[lit-ideas] David Lloyd George on Foreign Affairs
- From: "Lawrence Helm" <lawrencehelm@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: "Lit-Ideas" <Lit-Ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sun, 31 Dec 2006 21:28:15 -0800
I've been reading Margaret Macmillan's Paris 1919. She is the
great-granddaughter of David Lloyd George, but she doesn't seem to be taking
it easy on him. On page 62, she writes, for example, that "Lloyd George
ignored the Foreign Office wherever he could and used his own staff of
bright young men. . . ."
"Was this a bad thing for Britain? He clearly did not have a grasp on
foreign affairs equal to that of his predecessor, Lord Salisbury, or his
later successor Churchill. His knowledge had great gaps. 'Who are the
Slovaks?' he asked in 1916. 'I can't seem to place them.' His geography
was equally sketchy. How interesting, he told a subordinate in 1918, to
discover that New Zealand was on the east side of Australia. In 1919, when
Turkish forces were retreating eastward from the Mediterranean, Lloyd George
talked dramatically of their flight toward Mecca. 'Ankara,' said Curzon
severely. Lloyd George replied airily, 'Lord Curzon is good enough to
admonish me on a triviality.'"
Lawrence
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