than in the national economy. As a result, England ceased to be the "factory of the world" and at the beginning of the 20th century. in terms of industrial production was in third place - after the United States and Germany.

As in other European countries, by the beginning of the 20th century. a number of large monopolies arose in England: the Vickers and Armstrong trust in military production, tobacco and salt trusts, etc. There were about 60 of them in total.

Agriculture at the end of the 19th century experienced a crisis caused by the import of cheap American grain and falling prices for local agricultural products. The landowners had to reduce the area under crops, and many farmers went bankrupt.

Despite the loss of industrial superiority and the agricultural crisis, England remained one of the richest countries in the world. It owned enormous capital, had the largest fleet, dominated the sea routes, and remained the largest colonial power.

Political system

At this time it happened further development parliamentary systems. The role of the Cabinet of Ministers and its head increased, and the rights of the monarch and the House of Lords were even more limited. Since 1911, the decisive word in passing laws belonged to the House of Commons. The lords could only delay the approval of the bills, but were not able to fail them altogether.

In the middle of the XIX century. In England, a two-party system was finally formed. The country was alternately ruled by two large bourgeois parties, which changed their names and strengthened the organs of leadership. The Tories became known as the Conservatives, while the Whigs adopted the name of the Liberal Party. Despite differences in political orientation, both parties vigorously defended and strengthened the existing system.

For a long time, the leader of the conservative party was one of its founders, the flexible and intelligent politician B. Disraeli (1804-1881). Coming from a bourgeois-intellectual family, he nevertheless showed respect for the aristocracy and traditions. However, Disraeli was not a defender of all traditions and an opponent of all reforms. As head of the cabinet, he passed several laws in favor of trade unions and workers.

A prominent figure in the liberal party, who headed four cabinets, was W. Gladstone (1809-1898). He put his political talent and oratorical skill at the service of the party, justifying even the most unseemly actions of the government, especially in the colonies.

Domestic politics of liberals and conservatives

The ruling circles felt strong pressure from the working class and the petty bourgeoisie, who sought to improve the economic situation and expand political rights. In order to prevent major upheavals and maintain power, liberals and conservatives were forced to carry out a series of reforms.

As a result of their implementation, the number of voters greatly increased, although women and poor men did not receive the right to vote (until 1918). The right of workers to strike was reaffirmed. From 1911 workers were paid sickness, disability and unemployment benefits.

A feature of the political development of England was the expansion of democracy through peaceful reforms, and not as a result of revolutions, as in France and the United States.

But even in bourgeois-democratic England, far from all problems were solved. The national liberation struggle of the Irish did not stop. The liberals were ready to give autonomy to the Irish Catholics, but they ran into such fierce resistance from conservatives and Protestant circles that they were forced to abandon this intention. Only in 1921 Ireland (with the exception of Ulster) received autonomy.

Foreign and colonial policy

Leaders, both conservatives and liberals, sought to expand the British Empire (this is how Great Britain was called together with the colonies since the 70s of the 19th century).

One of the most staunch supporters of the expansion of the empire (they called themselves imperialists) Cecil Rode stated: "What a pity that we can not reach the stars ... I would annex (i.e., capture) the planets if I could."

In North Africa, England occupied Egypt and captured the Sudan. In South Africa, the main goal of the British was to capture the Transvaal and Orange republics, founded by the descendants of Dutch settlers - the Boers. As a result of the Anglo-Boer War (1899-1902), the 250,000-strong British army won, and the Boer republics became British colonies. In Asia, England occupied Upper Burma, the Malay Peninsula, and strengthened its position in China. The wars of the British were accompanied by the ruthless extermination of the local inhabitants, who offered stubborn resistance to the colonialists.

On the eve of the First World War, the British Empire occupied an area of 35 million square meters. km with a population of over 400 million people, which accounted for more than a fifth of the earth's land area and a fourth of the world's population. (Think about these numbers and draw your own conclusions.)

The exploitation of the colonies gave England huge profits, which made it possible to raise the wages of workers and thereby alleviate political tensions. S. Rode directly said: “If you do not want civil war you must become imperialists."

Colonial conquests led to a clash between England and other countries, also striving to seize more foreign lands. Germany became the most serious enemy of the British. This forced the British government to conclude allied treaties with France and Russia.

Unions. Formation of the Labor Party

The economic opportunities of entrepreneurs and the state made it possible to increase the material well-being of a significant part of the population of England. Wages for the period from 1840 to 1900 increased by 50%, housing conditions and nutrition of the population improved. But wealth was distributed extremely unevenly. Poverty has persisted, although on a smaller scale than before, unemployment has not disappeared. Half of the London workers did not even have money for a decent funeral. Hundreds of thousands of Englishmen in search a better life sailed across the ocean.

All this created the ground for the labor movement, the growth in the number and influence of trade unions. In 1868, the most massive trade union organization was founded - the British Congress of Trade Unions (TUC), which exists to this day. It included highly paid skilled workers. The BKT peacefully sought from entrepreneurs to increase wages and reduce working hours, and from Parliament to pass laws in favor of workers.

In 1900, on the initiative of the BKT, the first (after the Chartist) mass political organization of workers, the Labor (i.e., workers) party, was founded. It included not only workers, but also representatives of the petty bourgeoisie and intelligentsia, who played a leading role in the party. The Labor Party is still an influential political force today. Then she declared herself the defender of the interests of the workers and directed her main efforts to winning seats in parliament and carrying out peaceful reforms. At the beginning of the XX century. its population reached 1 million people.

THIS IS INTERESTING TO KNOW

In 1880 Irish tenants for the first time used boycott (disobedience, termination of work) as a way to fight for the improvement of their position against the English manager Boycott. Since then, the word has become widespread.
The English General Raglan died of cholera in the Crimea during the war of 1853-1856. The style of the coat is named after him, in which the sleeves are one with the shoulder. The general wore just such a coat, as it did not hurt his wound.

References:
V. S. Koshelev, I. V. Orzhehovsky, V. I. Sinitsa / World History of the Modern Times XIX - early. XX century., 1998.

Questions

1. What was the reason for the fall of Cromwell's protectorate? Could he have survived if Cromwell had lived another 10-15 years?

Cromwell's protectorate fell due to the fact that people were dissatisfied with the police regime in the country and the omnipotence of district governors. In addition, even Protestants began to be divided into right and wrong (for example, the Dutch were declared wrong Protestants). And almost any person could be attributed to the wrong ones at any time. Also, the reason was in the personality of Richard Cromwell, who had too few supporters. Whenever Oliver Cromwell died, there would still be discontent among the population, and Richard Cromwell would still turn out to be a weak politician.

2. What was the meaning of "habeas corpus act"? Was it beneficial to the whole of English society or some part of it?

In fact, he acted in the interests of all the English, because he protected them from judicial arbitrariness. But he was adopted by the opponents of the king in order to protect himself and his supporters.

3. Why did the British (as a whole) support William of Orange, while the Duke of Monmouth was denied support? What distinguished (besides the formal grounds) these two attempts to seize the throne?

First, by the time of the landing of William of Orange, the negative features of the reign of James II were already longer and more pronounced. Secondly, the Duke of Monmouth had very dubious rights to the throne, while the wife of William of Orange was from the Stuart family, and no one had any doubts about this. Thirdly, the Duke of Monmouth landed with too few forces, most of the British simply did not have time to speak out for or against his authority when the landing was defeated. And William of Orange brought with him a large force.

Too much time passed between the execution of Charles I and the Glorious Revolution. In addition, in 1688, completely different parties were operating in parliament. Therefore, it cannot be combined with the main revolution in England.

Tasks

1. The Act on the Abolition of Royal Power (March 1649) stated: “... Usually, every person, having such power, becomes interested in gradually restricting the legitimate freedom and liberties of the people and helping to strengthen his personal will and power, placing it above the law...” Can these words be attributed to the soon-to-be-established dictatorship of Cromwell? Justify the answer.

These words fully apply to the absolute power of Cromwell. It was not for nothing that he dissolved parliament and established a police regime in the country - he was afraid of the indignation of the population.

2. In one of the pamphlets of the leader of the diggers, Winstanley, it was said: "Private property is a curse, and this is clear from the fact that the landlords who buy and sell land got it either by oppression, or murder, or theft ..." Do you agree with such a statement? Express your attitude to private property and the idea of its abolition. Is such an abolition realistic in practice?

One cannot agree with this statement. Private property can also be used for good, because it is needed. There were attempts to abolish private property in the 20th century, but they did not lead to anything good. However, this was done much later by Winstanley, who could not know what the implementation of his requirements would lead to.

All connoisseurs of the history of the Second World War know the history of the English cruiser Edinburgh, which transported approximately 5.5 tons of gold in 1942. Now it is very often written that this was a payment for Lend-Lease supplies for which the USSR allegedly paid in gold.

Any unbiased specialist dealing with this issue knows that only pre-lend-lease deliveries of 1941 were paid in gold, and deliveries were not subject to payment for other years.

The USSR paid in gold for supplies before the conclusion of the Lend-Lease agreement, as well as for goods and materials purchased from the Allies other than Lend-Lease.

There were 465 gold bars on Edinburgh with a total weight of 5536 kilograms, loaded in Murmansk in April 1942, and they were the payment of the Soviet Union to England for weapons supplied in excess of the list stipulated by the lend-lease agreement.

But, and this gold did not reach England. The cruiser Edinburgh was damaged and scuttled. And, the Soviet Union, even during the war years, received insurance in the amount of 32.32% of the value of gold, paid by the British War Risk Insurance Bureau. By the way, all the transported gold, the notorious 5.5 tons, at the prices of that time cost a little more than 100 million dollars. For comparison, the total cost of Lend-Lease delivered to the USSR is $11.3 billion.

However, the story of Edinburgh's gold did not end there. In 1981, the English treasure-hunting company Jesson Marine Recoveries entered into an agreement with the authorities of the USSR and Great Britain on the search for and recovery of gold. "Edinburgh" lay at a depth of 250 meters. In the most difficult conditions, divers managed to lift 5129 kg. According to the agreement, 2/3 of the gold was received by the USSR. Thus, not only was the gold transported by Edinburgh not a payment for lend-lease and that this gold never reached the Allies, but a third of its value was reimbursed by the USSR during the war years So, forty years later, when this gold was raised, most of it was returned to the USSR.

We repeat once again that the USSR did not pay with gold for Lend-Lease supplies in 1942, since the Lend-Lease agreement assumed that logistical assistance would be supplied to the Soviet side with a deferred payment or even free of charge.

The USSR was subject to the US Lend-Lease Act based on the following principles:
- all payments for the supplied materials are made after the end of the war
- materials that will be destroyed are not subject to any payment
- materials that will remain suitable for civilian needs,
paid no earlier than 5 years after the end of the war, in order
providing long-term loans
- the US share in Lend-Lease was - 96.4%.

Deliveries from the USA to the USSR can be divided into the following stages:
Pre-Lend-Lease - from June 22, 1941 to September 30, 1941 (paid in gold)
First protocol - from October 1, 1941 to June 30, 1942 (signed on October 1, 1941)
Second protocol - from July 1, 1942 to June 30, 1943 (signed on October 6, 1942)
Third protocol - from July 1, 1943 to June 30, 1944 (signed on October 19, 1943)
Fourth protocol - from July 1, 1944, (signed on April 17, 1944), formally
ended 12 May 1945, but deliveries were extended until the end of the war
with Japan, which the USSR undertook to join 90 days after the end of
war in Europe (ie August 8, 1945).

Many people know the story of Edinburgh, but the story of another British cruiser"Emerald" few people know. But this cruiser had to carry gold incomparably larger volumes than the Edinburgh. Only on its first voyage to Canada in 1939, the Emerald transported a cargo of 650 million dollars in gold and valuable papers ah, ah he had several such flights.

The beginning of the Second World War for England was extremely unsuccessful, and after the evacuation of troops from the Continent, the fate of the island depended on the fleet and aviation, since only they could prevent the possible landing of the Germans. At the same time, in the event of the fall of England, the Churchill government planned to move to Canada and from there continue the fight against Germany. For this, the English gold reserves were sent to Canada, in total about 1,500 tons of gold and about 300 billion dollars in securities and currencies in modern prices.

Among this gold was also part of the gold of the former Russian Empire. Few people know how this gold got to England, and then to Canada.

Before the First World War, Russia's gold reserves were the largest in the world and amounted to 1 billion 695 million rubles (1311 tons of gold). At the beginning of the First World War, significant amounts of gold were sent to England as a guarantee of war loans. In 1914, 75 million gold rubles (8 million pounds) were sent via Arkhangelsk to London. On the way, the ships of the convoy (cruiser Drake and transport Mantois) were damaged by mines and this route was considered dangerous. In 1915-1916, 375 million gold rubles (40 million pounds) were sent by railway to Vladivostok, and then on Japanese warships transported to Canada and placed in the vaults of the Bank of England in Ottawa. In February 1917, another 187 million gold rubles (20 million pounds) were sent via the same route through Vladivostok. These gold sums became a guarantee of British loans to Russia for the purchase of military equipment in the amount of 300 and 150 million pounds, respectively. It is known that from the beginning of the war until October 1917, Russia transferred a total of 498 tons of gold to the Bank of England; 58 tons were soon sold, and the remaining 440 tons lay in the vaults of the Bank of England as collateral for loans.

In addition, part of the gold paid by the Bolsheviks to the Germans, after the conclusion of the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk in 1918, also came to England. Representatives of Soviet Russia undertook to send 250 tons of gold to Germany as an indemnity and managed to send two echelons with 98 tons of gold. After the capitulation of Germany, all this gold went as an indemnity to the victorious countries of France, England and the USA.

With the outbreak of World War II, already in September 1939, the British government decided that depositors holding securities in UK banks must declare them to the Royal Treasury. In addition, all deposits of individuals and legal entities from the countries of the opponents of Great Britain and the countries occupied by Germany and its allies were frozen.

Even before the operation of transporting valuables from the Bank of England to Canada, millions of pounds in gold and securities were transferred to buy weapons from the Americans.

One of the first ships to carry these valuables was the cruiser Emerald under the command of Augustus Willington Shelton Agar. On October 3, 1939, HMS Emerald anchored at Plymouth, England, where Agar was ordered to proceed to Halifax in Canada.

On October 7, 1939, the cruiser sailed from Plymouth with gold bars from the Bank of England bound for Montreal. As this voyage was a closely guarded secret, the crew wore tropical white uniforms to confuse German agents. As an escort, Emerald was escorted by the battleships HMS Revenge and HMS Resolution and, and the cruisers HMS Enterprise, HMS Caradoc.

Fearing a German landing in England, Churchill's government devised a plan to allow Britain to continue the war even if the island was captured. To do this, all the gold reserves and securities were transferred to Canada. Using its powers in wartime, the Churchill government confiscated all securities held in the banks of England and moved them under the cloak of secrecy to the port of Greenock in Scotland.

Within ten days, one of the participants in this operation recalled, all the deposits in the banks of the United Kingdom selected for transfer were collected, stacked in thousands of boxes the size of boxes of oranges and taken to regional collection centers. All these were riches brought to Great Britain by generations of its merchants and seafarers. Now, together with the accumulated tons of gold of the British Empire, they had to cross the ocean.

The cruiser Emerald, now commanded by Captain Francis Cyril Flynn, was again chosen to transport the first batch of secret cargo, and was supposed to leave Greenock Harbor in Scotland on June 24.

On June 23, four of the best financial experts from the Bank of England left London by train for Glasgow, with Alexander Craig at their head. Meanwhile, a heavily guarded special train brought the last batch of gold and securities to Greenock to be loaded onto a cruiser stationed in the Clyde Bay. During the night, the destroyer Kossak arrived to join the Emeralda's escort.

By six o'clock in the evening of the 24th, the cruiser was loaded with valuables like no other ship before it. His artillery cellars were filled with 2229 heavy boxes, each containing four gold bars. (The cargo of gold turned out to be so heavy that at the end of the voyage, the corners of the floors of these cellars were found to be bent.) There were also boxes of securities, there were 488 of them totaling more than 400 million dollars.

Thus, already in the first transportation there were valuables worth more than half a billion dollars. The ship left port on 24 June 1940 and, escorted by several destroyers, sailed for Canada.

The weather was not very conducive to swimming. As the storm intensified, the speed of the escorting destroyers began to drop, and Captain Vaillant, in command of the escort, signaled to Captain Flynn to go in an anti-submarine zigzag so that the Emerald would maintain its higher and, therefore, safer speed. But the ocean raged harder and harder, and in the end the destroyers fell behind so that Captain Flynn decided to continue sailing alone. On the fourth day, the weather improved, and soon, on July 1, somewhere after 5 o'clock in the morning, the coast of Nova Scotia appeared on the horizon. Now, on calm water, the Emerald was sailing towards Halifax, making 28 knots, and at 7.35 on July 1, she safely docked.

In Halifax, the cargo was transferred to a special train, which was already waiting and on the railway line approaching the dock. There were also representatives of the Bank of Canada and the Canadian National Express railway company. Prior to unloading, extraordinary precautions were taken, the berth was carefully blocked. Each crate, when removed from the cruiser, was registered as handed over, after which it was entered into the list when loaded onto the wagon, and all this happened at an accelerated pace. At seven o'clock in the evening the train with gold left.

On July 2, 1940, at 5 pm, the train arrived at the Bonaventure station in Montreal. In Montreal, the securities wagons were uncoupled, and the gold moved on to Ottawa. David Mansour, acting Governor of the Bank of Canada, and Sidney Perkins, from the Foreign Exchange Department, met the cargo on the platform. Both of these people were aware that the train was carrying a secret cargo codenamed "Fish". But only Mansour knew that they were about to take part in the largest financial transaction ever carried out by states in peacetime or wartime.
As soon as the train stopped, armed guards got out of the cars and cordoned it off. Mansour and Perkins were ushered into one of the carriages, where a thin, short, bespectacled man, Alexander Craig of the Bank of England, was waiting for them, accompanied by three assistants.

Now the valuables passed under their responsibility, and they had to put these thousands of packages somewhere. David Mansour has already figured out where.
The 24-story granite building of the Sun Life insurance company, which occupied an entire block in Montreal, was the most convenient for these purposes. It had three underground floors, and the lowest of them in wartime was supposed to be just assigned to a storehouse of valuables such as this “Valuable Deposit” papers of the United Kingdom," as it was called.

Shortly after 1:00 a.m., when the traffic on the streets of Montreal had died down, the police cordoned off several blocks between the marshalling yard and Sun Life. After that, trucks began to ply between the cars and the rear entrance to the building, accompanied by armed guards from the Canadian National Express. When the last box rested in its place - which was duly recorded - Craig, who was responsible for the deposit, on behalf of the Bank of England, took from David Mansour a receipt on behalf of the Canada Bank.

Now it was necessary to quickly equip a reliable storage. But making a chamber 60 feet long and wide and 11 feet high required an enormous amount of steel. Where can I get it in wartime? Someone remembered an unused, abandoned railway line, two miles of track with 870 rails. It was from these that the walls and ceiling were made, three feet thick. Ultra-sensitive microphones of sound pickup devices were installed in the ceiling, fixing even the faintest clicks of drawers pulled out of the iron cabinet. In order to open the doors of the vault, it was necessary to dial two different number combinations on the locking device. Two bank employees were told one combination, two others - the second. “The other combination was unknown to me,” one of them recalled, “and every time it was required to enter the cell, we had to gather in pairs.”

The campaign "Emeralda" was only the first in a series of "golden" transatlantic crossings of British ships. On July 8, five ships left UK ports carrying the largest combined cargo of valuables ever transported by water or land. At midnight, the battleship Ravenge and the cruiser Bonaventure left the Clyde. At dawn in the North Strait, they were joined by three former liners Monarch Bermuda, Sobieski and Bathory (the last two were Free Poland ships). The escort consisted of four destroyers. This convoy, commanded by Admiral Sir Ernest Russell Archer, was carrying approximately $773 million worth of gold bars and 229 boxes of securities, with a total value of approximately $1,750,000,000.

Throughout the passage across the Atlantic, eight 15-inch and twelve 6-inch guns and batteries of 4-inch anti-aircraft guns were in constant combat readiness. On July 13, the first three ships entered Halifax harbor. Shortly thereafter, the Bonaventure appeared, and then the Bathory. It took five special trains to transport the gold bars to Ottawa. The load was so heavy that no more than 200 boxes were stacked in each car to support the floor. Each train carried from 10 to 14 such freight cars. Two guards were locked in each car, who replaced each other every four hours.

All this gold was transported without insurance. Who could or even wanted to insure hundreds of millions of dollars worth of bullion, especially in wartime? The gold cargo delivered by the Ravenge convoy led to another record: the costs of the Canadian National Express for its transportation turned out to be the highest in its history - something like a million dollars.

In Ottawa, the Canadian National Railroad arranged for special trains to be unloaded and transported to the Canada Bank on Wellington Street at night. Who would have thought until very recently that this five-story building that housed the bank, only 140 feet high, would become like Fort Knox, the largest vault of valuables in the world? For three days the cargo of the Ravenge convoy flowed like gold into the bank vault, which measured 60 feet by 100 feet. The trucks were unloaded, and the 27-pound pigs, like large bars of yellow soap in wire wraps, were neatly stacked in the vault, row by row, layer by layer, into a huge, ceiling-high pile of tens of thousands of bars of heavy gold.
During the three summer months, three dozen shipments of securities arrived by rail in Montreal.

It took almost 900 four-door cabinets to accommodate all the certificates. The valuables hidden underground were guarded around the clock by 24 police officers who ate and slept there.

A spacious high room next to a vault full of securities was equipped as an office for working with deposits. Mansour invited 120 people to the state - former bank employees, specialists from brokerage firms and stenographers from investment banks - who took an oath of secrecy.

The office, of course, was exceptional. Only one elevator descended to the third floor, and each employee had to present a special pass (which changed every month) - first before entering it, and then downstairs - to the guards from the Mounted Police and sign daily in his arrival and departure. The desks of the guards had buttons that turned on the alarm right in the departments of the Montreal and Royal Canadian Mounted Police, as well as in the Dominion Electrical Protection Service. Throughout the summer, during which the total number of boxes of securities reached almost two thousand, Craig's employees worked ten hours a day with one day off a week. All these securities, which belonged to thousands of different owners, had to be unpacked, sorted and sorted. As a result, it was found that there were approximately two thousand different types of stocks and bonds, including all separately listed shares of companies paying high dividends. By September, Craig, who was responsible for the deposit, who knew everything he was supposed to have, knew that he really had it all. Each certificate was taken into account and entered into a file cabinet.

Gold, as well as securities, arrived continuously. According to documents available at the Admiralty, between June and August, British ships (together with several Canadian and Polish ships) transported more than $2,556,000,000 worth of gold to Canada and the United States.

In total, over 1,500 tons of gold were transported during the Fish operation, and considering the gold received by England from Russia during the First World War, every third gold bar stored in Ottawa was of Russian origin.
In today's gold prices, the treasure shipped is about $230 billion, and the value of the securities held in the Sun Life Building is estimated at over $300 billion in today's dollars.

Despite the fact that thousands of people were involved in the transfer, the Axis intelligence agencies never learned about this operation. This is evidenced by the absolutely incredible fact that during these three months during which transportation was carried out, 134 allied and neutral ships were sunk in the North Atlantic - and not a single one of them was carrying a cargo of gold.

Such countries as occupied by Germany, Belgium, Holland, France, Norway and Poland kept their gold in Canada.

According to information published by the Central Bank of Canada on November 27, 1997, in total during the Second World War, between 1938 and 1945, 2586 tons of gold were sent to Canada for storage by various states and individuals.

It is interesting that at present, Canada has generally sold off all of its gold reserves, and not at all because of an urgent need for money.

For many decades, Canada has been in the top ten countries with the highest standard of living, and even once was in first place. The government explained this step by the fact that the liquidity of securities is much higher than gold and gold has long been no longer a guarantee of the stability of the national currency, since volumes of gold reserves, in monetary terms, even the most significant, constitute only an insignificant share in the total volume of circulating money supply in the commodity turnover of developed countries.

The results of Britain's involvement in World War II were mixed. The country retained its independence and made a significant contribution to the victory over fascism, at the same time it lost its role as a world leader and came close to losing its colonial status.

Political games

British military historiography often likes to point out that the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact of 1939 effectively untied the hands of the German war machine. At the same time, the Munich Agreement, signed by England together with France, Italy and Germany a year earlier, is bypassed in Foggy Albion. The result of this conspiracy was the division of Czechoslovakia, which, according to many researchers, was the prelude to World War II.

September 30, 1938 in Munich, Britain and Germany signed another agreement - a declaration of mutual non-aggression, which was the culmination of the British "appeasement policy". Hitler succeeded quite easily in persuading British Prime Minister Arthur Chamberlain that the Munich Accords would be a guarantee of security in Europe.

Historians believe that Britain had high hopes for diplomacy, with the help of which it hoped to rebuild the Versailles system, which was in crisis, although already in 1938 many politicians warned the peacekeepers: “Concessions to Germany will only spur the aggressor!”.

Returning to London at the gangway of the plane, Chamberlain said: "I brought peace to our generation." To which Winston Churchill, then a parliamentarian, prophetically remarked: “England was offered a choice between war and dishonor. She has chosen dishonor and will get war."

"Strange War"

On September 1, 1939, Germany invaded Poland. On the same day, the Chamberlain government sent a note of protest to Berlin, and on September 3, Great Britain, as the guarantor of Poland's independence, declared war on Germany. Over the next ten days, the entire British Commonwealth joins it.

By mid-October, the British had moved four divisions to the Continent and taken up positions along the Franco-Belgian border. However, the section between the cities of Mold and Bayel, which is a continuation of the Maginot Line, was far from the epicenter of hostilities. Here, the allies created more than 40 airfields, but instead of bombing German positions, British aviation began to scatter propaganda leaflets appealing to the morality of the Germans.

In the following months, six more British divisions arrive in France, but neither the British nor the French are in a hurry to start active operations. So the "strange war" was waged. The head of the British General Staff, Edmund Ironside, described the situation as follows: "passive waiting with all the excitement and anxiety that follows from this."

The French writer Roland Dorgelès recalled how the Allies calmly watched the movement of German ammunition trains: "apparently the main concern of the high command was not to disturb the enemy."

Historians have no doubt that the "strange war" is due to the wait-and-see attitude of the Allies. Both Great Britain and France had to understand where German aggression would turn after the capture of Poland. It is possible that if the Wehrmacht immediately launched an invasion of the USSR after the Polish campaign, then the Allies could support Hitler.

Miracle at Dunkirk

On May 10, 1940, according to the Gelb plan, Germany launched an invasion of Holland, Belgium and France. The political games are over. Churchill, who took office as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, soberly assessed the strength of the enemy. As soon as the German troops took control of Boulogne and Calais, he decided to evacuate the parts of the British Expeditionary Force that were in the boiler near Dunkirk, and with them the remnants of the French and Belgian divisions. 693 British and about 250 French ships under the command of the English Rear Admiral Bertram Ramsey planned to transport about 350,000 coalition soldiers across the English Channel.

Military experts had little faith in the success of the operation under the sonorous name "Dynamo". The advance detachment of Guderian's 19th Panzer Corps was located a few kilometers from Dunkirk and, if desired, could easily defeat the demoralized allies. But a miracle happened: 337,131 soldiers, most of whom were British, reached the opposite shore with little or no interference.

Hitler unexpectedly stopped the advance of the German troops. Guderian called this decision purely political. Historians differed in their assessment of the controversial episode of the war. Someone believes that the Fuhrer wanted to save strength, but someone is sure of a secret agreement between the British and German governments.

One way or another, after the Dunkirk disaster, Britain remained the only country that had avoided complete defeat and was able to resist the seemingly invincible German machine. On June 10, 1940, the position of England became threatening when fascist Italy entered the war on the side of Nazi Germany.

Battle for England

Germany's plans to force Britain to surrender have not been canceled. In July 1940, British coastal convoys and naval bases were subjected to a massive bombardment by the German Air Force, and in August the Luftwaffe switched to airfields and aircraft factories.

On August 24, German aircraft launched the first bombing attack on central London. Some say it's wrong. The retaliatory attack was not long in coming. A day later, 81 RAF bombers flew to Berlin. No more than a dozen made it to the target, but this was enough to infuriate Hitler. At a meeting of the German command in Holland, it was decided to bring down the entire power of the Luftwaffe on the British Isles.

Within a few weeks, the sky over British cities turned into a boiling cauldron. Got Birmingham, Liverpool, Bristol, Cardiff, Coventry, Belfast. For the whole of August, at least 1,000 British citizens died. However, from mid-September, the intensity of the bombing began to decline, due to the effective opposition of British fighter aircraft.

The Battle of England is better characterized by numbers. In total, 2913 RAF aircraft and 4549 Luftwaffe aircraft were involved in air battles. The losses of the parties by historians are estimated at 1547 downed fighters of the Royal Air Force and 1887 German aircraft.

mistress of the seas

It is known that after the successful bombing of England, Hitler intended to launch Operation Sea Lion to invade the British Isles. However, the desired air superiority was not achieved. In turn, the military command of the Reich was skeptical about the landing operation. According to the German generals, the strength of the German army was precisely on land, and not at sea.

Military experts were convinced that the British land army was no stronger than the broken French armed forces, and Germany had every chance of defeating the troops of the United Kingdom in a ground operation. The English military historian Liddell Hart noted that England managed to hold on only due to the water barrier.

In Berlin, they realized that the German fleet was noticeably inferior to the English. For example, by the beginning of the war, the British Navy had seven active aircraft carriers and six more on the slipway, while Germany was never able to equip at least one of its aircraft carriers. In the open sea, the presence of carrier-based aircraft could predetermine the outcome of any battle.

The German submarine fleet was only able to inflict serious damage on British merchant ships. However, having sunk 783 German submarines with US support, the British Navy won the Battle of the Atlantic. Until February 1942, the Fuhrer hoped to conquer England from the sea, until the commander of the Kriegsmarine, Admiral Erich Raeder, finally convinced him to abandon this idea.

Colonial interests

As early as the beginning of 1939, the UK Chiefs of Staff Committee recognized the defense of Egypt with its Suez Canal as one of the strategically most important tasks. Hence the special attention of the armed forces of the Kingdom to the Mediterranean theater of operations.

Unfortunately, the British had to fight not at sea, but in the desert. May-June 1942 turned out for England, according to historians, a "shameful defeat" near Tobruk from the African corps of Erwin Rommel. And this is with a twofold superiority of the British in strength and technology!

The British managed to turn the tide of the North African campaign only in October 1942 at the Battle of El Alamein. Again, having a significant advantage (for example, in aviation 1200:120), the British Expeditionary Force of General Montgomery managed to defeat a group of 4 German and 8 Italian divisions under the command of the already familiar Rommel.

Churchill remarked about this battle: “Before El Alamein, we did not win a single victory. Since El Alamein, we haven't suffered a single defeat." By May 1943, British and American troops forced the 250,000th Italo-German grouping in Tunisia to capitulate, which opened the way for the Allies to Italy. In North Africa, the British lost about 220 thousand soldiers and officers.

And again Europe

On June 6, 1944, with the opening of the Second Front, British troops had the opportunity to redeem themselves for their shameful flight from the Continent four years earlier. The overall leadership of the allied ground forces was entrusted to the experienced Montgomery. The total superiority of the allies by the end of August crushed the resistance of the Germans in France.

In a different vein, events unfolded in December 1944 near the Ardennes, when a German armored group literally pushed through the lines of American troops. In the Ardennes meat grinder, the US army lost over 19 thousand soldiers, the British no more than two hundred.

This ratio of losses led to disagreements in the camp of the allies. American Generals Bradley and Patton threatened to resign if Montgomery did not resign from command of the army. Montgomery's self-confident statement at a press conference on January 7, 1945, that it was British troops who had saved the Americans from the prospect of encirclement, jeopardized the conduct of a further joint operation. Only thanks to the intervention of the commander-in-chief of the allied forces, Dwight Eisenhower, the conflict was settled.

By the end of 1944, the Soviet Union had liberated a significant part of the Balkan Peninsula, which caused serious concern in Britain. Churchill, who did not want to lose control over the important Mediterranean region, proposed to Stalin the division of the sphere of influence, as a result of which Moscow got Romania, London got Greece.

In fact, with the tacit consent of the USSR and the USA, Great Britain crushed the resistance of the Greek communist forces and on January 11, 1945, established full control over Attica. It was then on the horizon of the British foreign policy a new enemy clearly loomed. “In my eyes, the Soviet threat has already replaced the Nazi enemy,” Churchill recalled in his memoirs.

According to the 12-volume History of the Second World War, Great Britain, along with the colonies, lost 450,000 people in World War II. Britain's spending on the war accounted for more than half of foreign investment, the Kingdom's external debt by the end of the war reached 3 billion pounds. The United Kingdom paid off all its debts only by 2006.

The results of Britain's involvement in World War II were mixed. The country retained its independence and made a significant contribution to the victory over fascism, at the same time it lost its role as a world leader and came close to losing its colonial status.

Political games

"Strange War"

The French writer Roland Dorgelès recalled how the Allies calmly watched the movement of German ammunition trains: "apparently the main concern of the high command was not to disturb the enemy."