Churchill's Days Of Destiny

The film Darkest Hour focussed on a few crucial days when Britain’s war cabinet weighed an immense question – to seek terms with Germany or fight to the last. Allen Packwood reveals how Winston Churchill carried the argument to seek “victory at all costs”

It is 3pm on Monday 13 May 1940. Winston Churchill has just made his first speech as prime minister to the House of Commons. He has announced that he has “nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears and sweat”, and has pledged himself to a policy of waging war “by sea, land and air” with the single aim of victory: “victory at all costs, victory in spite of all terror, victory, however hard and long the road may be”. This short speech is now seen as an iconic moment in British history. But our view of that moment is coloured by hindsight, and by our knowledge that victory was achieved. No such luxury was granted to Churchill and his audience at the time. The prime minister’s speech, at six minutes long, was lacking in detail, and his position was far from secure. In the short term, things would only get worse – much worse.

Churchill became prime minister on 10 May 1940, the very day that Hitler launched his blitzkrieg offensive against France and the Low Countries. He was not elected prime minister – he was there because the Labour party would not serve under Neville Chamberlain in a national coalition; and because Lord Halifax, the Conservative foreign secretary, was not willing to try to lead a wartime government from the House of Lords rather than the Commons. It was a Westminster coup from which he emerged as the only leading Conservative with the popular credibility and political ability to form a government.