Who Really Writes History? The Winners, the Losers… or the Liars?

 “History is written by the victors.” It’s a familiar line that many people casually attribute to Winston Churchill. But there’s no evidence he ever said it. George Orwell, however, did—and he meant it as a warning.

In his As I Please column for the Tribune on February 4, 1944, Orwell used the phrase to describe how power shapes memory. Whoever wins—whether a war, an election, or even a public argument—gets to decide what “really” happened. And if the winners are totalitarians, they don’t just shape the story. They can rewrite the past itself.

That idea echoes through one of the most chilling lines in 1984:

“Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past.”

Orwell feared that authoritarian regimes don’t merely lie—they attack the very concept of objective truth. If dictators survive, their lies harden into “history.” If they fall, those lies evaporate. He pointed to Nazi radio reports of imaginary British air raids. Had Hitler won, those fictional raids would have become historical fact, dutifully recorded by future scholars.

So yes—history is written by the winners.

But is it really that simple?

When the Losers Pick Up the Pen

If history were only written by the victors, the 20th century would look very different. Some of the most destructive political myths in modern history were crafted not by triumphant powers, but by the defeated—losers rewriting their loss into a story of betrayal, nobility, or victimhood.

The Stab‑in‑the‑Back Myth: Germany, 1918

After World War I, Germany’s military leadership faced an inconvenient truth: they had lost the war. Rather than accept responsibility, they promoted the Dolchstoßlegende—the Stab‑in‑the‑Back Myth. According to this narrative, the German army was undefeated on the battlefield but sabotaged by Jews, socialists, and democratic politicians at home.

It was a lie. But it was a useful lie.

It destabilized the Weimar Republic, fueled antisemitism, and helped clear the path for the Nazi rise to power. A defeated military elite rewrote history—and millions paid the price.

The Lost Cause: America, 1865

The Confederacy lost the Civil War. Decisively. And yet, in the decades that followed, a new story emerged: the Confederacy hadn’t fought for slavery (despite its own documents saying exactly that), but for “states’ rights.” Slavery, in this retelling, was benign—sometimes even virtuous. The antebellum South became a romantic fantasy, complete with gallant generals and loyal enslaved people.

This myth—history written by the losers—reshaped American memory, culture, and politics for generations. Its echoes still reverberate today.

Truth as a Fragile Habit

Orwell believed that truth depends on a “liberal habit of mind”—a willingness to treat facts as something to be discovered, not manufactured. That habit requires a free press, open debate, and a public that values accuracy over comfort.

Without those, the idea of a “correct” version of history collapses. What remains is simply the version with the most power behind it. Sometimes that power belongs to the victors. Sometimes it belongs to the aggrieved, the resentful, or the defeated.

Either way, Orwell’s warning stands: If we stop believing that facts can be true whether we like them or not, then history becomes nothing more than a contest of narratives—and the loudest storyteller wins.