Has anyone seen this documentary by the history channel? I rather like it and appreciate the satellite/"from space" perspective it takes to the war. I had a question about something it mentioned: why did FDR want Churchill to dismantle GB's preferential trading routes? What does that mean exactly, and why was it a mixed and painful deal for Churchill? I thought the Empire was pretty much coming apart by this time anyway/wouldn't be sustainable?
I read another book about the commonwealth nations and their relationship to GB between the wars and during WWII. Pretty damning stuff all around. Churhill is said to have had some pretty unrealistic expectations about the Empire. He and many of the governmental figures of the time, seemed to be about twenty years out of step. By contrast the US president and his close advisors had some far reaching post war goals that did not include a British Empire of any kind. I don't know anything about preferential trading routes, but I thought I would mention that other stuff. In the book I am reading by Max Hastings, there is a section about the loss of British prestige and influence in the Pacific, and especially in areas like Burma.
