W. J. Hudson

Whilst many may know Billy Hughes as the "little Aussie battler", as a knock-about politician, who moved from the left of politics to the right - from Labour to conservative, and also that he was a prickly character, this book revealed to me that he had a leading role in putting the new nation of Australia on world stage. Until the 1910s, Australia had to defer to London for all international affairs. Hughes saw the UK putting their interests ahead of Australia, for example, buying German beef at a higher price than Australian beef (and so by the way the EC was not the start of the breach between the two countries).
Hughes fought hard in Versailles against US President Wilson and the UK's Lloyd George in a number of areas: to gain control of Papua (the northern part of PNG) - he partly lost, for German reparations (he lost), and to push back on Japanese expansionist aims (he won). He was also in on the formation of the League of Nations, but it appears his influence was not great.
This small book cover's Hughes' time in Paris (he was absent from Australia for about 15 months). It includes many pages of appendices too, of documents of Hughes' speeches and discussions in the Imperial War Cabinet, of his colleagues' thoughts about their boss, and most interestingly, Hughes' speech to the Australian parliament upon his return home. This speech is worth reading, along with the rest of the book.
I do not know anything about the author; the book does not reveal any information. However, LibraryThing does reveal him as an author of quite a number of books on the history of diplomacy.… (mehr)