Talk:Stafford Cripps

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Stafford Cripps is considered pretty much an ignorant fool. Exerpt from "Interim Peace" under paragraph "British disregard" (of Finland and Poland and rest of the Eastern Europe:

"Compared to the early spring, during the summer of 1940, Finland wasn't high in importance in British foreign policy. To gain support from the Soviet Union, Britain had appointed Sir Stafford Cripps, from the left wing of the Labour Party, ambassador to Moscow. He had openly supported the Terijoki Government during the Winter War and he wondered to Ambassador Paasikivi 'didn't the Finns really want to follow Baltic Republics and join the Soviet Union?'. He also dismissively called President Kallio "Kulak" and Nordic social democracy "reactionary". The British Foreign Office had to apologize for his language to Ambassador Gripenberg.

Britain opposed Finnish-Swedish cooperation and provided support for the Soviet Union to scuttle the initiative, until it became apparent in late March 1941 that it had driven Finland in the direction of the Germans, but by then it was already too late. Finnish foreign trade was another critical issue as it was dependent on British navycerts and the Ministry of Economic Warfare was extremely strict when issuing those so that even Finnish trade (and relations) with the Soviet Union suffered from it.

During the nickel negotiations the Foreign Office pressured the license owning British-Canadian company to "temporarily" release the license and offered diplomatic support to Soviet attempts to gain control of the mine with the precondition that no ore would be shipped to Germany."

So Mr. Cripps managed to play into mr. Hitler's and mr. Stalin's hands, mess up Brittish relations with Eastern EU and set foundation for Churchill's famous "Iron Curtain" speech. Term coined by Goebbels BTW.

"Ignorant fool" lets Cripps off far too easily. He actively supported Stalinist aggression before and during the War, and provided material support to the USSR after the War. He has the blood of British and American troops on his hands as the result of his transfer of British jet engine technology to the Soviets. He should have been hanged. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 63.152.94.226 (talk) 05:03, 8 August 2013 (UTC)

pov

The aims of wikipedia is not to decide who was an ignorant fool! Churchill believed the British Empire represented freedom and would last a thousand years!!!90.11.55.73 07:32, 5 November 2007 (UTC)

Reverted POV speculation regarding dying before prosecution

We deal with facts, not with what/if, and no original research. Ulflarsen 21:38, 23 January 2007 (UTC)

Inconsistencies and POV

The Music Hall section seems extremely POV and contrary to other information in the article, specifically... "The unpopular Cripps..." vs. "The popular response was phenomenal, and Cripps rapidly became one of the most popular politicians in the country." Also, the recent changes inserting comments that Cripps was Communist (and deleting the remarks that he was Socialist) seem totally unsourced. Could somebody verify these are correct - they seem like POV edits by somebody with an agenda. Torc2 (talk) 23:09, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

Expulsion from the Labour Party

I was under the impression, based on the description in the book "White Death: Russia's War on Finland 1939-40" by Robert Edwards, that Stafford Cripps was expelled from the Labour Party in September 1939 for advocating a common anti-fascist front and castigating the Nazi's for their invasion of Poland in an article that was printed on the day that the Soviet Union invaded Poland and the true nature of the Nazi-Soviet pact became known - thus upsetting supporters of the Soviet Union in Labour. Is this accurate? If it is the article should be edited to reflect this FOARP (talk) 11:43, 29 September 2010 (UTC)

Confused - was he pro or anti appeasement?

His pre-war section says he opposed rearmament... yet he was a leading figure in the United Front? It needs to be more clear about his position. 85.210.80.121 (talk) 15:58, 20 April 2011 (UTC)

Evangelical?

The article says: '... although his strong faith in evangelical Christianity prevented him from subscribing to the Marxist rejection of religion.' It is well known that he was a Christian, but is there any evidence that Cripps was specifically evangelical? (In a British context at the time, evangelicals tended to close to fundamentalism). For Christian Socialists to be evangelical was practically unheard of. Norvo (talk) 16:17, 16 June 2014 (UTC)

A glance at google shows numerous RS call him an evangelical. see Google citations. He made a speech at the World's Evangelical Alliance, 1948 and printed it up see his pamphlet Rjensen (talk) 16:42, 16 June 2014 (UTC)

Many thanks for your speedy and helpful reply. Norvo (talk) 23:26, 17 June 2014 (UTC)

External links modified

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Info Box

Should the political party details section of the info box not note that Cripps was technically and Independent from 1939 (following his expulsion from the Labour Party) until he rejoined Labour in 1945? Dunarc (talk) 18:49, 1 August 2019 (UTC)