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CHURCHILL'S SECRET WAR Paperback – Illustrated, 12 July 2011

by Madhusree Mukerjee (Author)
4.5 4.5 out of 5 stars 314 ratings
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A dogged enemy of Hitler, resolute ally of the Americans, and inspiring leader through World War II, Winston Churchill is venerated as one of the truly great statesmen of the last century. But while he has been widely extolled for his achievements, parts of Churchill’s record have gone woefully unexamined. As journalist Madhusree Mukerjee reveals, at the same time that Churchill brilliantly opposed the barbarism of the Nazis, he governed India with a fierce resolve to crush its freedom movement and a profound contempt for native lives. A series of Churchill’s decisions between 1940 and 1944 directly and inevitably led to the deaths of some three million Indians. The streets of eastern Indian cities were lined with corpses, yet instead of sending emergency food shipments Churchill used the wheat and ships at his disposal to build stockpiles for feeding postwar Britain and Europe.

Combining meticulous research with a vivid narrative, and riveting accounts of personality and policy clashes within and without the British War Cabinet, Churchill’s Secret War places this oft-overlooked tragedy into the larger context of World War II, India’s fight for freedom, and Churchill’s enduring legacy. Winston Churchill may have found victory in Europe, but, as this groundbreaking historical investigation reveals, his mismanagement—facilitated by dubious advice from scientist and eugenicist Lord Cherwell—devastated India and set the stage for the massive bloodletting that accompanied independence.

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  1. Print length
    332 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publisher
    Basic Books
  4. Publication date
    12 July 2011
  5. Grade level
    8 and up
  6. Reading age
    13 years and up
  7. Dimensions
    15.24 x 2.54 x 23.5 cm
  8. ISBN-10
    0465024815
  9. ISBN-13
    978-0465024810
  10. See all details
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Product description

About the Author

Madhusree Mukerjee won a Guggenheim fellowship to write her previous book, The Land of Naked People. She has served on the board of editors of Scientific American. She lives near Frankfurt, Germany.

Madhusree Mukerjee won a Guggenheim fellowship to write her previous book, The Land of Naked People. She has served on the board of editors of Scientific American. She lives near Frankfurt, Germany.

Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Basic Books; Reprint edition (12 July 2011)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Paperback ‏ : ‎ 332 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0465024815
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0465024810
  • Reading age ‏ : ‎ 13 years and up
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1 kg 50 g
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 15.24 x 2.54 x 23.5 cm
  • Country of Origin ‏ : ‎ India
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.5 4.5 out of 5 stars 314 ratings

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Madhusree Mukerjee

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4.5 out of 5 stars
314 global ratings

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Customers say

Customers find the book well-researched and revealing. They say it should be read by every Indian as it provides great learning about their past. The book has all the facts and references properly.

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15 customers mention "Readability"15 positive0 negative

Customers appreciate the book's readability. They say it's a must-read for history enthusiasts and well-written.

"...This book is very well written and no one can put it aside till it is read in full! But no one can read it without feeling deeply disturbed...." Read more

"...Otherwise, a pretty solid effort and an eye-opener of a work." Read more

"...The book is definitely worth a read or two. The delivery was on time. However, the quality of book is not satisfactory...." Read more

"It's a must read book for every Indian interested in the Famines in India under British Raj, especially the Bengal Famine perpetrated during the WW2..." Read more

15 customers mention "Research quality"15 positive0 negative

Customers appreciate the book's research quality. They find it well-researched, with all facts and references properly documented. The book provides a revealing account of our past and how the West viewed India and Indians from an Indian perspective. The prologue is a competent summary of historical developments leading up to the main theme.

"...The prologue is a competent summary of historical developments leading up to the main theme and the 4 maps provided greatly aid our understanding...." Read more

"...This is a historic non-fiction and has all the facts and references properly accounted for...." Read more

"...The author has done exhaustive research using available materials and latest published confidential documents/ correspondence; and backed his claims..." Read more

"...Madhusree's book is extremely well researched and presented coherently...." Read more

3 customers mention "Pacing"3 positive0 negative

Customers appreciate the book's pacing and well-researched content. They find it coherently presented with hard-hitting commentary on Churchill's World War II policies that led to Bengal. The book provides fantastic detail on the evils of a man dubbed hero.

"A hard hitting commentary on Churchill's World War 2 policies that led to Bengal famine in 1943 causing 1.5 millions death (official figure),..." Read more

"...Madhusree's book is extremely well researched and presented coherently...." Read more

"A fantastic detail on the evils of a man dubbed hero..." Read more

You should read it!
4 out of 5 stars
You should read it!
We all know what and how we achieved independence, the sacrifices that led to it. But we don’t know there are so many unsung heroes who valiantly fought to give us the independence we are enjoying. This book is not just about Bengal but the famines, conditions of Bengal and how it affected the nation and also how British government chose to ignore by stating that ‘they had more important issues to pursue’. Every Indian should read it, comprehend and really pray for those who lost lives in bringing our nation to a independent country. It’s a beautifully wtitten and yes one of the reviewers did mention that it boils down your blood while reading it. Yes i had that feeling and you will too.Do yourself a favour, buy this book and read it. The extent of research went in writing this book will amaze you.
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Top reviews from India

  • R.Nanjappa
    5.0 out of 5 stars Churchill the Villain!
    Reviewed in India on 29 March 2014
    Verified Purchase
    Most Indians have no reason to love Churchill, though they admire him for his leadership qualities during a difficult time in the history of his people. This is because he was a staunch imperialist who said famously that he had not become the first minister of His Majesty to preside over the liquidation of the empire! But this is really not so bad- which of us would willingly give up power?

    The real problem with Churchill was that in his single minded pursuit of success over the Germans in the War, he was totally unmindful of the suffering of Indians during the severest famine and its aftermath, which claimed 3 million lives. Hitler killed 6 million Jews and Churchill and his war-time advisers caused the death of half that number! Do they not deserve a Nuremburg?.

    The other aspect of Churchill is his patent hatred of Hindus and positive encouragement for Muslim separation and his overt and covert support to Jinnah, even when he was out of power. Thus, Churchill emerges as a key element in the creation of Pakistan.

    LIke this, this remarkable book by Madhusree Mukerjee points out so many aspects of our history during the years of the World War II. This book is well researched and closely argued. It reveals so many aspects of our history during the closing moments of our Independence movement- which are not written about generally. Gandhi emerges as a poor leader in a crisis- how he was bullied and outwitted by Churchill, how artless he was in declaring Quit India and giving the slogan 'Do or Die'- without telling exactly what the people should do! We also learn how revolutionaries kept to non-violence under the severest provocations, how they fought and even administered on their own! Churchill too emerges as muddleheaded, stubborn with narrow views, believing what he would and not willing to learn, surrounded by advisors chosen for their personal loyalty. However, he was great enough to admit towards the end that he had been wrong about India.

    This book throws light on the role of Subhas Bose too, and his INA. It is clear that the British feared the impact of Subhas on the Indian army. Did the fear of Bengal revolutionaries propmt the British to decide to deny them rice-their staple grain? The clashes between Nehru and Jinnah, the way Jinnah developed his muslim separatism and emerged as their spokesman with help from the British are all dealt with.

    This is one of the best researched books on our history during the War. The prologue is a competent summary of historical developments leading up to the main theme and the 4 maps provided greatly aid our understanding. Churchill won the War but his life was a failure in the sense his cherished dream of empire got shattered. India got Independence, but Gandhi was a colossal failure as he could neither prevent the partition, nor the violence that ensued. Between the two, the fate of India was sealed! It appears almost that India became free in spite of itself!

    This book is very well written and no one can put it aside till it is read in full! But no one can read it without feeling deeply disturbed. This is essential reading for every educated Indian.
    13 people found this helpful
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  • Dr. Anand R
    5.0 out of 5 stars Nice
    Reviewed in India on 27 September 2024
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    Good
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  • Arindam Bhattacharjee
    4.0 out of 5 stars The research that went into this book shows; it enrages you.
    Reviewed in India on 3 September 2014
    Verified Purchase
    I got interested into Mukerjee's book after starting to read about Direct Action Day (the gruesome Hindu-Muslim genocide orchestrated by several minds). Someone on Reddit recommended this book as a reference to the pre-independence chronicles. To that end, I was thoroughly disappointed. Direct Action Day (8/16/1946) is briefed in two pages, whereas it deserves plenty more ink. It also skims by the Jinnah-Nehru conflict, choosing to carefully avoid all the dogmatic tension between the two religious camps. But after finishing it, I realized it is a book about neither. Far more than chronicling all the pre-independence events in British India, Mukerjee focuses on the wide famine that petrified India as harvests reaped from the country (especially Bengal) was used for war (WWII) purposes. Her factual directions and tiresome research unravel (in pristine detail) how the then British PM, Winston Churchill deviated the supply of these foodgrains away from India to stockpile them for the British, where they'd ultimately perish. Bengali people (and to some extent, other Indians) meanwhile would die from hunger and kill each other in a planned famine. However, the abrupt cuts from rather personal, gut wrenching anecdotes from this mass-massacre to digging deep down to logistic calculations was a bit uneasy for me. Otherwise, a pretty solid effort and an eye-opener of a work.
    10 people found this helpful
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  • Hotchpotch
    5.0 out of 5 stars Must read. Truly appreciable.
    Reviewed in India on 22 April 2019
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    The content of this book is somewhat heavy, but then we are talking about the oppression and exploitation of India by the British over a course of two centuries so its heaviness is not only justified but is also asked for. This is a historic non-fiction and has all the facts and references properly accounted for. Surely some knowledge of the Indian fight for independence is required but even if you know the very basics about it, it'd do. This book not only shows the other face of Churchill which is often shadowed by his better known stature of being a war hero but also contains points about difference of opinions among the Indian leaders at various points. Mukerjee has done a really good job of tracing the ultimate happenings to the point where they were initially set into motion. The depiction of the cause and effect elements of the events is truly appreciable.
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  • ALBERTO NAVARRO
    5.0 out of 5 stars CHURCHILL'S SECRET WAR.
    Reviewed in the United States on 3 May 2023
    Verified Purchase
    EXCELLENT TEN STARS !
    FOR YEARS WE HAVE BEEN MADE TO BELIEVE THAT WINSTON CHURCHILL HAS BEEN A HERO,
    BUT THIS BOOK WRITTEN BY MADHUSREE MUKERJEE DEMYSTIFY THIS, HIS ACTION DURING
    WORLD WAR TWO IN INDIA, IN WHICH THREE MILLIONS PERISHED IN A FAMINE ( ESPECIALLY
    IN THE BENGAL REGION), SHOWS THAT CHURCHILL WAS ONE OF THE MOST EVIL FIGURES IN
    THE TWENTY CENTURY NOT DIFFERENT THAN HITLER, STALIN, MAO AND CASTRO.
    THE BRITISH COLONIZATION IN INDIA COULD BE DESCRIBED AS A PUNISHMENT; AS THE AUTHOR
    POINTS OUT BENGAL ( TODAY BANGLADESH), WAS A PROSPEROUS COUNTRY BEFORE THE
    BRITISH CAME IN THE LATE EIGHTEEN CENTURY, INDIA ITSELF WAS RULED BY THE MOGULS
    WHO HAVE SHORTCOMINGS AND ACHIEVEMENTS, THE HINDUS AND MOSLEMS COEXISTED,
    ALL OF THESE CAME TO AN END WHEN THE BRITISH TOOK OVER, FOR MORE THAN A CENTURY
    THE COUNTRY WAS RAVAGED, THERE WERE PERIODS OF FAMINE, IN FACT THE BEGINNING OF
    THE COLONIZATION STARTED WITH A FAMINE.
    THE COLONIAL RULE SOWED ETHNIC AND RELIGIOUS DIVISIONS, THAT HAVE LEFT AFTER 1947, THE YEAR
    OF THE INDEPENDENCE AND PARTITION ;A LEGACY OF INTERCOMMUNAL VIOLENCE THAT PERSISTS
    TO THIS DAY IN ALL SOUTH ASIA.
    THE YEAR 1943 WAS THE WORST, IN SPITE THAT THE STOCKPILES WERE PLENTY OF FOOD THEY WERE
    DELIBERATELY WITHHELD FROM THE BENGAL POPULATION WITH THE EXCUSE THAT IT WAS NEEDED
    FOR THE WAR, THE AUTHOR POINTS OUT THAT INDIA WAS THE MAIN SOURCE NOT ONLY IN MATERIAL
    RESOURCES BUT IN TROOPS FOR THE PROSECUTION OF THE WAR NOT FOR ITSELF BUT ON BEHALF
    OF THE BRITISH EMPIRE, STILL CHURCHILL REGARDED THE INDIANS ESPECIALLY THE HINDUS WITH
    THE UTMOST DISRESPECT.
    THE INDIAN NATIONAL CONGRESS HEADED BY MAHATMA GHANDI AND JAWAHARAL NEHRU ACTED
    WITH PATRIOTISM AND LOVE FOR THEIR COUNTRY BY NOT COOPERATING WITH THE COLONIAL
    AUTHORITIES IN THE WAR EFFORT AS OPPOSED TO THE COMMUNISTS THAT WERE SERVILE TO THE
    SOVIET IMPERIALISM ( CHURCHILL AND STALIN WERE ALLIES AT THAT TIME) ; HOWEVER THE
    GREATEST OF ALL THE INDIAN PATRIOTS AND I WILL ADD THE QUINTAESSENTIAL OF PATRIOTISM AND
    LOVE AND DEDICATION FOR HIS COUNTRY WAS THE NATIONALIST LEADER SUBHAS CHANDRA BOSE,
    LEADER OF THE FREEDOM FIGHTERS INDIAN NATIONAL ARMY FROM 1943 TO 1945 ( IT WAS FOUNDED
    IN 1942 BY MOHAN SINGH) , THE INDIAN NATIONAL ARMY (INA) FOUGHT VALIANTLY AND CORAGEOUSLY ALONGSIDE THE JAPANESE ARMY IN SOUTHEAST ASIA; IN SPITE THAT THEY NEVER
    ENTERED INDIA, ITS STRUGGLE WITH BOSE AT THE HEAD SERVED AS AN EXAMPLE FOR THE INDIAN
    PEOPLE TO THROW OUT THE YOKE OF BRITISH COLONIALISM AFTER WORLD WAR TWO.
    THE INDIAN NATIONAL ARMY WAS COMPOSED OF HINDUS, MOSLEMS AND SIKHS, THEY WERE UNITED
    UNDER THE BANNER OF INDEPENDENCE, ALL OF THEM FELT PART OF THE INDIAN NATION REGARDLESS
    OF THEIR RELIGION IN CONTRAST TO THE DIVISIVE AND SECTARIAN POLICIES OF THE COLONIAL AUTHORITIES.
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  • savon
    5.0 out of 5 stars Kollateralschäden
    Reviewed in Germany on 30 July 2013
    Verified Purchase
    Wer weiß in Europa heute schon, das in Indien, auf dem 'Flugzeugträger Englands', während des 2. Weltkrieges zehntausende Menschen prophylaktisch inhaftiert und tausende hingerichtet wurden um die Befreiungsbewegung niederzuhalten; das durch die erbarmungslose Umstellung auf Kriegsproduktion durch die britischen Kolonialgouverneure, verstärkt durch eine Naturkatastrophe, Hungersnöte ausbrachen, die weitere 100.000 das Leben kostete ? Das ausgerechnet Ghandi als EInziger vom Vorstand der Unabhängigkeitspartei den Kolonialismus für die Kriegsdauer für tolerabel hielt, während der restliche Parteivorstand standrechtlich ins Gras biss ? Prima Buch einer Inderin ! Leider nicht auf Deutsch erschienen.
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  • S Wood
    5.0 out of 5 stars "I didn't see much difference between Churchill's outlook and Hitler's"
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 4 August 2012
    Verified Purchase
    Guess who said that? Perhaps it was Subhas Chandra Bose leader of the Japanese alligned Indian National Army? Or Nehru or Gandhi during an intemperate moment? Or some other Indian nationalist? The reality was that none of these Indian political figure made the comparison, rather it was spoken by Churchills contemporary at Harrow, his accomplice in the rearmament debates of the 1930's and his then Secretary of State for India, Leo Amery. He said it with Churchills views of the Indian people, particularly Hindus, in mind, and with especial regard to how these beliefs impacted on British policies in India during World War 2 in general, and the Bengal Famine of 1943 in particular. This famine probably (as usual no one was counting with any particular care) cost Bengal and the surrounding provinces in excess of 3 million lives, and formed a brutal endpiece to Britains Imperial rule in Bengal that mirrored the famine that accompanied the Empires first steps there in the 1770's.

    If anyone has the notion to regard Amerys comparison as hyperbole they would do well to read Madhusree Mukerjee's "Churchill's Secret War". The centre piece of Mukerjee's book is the Bengal famine of 1943 to which she devotes much space to set the context within which it occurred, analysing the British response (stymied by the Hitlerite attitude of Churchill towards Indians), as well as measuring up the practicality and likely results of the options pushed for at the time by Amery and other officials. Beyond this the whole of the British policy in India during the War is covered, from India's War effort (paid for by the accumulation of Sterling balances in London for gradual payment after the war), the efforts to divide Muslims from Hindus, and the effects of British plans for the defence of Eastern India from Japanese invasion which made famine almost inevitable.

    Beyond the narrating and analysis of events is Mukerjee's accounts of the main actors, in particular Churchill (whose repulsive views on Indians are extensively quoted) and his all purpose aide Lord Cherwell whose views of the "lesser" races make one wonder why he hadn't just stayed in Germany during the Nazi period. This pair between them bear a major part of the responsibility for the negligible efforts at avoiding or ameliorating the effects of the famine. This negligence was not based on ignorance of the facts, but the fruit of their vicious racial beliefs with regard to Indians that makes Amery's comparison of Churchill to Hitler an apposite one.

    Overall "Churchill's Secret War" is the brilliant, well researched account and analysis of India's experience of the second world war. Fans of Churchill may be a little upset, but the "great" mans reputation is long overdue a reappraisal in the popular imagination. His policies and opinions on India were perhaps his most brutal, but they are not alone and chime in with his attitudes towards Arabs, whom he advocated bombing with poisoned gas, and other colonial peoples, not to mention the working people of Britain itself. Thoroughly recommended.
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  • Nick D Kenyon
    5.0 out of 5 stars Five Stars
    Reviewed in Australia on 27 December 2015
    Verified Purchase
    Suspected he was a B....rd.
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  • Sujoy Bhattacharyya
    4.0 out of 5 stars Book about how racism killed 3 million people and the perpetrator is WW II's greatest hero
    Reviewed in Canada on 24 April 2019
    Verified Purchase
    Hope this book helps view Churchill's legacy in a more balanced light. He is not the great hero that most people think. The reality is more complex.
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