Britain is becoming a disgracefully ignorant nation. The flouting of its national history will come back to destroy it—that’s a law of history!

Earlier this year, a survey found that one in three primary school pupils thought Sir Winston Churchill was the first man to walk on the moon rather than the British leader who defeated the Nazis. Previous surveys show that some students thought Adolf Hitler was the prime minister that led Britain to victory over the Nazis.

That is pretty sad.

But as sad as that is, there is a simple reason for such ignorance. Britain no longer values history. According to the Daily Mail, only 30 percent of students take history for their General Certificate of Secondary Education. It is little wonder that 84 percent of freshmen at Cardiff University can’t name the British general who defeated Napoleon at Waterloo; almost 70 percent didn’t know where the Boer War was fought; and almost 89 percent couldn’t name a single prime minister of Britain in the 19th century.

Yet the ignorance among Britons is set to get dangerously worse. Politicians are shaking up the education system. Schools Secretary Ed Balls recently recommended that schools in Britain stop teaching children about the Romans, Vikings, Napoleon or the Second World War. Instead, under the controversial blueprint, pupils would learn practical skills such as how to use social networking sites like Twitter.

Forget history, it is more important to Twitter! What a disgrace. It is almost as if those in power want a nation of idiots.

The situation in the United States is just as shameful. A 1999 survey of college seniors at 55 elite colleges, from Princeton to Stanford, revealed that only 22 percent knew that the words “government of the people, by the people, for the people” are from the Gettysburg Address. Forty percent did not know that the Civil War took place in the second half of the 19th century. Twenty-five percent thought the pilgrims signed the Magna Carta on the Mayflower.  When asked who commanded American forces at Yorktown, the most frequent answer was Ulysses S. Grant.

These are students at America’s top colleges! These are the individuals who are leading our country today.

The total disregard for history is carried to the highest level. Last month, it was once again revealed how dangerously ignorant Britain’s leaders are. A Labor minister was forced to apologize after producing a leaflet for British schools intended to highlight the milestones of female politicians in Britain. Get this: It omitted arguably Britain’s most well known and respected prime minister since Churchill: Margaret Thatcher!

By contrast, the document names many individuals of such esteemed nature that no one outside of the island kingdom has probably ever heard of them. The first female prime minister of Sri Lanka was mentioned, as were Britain’s first black woman mp, Diane Abbott, and Baroness Amos, the first black woman leader of the House of Lords. The document also made sure to not forget the first Muslim woman in the House of Lords, the first black mayor of a city, and the first black attorney general—but Mrs. Thatcher, who is she?

Her omission was sadly ironic: Lady Thatcher—Great Britain’s first and only female prime minister—was one British politician of modern times who actually studied and valued history for its priceless lessons. She applied those lessons too.

Baroness Thatcher was the British prime minister who presided over the nation during the fall of the Berlin Wall and the reunification of Germany. She spoke out strongly against both, warning that Britain would eventually become subservient to a European union of nations dominated by Germany. Time has proven her correct. Yet today we see politicians signing away British sovereignty to a German-dominated European Union, despite the fact that most Britons want out of the EU.

Lady Thatcher was also the driving force behind Britain retaking the Falkland Islands from Argentina at a time when British military planners and weak-willed politicians said it was impossible. Had Britain not defended its subjects in the Falklands, the loss of Gibraltar would have probably soon followed—along with virtually all remnants of its once global empire.

British politicians would do well to spend less time focusing on the race, religion and sex of its historical figures, and more upon what they accomplished and contributed to society. More importantly they should focus on current events and their similarities to the pre-Great Depression and World War ii era—because those days are coming back, only this time in a world with nuclear weapons.

“Today we hear many academic voices telling people that learning history is of little or no value. This is an extremely dangerous trend that may be too entrenched to correct,” wrote Gerald Flurry. “This educational plague is rampant among the American and British peoples. And it seems that very few of our leaders understand what a colossal disaster it is!”

The lesson of history is not being learned. History is prophecy. Learn from history or be doomed to repeat the mistakes of the past.

“Now all these things happened unto them for ensamples: and they are written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the world are come” (1 Corinthians 10:11). God left us examples in our history. They were recorded in the Old and New Testaments to educate us. But few people heed God’s warnings. And we, like the ancient Israelites before us, are going to pay the ultimate price if we don’t learn these God-inspired lessons.

At a time when Britain is on the verge of bankruptcy, as it prepares to slash its military and eliminate 25 percent of what is left of its nuclear deterrent, while the world edges toward trade war and hot war, when terrorist-sponsoring nations hide nuclear facilities and provocatively test long-range missiles—if ever Britain needed to understand history, it is today.

Instead, the once Great Britain seems content to Twitter as the flames approach.

To see what history and prophecy reveal is in store for Britain, read The Former Prophets by Gerald Flurry. Pay particular attention to Chapter 1: “A Law of History.” To see just how unique Britain’s history truly is, read: “The Inspiring History Britain Should Never Forget.”