Faced with the Prime Minister's inquiry, Churchill replied seriously. "Yes, Your Excellency, I know what I am doing."
Winston Churchill certainly knew what he was talking about. As a cabinet minister at the age of 34, and as Lord of the Admiralty, the most important position in the British Empire at the age of 37, it can be seen that his official career was prosperous.
But everything makes sense because he comes from the Churchill family. His father, Randolph Churchill, is famous for his failure in politics, but this failure is relative. He served as Secretary of State for India and became Chancellor of the Exchequer at the age of 37.
, but this made Randolph Churchill, who was determined to serve as Prime Minister, depressed and eventually passed away at the age of 46.
Looking at this experience that frustrated Churchill's father, this fully illustrates the status of the Churchill family in Britain. This is also the main reason why Winston Churchill can stay in the cabinet after the disastrous defeat in the Battle of the Dardanelles.
But as for the Foreign Secretary Balfour who has served as Prime Minister and is almost 70 years old, the old man is not suppressed by the prominence of the Churchill family at all, even if he is only the nephew of the Marquis, I saw him slowly wiping his reading glasses and preaching
.
"Mr. Churchill, please note that this is a meeting to decide the policy and strategy of the empire, not your munitions office. Please give the reasons you think are appropriate."
Facing Balfour's cross-examination, Churchill would not be polite when he was Lord of the Admiralty. You must know that Marshal Fisher, who pioneered the era of dreadnoughts, resigned due to being squeezed by him over the direction of attack at the first station. However, Churchill
He did not end well, because he was excluded from the decision-making circle due to the defeat in the Battle of the Dardanelles. Fortunately, thanks to his family's connections, he quickly returned to the post of Minister of Munitions.
During his tenure as Minister of Munitions, he promoted a number of new inventions that had far-reaching impacts, including tanks, aircraft and chemical poison gas. Under Churchill's proposal, Britain rapidly expanded the production scale of tanks and promoted the application of aircraft in war.
If he had not performed well as Minister of Munitions, his speech at this meeting would not have received such attention.
Seeing everyone looking at him, Churchill explained his reasons. "Everyone, I wonder how much you know about Romania?"
Seeing everyone looking at him with blank expressions, Churchill took out a bunch of Romanian information from his briefcase and distributed it to everyone. "This is the information I found from the government about Romania over the years, and some of it is my own
It’s been sorted out, please take a look at it.”
Everyone picked up the information prepared by Churchill and read it. From this information, we can see Churchill's intentions. He analyzed Romania's industry, population, resources, geographical environment, diplomatic transformation and other aspects, including several aspects of Romania.
All major senior executives made comments.
Among them, Chief of General Staff Presan was evaluated by Churchill as a rare military genius because he completely changed the Romanian army, which can be seen from the Balkan War. Moreover, in the field of new military technologies, Presan was also prepared for research and development.
The new weapons allowed the Romanian army to not lag behind any other great power in terms of equipment. (Obviously he did not know Edel's role in it.)
Romanian Prime Minister Bretianu was also evaluated by him as an outstanding internal affairs genius. During his tenure as Prime Minister, Romania's economic development has been developing at a high speed.
Of course, King Edel of Romania was also evaluated by him. In his evaluation of Edel, Churchill praised his performance in Romania for his shrewd mind, excellent vision, and genius ideas. Whether it was for early development
Romania quickly moved closer to Germany and Austria, or changed to neutrality before the outbreak of World War I. Now the situation is gradually becoming clear. It has chosen an excellent time for London and Paris to rely on him and meet his requirements. It is all based on his ability.
Performance.
Churchill's information gave everyone a deeper understanding of Romania. One of them, Finance Minister Andrew Law, couldn't help but said after reading it. "I didn't expect that small Romania actually has an income of 60 million pounds. This is really unbelievable."
Unexpected."
The other cabinet members present were also very moved by the Chancellor's remarks. Before the war, the British Empire, the world's largest power, only had only close to 300 million pounds. I didn't expect that a small Balkan country could now reach one-fifth of its own. Even though it had taken pre-war money
It is unfair to compare it with now, but it also made the cabinet ministers present sigh, mainly because Romania's income before the war was only 20 million pounds, but now it has tripled, how can it not make people jealous.
Churchill saw that everyone had read it, so he said, "As for why Romania is given the opportunity to expand its territory, it is also through these data that we can find out."
Churchill pointed to the map that the Foreign Secretary had hung up and said to them, "Look, everyone, this is Romania."
He clicked on the location of Romania, then pointed to the part of Hungary east of the Tisza River. "This is the territory that Romania claims. I think now is not the time to get entangled in these Hungarian territories."
He made a stroke in Ukraine, including everything east of the South Bug River and said, "We can also give him the territory of Ukraine. If it is not enough, we can also give them everything east of the Dnieper River."
All senior politicians present immediately understood Churchill's intention. "You want Russia and Romania to fight to the death in the future."
Hearing someone express his intentions, Churchill nodded and admitted. "Yes, I think that if we personally hijack a country with potential, it will consume our precious national power, which is not worth it. Then find him an opponent, that is
We need to prepare.”
It was obvious that Russia was the opponent Churchill was looking for for Romania.
Churchill paused here to allow other members of the cabinet to digest what he said before continuing to express his thoughts on making such a decision. "We have been fighting this war for three years, and we currently have an absolute advantage. I believe it will not be necessary.
How long will it take for Germany and Austria to be unable to fight, so we need to take precautions and prepare in advance. If Germany and Austria surrender, the biggest gains will be made by our allies, the French, who will dominate the European continent, which is a very bad thing."
No one present was surprised to hear that Churchill was worried about his ally France. Although Britain and France are now fighting in the same trench, there are many times when the two are not at odds with each other on other occasions.
Churchill was not the only one to worry about France's dominance in continental Europe after the war. They believed in Prime Minister Palmerston's words: There are no permanent friends, only permanent interests.
