Do mention the war

The Blitz, 1940

Over the past week I have been reliving the 1939/45 war as depicted in a magnificent new television series.  A revelation as much of it is news to me.

I was a teenager at school when the war started and even when I became a reporter in 1942 I knew little more than anyone about the progress of the war and the raging battles on air, sea and land.

The radio and newspaper reports gave little away for what today would be cited security reasons. 

They certainly did not convey the enormity of the conflict as it engulfed the world.

From the anxious late 1930s when Britain hoped war would never come, boosted by the peace seeking prime minister Neville Chamberlain, to the final battles in the ravaged city of Berlin there were countless battles, some epic in scale.

For me the most startling revelation is the bold reaction to adversity and possible catastrophic defeat by nations’ leaders Churchill, Roosevelt and Stalin, all three so different.

I was at school in London during the Battle of  Britain and the blitz when Britain stood alone, invasion by Germany seemingly imminent.

It was averted and we were saved by ‘The Few' in the RAF, but that victory was only made possible by Churchill ordering Beaverbrook, his minister of aircraft production, to produce hundreds of fighter planes in a few weeks.

Immediately after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor that almost wiped out the US navy, Roosevelt did the same, on a vast scale. 

Within months the US was producing an aircraft carrier a month, tanks, guns and countless billions of rounds of ammunition that eventually sealed the fate of both the Japanese and German armies.

Stalin staged a miraculous turn around at Stalingrad where, on the brink of defeat, he conjured up a secret army of a million soldiers and hundreds of aircraft to end Hitler’s ruinous gamble.

Turning to today, inspirational leadership is missing. Leaders throughout the world are shadows of the heroes  of the past.

In Britain there is the pandemic with the dithering prime minister Johnson, the USA, divided by Trump, led by a cautious, elderly Biden, while Putin manipulates and schemes.

It is all so shallow, so weak - and so dangerous.

Even worse, there is no sign of bold, imaginative leaders coming to rescue our troubled world.