History is written by the victors, and by most measures Oswald (Tom) Mosley was a loser. His campaigns for a more interventionist state during the economic depression and against entanglement in a second World War have generally been forgotten. Instead he's remembered for the blackshirted security guards who protected his meetings and tends to be associated with Britain's enemies in Germany and Italy.
This account of his life and ideas although, inevitably, an exercise in self-justification, shows him capable of doubt and self-criticism too. He provides an alternative view of mid-twentieth century politics in Britain and Europe which challenges our national mythology, and is of continuing relevance today.
No one can say whether our nation would have fared better if Mosley had formed a government in the 1930s and Winston Churchill had remained in his wilderness. My conclusion, however, is that the answer is not as obvious as we've been encouraged to believe.
