WWII Historian: 3 Decisions That Built The West and How We're Destroying It - James Holland
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What is the significance of soft power in America's global influence?
What America has, and which no other country has ever had to the same extent, is it has soft power. This is partly through Hollywood, but it also has t-shirts and Nikes and Coca-Cola and chewing gum and McDonald's and everything else. And it's selling modernity and freedom and if you work hard and if you graft you can be like americans and you can live the american dream that's what they're selling and that is what america has always sold and as it has grown post-war post-1945 not everything has gone 100 according to plan why it's so important is american gear can get rich through the combination of the threat of military dominance but with the soft power of selling a dream that is irresistible to a vast number of people who are otherwise going to be oppressed.
Welcome to Open Book. I am your host, Anthony Scaramucci, a frequent guest on Open Book, a prolific author, James Holland. He's back with a new book, The Visionaries, The Making of the Post-World War II Order in the West. And I am delighted to have you back on, James. And you've become a personal friend of mine. And I love your writing. And I appreciate you giving me the opportunity to read this in advance and also comment on it. You've been a great friend to me. But I want to go back to World War II.
Well, first of all, let me just say thank you, Anthony. Thank you for that lovely introduction. And thank you for reading it. And give me your thoughts and your notes and some pointers on stuff. Because, you know, you're an American, I'm not. I'm writing predominantly about the Americans in this book. And, you know, you... You don't want to take things for granted as a Brit writing about America.
Well, you may be more objective as a result of not being American, but the book is a fascinating book. And what I have said to people, this should be a brief. This should be in the hands of every presidential candidate. This should be in the hands of anybody that's aspiring to think about leadership and the way that we should think about it, which is not even about us, but it's about future generations. What are our decisions going to do to future generations and how will that sit? I moved Alastair Campbell to Belfast and he took me to the castle and he regaled me with stories about the peace in Northern Ireland. And he said something to me, which I'll share with you, which is directly related to this brilliant book, is that good decision-making, good political decision-making
has saved a generation of people in Northern Ireland from violence. And the decision-making that was made here 80 short years ago, 81 short years ago, had really helped create this prosperous moment for the West. It didn't solve everybody's problems, because we had the Iron Curtain, the rise of communist China, et cetera. But it really did lay down the structure of what became the post-World War II world, the rules-based society, the Western democracies, and led to, frankly, the success that you've had in your life, success, frankly, I've had in my life. But I want to go to World War II because you had me in the back of a half track last June at the Chalk History Festival. I mean, I'm climbing into the back of a half track that I think was used by the British or the American military to carry infantrymen.
And we were cruising around a field in southern England. And tell us a little bit about this love affair with the Second World War. What drew you to this period of time?
Well, I guess I must have been in my late 20s around that time. And I'd been interested in World War II when I was a boy. And then, you know, I got a teenager and I got into sport and cricket and, you know, hanging out with my mates and chasing girls and whatever. And I just sort of, it kind of just disappeared from view really. And I never, although I studied history at school and then at university, I never did any 20th century history at all. And so World War II just wasn't really on my radar. And then I went to the 1995 50th anniversary of the end of World War II in London, which was a massive deal.
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