Second World War
Randolph Churchill served with his father's old regiment, the 4th Queen's Own Hussars, and was attached for a time to the newly formed Special Air Service (SAS), joining their CO, David Stirling, on a number of missions behind enemy lines in the Libyan Desert. He also went on a military and diplomatic mission to Yugoslavia in 1944, part of the British support for the Partisans during that civil war. He and Evelyn Waugh arrived on the island of Vis on 10 July, where they met Josip Broz Tito, who had barely managed to evade the Germans after their "Operation Knight's Leap" (Rosselsprung) airdrop outside Tito's Drvar headquarters. In September that year, Churchill and Waugh established their military mission at Topusko. An outcome was a formidable report detailing Tito's persecution of the clergy. It was "buried" by Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden (who also attempted to discredit Waugh) to save diplomatic embarrassment, as Tito was then seen as a required ally of Britain and an official "friend". In both the Western Desert Campaign and Yugoslavia, Churchill crossed paths with Fitzroy Maclean, who wrote of their adventures, and some of the problems Churchill caused him, in his memoir Eastern Approaches.
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Famous quotes containing the words world war, world and/or war:
“One ... aspect of the case for World War II is that while it was still a shooting affair it taught us survivors a great deal about daily living which is valuable to us now that it is, ethically at least, a question of cold weapons and hot words.”
—M.F.K. Fisher (1908–1992)
“Patience, to hear frivolous, impertinent, and unreasonable applications: with address enough to refuse, without offending; or, by your manner of granting, to double the obligation: dexterity enough to conceal a truth, without telling a lie: sagacity enough to read other people’s countenances: and serenity enough not to let them discover anything by yours; a seeming frankness, with a real reserve. These are the rudiments of a politician; the world must be your grammar.”
—Philip Dormer Stanhope, 4th Earl Chesterfield (1694–1773)
“... the next war will be a war in which people not armies will suffer, and our boasted, hard-earned civilization will do us no good. Cannot the women rise to this great opportunity and work now, and not have the double horror, if another war comes, of losing their loved ones, and knowing that they lifted no finger when they might have worked hard?”
—Eleanor Roosevelt (1884–1962)