Edited sentence: But that led to national economic exhaustion, and the end of empire, as Britain was eclipsed by the U.Charmley believes the best policy in 1940-1942 was a negotiated peace with Germany and appeasement of Japan.Charmley sees Neville Chamberlain as having a sound appreciation of the nation's military and diplomatic strengths and weaknesses.Churchill issued orders to raze German cities to the ground using "terror bombing" raids.Churchill, says Charmley, repeatedly  overestimated British strength and forced a commitment to total war and total victory.Furthermore he argues Churchill had a deeply flawed character, exerted poor leadership, schemed and intrigued for war.He encouraged these "impressive acts of terror and wanton destruction" through "other pretexts", which were to depress German morale and "de-house" the German population.Implementation of the plan resulted in the destruction by relentless firebombing of historic German cities such as Cologne, Hamburg and Dresden.The most critical study of Churchill is the revisionist work of John Charmley.This interpretation does not address the political and moral impracticality of leaving Europe under Nazi domination, nor how Britain could have survived indefinitely in a relationship with such a state.This was not his final involvement with the RAF.and the USSR