Menzies, Robert

Menzies, Robert (1894–1978),Australian lawyer who served as prime minister of his country from 1939 to 1941, and again from 1949 to 1966.

Menzies entered politics in Victoria in 1928 and by April 1939 was the national leader of the United Australia Party. The same month he formed his first administration and, having supported the policy of appeasement, reluctantly led Australia into the war against Germany a few hours after the UK had declared war. Despite having a majority of only one after the general election of September 1940 he went to London in February 1941 in an attempt to alert the British to the Japanese threat. In this he was hardly successful, but in the following two months he helped in some vital decisions by attending war cabinet meetings—including the disastrous intervention in Greece (see Balkan campaign), for which he was heavily criticized in Australia.

In May 1941 he returned to Australia and found his party in disarray. The Labour Party opposed a vote approving his visit to London and in August 1941 he was forced to resign. He was replaced by his deputy, Fadden, though he continued to serve in the cabinet as minister for the co-ordination of defence, but in October 1941 Curtin's Labour government was voted into power and Menzies spent the rest of the war in opposition.

‘We are all very grateful to you for the courage you showed and the help you gave,’ Churchill wrote to Menzies, referring to his time in London; ‘I am the gainer by our personal friendship’. He found Curtin much less ready to co-operate. Nevertheless, Menzies was highly critical of how the war cabinet was run and of Churchill's wide-ranging powers. A strong supporter of the British Empire, he wanted an Imperial war cabinet that included the prime ministers of the dominions, but this was opposed not only by Churchill but by the prime ministers of New Zealand and Canada as well. See alsoAustralia, 3.

Bibliography

Hazlehurst, C. , Menzies Observed (London, 1979).
Martin, A. , Robert Menzies: A Life, Vol. 1 (Melbourne, 1993).
Menzies, R. , Afternoon Light (London, 1967).