3 March 2015

His speech is sure to contain the following elements. Netanyahu will salute the members of both parties. He will remind us that he lived in America for a time, and his unaccented English will confirm this. He will acknowledge that his speech has become a subject of controversy, but he cannot avoid the challenge of this crisis, when his message is especially important. The fate of the United States as well as Israel hangs in the balance. The threat from Iran is the most dire that has faced the world since the rise of Hitler. Just as Fascism arose in more than one country, so has Warrior Islam also arisen in more than one country. This analogy is inevitable given Netanyahu’s ambition to inherit the mantle of Churchill — a piece of drapery several sizes too large for him. [Huffington Post, 01 March 2015.]

Now, two years ago, we were told to give President Rouhani and Foreign Minister Zarif a chance to bring change and moderation to Iran. Some change! Some moderation! Rouhani’s government hangs gays, persecutes Christians, jails journalists and executes even more prisoners than before. [NYT transcript.]

On top of all this came the great French catastrophe. The French Army collapsed, and the French nation was dashed into utter and, as it has so far proved, irretrievable confusion. The French Government had at their own suggestion solemnly bound themselves with us not to make a separate peace. It was their duty and it was also their interest to go to North Africa, where they would have been at the head of the French Empire. In Africa, with our aid, they would have had overwhelming sea power. They would have had the recognition of the United States, and the use of all the gold they had lodged beyond the seas. If they had done this Italy might have been driven out of the war before the end of 1940, and France would have held her place as a nation in the counsels of the Allies and at the conference table of the victors. But their generals misled them. When I warned them that Britain would fight on alone whatever they did, their generals told their Prime Minister and his divided Cabinet, “In three weeks England will have her neck wrung like a chicken.” Some chicken; some neck.