The peacemakers of WW2

Politicians and generals today talk a lot about the need for exit plans to be established if conflict erupts between nations. In the middle of the horrors of the Second World War, Britain's diplomats were doing exactly that, working hard to think what peace would look like after the fighting. Lord Peter Ricketts, the former head of Britain's diplomatic service and the author of Peacemaker's Shaping the Modern World, the Men and Women of the Foreign Office in the Second World War, spoke to David Musgrove for this episode of the History Extra podcast. He explains the key role played by Britain's diplomats and Foreign Office staff, both men and women, in shaping the outcome and the aftermath of the war. So we are talking about the Foreign Office and the diplomatic service in the Second World War.

So that's not an area that gets talked about as much as other aspects of the war in comparison to the the military operations at least. Just introduce us to the story. How important were the people of the Foreign Office and the diplomatic service? to the story of the Second World War and maybe just pull out a couple of key characters who who might come up in this conversation as we go forward. Well I myself am a 40-year diplomat, now retired, and I've always felt that the Foreign Office is the kind of cinderella of the British story of the Second World War.

I mean we all have books about Churchill, about the military commanders, the battles, the spies, but the diplomats were also central to the war effort, and in particular to thinking about the future peace, even in the middle of a world war. And so I wrote the book to put the people of the Foreign Office a little bit back in the story, and there are some fascinating stories in the book. One of the dominating characters is a guy called Sir Alec. Caduggan, who was the head civil servant in the Foreign Office throughout the war, called the Permanent Under Secretary.

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