This is the story of the men who brought down Chamberlain and installed Churchill as prime minister--an outcome that seemed unlikely at best when World War II began. Lynne Olson's account of these men and their times reads like a finely-crafted and eminently readable novel. Here are the coming out balls, the wire-tapping, the hostile press, the exclusive clubs, the public school mentality--the whole glittering world of upper class Britain with its extravagances, suspicions, and contempt for the masses. The men who brought Chamberlain down belonged to that world just as much as did the men who supported Chamberlain. (Indeed, Chamberlain's supporters and opponents were often close friends and relatives.) And for that reason, voting against the Government felt to these Tory Rebels as a betrayal. And perhaps in some sense they had betrayed that glittering world with their vote.

But if betrayal it was, it was certainly not the first time these men betrayed one another. Boothby carried on an affair with Macmillan's wife for twenty years; none of the rebels would defend the Duchess of Atholl who, as a result, lost her seat to Chamberlain's yes-man over her anti-appeasement stance; Churchill himself (once he was in Chamberlain's Government) would hear no word said against Chamberlain--thus betraying his erstwhile companions, the Tory Rebels.

The Rebels were very fallible humans not angels. And they were disorganized, often uncertain, and lacking a credible strategy. As a result, things had to come to a nearly catastrophic point before they could act. But in the end, it was a Tory Rebel (Leo Amery) who stood up in the House of Commons and told his friend Chamberlain, "In the name of God, go!" Amery did that, knowing full well that if the Revolt did not succeed (prior to that day Chamberlain had a 250-vote majority) his career and perhaps England were doomed.

In the end, of course, the Rebels and their Labour and Liberal colleagues did succeed. Though it was a close thing. This is the story of that one success and their many, completely human failures. But more than that, it is a story of how very fallible individuals can and do make a difference even when faced with a seemingly insurmountable machine. I highly recommend it.

Olson describes British politics in the years leading up to World War II when Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain and most of his country were in denial about Hitler's intentions. Olson focuses on a small group of Members of Parliament (MPs) who see the Nazis as a growing threat but who struggle to persuade the government to do anything about it.

I had long known of the Munich Pact and Chamberlain's false hopes for "peace in our time" which served only to encourage further Nazi aggression. But I did not know how dictatorial Chamberlain acted with regards to his own government. As Olson describes it, Chamberlain apparently felt he had sole responsibility and authority for British foreign policy. It was almost as if he didn't trust anyone else for fear they would see Hitler differently.

Olson's story powerfully illustrates the folly of peace-at-any-price mentality which had an unbreakable grip on Chamberlain and most people in England. Having survived the bloodbath of World War I, people were afraid of an even deadlier conflict. They sensed England was woefully unprepared to fight, although the government suppressed most information about this. There were also a number of leaders who liked Germany because it was anti-Semitic and anti-Communist. I was surprised to learn that British newspapers saw their role as not to question the government but to support it. The result was that most citizens did not know the facts about Nazi brutality.

The British government so badly misjudged Hitler and Mussolini that at one point, Chamberlain sent an important, unencrypted message via regular mail to Italy. When asked why he did not use more secure means, Chamberlain responded, "Gentlemen do not read each others mail." The message was of course intercepted by Mussolini.

In the tension-filled days leading up to the Munich Pact, as Chamberlain deliberated fighting Hitler over Czechoslovakia, the Czech ambassador Masaryk told the British government, "If you have sacrificed my nation to preserve the peace of the world, I will be the first to applaud you. But if not, gentlemen, God help your souls." The appeasement policies pursued by England and France not only delayed war but made it all the more savage when it finally came.

The book is well researched and thorough. I withheld one star because Olson devotes too much space (in my opinion) to the personal lives of various actors in this drama. While I found myself skimming through those pages, other readers may find them fascinating. The story as a whole is interesting and at times fascinating

Those who enjoy this book should read a newly released book that brings back into print some of the writings of G. K. Chesterton. He was, by the 1930s a "troublesome old man" who (like Churchill) got little respect for warning about the menace that Germany posed to European peace. He had done so as far back World War I and continued to do so, despite the fuss he created, during Hitler's rise to power and up until his death in 1936. It's no exaggeration to say that Chesterton was `Churchill before Churchill.'

In September of 1932, four months before Hitler took power, Chesterton wrote a scathing article for the Illustrated London News. Referring what was once called the Great War, he notes that it had become a commonplace to discuss how "the young were embittered when they realised how their elders had brought the world into a horrible catastrophe and a hideous mess." He goes on to issue a stern challenge to those young men: "Since then, the first batch of Young Men have themselves almost become Old Men; but they are still saying it. They are still saying it without seriously thinking about it."

After devoting most of his article to defending the decisions those Old Men made, he turns again to the Young Men of that war now growing old.

"I think this worth mentioning now, for a simple reason. We are already drifting horribly near to a New War, which will probably start on the Polish Border. The Young Men have had eighteen years in which to learn how to avoid it. I wonder whether they do know much more about how to avoid it than the despised and drivelling Old Men of 1914. How many of the Young Men, for instance, have made the smallest attempt to understand Poland? How many would have anything to say to Hitler, to dissuade him from setting all Christendom aflame by a raid on Poland? Or have the Young Men been thinking of nothing since 1914 except the senile depravity of the Old Men of that date?"

All this was but a continuation of a criticism Chesterton directed at all those in positions of leadership, young or old, who lack the courage and will to stand up to evil. Chesterton had been warning about such people for some two decades. In 1918, he would say this about a new breed of pacifist that had appeared just before World War I.

"There still lingers--or rather, lounges--about the world a special type of Conscientious Objector who is luckily in a minority, even in the small minority of Conscientious Objectors. He might more properly be described as an Unconscientious Objector--for he does not so much believe in his own conscience as disbelieve in the common conscience which is the soul of any possible society. His hatred of patriotism is very much plainer than his love for peace. But, just as the instantaneous touch of ice has been mistaken for hot iron, so the unnatural chilliness of his personality is sometimes mistaken for fanaticism. The most horribly unholy and unhappy thing about him is his youth. Most of the more representative Pacifists are old men and indeed, saving their presence, old noodles. But they are kindly old noodles, and their pacifism is mostly a prejudice left by the last sectarian eccentricities of people who could not wholly cease to be Christians even by being Puritans. These people had always disapproved of what they rather vaguely called militarism, regarding it in some mysterious manner as a form of dissipation. As they had been taught not to look on the wine when it was red, so they were taught not to look on the uniform when it was red. They disapproved of bullets rather as they did of billiards, from a hazy association of ideas that connected it with having a high old time. Whether the experience of war is really a giddy round of gaieties, there are probably many to-day who could testify. The point here is that this sort of conscientiousness was a most comical perversion of the Christian tradition; but was still Christian, in the sense that it was a perversion of that and of nothing else. Some sincerity, some simplicity, some sorrow for others, dignified the dying sect."

"But no such lingering grace clings to the remarkable young man I have in my mind. He is cold, he is caddish, he is an intellectual bully, and his intellect is itself vapid and thin. He is marked by an imaginative insufficiency which can be compared to nothing except to finding a Commander, in the thick of battle, looking into a pocket-mirror instead of a field-glass. I remember a debate nearly four years ago in which some followers of Mr. Norman Angell tried to persuade me that, by our moral progress, we had outgrown the very notion of war. When I pointed out that even to abandon war, merely to make money, indicated no moral progress at all, a young Cambridge man put his head on one side and said, "My ethics are not at all ascetic." I can see him still, with his eye cocked up at a corner of the ceiling, and the white light from a high window falling on his funny little head. It happened to be the very day when the Austrian ultimatum went to Serbia." [Chesterton on War and Peace, 294-295, from the Illustrated London News, May 11, 1918. With Austria's harsh ultimatum to Serbia, the long slide toward a Europe-wide war became almost unstoppable. In 1933 Norman Angell would win the Noble Peace prize and tell his many followers that a now Nazified Germany posed no special threat to the peace of Europe.]

As Lynne Olson describes in her book, a few of those Young Men of World War I did take up Chesterton's call to stand up to Hitler. Unfortunately, there were too few of them and they acquired power too late to dissuade Hitler "from setting all Christendom aflame by a raid on Poland" in September 1939, unleashing the war precisely as Chesterton had predicted in 1932.

--Michael W. Perry, editor of Chesterton on War and Peace: Battling the Ideas and Movements that Led to Nazism and World War II

This lively book defines the personalities of the British leaders prior to WWII on both sides of the fence: the appeasers as well as the few realists.
A short 20 yrs after WWI, the British were in no mood to go to the slaughter again. Yet a few courageous men believed that there was no other choice, if England and, indeed, the world was to be saved from the aggressors. The personalities on both sides are exposed with all their human frailties as well as their unselfish bravery.
Are we right at this very threshold again?

This is a story that has needed telling for some time, and the author does a tremendous job of telling it in an entertaining and highly readable manner. The lesson that these troublesome young men brought to the world needs to be told and re-told again and again.

The difficulty is that the lesson of these troublesome young men and their extended fight against appeasement, however so wonderfully told by Ms. Olson, for she mostly allows the words and deeds of the troublesome young men to speak for themselves, is very quickly forgotten in the last chapter, the aftermath of the book.

It is easy for her to propagandize for most of the book, for her proselytizing is exactly in line with theirs. With the history of the 20's, 30's, and 40's behind us, it is easy for the preaching of Ms. Olson to end up on the side of light and reason, for who, now, cannot completely agree that Nazism was the great evil that had to be fought and that could not be negotiated with.

In the aftermath, she departs from historical certainty, and preaches in favor of appeasement, which is quite unbecoming for this tome, shines an unfortunate light on the analytical capabilities of the author, and points out how horridly history can repeat itself and that appeasement is still a clear and present danger to Western Civilization and Democracy.

In briefly recanting the history of the troublesome young men postwar, she ever so briefly recants the tale of the 1956 British/French/Israeli Suez war against the IslamoNazi (my term), Gamel Abdul Nasser, who helped the Nazi Odessa organization post WWII and modeled his regime on the structure of the Nazis.

"Not for the first time, and certainly not for the last, the lessons of Munich and appeasement were wrongly applied to a later international crisis. Hitler had been a real threat to Britain's security and survival. Nasser was not." - P 358.

The actions of the USA, to put a halt to the confrontation with Nasser, emasculated England and France. It emboldened the Islamists of the Middle East and North Africa to be able to confront the now decaying powers of the West and believe that they could win. President Dwight D. Eisenhower, shortly before leaving office at the end of his 2nd term, said that interfering in Suez was his greatest foreign policy mistake, and that he should never have done it. It helped to embolden the Baathist IslamoNazis of Syria and Iraq that bedeviled the USA for over fifty-five years, and that in Syria, still bedevil us today. The threat was not just Nasser, it was Islamists, and Nasser was a symptom that needed curing. If Hitler had been stopped at the Beer Putsch -if only the USA had allowed England and France to stand up to Radical Islam in 1956.

Although much more slowly moving than the crisis before World War II, by a factor of 15, this was one of the early events that made Europe turn away from the USA, and turn to the Middle East. This helped form a partnership between Europe and the Islamist world that allowed unbridled immigration into Europe, that will result in England, the rest of Western Europe, and Russia lose the most important war of all, not just that of Democracy and Civilization, but of mere existence, as demographically England and France have already surrendered to the radical Islamist and will be 100% Islamist countries by 2100.

So Suez was not like Munich, it was more like the re-arming of the Rhineland. Approving that first step enabled the steps that followed for Hitler, and for the Islamists.

Now the USA needs its own troublesome young men, or troublesome men and women of all ages, and it needs a Churchill to save the USA from the onslaught of Radical Islam, partially brought on by the ignorance and appeasement of authors like Olson who cannot recognize any threat other than the one in the past that these troublesome young men so ably vanquished.

This is a story that has needed telling for some time, and the author does a tremendous job of telling it in an entertaining and highly readable manner. The lesson that these troublesome young men brought to the world needs to be told and re-told again and again.

The difficulty is that the lesson of these troublesome young men and their extended fight against appeasement, however so wonderfully told by Ms. Olson, for she mostly allows the words and deeds of the troublesome young men to speak for themselves, is very quickly forgotten in the last chapter, the aftermath of the book.

It is easy for her to propagandize for most of the book, for her proselytizing is exactly in line with theirs. With the history of the 20's, 30's, and 40's behind us, it is easy for the preaching of Ms. Olson to end up on the side of light and reason, for who, now, cannot completely agree that Nazism was the great evil that had to be fought and that could not be negotiated with.

In the aftermath, she departs from historical certainty, and preaches in favor of appeasement, which is quite unbecoming for this tome, shines an unfortunate light on the analytical capabilities of the author, and points out how horridly history can repeat itself and that appeasement is still a clear and present danger to Western Civilization and Democracy.

In briefly recanting the history of the troublesome young men postwar, she ever so briefly recants the tale of the 1956 British/French/Israeli Suez war against the IslamoNazi (my term), Gamel Abdul Nasser, who helped the Nazi Odessa organization post WWII and modeled his regime on the structure of the Nazis.

"Not for the first time, and certainly not for the last, the lessons of Munich and appeasement were wrongly applied to a later international crisis. Hitler had been a real threat to Britain's security and survival. Nasser was not." - P 358.

The actions of the USA, to put a halt to the confrontation with Nasser, emasculated England and France. It emboldened the Islamists of the Middle East and North Africa to be able to confront the now decaying powers of the West and believe that they could win. President Dwight D. Eisenhower, shortly before leaving office at the end of his 2nd term, said that interfering in Suez was his greatest foreign policy mistake, and that he should never have done it. It helped to embolden the Baathist IslamoNazis of Syria and Iraq that bedeviled the USA for over fifty-five years, and that in Syria, still bedevil us today. The threat was not just Nasser, it was Islamists, and Nasser was a symptom that needed curing. If Hitler had been stopped at the Beer Putsch -if only the USA had allowed England and France to stand up to Radical Islam in 1956.

Although much more slowly moving than the crisis before World War II, by a factor of 15, this was one of the early events that made Europe turn away from the USA, and turn to the Middle East. This helped form a partnership between Europe and the Islamist world that allowed unbridled immigration into Europe, that will result in England, the rest of Western Europe, and Russia lose the most important war of all, not just that of Democracy and Civilization, but of mere existence, as demographically England and France have already surrendered to the radical Islamist and will be 100% Islamist countries by 2100.

So Suez was not like Munich, it was more like the re-arming of the Rhineland. Approving that first step enabled the steps that followed for Hitler, and for the Islamists.

Now the USA needs its own troublesome young men, or troublesome men and women of all ages, and it needs a Churchill to save the USA from the onslaught of Radical Islam, partially brought on by the ignorance and appeasement of authors like Olson who cannot recognize any threat other than the one in the past that these troublesome young men so ably vanquished.

I found Troublesome Young Men to be an engrossing and informative read. While I was generally familiar with Chamberlain's appeasement views and then the ascension of Churchill; this book lays out how a small band of young individuals took great political risk to do what they thought was right for their country, to bring a non-appeasement prime minister to office to confront the Nazi fascist regime. While most of the "young men" were by no means a tight bunch and most had personal issues throughout life they all answered the most important political call of their generation.

I found many parallels to today regarding the War on Islamic Fascism and believe we are at a cross roads of either confronting this struggle with deliberate intention of winning or we could take the road of appeasement due to a lack of effective communication about our current perilous situation.

Where will our generation's troublesome young men and women come from? Will there be a band of individuals who look out over the globe and recognize the global struggle we are in and take actions to confront the issue head on? I believe the result of these questions may determine our future. Perhaps Troublesome Young Men should be required reading for our current national leaders.

In her introduction to this magnificient history, Lynne Olson gives a hint as to her person politics when she says "[u]sing tactics that have striking resonance today, Chamberlain and his subordinates restricted journalists' access to government sources . . ." She then goes on to tell a story - - - a truly wonderful and great story - - - of how a few dedicated Britons battled hundreds of devoted political party hacks and the press that was enslaved to them in order to save Britain and Western Civilization. Olson's sttempted dig at today's White House actually turns out to be a tale about our present U. S. Congress and how the majority puts party loyalty above the safety and security of the nation.

Regardless of contemporary politics, "Troublesome Young Men" is a masterpiece. Olson painstakingly recounts how a very few, amazingly few Members of Parliament, sensing the danger of Neville Chamberlain's policy of appeasement to dictators, tried to get the nation to listen and then, finally, to topple Chamberlain's government from power.

The student of histroy will be reminded by Olson's book that one of the great difficulties of studying history is that there is so much of it!

For those few American public school students today who are still taught anything of the run up to World War II, which killed a mere 55 million and might well have been avoided if only European politicians weren't so stupid, the name Neville Chamberlain might bring to mind the image of a decidedly old fashioned gentleman holding a furled umbrella and a piece of paper and the words "peace in our time". And that's the sum total of their knowledge.

In fact, Chamberlain came as close to being a dictator in a parliamentary government as anyone since Cromwell in the 17th Century. But Chamberlain's power was assured by a rigid party system that essentially destroyed any Tory who did not do the party's will. This couple with a large majority in Parliament rendered Chamberlain essentially invulnerable. regardless of how threatening Chamberlain's policy of appeasing Hitler was. Chamberlain, like so many of today's American politicians, believed he could negotiate peaceful resolutions with Hitler and other tyrants.

There was also another set of circumstances that made Britons likely to look away from looming danger: Britain had lost a million dead in WWI, with another million or so permanently disabled. Two million British women were unable to find husbands. The terror of war had touched virtually every household and no matter how great the danger, ordinary citizens and hack party politicians alike wanted to avoid war.

So Britain moved deliberately toward its own destruction ... save for a few, relatively young Members of Parliament who risked their political careers to sound a warning.

It is these men, some of whose names became familiar in later years (Anthony Eden, Harold Macmillan, etc.) who became thorns in the side of the party establishment and tried to warn of the dangers of appeasement.

Winston Churchill who led England during the six years of WWII was not a prime mover among these "troublesome young men". In fact, many of the dissidents - and there were less than two dozen for most of the time - didn't want Churchill.

The story has been largely untold and in recent years not told at all.

Olson's approach is flawless. Her 46 pages of notes and bibliography attest to the depth and meticulousness of her research. She paints excellent, detailed portraits of each of the troublesome young men, most of whom have been lost to history. Who, for example, knows of Ronald Cartland? This young, newly elected Member of Parliament was the first to speak out against Chamberlain - and he suffered for it. How many of us know that Harold Macmillan, who acheived a modicum of fame in his own right as a Prime Minister, shared his wife with another man for nearly forty years? Macmillan and his wife lived together and she was the perfect political wife, but her love and lover was Robert Boothy, a friend and politicl ally of her husband.

On the pivotal day of May 8, 1940, Olson's surprisingly plain text almost makes real the heavy air of Parliament as hundreds of members crammed the benches to hear the speeches for and against Chamberlain. You can also smell the tobacco smoke clinging to the clothes, the odor of liquor on the breath of members and perhaps the occasional whiff of cologne or perfume from the few women in Commons and those in the gallery.

The event itself was dramatic, of course, but using her plain, but well constructed language, Olson squeezes out every drop of drama. It is, frankly, a breathtaking exhibition of prowess in prose.

This is not a book about Churchill, but truly a book about those who made it possible for him to come to power.

These few rebels, fighting against the lethargy and stupidity of their party were frightened for the future of Britain, indeed for all Western values. As Leo Amery so eloquently put it: " Somehow or other, wer must get into the Government men who match our enemies in fighting spirit, in daring, in resolution and in thirst for victory . . . It may not be easy to find these men. . . ."

If only we had such "troublesome young men" today in the halls of our Congress, our civilization would not once again be in danger because of those who put party allegiance ahead of the nation's well-being.

Lynne Olson has written a masterpiece. The left-wing may deride it for being about "dead white men", a male-dominated society, war and the like, but every intelligent, reasoning person owes it to themself to read it and ponder the lessons of the past as a guide for the future.

Jerry

This book should put to rest forever the mistaken notion that Churchill's ascension to be Prime Minister was a foregone conclusion in 1940. In great detail, the author has laid out all of the work done by many (the "troublesome young men" of the title) Tory backbenchers, and also some opposition party leaders, that led to the fall of Chamberlain. Even then, there was no clear cut successor, and the book implies that, if Anthony Eden had been a bit more agressive, he might have been PM. We are treated to thumbnail biographies of all of the major players, and that helps in seeing how they acted (or didn't act) in the late '30s. It's also astonishing to see how Churchill, when he became PM, stayed with the Chamberlain loyalists in his cabinet, and almost effectively shut out of power those who gave that power to him. This book has eerie parallels to today's political scene, where a large number of politicians and their media followers wish to appease those who would seek to do us harm, while a smaller but determined band of folks are attempting to keep the country safe from further terrorist attacks. There's no question on which side Churchill would be if he were still alive.
Ede

While reading this outstanding book I was struck by the polemics surrounding World War II and how similar they are to the current Iraq War/War on Terrorism debates. British party loyalty rather than country loyalty ruled the day and provided an environment for Hitler to unfold his war plans. As I read this book I wondered if we were doing the same thing.

I started skimming this book in the bookstore and couldn't stop thinking about it after I had left. I bought it and practically devoured each word. It's not perfectly written - sometimes the timetable was confusing and histories were concluded too early for my taste. However, I found myself growing desperate to know the outcome of all their machinations - beyond the obvious - and increasing appalled at the blindness of so many people. The author doesn't suffer from hero worship for any of these chaps (save one, Cartland) which is refreshing in a book of this sort.

If you think Chamberlain was given a bad rap, you'll hate this book (actually, you might want to read this book). If not, you might find it as enthralling as I did.

This was an informative and insightful book. So much of the history of this period is known to us today from Churchill's perspective that it is interesting to view the events from the perspective of others who were key players in them. For much of the book, Churchill is the looming presence off-stage. Only as the troublesome young men become disenchanted with the vascillating Eden does WSC move to the center.

The author's description of the period of the "phony war" (September 1939 -- May 1940) was quite interesting. She includes not only the significant events but also the small ones that provide a complete picture. Stories about children being evacuated are common, but I had not read before about the number of Londoners who had their pets put down when the war began. The comment by an American about the weirdness of walking streets with no children or dogs was telling.

I was startled by an error also noted by another reviewer. The sinking of Royal Oak at Scapa Flow by a U-boat was a noteworthy event. However, it would not have been particularly noteworthy if, as the author states, Royal Oak had been a destroyer. The ship was an R-class battleship -- virtually obsolete by 1939, but still a capital ship. No destroyer that ever sailed has had a crew as large as the 800 sailors who were lost. Who was responsible for this mistake?

Lastly, I enjoyed the way the author traced the lives of the young men as they became old men. The portrait of Super Mac was especially good. I began the book expecting it to end in 1940, but I was pleased to find that completed the stories of the main characters.

I thought this an extremely interesting book. It explained the operation of the House of Commons, and how very different it operates compared to our US Congress. I was unaware of the stranglehold that Neville Chamberlain had over the Tory party. It described the desire of the anti-appeasement forces to oust Chamberlain. I would recommend this book to anyone interested in WWII, or British politics.

The scintillating cast of characters and the world-shaping drama of this wonderful book are worthy of Shakespeare and Lynne Olson presents them brilliantly. Comparisons can be odious, but Chamberlain's authoritarian bent, secrecy and phone tapping will have to remind us of some current events. The Prime Minister's chief whip even sounds a lot like Tom DeLay. But that's just by the way. Olson's focus is on the drama surrounding the beginning of World War II. The leaders the Tory rebels want--Anthony Eden and Winston Churchill--are reluctant dragons. But the troublesome young men, who are also highly articulate men of integrity--will not be denied the change in leadership they believe Britain must have in order to win the war. How they manage it, through trial and error, and how ungrateful Churchill is, are the heart of the story. It's exciting reading.

Troublesome Young Men is an excellent read. It offers insight into the politics of appeasement, which was the mindset of Neville Chamberlain's Tory government in the late 1930's. The Troublesome Young Men were young Tories who opposed appeasement and risked their political futures to unseat Chamberlain. Some names you might remember: Anthony Eden and Harold MacMillian. Both were Prime Ministers in the 1950's.
Read this and you will see just how close the civilized world came to total destruction.
A good companion book is Leonard Mosley's On Borrowed Time (1969)

A new look at the politics of the UK in the run up to WW II. Fascinating to learn more about the Churchill/Chamberlain interactions and the efforts of the "rebels" to force the appeasers to recognize the reality of Hitler and Mussolini.

For history buffs, this insight into the social relationships in England of the 20s and 30s and their effects on the workings of government is quite illuminating. The parallels to the present global situation are unnerving.

An excellent read.

In one of his most popular "Far Side" cartoons, Gary Larson has a mathematician working at a blackboard. A complex mass of equations is labeled "Step One," while on the other side of the board, a simple syllogism is "Step Three." In between, for "Step Two," he has written "And then a miracle occurs."

In some ways, this idea represents the conventional understanding of Winston Churchill's rise to power in 1940. For his "wilderness years," WSC was on the outside looking in, railing against appeasement and warning of the impending Nazi threat. The war begins and things look dark for the British. But then "a miracle occurs" and Churchill becomes PM, he and the British experience their Finest Hour, and Hitler is vanquished. High-fives all around.

As Lynne Olson's fine book demonstrates, Churchill's becoming prime minister was no miracle at all. Instead, it was (like most so-called "miracles") the product of some very hard work by a number of people who never got the recognition and thanks they deserved -- least of all by Churchill himself. As some reviewers have noted, "Troublesome Young Men" is not heavy on analysis or original research. It is, however, an excellent example of storytelling and characterization, and shines some much-needed light on men (and some women) who have been eclipsed by Churchill's immense shadow for too long.

This is not primarily a book about Churchill, though -- typically and inevitably -- his gravity bends and shapes the universe around him. The picture we get of The Man of the (Twentieth) Century is far from flattering: Olson notes that in spite of his independent spirit and periods of political radicalism, he was fundamentally a conservative man, and had the conservative's typical monarchical sentiment. This, she argues, is why he remained so perplexingly, infuriatingly loyal to Neville Chamberlain once he was brought into Chamberlain's cabinet, and why he never seemed to appreciate the Troublesome Young Men's efforts on his behalf. They had, after all, "disloyally" engineered the fall of a Tory leader. Even though Churchill himself (to say nothing of the nation and the world) benefited from this, regicide could never be rewarded.

Despite all we learn (or re-learn) about WSC from this book, the reader shouldn't let his dominant presence distract her from the very many other interesting characters Lynne Olson introduces us to. I've always considered a mark of a good book to be the number of *other* books an author makes me want to track down and read, and Olson scores high in this regard. Titles she cites about Leo Amery and Harold Macmillan are two obvious examples, but I'm especially interested in finding a copy of romance-novelist-to-be Barbara Cartland's biography of her brother Ronald, who is clearly Lynne Olson's tragic hero. Andrew Roberts' "Eminent Churchillians" and Graham Stewart's "Burying Caesar," both of which I already own, have also moved a good ways up my to-read-someday list.

As American conservative activist and educator Morton Blackwell has said, "In politics, nothing moves unless it's pushed." Lynne Olson's "Troublesome Young Men" is an entertaining and fast-paced look at one of the most important political "pushes" in modern history. As popular historic storytelling, this title is a worthwhile and compelling read, and deserves the attention it has been receiving.

This is an outstanding book in almost all ways. Olson did a phenomenal job taking the reader back to the perilous political times in England after WWI and during the deep depression that impacted them just as hard as it did the U.S. Many people still remember the big impact that Churchhill had on England, or get taught it in european history, but the story of the fight to get Chamberlain and his cronies out of office is not well known. I certainly didn't know a lot about it, and that was what attracted me to this book.

Churchill saved and prodded England during WWII, but he had an unfortunate tendency to get himself into political trouble, as well as a dismaying type of political loyalty to the very people who would put him in minor positions in order to control him. So these young men from the upper classes who had the foresight to see that his 'type' was needed to pull England out from under Hitler's attempt at world domination, often had to rescue him not only from Chamberlain, but also from himself.

I really see a stark reminder of what we need in our own country right now, in our own political arena. We need some young men and women from all walks of life, who have compassion and the courage to stand up for what this country and democracy stands for to pull us out of the current mess we are in. This book is an excellent suggestion for reading for our current would-be politicians and leaders in this country, and probably England again. These young men spoke their mind when they saw Chamberlain leading England into slavery under Hitler, in the name of peace...even though many of them knew it would mean another war, and they would have to serve in the war and lose their lives. It meant enough that they believed in England's parlimentary democracy to put themselves at risk, both physically and politically. Some of these men even put aside their own personal problems in order to work together, and get England to recognize the danger she was in, not only from Hitler and cronies, but from the insidious old men who were left running the country when England lost an entire generation of men to WWI.

Olson wrote well, and this is an exciting book, which you don't expect when dealing with political history. The research and the private letters, all the little pieces of information from between these people really added to the telling of this story. My only complaint about this book, is Olson is an American and came at this from our point of view. That doesn't make it wrong, but there were a few times I cringed when she would write something that made it obvious what her personal feelings were in all this. Now, admittedly it's got to be difficult to write a history book of any kind without allowing your own personal feelings to dictate what is written, but there have been some historians who are able to do that without adding comments that so obviously reveal their own opinion. I suspect that some British readers of this book may also cringe at points, because even though our countries are both democracies, they are democracies with differences...one of which, the British are more stoic than we are, and I wish we had some of that.

We may have declared our independence from Britain, but that's never stopped me from continuing to read about and admire the many good people who have led the way for all of us with courage...

Karen Sadler

Lynne Olson's "Troublesome Young Men" is a grandly successful book on numerous levels. For one it is a vivid portrayal of England in the extraordinary few years before Hitler plunged Europe into war. We learn how blind so many British leaders were to the threat the Nazis presented and indeed how a few were even sympathetic to some of Hitler's aims. We also see how British parliamentary leaders muzzled dissent within their own ranks and worst of all manipulated the press and thus public opinion. We are also reminded that the horrible business of war cannot be done on the cheap or with half measures (as Lincoln learned during the Civil War upon sacking McClellan and ultimately opting for Grant). Most of all "Troublesome Young Men" teaches us how a few brave young men willing to risk political careers can do the right thing for their country and their civilization in the face of very long odds.
This is the story of rebels within Britain's Tory majority who fought the powers that were when they witnessed their leaders' unwillingness to stand up to the burgeoning Nazi threat of the late 1930's. These progressive Tories recognized that sycophantic diplomacy was no way to stop a totalitarian regime armed to the teeth and threatening its neighbors. The rebels sought a change in leadership to someone (Winston Churchill was the obvious choice to many) who would stand up and if necessary fight. Once the war came with Neville Chamberlin still Prime Minister, they sought a leader (again Churchill would do) who would vigorously prosecute the war. Thankfully they were ultimately successful.
Olson's book succeeds in large part because of the manner in which she brings back to life these brave soles. Many of us are quite familiar with Churchill but here we meet Boothby, Amery, Cartland and Macmillian to name but a few. Olson is not above mixing a little scandal (such carrying on among England's elite!) but always for the purpose of adding full depth and dimension to her portraits. Readers are also familiarized with less heroic figures such as Chamberlin who was very much a man in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Olson not only re-creates the figures but also the events. She brings readers into the House of Commons, the smoking rooms, into offices and onto estates and other locales where the story plays out. Thankfully she avoids the problem common to many writers of non fiction by not indulging in long quotations, instead getting the essence of the speaker's remarks in a few aptly chosen sentences or less.
"Troublesome Some Young Men" is an important addition to the vast body of work on World War II and one that demonstrates that while some heroes did their fighting on battlefields with guns, others fought in in the political arena with words (a few like Ronald Cartland did both).

Lynne Olson's book, Troublesome Young Men: The Rebels Who Brought Churchill to Power and Helped Save England, is a superb study of a younger generation of courageous activists who took on the Chamberlain Machine and ultimately brought Churchill to power.

Every republican who wants to create an idea-oriented Republican Party worthy of becoming a majority again should read this book and think about its application to the mess we are currently in.

Every conservative who wants to find a 21st century path to do for our time what Reagan did for his should read this book.

And every moderate democrat who knows the left wing of their party is a dead-end and incapable of solving America's problems should read this book.

"Troublesome Young Men", by Lynne Olson is at once an absorbing read, and a window on the machinations of the upper classes in England prior to the outbreak of the Second World War. The story details the activities of a group of ambitious politicians to undermine Prime Minister
Chamberlain, and elevate Winston Churchill to the Premiership thereby thwarting the unsavoury efforts of Adolf Hitler.

By the standards of today, they were not `young men'. The average age was close to 50, and they were all `comfortably off', as the saying went in those days. The general tenor of the work suggests that these `young men' sacrificed their political careers for the greater good of their country. This is difficult to comprehend as every one of them that lived (Ronald Cartland perished in the opening stages of the war), was elevated to the peerage or knighted. The only exception was Leo Amery: the best Prime Minister England never had, who declined the offer of an elevation. Their lack of altruism is not lost on Ms Olson, but she none-the-less portrays the events with candid and unbiased accuracy.

The book is a `page turner', written by an accomplished journalist in the manner of a `breaking story'. To be sure, there are a couple of factual errors which would be churlish of me to reveal, but they detract not an iota from the gist of the story.

The book ends with Churchill's achieving his ends, but the activists not achieving theirs. Indeed, I have the feeling that the book ends without fully developing Churchill's motives for not rewarding his acolytes.

Churchill did not appoint any of them to exulted positions indeed, he ran with the very same team appointed by Chamberlain. It is a measure of the man as a manager that he didn't effect the obvious. Had he elevated these recalcitrant worthies, they would have seen it as `pay-back', and would have been a constant thorn in his side. By keeping Chamberlain's men, he showed the whole administration that he was his own man; answerable to no one.

An excellent read, and one that should send us all scurrying for other works by this superior writer.

Olson's account of the long lonely and uphill struggle of the anti-appeasement movement among Conservative MPs in the 1930s is an absorbing tale of parliamentary manuevering, and class and gender poltics, told in a riveting style. This deserves to be read along with Roy Jenkins' "Churchill" in order to develop a complete view of the myth and reality of Churchill and British politics in the 1930s. We get to see Harold Macmillan as a young firebrand of the '30s, instead of as the cautious PM of the '50s. Anthony Eden loses much of his luster in Olson's telling. His inabillity to lead and unwillingness to take risks presages his disastrous handling of the Suez crisis.

So why only 5 stars? I limit my plaudits to 4 stars on account of the egregious errors in Olson's handling of military detail. One of the most eye-popping is her classification of the Royal Oak, a battleship, as a destroyer. She does correctly note that over eight hundred lives were lost when the ship went down, which makes her error all the more puzzling as that total would far exceed the complement of any destroyer. She implies that the RAF air offensive against Germany sprung into gear once Churchill became PM. The RAF was not a factor in attacking Germany until mid 1942, as the [...] Report clearly indicates.

The Norway disaster is handled in a cursory manner, and the lack of maps will be keenly felt by all readers who are not already familiar with that campaign.

Her errors are not confined to Great Britain. She claims on p. 228 that "In the Reich the war economy had been placed on a clear war footing." The Allies may be glad that in fact the Reich did not move to a war economy until late 1943. Her description of the Allied collapse in late May 1940 is unfair to the French, their only mention coming as "surrendering by the thousands". The French troops who fought to keep the Wehrmacht off the backs of the British as they evaculated Dunkirk deserve better than this.

This is a good book for the insights it provides into the fight against appeasement in Great Britain. More detail to the military facts, both in the run up to war and the fighting in 1939 and 1940 would have made it an excellent one.

and let us have done with you. In the name of God, go!"

With those words to Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain on May 7, 1940 (quoting a speech of Oliver Cromwell to Parliament in 1653), Conservative Member of Parliament (MP), Leo Amery stunned Parliament and Britain and sounded the death knell for Chamberlain's term as Prime Minister. Three days later, on May 10, 1940, Neville Chamberlain resigned and Winston Churchill took office. Chamberlain's resignation marks the emotional climax of Lynne Olson's compelling popular history, "Troublesome Young Men". "Troublesome Young Men" tells the story of the small group of Conservative MPs who opposed Neville Chamberlain's policy of appeasement toward Hitler's Germany from the mid-1930s until Churchill's accession to power.

Olson's book is a valuable piece of work for a number of reasons. During the premiership of Neville Chamberlain it was not Winston Churchill who stood out as the primary threat to Chamberlain's appeasement policies but the young MPS who are the subject of Olson's book. Those MPs included future Prime Ministers in Anthony Eden and Harold Macmillan and others including Robert Boothby, Ronald Cartland, Bobbety Cranborne (the future Lord Salisbury) and Violet Bonham Carter. Leo Amery was certainly not young, he was a schoolmate of Churchill's at Harrow, but was just as `troublesome'. Olson does an admirable job of taking this cast of characters and providing the reader with information as to who they were and why they took a political stand in the face of fierce opposition from a fierce and vindictive Conservative Party leadership.

Olson also does a commendable job of portraying Chamberlain in a light that, while being far from sympathetic, paints a more substantive picture than the usual superficial clichés about his character and premiership that one often finds. Chamberlain's foreign policy decisions were, in fact, disastrous and were the product of the naïve belief that he and he alone, could deal with and control Herr Hitler. However, the image of him as nothing more than a prim, umbrella-toting milquetoast does not stand scrutiny. As Prime Minister, Chamberlain was far from docile and, in fact, was suspicious, domineering and close to tyrannical when it came to maintaining control over Parliament. Olson portrays him, accurately I think, as a very astute politician with a well-developed Machiavellian sense of tactics. Chamberlain outmaneuvered these troublesome young men at every turn. Unfortunately, this masterful ability was expended solely in Parliament and solely for the purpose of keeping himself in power. When it came to foreign policy Chamberlain was hopelessly lost.

Perhaps the most compelling and disturbing portrait painted by Olson is that of Anthony Eden. It is easy to forget that during the premiership of Neville Chamberlain that it was not Winston Churchill who stood out as a threat to Chamberlain's appeasement policies but Anthony Eden. The troublesome young men were generally considered to be "Edenites. But Eden, for all his intelligence, comes across as a timid and vacillating political rival notoriously incapable of making tough political decisions. Eden's indecisiveness reminded me of Leon Trotsky. Like Trotsky, Eden managed to fall ill or absent himself from the center of action at critical moments in time when a few well-chosen words or strong action could have set Chamberlain's policy of appeasement on its heels. Time and time again the troublesome young men turned to Eden and time and time again he found a way to avoid making a tough decision. It is no wonder that even his friends referred to him as Hamlet.

Eden's inability to commit effectively left Winston Churchill as the only viable alternative to Chamberlain. To the extent that Eden's vacillation helped pave the way for Churchill one cannot help but think that Britain and the U.S. owe Eden a debt of gratitude for his indecisiveness.

Olson's "Troublesome Young Men" is both entertaining and informative. Although much has been written about Churchill, Chamberlain, and appeasement, by focusing on the other characters Olson has done a tremendous service. These troublesome young men (and women) exhibited courage and integrity. Some had their political careers ruined by Chamberlain's political machine. Others were considered traitors to their party. Yet they persevered and by retelling their not often told story Olson had done a tremendous job in fleshing out the historical record. 4.5 stars. Highly recommended. L. Fleisig

[...]

Nowadays we see Winston Churchill as one of the great (maybe greatest) heroes of the twentieth century, the man who stood firm against Hitler and Fascism and rallied the West to victory. Its easy to forget that until Churchill had actually been Prime Minister and steered the British through the worst of the Blitz he was regarded with suspicion deepening to active dislike by much of the British ruling classes. He was an imperialist, a warmonger, an eccentric whose best days were behind him: this was the prevailing opinion among most of Churchill's peers in Parliament throughout most of the 1930s.



Fortunately there were a few politicians, mostly Tories a generation or so younger than Churchill, who recognized that the appeasement policies of the Government under Stanley Baldwin and Neville Chamberlain were only making Hitler stronger and setting Britain up for defeat in an inevitable future conflict. These MPs and other leaders, some like Harold Macmillan and Anthony Eden still well known today, others like Ronald Cartland and Robert Boothby less recognizeable, undertook the dangerous job of opposing the policies of the Government they as Conservatives were supposed to uphold.



Lynne Olson makes it clear how risky this opposition was. Neville Chamberlain was Nixonian-Bushian-Cheneyian in his devotion to secrecy and loathing of any opposition. Chamberlain's henchmen, like Chief Whip David Margesson, approached Karl Rove levels in their willingness to smear and destroy anyone who dared question the policies and tactics of the Government. The British public and the national press tended to see and portray anyone who deviated from the official line as dangerously unstable or traitorous, a mentality which will have a familiar ring to Americans who lived through the post 9-11 period (2001-2003) when few dared to question anything the Bush Administration said or did.



Not only did these rebels undergo great political risk, they also sacrificed much of their private happiness. Harold Macmillan had to work daily with Robert Boothby, even though he was aware that Boothby was involved in a long term affair with Macmillan's own wife. Leo Amery stood firmly beside Churchill, even though it made his unstable eldest son a target for Nazi propagandists when he was interned in Germany during the war and eventually led to the younger man's hanging for treason.



Lynne Olson writes vividly and clearly. I could understand what it was like to live in Britain during the late 1930s and early 1940s, and I recognized how desperate the British felt when they finally turned to Churchill in May, 1940. I gained a new understanding of Churchill as politician, and I found much new respect for men I already admired like Harold Macmillan. I was also impressed with the role women like the Duchess of Atholl, Eleanor Rathbone, and especially Lady Violet Bonham-Carter (whom I would dearly love to have met) played in the anti-appeasment movement. Britain was fortunate to have such leadership in the 1930s, and I trust that the US will be just as fortunate in coming years when we in our turn seek new leadership.

and let us have done with you. In the name of God, go!"



With those words to Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain on May 7, 1940 (quoting a speech of Thomas Cromwell to Parliament in 1653), Conservative Member of Parliament (MP), Leo Amery stunned Parliament and Britain and sounded the death knell for Chamberlain's term as Prime Minister. Three days later, on May 10, 1940, Neville Chamberlain resigned and Winston Churchill took office. Chamberlain's resignation marks the emotional climax of Lynne Olson's compelling popular history, "Troublesome Young Men". "Troublesome Young Men" tells the story of the small group of Conservative MPs who opposed Neville Chamberlain's policy of appeasement toward Hitler's Germany from the mid-1930s until Churchill's accession to power.



Olson's book is a valuable piece of work for a number of reasons. During the premiership of Neville Chamberlain it was not Winston Churchill who stood out as the primary threat to Chamberlain's appeasement policies but the young MPS who are the subject of Olson's book. Those MPs included future Prime Ministers in Anthony Eden and Harold Macmillan and others including Robert Boothby, Ronald Cartland, Bobbety Cranborne (the future Lord Salisbury) and Violet Bonham Carter. Leo Amery was certainly not young, he was a schoolmate of Churchill's at Harrow, but was just as `troublesome'. Olson does an admirable job of taking this cast of characters and providing the reader with information as to who they were and why they took a political stand in the face of fierce opposition from a fierce and vindictive Conservative Party leadership.



Olson also does a commendable job of portraying Chamberlain in a light that, while being far from sympathetic, paints a more substantive picture than the usual superficial clichés about his character and premiership that one often finds. Chamberlain's foreign policy decisions were, in fact, disastrous and were the product of the naïve belief that he and he alone, could deal with and control Herr Hitler. However, the image of him as nothing more than a prim, umbrella-toting milquetoast does not stand scrutiny. As Prime Minister, Chamberlain was far from docile and, in fact, was suspicious, domineering and close to tyrannical when it came to maintaining control over Parliament. Olson portrays him, accurately I think, as a very astute politician with a well-developed Machiavellian sense of tactics. Chamberlain outmaneuvered these troublesome young men at every turn. Unfortunately, this masterful ability was expended solely in Parliament and solely for the purpose of keeping himself in power. When it came to foreign policy Chamberlain was hopelessly lost.



Perhaps the most compelling and disturbing portrait painted by Olson is that of Anthony Eden. It is easy to forget that during the premiership of Neville Chamberlain that it was not Winston Churchill who stood out as a threat to Chamberlain's appeasement policies but Anthony Eden. The troublesome young men were generally considered to be "Edenites. But Eden, for all his intelligence, comes across as a timid and vacillating political rival notoriously incapable of making tough political decisions. Eden's indecisiveness reminded me of Leon Trotsky. Like Trotsky, Eden managed to fall ill or absent himself from the center of action at critical moments in time when a few well-chosen words or strong action could have set Chamberlain's policy of appeasement on its heels. Time and time again the troublesome young men turned to Eden and time and time again he found a way to avoid making a tough decision. It is no wonder that even his friends referred to him as Hamlet.



Eden's inability to commit effectively left Winston Churchill as the only viable alternative to Chamberlain. To the extent that Eden's vacillation helped pave the way for Churchill one cannot help but think that Britain and the U.S. owe Eden a debt of gratitude for his indecisiveness.



Olson's "Troublesome Young Men" is both entertaining and informative. Although much has been written about Churchill, Chamberlain, and appeasement, by focusing on the other characters Olson has done a tremendous service. These troublesome young men (and women) exhibited courage and integrity. Some had their political careers ruined by Chamberlain's political machine. Others were considered traitors to their party. Yet they persevered and by retelling their not often told story Olson had done a tremendous job in fleshing out the historical record. 4.5 stars. Highly recommended. L. Fleisig



NB: Simon Ball's "The Guardsmen" would make an excellent book to be read in conjunction with Troublesome Young Men.

The Guardsmen

The book is enriched by Lynne Olson's accounts of the wives of the "troublesome young men" and the influence that they had on their husbands. Olson also gives us a great portrait of the feisty Lady Violet Bonham Carter. Lady Violet was active in British politics at a time when women were virtually excluded from political life and government. She was a tremendous supporter of Winston Churchill and a vigorous opponent of appeasement and Chamberlain.

Olson also introduces us to Kitty Atholl, the third woman ever elected to Parliament. A demure and polite lady, she was a real firebrand in opposing appeasement. The story of Chamberlain's retaliation against her is sure to get your blood boiling.

Lynne Olson tells this story in such a way that you really wonder what the outcome will be even though you know full well how it ends. This is a great "read".

Lynne Olson gives the untold story of the small group of "troublesome young men" that maintained the passion to oppose Prime Minister Chamberlain's policy of appeasement to Hitler and how they ushered an unpopular and distrusted man into power as Prime Minister and thus saved England during WW II. That unpopular and distrusted man was Winston Churchill.

Opposing their own government was not easy. They were branded as traitors, targeted for defeat in their next election and the victims of numerous "dirty tricks" employed by the government. Even more problematic, they were required to act contrary to the code of gentlemen drilled into them through the English Public School system.

The book is enriched by Lynne Olson's accounts of the wives of these men and their influence on them and by the influence of the feisty Lady Violet Bonham Carter. Lady Violet was active in British politics at a time when women were virtually excluded from political life and government. She was a tremendous supporter of Winston Churchill and a vigorous opponent of appeasement.

More importantly, the book illustrates the awful disaster that comes from a press that refuses to criticize the government.

Neville Chamberlain, as Chancellor of the Exchequer, had been the most effective minister in the MacDonald and Baldwin cabinets. He had been instrumental in reviving England's economy after the 1931 collapse. Chamberlain was a sensitive, affectionate and charming man.

Chamberlain was 68 when he became Prime Minister. But election to that office substantially changed him. His manner became frigid and condescending. He became impressed with his own abilities and surrounded himself with men who refused to challenge him.

Chamberlain refused to brook any dissent to his government. The men who owned the major newspapers supported him and they refused to publish anything critical of his government. Chamberlain's machinations against those who opposed him, especially those who did no more than abstain from a vote of confidence regarding his handling of the Czechoslovakia matter in Munich, makes Richard Nixon look like a ham-fisted amateur.

With the government controlling the press, British citizens had no idea how bad the situation in Europe had become and how vulnerable Britain was, especially with the collapse of Czechoslovakia. Chamberlain and France's PM Edouard Daladier engineered the collapse of Czechoslovakia, essentially handing the country over to Hitler. Czechoslovakia's ambassador to England, Jan Masaryk, told Chamberlain: "If you have sacrificed my nation to preserve the peace of the world, I will be the first to applaud you. But if not, gentlemen, God help your souls." After England and France sold out Czechoslovakia, there was no hope that either country could avoid attack by Hitler.

This book is entertaining and informative. More importantly, it contains important lessons about the disaster that awaits any democracy when the government considers all dissent to be treason.

This is a well-researched and very well-written book. It gives what for me was a new pespective on Churchill's "wilderness years," showing that his rise to power would have been impossible without the dedicated efforts of a relatively small group of anti-appeasement Tories. Some are well-known, like Harold MacMillan, but one or two were new to me, especially Ronald Cartright. I would consider it essential (and pleasurable) reading for anyone interested in this vital chapter of history. I had not realized the extent to which Churchill, once in power, did not rush to bring very many of these TYM into his wartime government. If I have one criticism of the book it is a small one--that the author seems critical of Churchill for this policy, but she may not give sufficient weight to the fact that the Chamberlain forces still dominated the House of Commons.

The author's treatment of events makes for compelling reading. Of even greater interest to me are the personal relations and personalities described.
This is a valuable treatment of a time, place and people. As one example, in fighting to stay on as prime minister (but certainly not fighting the Nazis) Chamberlain personalized the struggle - seeing his opponents (e.g., the troublesome young men) as attacking him not his policies. Where have I seen this before? In my own work in government and in corporation politics.

Troublesome Young Men: The Rebels Who Brought Churchill to Power and Helped Save England: This is an excellent book about little known part of pre WWII history. It shows incredible courage by a few young men who are ready to sacrifice their careers to save England and the Western civilization. It describes them with all their strengths and also weaknesses.

It reads like a suspense novel and proves that appeasement never works. A good lesson for today's world. Romans used to say: "If you want peace, be ready for war" This simple truth is often forgotten and has to be relearned by every generation, many times at a very heavy price.

Troublesome young men is a compelling read, difficult to put down. But in the end I found myself questioning the thesis. I am not a specialist in this period, but the small group of anti-appeasement Conservatives (of whom many would be liberals in the U.S.) did not win a no confidence vote on Chamberlain, and it is questionable whether they brought him down in May 1940, after the invasion of France and the low countries. It is quite possible that Chamberlain resigned because he felt he was not the leader needed, but it is even more likely that he did so because he had cancer, of which he would die a few months after he left office. Furthermore, Ms. Olson does not explain Churchill as his successor. In the end one reads a book that is beautifully written and delightful to read, but which is suspiciously romantic, tied in a bow with one of its major characters killed in action just prior to Dunkirk.

Neville Chamberlain's "tin ear" -- his inability to listen to any dissenters -- is eerily familiar more than 70 years later. Lynne Olson's narrative takes the reader back to the late 1930s as Hitler is about to invade Czechoslovakia and Churchill's small circle of liberal tories rebel against Chamberlain's wire-tapping, punitive Conservative government. Olson "sets up" "troublesome young men" by introducing the reader to this fascinating circle -- Harold Macmillan, Anthony Eden, Robert Boothby, Ronald Cartland, Leo Amery and others -- for the most part, a generation or so younger than Churchill who had been in the HOuse of Commons for three decades and was considered to be past his prime by many Conservatives in his own generation. Olson's narrative is riveting, and if it weren't for the fact that we already know the outcome, it would seem that the odds of this group seizing power and actually going to war against the Germans seemed near to impossible given the state of Britain's intransigent "power elite" around Chamberlain and the public's horror of re-living the Great War. Olson tells a story -- about this group of tory rebels -- that hasn't really been told before. Her detailed profiles of these unlikely rebels is fascinating, and she slowly builds her story that eventually leads to Churchill's rise as prime minister.

An excellent, absorbing read on a critical, but often overlooked, period of World War II. Olson's portraits of these flawed Tory rebels, with their personal shortcomings, their ambivalence and their ambitions, give the reader a keen sense of how events unfolded. It is painful to watch that golden boy, Anthony Eden, fritter away public adoration at precisely the moment when political fortitude is demanded. This is no march to a preordained outcome in bringing down Chamberlain. It is an uncertain journey, replete with doubt, handwringing, and spurts of courage. Churchill emerges as both formidable and calculating; ruthless yet oddly compassionate toward Chamberlain. We all know the outcome, but the showdown in the House of Commons is nonetheless a real nail-biter. How many books on parliamentary maneuverings can claim that? Olson also deftly recreates the political and social backdrop to the "Phony War," which many historians simply skip over. Most shocking is an examination of the extent to which the British media - in the hands of a few press barons -- play along with the government, leaving the British public largely in the dark over what [...] is up to on the Continent. Fascinating and highly readable.

"Troublesome Young Men" tells the story of the people (not all young, not all men, not all Tories, although the book concentrates on Tories) who came together in coalitions to dislodge Neville Chamberlain, thereby opening the way for Winston Churchill. Considering that we know the outcome, or think we know the outcome, the book is full of tension and drama. Will Anthony Eden emerge to lead the rebels? (No.) Will Leo Amery's impassioned speech to the House of Commons, "In the name of God, go," make a difference? (Yes.) And the book is full of surprises, one of them being Churchill's unwillingness to appoint most of the troublesome young men to office immediately after he took power.

But above all the book is a pleasure for the sense it gives the reader that we are there. Duff Cooper debates resigning his position as first lord of the admiralty, and does so, even though it means giving up living at Admiralty House, one of London's most splendid residences. Francis Williams, the anti-appeasement editor of a Labour newspaper, picutures in his mind his small daughter doing handstands and his son riding a bicycle, and is torn because part of him thinks it is worth anything to avoid war. The author, Lynne Olson, has a background in journalism, and whether it is because of this or because of her great empathy with things as they are she gives us the privilege of living for a while in another time and country.

A useful corrective for the commonly held view that Winston Churchill was alone in fighting against the official policy of appeasement in the years leading up to World War II.

Lynne Olson has written a very good work on the social and political background to the ultimate shift in Parliament from the peace-at-any-price leadership provided by Chamberlain to that of the more robust and winning Churchill.

While focused of the late 1930s and early 1940s, the book is useful for those with an interest in understanding British politics of the 1950s (Eden/Suez) to the early 60s (the resignation of Harold Macmillan.)

Also, as a result of this book, I am now an admirer of Ronald Cartland, who was one of the best of the troublesome young men.

As the most famous voice against the appeasement polices of Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain in the 1930's, Winston Churchill drowns out the myriad of other voices who spoke out at great personal and political cost. "Troublesome Young Men" is the story of those voices who "brought Churchill to power" against a powerful establishment that brooked no dissent.

Prime Minister Chamberlain was detemined to avoid the slaughter of World World I by buying peace at any price and was supported by the English people. He also resembled Richard Nixon with his use of dirty tricks, including taping phone conversations. To oppose a popular PM who could ruin your career was a hard choice for Leo Amery, Ronald Cartland, Harold Nicolson and others. To support Churchill was not a sure thing as he was viewed as being over the hill (he had been in public view for nearly 40 years since the Boer War). These rebels were eloquent in their opposition and courageous in their public convictions. This is a book about politics at its best, when nothing less than the best would save the world.