Author:Ian Kershaw
Ian Kershaw's Fateful Choices: Ten Decisions that Changed the World, 1940-41 offers a penetrating insight into a series of momentous political decisions that shaped the course of the Second World War.
The hurricane of events that marked the opening of the Second World War meant that anything could happen. For the aggressors there was no limit to their ambitions; for their victims a new Dark Age beckoned. Over the next few months their fates would be determined.
In Fateful Choices Ian Kershaw re-creates the ten critical decisions taken between May 1940, when Britain chose not to surrender, and December 1941, when Hitler decided to destroy Europe's Jews, showing how these choices would recast the entire course of history.
'Powerfully argued ... important ... this book actually alters our perspective of the Second World War'
Andrew Roberts
'This fascinating, closely-argued book adds to our understanding of a terrible war'
Alan Massie
'A compelling re-examination of the conflict ... Kershaw displays here those same qualities of scholarly rigour, careful argument and sound judgement that he brought to bear so successfully in his life of Hitler'
Richard Overy
'A splendidly lucid and impeccably argued exposition of the greatest political decisions of the Second World War'
Max Hastings
'How fortunate that it is Ian Kershaw bringing his immense knowledge and clarity of thought to the task ... brilliantly explained ... an immensely wise book'
Anthony Beevor
Ian Kershaw (b. 1943) was Professor of Modern History at the University of Sheffield from 1989-2008, and is one of the world's leading authorities on Hitler. His books include The 'Hitler Myth', his two volume biography Hitler 1889-1936: Hubris and Hitler 1936-1945: Nemesis, and Fateful Choices: Ten Decisions that Changed the World, 1940-1941. He was knighted in 2002.
Powerfully argued ... important ... this book actually alters our perspective of the Second World War
—— Andrew RobertsThis fascinating, closely-argued book adds to our understanding of a terrible war
—— Alan MassieA compelling re-examination of the conflict ... Kershaw displays here those same qualities of scholarly rigour, careful argument and sound judgement that he brought to bear so successfully in his life of Hitler
—— Richard OveryA splendidly lucid and impeccably argued exposition of the greatest political decisions of the Second World War
—— Max HastingsHow fortunate that it is Ian Kershaw bringing his immense knowledge and clarity of thought to the task ... brilliantly explained ... an immensely wise book
—— Anthony BeevorA tour de force
—— Irish TimesBob Drogin accomplishes what only the best reporters can; he forces you to wonder how he could possibly know that! If you want to know how the CIA could have possibly been so wrong about Iraq, here is a big part of the answer. It is a case study in how even the most intelligent and capable people can, when determined enough, hear only what they wish to hear
—— Mark Bowden, author of Black Hawk Down and Guests of the Ayatollah: The Iran Hostage Crisis: The First Battle in America's War with Militant IslamA crucial study in the political manipulation of intelligence. Understanding how Curveball got us into Iraq will arm us for the next round of lies coming out of Washington
—— Robert Baer, author of See No Evil: The True Story of a Ground Soldier in the CIA's War on Terrorism, and Sleeping with the Devil: How Washington Sold Our Soul for Saudi CrudeCurveball is a true story, marvelously reported, about a descent into the nether world of deceit and duplicity, where the lies of a single man in an interrogation cell in Germany grew like a malign spore in the dark. When it emerged, on the lips of the President and the Secretary of State, it infected the course of world events.
—— Jonathan Harr, author of The Lost Painting and winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award for A Civil ActionHere we go again: the self-deception, the corruption of intelligence, and the abuse of authority, amid a full cast of the usual suspects in the White House and the Pentagon. It's a crucially important story, and it comes wonderfully alive in Curveball. It would be almost fun to read if the message wasn't so important-and so devastating to the integrity of the American processes.
—— Seymour M. Hershpacey, insightful and compelling
—— The ScotsmanMiranda Carter writes with lusty humour, has a fresh clarifying intelligence, and a sharp eye for telling details. This is traditional narrative history with a 21st-century zing. A real corker of a book
A highly original way of looking at the years that led up to 1914
—— Antonia Fraser , Sunday Telegraph Books of the YearCarter deftly interpolates history with psychobiography to provide a damning indictment of monarchy in all its forms
—— Will Self , New Statesmen Books of the YearA depiction of bloated power and outsize personalities in which Carter picks apart the strutting absurdity of the last emperors on the eve of catastrophe
—— Financial Times Books of the YearTakes what should have been a daunting subject and through sheer wit and narrative élan turns it into engaging drama. Carter has a notable gift for characterisation
—— Jonathan Coe , Guardian Books of the Year
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