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"I ... feel a desire to speak words of good will to you, as chief of the Italian nation, across what seems to be a swiftly widening gulf. . . . We can, no doubt, inflict grievous injuries upon one another and maul each other cruelly and darken the Mediterranean with our strife. If you so decree, it must be so. But I declare that I have never been the enemy of Italian greatness, nor ever at heart the foe of the Italian lawgiver. . . . Down the ages, above all other calls, comes the cry that the joint heirs of Latin and Christian civilization must not be ranged against one another in mortal strife. Hearken to it, I beseech you in all honor and respect, before the dread signal is given. It will never be given by us." This plea failed, but last week Winston Churchill made it again, this time over the head of II Duce in a broadcast directly to the Italian people. This time he used his broadsword. He said: "One man and one man alone has ranged the Italian people in deadly struggle against the British Empire and has deprived Italy of the sympathy and intimacy of the United States of America. . . . One man has arrayed the trustees and inheritors of ancient Rome upon the side of the ferocious pagan barbarians. . . . There lies the tragedy of Italian history and there stands the criminal who has wrought the deed of folly and of shame." How many Italians hearkened to these words no one knows,* but it was necessary for King Vittorio Emanuele to make a plea for unity to his people and for Crown Princess Marie Jose publicly to join the Fascist Party.
The Men. Man-of-the-Year Churchill does not stand alone. Neither does Runner-up Hitler. Beside and behind Hitler stand the German armed forces, the superbly destructive machine fashioned by Goring, Brauchitsch, Raeder and hundreds of others. Beside and behind Churchill stands a very small man multiplied a millionfold. He is just an Englishman. He was born in the country, or in one of the big cities of the Midlands, or in a grey house in a London suburb. The hands that reared him were hard. His food was tepid or cold: butter and bread, jam and strong black tea, mutton and what was left over of the Sunday joint. His boyhood was tough. At school he was caned. He grew to know history in a simple way; he grew to love his King as he loved the mist in the park on a summer's morning, the hedges and the downs and the beaches.
But he never spoke of these things.
When the war came he did not like it.
For a moment he knew fear, then he lit his pipe and poured himself a whiskey.
When the blackout came he groused.
Churchill took over: the right man for the job. Then came Dunkirk: a bloody shame.
Then the stuff fell: St. Paul's, the club, women and children, London afire. He got mad, but he did not show it. There was too much to do: business to carry on, children to be sent to the country, people to be dug out of shelters, sleep to be got somehow. A bloody nuisance.
On his behavior hung the shape of the future. His civilized toughness, his balanced courage and his simple pride altered the course of history in 1940. Without him there could have been no Churchill.