The Devils Will Get No Rest
FDR, Churchill, and the Plan That Won the War
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- $30.99
Publisher Description
Written with “a cinematic sense of urgency and realism” (Evan Osnos, National Book Award–winning author), this is the first full account of the Casablanca Conference of January 1943, the secret ten-day parlay in Morocco where FDR, Churchill, and their divided high command hammered out a winning strategy at the tipping point of World War II.
The Devils Will Get No Rest is a “vivid and engaging” (Jon Meacham, Pulitzer Prize–winning author) character-driven account of the Casablanca Conference of January 1943, an Anglo-American clash over military strategy that produced a winning plan when World War II could have gone either way. Churchill called it the most important Allied conclave of the war. Until now, it has never been explored in a full-length book.
In a secret, no-holds-barred, ten-day debate in a Moroccan warzone, protected by British marines and elite American troops, Franklin Roosevelt, Winston Churchill, Charles de Gaulle, George C. Marshall, Dwight D. Eisenhower, George S. Patton Jr., Sir Alan Brooke, Lord Louis Mountbatten, Sir Harold Alexander, and their military peers questioned each other’s competence, doubted each other’s visions, and argued their way through choices that could win or lose the war. You will be treated to a master class in strategy by the legendary statesmen, generals, and admirals who overcame their differences, transformed their alliance from a necessity to a bond, forged a war-winning plan, and glimpsed the postwar world.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
As lawyer-turned-historian Conroy (Jefferson's White House) notes in this in-depth account of the January 1943 Casablanca Conference, by the time Allied leaders met in Morocco, it was more than two years since France had fallen and the British had barely escaped Dunkirk. Meanwhile, the U.S. had only arrived in the European theater two months earlier, when Gen. George Patton ("a cursing comic book warlord with a high-pitched voice") landed his troops in North Africa. Seeking to hammer out a plan for victory, Churchill and Roosevelt brought their top lieutenants to Casablanca, including White House adviser Harry Hopkins, U.S. Army chief of staff George C. Marshall, and British generals Alan Brooke and Bernard Montgomery. In 10 days of rigorous planning, attendees plotted amphibious landings, discussed the merits of daytime versus nighttime bombing raids, and debated whether to launch or delay an Anglo-American invasion of northwest Europe; the British, mindful of the horrors of WWI, wanted the latter; Marshall and other Americans preferred the former. Conroy vividly describes daily conference sessions at the Anfa Hotel and draws sharp, memorable character sketches of the participants ("no one admired Charles de Gaulle more than Charles de Gaulle"). This gaze into the corridors of power enlightens.
