1) It is hard to say when examining the short yet impactful Premiership of Lord Halifax if it was completly a failure. In the eyes of anti appeasers and Anti Treaty supporters of then and the public at large nowadays,his reign represented the penultimate gasp of those who have let the world go to hell and the betrayal by the elite of all those who died fighting fascism in Europe. In the eyes of others though,Halifax merely did what was viewed as necessary and rational at the times,making only a temporary peace deal with the Reich to regroup and restart the war with renewed force.
Ultimately however it feels irrelevant to judge whether Halifax was succesful or not. Mainly because he didn’t intend to. He was a sacrifice PM,put in to execute the hard choices that others didn’t want to take resposibility for. And in that sense,he accomplished his mission: Britain signed a peace treaty with Germany and Italy,the war was over (for now at least) and in an “acceptable” manner. Nothing more,nothing less. Was it immoral to do this after all that had happened after the invasion of Poland? Perhaps. But that was never the concern of people like Halifax or Simon or other of said Guilty Men. Their concern was for Britain’s people to be safe,to stop the bloodshed and regroup the Empire’s forces and in their minds they have done just that. It didn’t matter if it was an illusion-as long as they believed in it then it was reality to them.
The governments in exile of Czechoslovakia,Poland,Netherlands,Belgium,Luxembourg,Denmark,Norway and France,to put mildly,were furious of this decision.Despite the best efforts of Halifax and others to convince them that this was only a temporary peace and that they shall still aid their fellow allies (abit less officially and openly as before),it unsurprisingly didn’t calm things down. Beneš and his government angrily left to America,the Polish were spilt in two after Sikorski formed his own government,the Dutch moved to Aruba,the Belgians to the Congo and what remained of the French government and their forces that didn’t die with De Gaulle in the Battle of Brittany to North Africa. The Danish,along with Norway,Luxembourg and the recognized Polish Government in Exile remained in London-mainly because they had nowhere else to go.
Halifax after war admitted he was partially ashamed of his actions,but still considered them as necessary at the moment.The survival of his nation and empire trumped over all else.And in his view he did what was needed to be done. He’d accept any criticism of his actions,but always believe that he did the right thing and that’s all that mattered to him in the end. ‘A job had to be done and I did it to the best of my abilities.Simple as that,sir,nothing more than that”.As such,when the situation was deemed as stable by the forces that be in control of the government at the time,Halifax resigned and let someone else become Prime Minister.
And thus stepped into the frame Sir Samuel Hoare,last of the Guilty Men.
2) Despite his best intentions,history has not been kind to Sir Samuel’s premiership. Yes,of all the appeasers he was probably the most liberal minded one that meant well. Yes,compared to Halifax’s run it wasn’t per se as bad. Why,in another universe he might have had more luck and done the massive social reforms that he wanted in prison-maybe even abolish the death penalty. But having good intentions means nothing compared if you can’t actually make them reality. Halifax at least was realistic. Hoare meanwhile represented the worst kind of the pre war appeasers: the naive kind that thought they were doing good for mankind with their actions. He wasn’t a bad man per se. But he wasn’t good either. Just a man who didn’t realize the world was going to hell,good intentions be damned.
Soon after the death of Chamberlain and his election as the new leader of the Conservative Party (which,apart from Churchill’s quixotic run,went largely unchallenged),Hoare faced the “challenge” of winning the General Election since,well,there wasn’t any real reason why it shouldn’t occur now that war was officially over. To the disappointment of some (but unsurprising to anyone else),
Labour and the Liberals didn’t highlight the war that much in the campaign or express any pro war message. And why should they? The electorate at large before the war was in favor of appeasement and many supported the peace treaty. In the eyes of the most of the voters,as long as their sons weren’t dying anymore,Europe wasn’t their problem. Being against the treaty would have been electoral suicide for the opposition.
Which is something that Churchill and his supporters would learn the hard way.