William Lyon Mackenzie King Quotes
For the moment it appeared to me that the United States was trying to save itself at the expense of Britain.
At the beginning of the Battle of Britain, it appeared that England would not be able to hold out against Germany. King was asked by Roosevelt to try and persuade British officials that if they sued for peace that they would not turn over the British fleet to the Germans but would convey it to Canada. Such an act would have produced serious retribution by the Germans.
William Lyon Mackenzie King, 1874-1950, Canadian Prime Minister (Liberal), Diary
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Chamberlain’s policy was to appease Hitler and Germany to avoid war. Although he did not see Czechoslavkia as a critical British national interest and claimed he had secured peace {585941} , the reality was that he gave Germany room to start its aggression which would engulf all of Europe and much of the world. The British became the only bulwark against Hitler until the Russians stopped the Germans and America entered the war.
This was very much a minority opinion at the time, and has much historical significance as he was the father of the British Prime Minister, Neville Chamberlain, 1869-1940, whose appeasement of Germany led to Word War II. . See {585941}.
The “entangling alliances” phrase was first used by Thomas Jefferson in his First Inaugural Address. He had been Secretary of State in George Washington’s cabinet. The phrase is often misattributed to Washington. The sentiment was definitely his also however.
Germany had just attacked Russia with whom it had a treaty. For a while, Hitler paid little attention to Italy and just gave their “ally” orders and instructions. Italian public opinion was concerned about the same question. See {627973} .
The term immediately grew very popular in Germany and soon made its way to the English-speaking countries as “realpolitic”.
William Lyon Mackenzie King OM CMG PC, commonly known as Mackenzie King, was a Canadian statesman and politician who served as the tenth prime minister of Canada for three non-consecutive terms from 1921–1926, 1926–1930 and 1935–1948. A Liberal, he was the dominant politician in Canada during the interwar period from the 1920s through the 1940s. He is best known for his leadership of Canada throughout the Second World War (1939–1945) when he mobilized Canadian money, supplies and volunteers to support Britain while boosting the economy and maintaining morale on the home front. With a total of 21 years and 154 days in office, he remains the longest-serving prime minister in Canadian history.
