Claim a7b28314Checked 21 Jul 2026
Partly True/FalseOn the truth scale
“The entire political class was wrong about Hitler.”
Reasoning & Evidence21 Jul 2026
The claim that "the entire political class was wrong about Hitler" is a broad generalization that is partly supported but materially overstated.
**What is accurate:** The dominant establishment view in 1930s Britain was appeasement, which proved wrong. The Munich Agreement vote in October 1938 passed 366–144, with no Conservative voting against and Churchill's small group only abstaining. MPs who warned about Hitler were indeed attacked as "warmongers," threatened with deselection, had their phones tapped, and were disparaged by Chamberlain (who dubbed a group of young anti-appeasement Conservative MPs the "Glamour Boys"). Churchill was a marginal, isolated figure for much of the decade, and his warnings about German rearmament were largely dismissed. The appeasement consensus was strong across both front benches.
**What is overstated:** The word "entire" and Farage's figure of "20" MPs who raised the alarm significantly understate the opposition. The Labour Party (154 seats after 1935) generally opposed appeasement and voted against Munich (144 votes against). Beyond Churchill, there were Anthony Eden, the "Glamour Boys" (Ronald Cartland, Robert Bernays, Harold Nicolson, Ronald Tree, etc.), Josiah Wedgwood, and various "diehard" Conservative MPs who pressed for faster rearmament. While anti-appeasement voices were a minority and were marginalized, they numbered well above 20 and included figures from multiple parties. The claim that "the entire political class" was wrong erases this substantial dissenting minority.
Sources:
- BBC News, "The gay MPs persecuted for opposing appeasement of Nazi Germany" — https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-54478753
- The Guardian, "The Glamour Boys: gay MPs who gave early warning of Nazi threat" — https://www.theguardian.com/society/2020/oct/04/the-glamour-boys-gay-mps-who-gave-early-warning-of-nazi-threat
- Wikipedia, "A total and unmitigated defeat" (Munich vote details) — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_total_and_unmitigated_defeat
- History of Parliament, "'Peace for our time': opposing the Munich Agreement" — https://historyofparliament.com/2018/09/28/opposing-the-munich-agreement/
- Wikipedia, "Winston Churchill in politics, 1900–1939" — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winston_Churchill_in_politics,_1900-1939
- Wikipedia, "1935 United Kingdom general election" (seat totals) — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1935_United_Kingdom_general_election
- Wiley Online Library, "Diehard Conservatives and the Appeasement of Nazi Germany, 1935–1940" — https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1468-229X.12108
From article
How can the entire political class be wrong? Well, they were all wrong about Hitler, weren’t they? Out of 600 MPs, there were 20 [who raised the alarm] – and do you know what they were called? Warmongers. Eccentrics. They were lampooned; they were considered to be mad. Even when Churchill produced the data [about German rearmament], the political class looked away.
You know, we’ve seen it in science, we’ve seen it in business: even if the status quo is pointing in entirely the wrong direction, it exerts a very strong force on the political class – and the more career-orientated our politicians are, the stronger it is.
Sources opened