6 MAY 1995, Page 31

LETTERS Churchilliana

Sir: Professor Charmley says that Churchill's victory was bought by Soviet domination of part of Europe, the loss of the Empire, his spending, United States power and a post-war Labour government ('What are we celebrating?', 29 April).

Both wars showed that Germany could only be defeated by spending more than the whole gross national product of Britain on arms alone and with at least 10 million deaths.

Churchill's greatness was in defeating Germany at, relatively, no cost to Britain: half a million dead, and debt which has long been paid off. He fought with Soviet manpower and American money: being British, this sounds a good deal to me.

Mr Attlee and Mr Nehru may have been awful, but they were better than Adolf Hitler. Yes, the Poles ended up communist: awful, but not the multi-million massacre of Nazism. And haven't they voluntarily put the communists back in power?

Churchill defeated Germany and Nazism far more comprehensively than the Allies did in 1918 — yet over 95 per cent of those who marched behind him stayed alive. Could you do better, Profes- sor Charmley?

George Stem

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