“Said as an ironic comment on an overconfident assertion that may later be proved wrong”.
“Prediction is very difficult, especially about the future!” Niels Bohr, Nobel Prize-winner.
Here are a few historical examples.
(A). William Pitt
In 1792 William Pitt (“the younger”) had been Prime Minister and Chancellor of the Exchequer of Great Britain since December 1783. The 7-year war to attempt to suppress the rebellious American colonists had been settled in September 1783 by accepting their independence. Peace was also made with France and Spain, who had taken advantage of the American conflict to attack Britain. That war had a very unsatisfactory outcome for Britain. Pitt then led the British government for 9 years in peace.
In July 1789 in France a mob seized the Parisian fortress of the Bastille and in October made King Louis XVI effectively a prisoner. The revolutionaries began to plan a democratic future for France.
With these events in mind, Pitt placed a tax-reducing budget before the House of Commons on the 17th February 1792, opening with the words:-
“There never was a time in the history of this country when, from the situation in Europe, we might more reasonably expect fifteen years of peace than at the present moment” (Quoted in Ref. 1).
What happened next?
The French Revolutionary government declared war on Great Britain on 1st February 1793.
With two brief pauses (of 14 months from 25th March 1802 and 11 months from 4th April 1814) the war with France lasted 22 years, up to 28th June 1815.
As a consequence, the British Public Debt as a ratio of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) rose from 120% in 1792 (a hangover from the American war, after slight reductions during Pitt’s 9 years of peace) to 260%, despite the growing GDP from the Industrial Revolution.
LHS
William Pitt (the Younger)
Prime Minister of Great Britain in 1793
RHS
Maximilien Robespierre
Main mover in French Revolution in early 1793.
References
1 Trafalgar J. Terraine Sidgwick & Jackson 1976.
2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Kingdom_national_debt#/media/File:UK_GDP.png2.
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(B). Neville Chamberlain
Neville Chamberlain had a great political success on the morning of 30th September 1938 by getting Adolf Hitler’s signature on a piece of paper which proclaimed (inter alia) the:-__
“desire of our two peoples never to go to war with one another again”.
He amplified that at No. 10 Downing Street the same day by saying:-
“I believe it is peace for our time”.
Most of the nation, which had been expecting war, reacted as he had hoped. They cheered enthusiastically and his political career was saved despite the betrayal of Czechoslovakia . His partner in the Munich Agreement, Edouard Daladier, Prime Minister of France, which nation actually had a pact of defence with Czechoslovakia, was also relieved not to be torn to pieces on his return but was also cheered.
“Missed the bus”
Chamberlain wrote to his sister (with whom he kept up a frequent correspondence) on 30th December 1939, when Great Britain had been at war with Germany for 4 months and he had seen Poland invaded and quickly conquered despite his “Knee-jerk” guarantee of 31 March 1939,:-
“I stick to the view I have always held that Hitler missed the bus in September 1938. He could have dealt France and ourselves a terrible, perhaps a mortal, blow then. The opportunity will not recur.“
This website at No. 2 Admiralty Actions P. 12 has shown that Chamberlain was to blame for the UK not being adequately armed with Hurricane fighters in September 1938.
So much for his privately-expressed thoughts – although he may have said the same in Cabinet. What this example records is that he said the same thing in public in a speech at the Central Hall, Westminster on 4th April 1940:-
“Whether it was that Hitler thought he might get away with what he had got without fighting for it, or whether it was that after all the preparations were not sufficiently complete – however, one thing is certain – he missed the bus” (Ref. 3).
What happened next?
Five days later, on the 9th April 1940 Germany invaded Denmark and Norway; the first country quickly gave in, having no chance of resisting; Norway, despite a “5th Column” of traitors led by Vidkun Quisling, did put up a fight and was helped by British and French troops, to very little avail. Germany was soon able to add the two Scandinavian countries to its Polish scalp. It was a foretaste of the defeat of France in 44 days from 10th May 1940 and the ejection of the British from the Continent.
Remarks
Neville Chamberlain was a Rugby-educated gentleman who had no idea of how to deal with an un-principled thug like Hitler. He may have read “Mein Kampf” but, if he did, he was like so many other people in not realising that Hitler was carrying out step-by-step the action plan in that effusion. He was naïve in foreign affairs and obstinate in his ignorance. For instance, a well-researched book written by an Australian Professor who had spent 17 months in Germany and neighbouring countries, published in October 1937 (Ref. 4, during Hitler’s “Quiet year”), predicted “Hitlerism cannot achieve its aims without war”. Ref. 5 states that Chamberlain asked his Foreign Secretary, Anthony Eden, if the book was true, saying “…if true must alter whole policy – encircle Germany – bring in Russians”
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. Eden assured him it was true. Chamberlain then wrote in his diary:-“I know it is not true – exaggerated – must go forward with my policy with hope & faith in my heart” – (a curious phrase by one who described himself as a “reverent agnostic”(Wikipedia)).
Neville Chamberlain’s tragedy was that he lost an elder half-brother, Austen, in March 1937 – a distinguished statesman who could have helped him in foreign affairs, having been Foreign Secretary. Austen had no illusions about Germany; in a speech to Parliament on 5th July 1933 he said:- “Whether you read the story of the 20 or 30 years which preceded the war, or whether you read the story of the post-war years, you will find the same thing. While something is refused to Germany, it is vital. If you say, “Well, we will give it to you, and now our relations will, of course, be on a satisfactory footing” it loses all value from the moment that she obtains it, and it is used by her merely as a stepping-off place for a further demand.” (Ref. 6).
It cannot be known whether Neville would have listened to Austen – he must have known of that speech. Those who ignore history are often condemned to repeat it!
LHS
Neville Chamberlain
on his return from Munich, 30th September 1938.
RHS
Adolf Hitler.
As a result of “not paying the fire insurance premium before the house burns down” in 1937 Great Britain lost 451,000 lives in WW2 and the ratio of National Debt to Gross Domestic Product rose from 110% to 240%.
References
3. https://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/acref/9780191826719.001.0001/q-oro-ed4-00002794
4. The House that Hitler Built S. Roberts..Methuen 21 October 1937.
5. The Diaries of Sir Robert Bruce Lockhart Vol. 2 1939-1965 Ed. K. Young Macmillan 1980.
6. Churchill: a study in failure: 1900 – 1939 R. James Orion 1970.
(C). Duncan Sandys
Seven days after D-Day (13th June 1944) the Germans began a bombardment of Southern England with 400 MPH low-altitude unmanned cruise missiles. They carried a warhead of 850 Kg (1,870 lb). The type reference was Fiesler Fi 103 but the Nazi name was Vergeltungswaffe Eins (V1) (Retaliatory Weapon One), because it was retaliation for the Allied bombing of their home country. Raids by manned aircraft, even at night, were no longer possible because of Allied day and night aerial superiority. Because of its unusual pulse-jet engine, vibrating at 45 cycles/sec, the English nicknamed it the “Buzz-bomb”. American troops called it the “Doodle-bug”.
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Apart from a few aimed at Southampton, part of the Allied beach-head supply system, the V1s were directed at the enormous target of London. The strain on the war-weary populace, after 3 years without air-raids, was high. In particular this was because the V1s might arrive at any time and the un-intended engine cut-out as the timing system initiated a dive meant several seconds of suspense until the impact. The author can testify that a close passage overhead caused the whole house and contents to shake with the exhaust vibration and that V1s were very scary indeed.
The defence – air attacks on the hard-to-spot launching sites in Northern France, radar-directed 3.7’’ AA guns soon re-deployed to fire across the Channel with proximity-fused shells and the fastest fighters inland – cut down a high proportion of the missiles.
After the allies broke out of Normandy their rapid advance over-ran the French launching ramps by about the 5th September 1944. This led the Cabinet Minister with the oversight responsibility on the V-weapon attack – including the known threat of the V2 rocket ballistic missile – to declare on the 7th September at a Press conference:-
“Except possibly for a few last shots the Battle of London is over” (Ref. 7)
He even held a party that evening in celebration (Ref. 8).
What happened next?
The very next day, 8th September 1944, the first V2 impacted supersonically (at nearly 2,000 MPH) in London. The double crack of its shock waves arrived after the impact and the noise of the wake after that again. It demolished houses and killed 3 people, including a soldier on leave.
It is really hard to know why Sandys made the statement he did. It could only have been valid if the range of the V2 had been estimated as under 150 miles because the Allied advance in Belgium had just reached beyond that range to central London. A report from Reginald Jones, chief of Air Scientific Intelligence, of 26th August 1944 had already predicted the maximum range as 210 miles with a one-ton warhead (Ref. 8)*. This figure would enable V2s fired from the Dutch coast near Amsterdam to reach London. That area had not been liberated at 7th September, although with the euphoria of the rapid pursuit of a badly-beaten German army it may have been thought that it soon would be. Perhaps that optimism was behind Sandy’s statement. The 8th September rocket was launched from The Hague at a range of 194 miles. That place would remain in German hands for another 8 months.
With air-launched V1s beginning in October, the combined V-weapons attacks on London continued until March 1945.
*These were very good predictions. Post-war German information gave the range as 333 Km (207 miles) with a 1,000 Kg (2,200 lb, 0.98 ton) warhead (Ref. 8).
The wasted effort on the V2
Churchill in Ref. 9 put the V2 in perspective:-
Ref. 9 also quotes Albert Speer’s assertion that 20 V1s could have been built with the effort to produce 1 V2. Of course, slave labour was used to make them, in the case of the V2 in a particularly inhumane way in an underground factory at great cost in life.
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[This author and a friend, as schoolboys, recovered post-War a V1 spherical wire-wound compressed air bottle which had washed down the River Alver near our homes. It must have come from one of the few missiles launched towards Southampton.]
The V2 was, of course, the foundation of all post-WW2 space technology.
References
7. https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=jM0ZEAAAQBAJ&pg=PP196&lpg=PP196&dq
8. Most Secret War..R. Jones..Coronet 1979.
9. The Second World War Vol. VI W. Churchill Cassell 1954.l